Follow Me I Pastor Kendrick Vinar

Have you ever felt God nudging you to let go of something you're clinging to? In this powerful message, Pastor Kendrick unpacks Jesus' encounter with a wealthy young man to reveal how surrender flows from God's deep love for us. Through vivid examples from Scripture and his own journey with cancer, Pastor Kendrick shows that God's invitations to surrender—whether through gentle promptings or life-shaking circumstances—always lead to greater blessing. Ready to experience the "hundred-fold" return Jesus promised? Don't miss this timely message about trading our temporary treasures for God's eternal purposes. Watch now to discover how true discipleship begins with surrender.

📖 Key Scripture: Mark 10:17-22
🔔 Follow, Hit the Notification Bell, Leave a 5-Star review & share with someone who needs this encouragement!

Join us next week for another life-giving word from Grace Church of Chapel Hill!

Transcript

Jesus, Here we are, New Year. So excited for all that God's gonna do. I wanna welcome everybody from the Almance Campus. Hey, everybody out there, we love you. We're one church in two locations.

And can we just honor and bless all of everybody, Say, we love you. Come on, y'. All. God's just doing such a good thing out there at Alamance. And so proud of Pastor John, Mark and the team.

They're really. They're killing it for Jesus. And so. Hey, y'. All, Today we're kicking off a new series for 2026 that we call Disciple.

And it's really simple. Let me tell you our goal, and this is our prayer. Our team has been working hard. So proud of the team and for how they've wanted to build your life. And here's the big goal, is that you would grow as a disciple of Jesus.

Like, not just grow.

So y' all hear that? Okay, thank you. I'm not going crazy. I'm like, oh, the Lord's returning, you know? Anyway, thank you for shutting that off.

Okay. I feel much better. Like, okay. Not just that you would pray, not just that you believe in God in your head, but here. Here's a prayer is that you would know God better, that you would walk with him more closely, the spiritual roots of your life would grow deeper, and that you would bear much fruit.

Like, here's an amazing thought. What if every single person at Grace Church in Chapel Hill, in Alamancio, if all of us together decided to lean in and we grew over the next eight weeks in our relationship with the Lord as a disciple, as a follower, I tell you what. I believe. God would do something not only in our personal lives, in our relationships, in our families, in our community, and ultimately, we can make a greater impact in the world for Jesus if just super simply. We grew as disciples, as followers.

And so that's really our heart and our prayer. Actually, today is our small group expo. So let me just explain this to you. Today we're kicking off eight weeks of disciple, and on our Sunday morning experience, we're gonna be, by God's grace, helping you become a disciple of Jesus in your relationship with the Lord. How do you.

Today we're gonna talk about. Follow. How do you hear from the Lord and know God's plan for your life? How do you trust him? How do you step out?

Each week, there's gonna be something that's gonna build into your relationship with the Lord and being a disciple of Jesus. Now, in our small groups, we're gonna do six weeks of small groups. Our small groups will be starting two weeks from today. You got this Sunday and next to sign up. Let me tell you though, you wanna sign up today, pronto, because groups will fill up and start closing.

Okay? And so today is like woo hoo, day one. All right, so we've got 130 groups. We've put together this field guide for you that will follow along on our Sunday mornings as well as our small groups. And our small group content is different than Sunday morning.

So briefly, Sunday morning is vertical, like our relationship with the Lord. Small group content. Those six weeks is gonna be horizontal, like God, for you to be, grow, be healthy, flourish. We need our relationship with the Lord to be strong. But let me say this too.

Your spiritual growth, you're being a disciple, it's also meant to be in community, it's in relationship. And so we're talking about the relationships of a disciple. And that's what we've got videos for you that we've shot. You play a video 15 minutes and then have discussion and then have a cookie. It's awesome.

It's really.

And I really believe if you lean into both of these, lean into Sundays and my relationship to the Lord, I want to grow stronger, I want to know God better, walk with him more closely and. And I wanna work on my relationships. I'm gonna join a small group, I'm gonna get to know some people and we're gonna really discuss the dynamics of the relationships of a disciple. And we're gonna be looking into the Bible for that. I really believe that the Lord will really bless you and me over these eight weeks.

I wanna just briefly start with a prayer and just dedicate this time to the Lord, because I think God's going to do some special things in our lives. So Lord, we just take a moment starting off the new year, starting off this new series. And Lord, we want to commit it to you and really ask God that you would give us ears to hear, you would help us to know you better, to walk with you more closely, that our spiritual lives would be stronger, healthier, and our relationships and those that we connect with, Lord, that you would change some things. And then by the grace of God, eight weeks from now, Lord, we're going to be different people. You're going to do something powerful in our lives.

In Jesus name, Amen. Awesome. Okay, so disciple. Now the word disciple in the Greek in the New Testament is mathetes and it means to be a student or a learner. Now we're in kind of an academic area and so I think when we think student or learner, we tend to go in our heads to classroom, right?

Sit and take notes, you know, in a desk, and then learn the material and take a test to see if you learn the material. But let me say this. The idea of Mephites and being a disciple is much more learning by doing than that you would be. Think of it this way. You become an apprentice.

You learn by being with your teacher, by doing what your teacher does, by example. John Mark Comer describes it this way. I love these three things that being a disciple means. One, being with Jesus. And I really pray, even over these eight weeks that you would be with Jesus.

All of us would. Would make some room to be with Jesus. That is one. And then two, you would become like Jesus. Becoming like Jesus that when we're with Jesus, we get changed and we become more like him in our heart, in our character, in our values, in our decisions.

And then thirdly, it plays out in doing what Jesus did. So we're with him, we become like him, and then it shows up in our actions, in our words, in our life, in our lifestyle, doing what Jesus did. See discipleship. And the idea being me, you know, was not so much about information, although information's good, but more about transformation. It's more about relationship.

And really today, what we're gonna talk about, this is the beginning of being a disciple, which is the invitation that Jesus gave over and over. Two simple words. He just said this, Follow me, follow me. That was really his invitation to being a disciple. And then when any person made a decision to say yes to that simple invitation that he gave over follow me, they became a follower of Jesus and really a disciple, a learner, a student.

And so that's what we're going to dive in today. Now, when we say yes to following Jesus, what we see in the Bible is that the disciples had to leave in order to follow. Let's look at Peter and Andrew, because that's going to be also true for us. Matthew 4:18 says, as Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen, they were out fishing.

Jesus is walking by the Sea of Galilee near Capernaum, and he saw them out fishing. And then he said this. Come, follow me. Now store those three words in your head, Come, follow me. And I will send you out to fish for people.

Now Jesus was inviting them to become his followers, to become disciples, to be his apprentice. And he goes, you're not gonna be fishing for fish. You're gonna be fishing for people. I've got a different plan. I've got a different purpose for your life.

Now look at their response. At once, they left their nets and followed him. Now this verse is so simple and yet so powerful. At once they just had something inside of them that just said, yes. And now notice the two things.

They left their nets and they followed. They left and they followed. They left their nets, they left their livelihood. They left the family business. They left their daily routine.

They left what they knew, they left what was going to bank them for the future. They left and they followed. Let me say this. Every time we follow, we have to leave. And they didn't know exactly what they were getting themselves into.

It's a little bit like Abraham. God told Abraham, hey, I got a promised land for you. And he's gonna have to leave his family and his what he knew and everything. And Abraham actually asked him, where are we going? He goes, eh, I'll let you know when we get there.

And God does that with us. Like, they just. At once they left and they followed. They had to surrender. They had to surrender their plan, their livelihood, their purpose.

And. And in order to leave, to surrender. Let me say this, when we start talking about that, don't you all know that that word surrender in particular tends to have a negative connotation, doesn't it? When I say surrender, you go, oof. You know, because surrender means you gotta give something up.

It means loss, right? If an army surrenders, that means they lost. Thor. Right? If an athlete surrenders, they tap out, they're out, they lost, right?

If a criminal surrenders, they got caught, right? Like, surrender means giving something up. It's a downgrade. It's a loss. And I think when God asks us to surrender, we wouldn't think of it like super consciously, but in the back of our head there's this anxiety, this concern, like, is this demanding God going to ask me to give up something?

Am I going to lose? Is he going to take away something from me? Did is this like a kind of a demanding, mean God that just wants me to prove my loyalty to him? And we struggle. We struggle at times to give up, to surrender.

We're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I like to hang on to what I know, what I'm comfortable with. And it's not easy. We struggle. We struggle against the Lord a little bit.

It's a little bit like a person drowning. In college, I actually Got my Life Guard certification, you know. And you know, some of you have probably done that. But one thing they teach you is this, if someone's drowning, like in a pool, and there's thrashing around, you have to give them a minute. Cause if you just go in there, hop in and help them, like right away, they're gonna fight against you.

You're trying to rescue them, they will grab you and pull you down. And you actually, what they teach you is you have to wait, just let them tire out just a minute, and then they won't fight the person trying to rescue them.

What a great picture. I think at times the Lord asks us to surrender and he's coming to rescue us and help us, and we're fighting against him. And the Lord will be very gracious, he'll just wait till we get tired til we wear out and then he'll help us. And I think that picture is very powerful. We tend to do the same thing.

The Lord comes to knock on the door of our heart. Now what I wanna do is this. I wanna look at another story where someone was invited to follow Jesus. And we're gonna learn from this story about surrender. I think it could help us in a healthy way.

And it's somewhat of an unlikely story to give us wisdom on how to follow. But let's look at this. This is Mark, chapter 10, another story from the life of Jesus. He is traveling with his disciples. He started on his way, and look at this.

It says a man ran up to him, pretty ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. Didn't just talk to him literally like boom. Fell down on his knees and said, good teacher. He asked, what must I do to inherit eternal life? So here's this person runs up, falls down on his knees, very honorable, says, good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

And Jesus response is fascinating. He says, why do you call me good? Jesus answered, no one is good except God alone. Which is pretty loaded statement because he actually is God and he actually is good. But anyway, then he goes on, you know the commandments, you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you should not give fault, witness, don't lie, you shall not defraud, don't steal.

You know, honor your father and your mother. And look at his response, teacher. He declared, all these I have kept since I was a boy. I mean, let me just say this, y', all, this young rich man is, is well to do. He's sincere, he wants to please Jesus, he wants to do what's right.

And look what Jesus looked at him and he loved him. He said, one thing you lack. Go sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. And then come follow me. There's those three words, exact same invitation.

Then after you do that, so all you possess, give it to the poor. Then come follow me. Next verse. At this, the man's face fell. He went away sad because he had great wealth.

Now, y', all, let me just say this. This young rich man was really a good guy, right? Like, he's religious. He wants to please the Lord. And he was a good person.

He didn't get wealthy by cheating. He's honest, he's fair, he's upright, he's accomplished as a young person, which means he's hardworking, he's dependable, and he's seeking Jesus. He wants to do what's right. He wants to please God. He's sincere.

He's authentic. But look at this. He still felt like something was missing. See the unsettledness inside of him. He's like, hey, am I good?

What must I do to inherit eternal life? Like, have I done enough? Am I in there? Where am I at? Is this locked up?

And let me just say this. As long as you're in a mindset of performance to please God to earn his favor, you'll feel unsettled. Intuitively, you aren't confident because you don't know if your good things have really outweighed your bad things. And let me say this. God isn't looking for performance and good behavior.

He's inviting you to surrender, to follow. He's inviting you into relationship, and you'll be unsettled until you're surrendered. It's true for all of us. Like, maybe you feel that way. Maybe you feel like you're doing all the right things, trying to be a good person and follow God, but you still feel like your relationship with God is missing.

Something still feels distant. Let me just say this. It may be maybe. Maybe that you're still holding on to something that God wants you to surrender. That was true of this man.

And actually, you look at the story and it almost seems unfair in terms of, like, there's nowhere else in the Bible. Think about this. This is kind of crazy. There's nowhere else in the Bible where God asks anyone to give up all that they have, all their money, all their resources. There's nowhere else.

Like, you know, Abraham gave it 10%, gave a tithe. And, you know, Proverbs talks about that. It was in Jewish culture and in the law and the book of Proverbs and like all that. But after that. And God would ask of that.

But after that, it was called a free will offering. Out of your free will, you could give offerings. You could be more generous. And there was a man by the name of Zacchaeus who had cheated a bunch of people. And when he changed his heart, he said he gave half his possessions to anyone that he'd stolen from.

He gave back twice. Like, he just did it out of the abundance of his heart. Book of Acts. And actually, people did sell their possessions and gave it all. But let me tell you this.

In that situation, that was not once a demand from God or even a request. Like, people just did that because they wanted to. And yet God is asking this guy to do something he didn't ask of anyone else.

Why?

Why would God do that? Let me say this. Jesus, for all of us, will at times take his finger and touch the one area that could hold us back, the one area where we have the hardest time trusting him, the one area where we want to stay in control, the one area where we trust him least. He'll go right there and go ding. Because if I can get that area to change and move, everything else will be good.

For Abraham, he just did one. He went right there. Your son Isaac, would you sacrifice him? The promise, like, like, God will do that in your life and in my life. God loves us enough in order that he would come and lovingly, gently touch that.

Now I want us to see if we can learn a few things from the young, rich ruler story that could help us surrender. Here's the first thing.

Surrender flows from love.

Surrender always flows from love. There's something interesting in this story, verse 21, that we could easily skip over and get to the story. You ever, like, read the Bible and you go, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Tell me what happened in the story, you know, I want to know the story, you know, And I think that happens, and I think that's easy. But this is, I think, important.

Look at this. Before the story kind of happens and Jesus responds, it says this, Jesus looked at him and loved him.

Can you imagine that? Everyone out of that mouth? Like, it's just like Jesus looked at him and I don't know, it's not in the Bible. My hunch is it took just a minute, just a second. Like, he probably paused and took a moment, and I think he looked at his heart, he looked at his values.

He, like, looked into his soul. He Looked into his future and maybe God's purpose and God's plan for him. I wonder if Jesus looked at him and saw the purpose of God, the destiny of God, that was just around the corner of surrender and he loved him. Now, look, y' all could have said this. The Bible could have said, this is the B I B L E Bible, okay?

Jesus looked at him and said.

But the Bible goes out of its way to say Jesus looked at him and loved him. Because I think when God asks us to surrender, we might not feel the love. We wonder if he's trying to take something away. And I think it's being crystal clear that surrender flows from the love of God. That God loves you and God cares for you.

And every single time, it's God showing up. Not people, not organizations, not man. But God shows up and he speaks to your heart or through His Word, he leads you to a place. Let me tell you this. It's always that he loves you.

I think God just loved this young man. The problem was not that the young man had money. The problem was that money had him.

And Jesus loved Him enough to say something hard that was challenging. I think God will do that with us. Everyone's gonna take his finger and go, ding. He'd go like, whoa. That was painful.

Whoa. I wanted to move on and bury that issue and forget about that. And he'll go right there and go, ding. Well, that was sensitive. That was deep.

Let me tell you this. God always asks us to surrender. Not in order that he would love us, but because he loves us, because he cares for us. And the surrender is for you, not for Him. The surrender is for you.

It's not for God. Which really leads us to the second point, which is this. Surrender is an invitation, not a demand. Surrender is an invitation. Jesus gave him an invitation.

He didn't demand Him. He didn't compel Him. He just gave an invitation. Hey, he touched on that one area and said, surrender, and then, come follow me. And the young man walked away sad.

And Jesus didn't go, oh, I'm so sorry. Did I make you feel bad? I'm not bad. Hey, let's work this out. You know, why don't you sell your stuff?

Just make it 50%. Is that cool? You good? Like, he lets him walk away. And I don't know about y', all, but to me, that's a little bit unnerving.

Cause I think, Lord, where have youe given me an opportunity to trust you, to follow your plan? And I didn't want to, like, he just let him walk away. How many times have I walked by an opportunity to surrender, to trust, to see God do something? And I hung onto my plan instead of trusting him with Him. Let me just say we've all been there, we've all had an opportunity to surrender and we're not sure if we want to.

It's actually been described as the miserable middle, right? Or you got like one foot, I'm in with Jesus, and one foot, like, no, I like to hang onto this. I like to stay in control. It's like, like there's one sense where you go, like, I'm all in, but not quite all. I'm mostly in.

And it really is a miserable middle. We end up with a divided heart. We ended up with like, James calls it double minded. We end up with one foot in and we have this internal conflict. And let me say this, at that place where we've all been, there's two ways that we've been invited to surrender.

One way that God will invite you to surrender. Surrender's an invitation, not a demand, is he'll invite you to surrender when he just makes it clear to you. Like, we're at the beginning of the new year. We're gonna do 21 days. We're kicking off our new year, 21 days of prayer.

And maybe as you're praying about the new year and you wanna have a good year, a good start, and you go, as you are kind of reflecting on your heart and your life and you're talking, praying, talking to the Lord and you go like, oh, I should really. I've been a little too focused on obsessed with work, with spending too much time on my phone, on my computer, on the tv. I don't know what it might be, whatever, doesn't matter what it is. But God just kind of makes it clear to you, like, you know what? If I'm going to make some space for God, if I, as I analyze myself, as I talk to the Lord about it and he just makes it clear, he gives you an invitation to surrender.

Now the other way that it happens is the first way is that we know what I need to surrender. The second way is I don't know what I need to surrender. And God allows a circumstance into my life that allows that issue to bubble to the surface. And then he gives us an invitation to surrender. Hebrews says this once more.

God says, I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens. The words once more indicate the check this out. The removing of what can be shaken, that has created things so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Let me just say it this way. What God will do from time to time is shake your life in order that the created things, the temporal things, the things that don't really matter that much, would be shaken.

And the things that remain would be the eternal things, the significant things. And God will give us an invitation to surrender that thing that I might be holding onto, because he gives it a little shake and it bubbles up to the surface. And I'm telling you, it happens a lot of ways. And it's not always comfortable, easy, or fun, like maybe it's a health issue. Shake.

And you know my story. About six years ago, I went in for an appointment. I was working on my feet, trying to figure out whatever. I walk out of the appointment, I realize, oh, I've got cancer growing out of my vertebrae in my neck. That was not insignificant.

You feel shook and you have to surrender. Lord, I was really planning on walking my three daughters down the aisle. I'd like to be there that day. You have to surrender. Every day is a gift.

It was really hard. You gotta surrender. This spring, our daughter Amelia got. Went into sepsis, had to go into the hospital, was there for a couple days. And you can bury your head in the sand and go, everything's gonna be fine, or you can freak out and worry and melt down.

But anyway, let me say this like, it's the real deal. Like, you know, it's like it's. It's not, you know, and everything worked out. Let me tell you this. We had to surrender.

If you're going to feel the emotion of the concern and look it in the eye and realize this is potentially problematic, then give it to the Lord in surrender.

And I'm telling you, it might be a relationship that melts down with a family member, extended family member. I thought we were all good, and all of a sudden there's a distance or a wall goes up, there's a meltdown. Maybe in your marriage there's a difficulty. Maybe it's at work and you feel totally misunderstood. You feel totally disrespected.

And people talk and, like, it's going around, and you're like. It's totally not even like. And everything inside of you wants to defend yourself. Let me tell you this. You have to lay down your right when you get angry.

Every time you get angry, it's because you need to lay down a right. You need to lay down a right. Some right that we think we have. So what might that be for you? How might God be Shaking your situation in order that you would trust him.

And then in that situation, he gives us the invitation to trust him. Surrender flows from love. Surrender is the invitation. But how do we actually do it? Here's, here's.

I think the most significant part is this. Surrender is trust. Surrender is trust. Like, if you're going to live a life of surrender, really the issue is trust. Will you trust that your father knows best, that God loves you, that God's giving you an opportunity invitation?

But at the end of the day, God knows what's best for you. God loves you. There's nothing he ever asks you to lay down that's not in your best interest. Always. Which is really amazing.

Doesn't always feel that way though, does it? It can feel like there's this young man, like, giving up all that I possess and selling it and giving it to the poor. Like, when you're in that moment, it doesn't feel that way. It feels like you're giving up something. Let me tell you this, though.

I wonder another question I want to ask God with David, what was just around the corner for him?

It's always an upgrade, y'. All. And whatever you surrender to, God determines what you can pick up from him. When your hands are empty, the more he asks you to surrender, the more he's gonna bless you. Joseph had to surrender.

David had to surrender. Abraham. We can go on and on and on and on, okay? And every time God comes and knocks on the door, I think just around the corner, what God had for this young man, was he called to be one of the disciples and with the door open and he would have a front row seat. All that God did and the significance in God's kingdom, every time you lay something down, it's always a better deal.

And it's like this because we can't see and we don't know the end. We just don't know what to do. And it's harder to trust. But if we could see so clearly, like on the front end of surrender, we count the cost. Jesus talked about that.

He if you're gonna build a tower, don't you first count the cost. And we count the cost. And we talk about counting the cost and surrender and sacrifice. Let me tell you this. After surrender, nobody talks about counting the cost or sacrifice.

It's such a good deal. This is what Paul says. He goes, I don't consider the sufferings of this present time are even worth compared to the glory that's to be revealed to us. He goes, that's like such A good deal.

It's a little bit like a kid. If you give a kid wrong pocket, four quarters, I mean, four shiny, fun to play with quarters, you can play with them, you can play games with them. You can sing them like a Frisbee. Give that kid a couple days, and they're like, they're my quarters and they're fun. Now if you come up to that little kid, cute little kid, and you say, hey, buddy, I know those are your quarters, but I got a piece of paper to give you.

You want to trade? I know, no chance. Are you kidding? No, no, it's really a good deal. I'll give you this piece of paper right here.

I'll give you this piece of paper.

It's worth a hundred times as much. Get like, no chance. I got my quarters. Why would I give up my quarters for some vague piece of paper?

Look at this. Jesus says this. Truly, I tell you. This is from our passage. Disciples go, lord, this is tough.

This guy walked away. They're like, this is tough, like.

And Jesus said, like, hey, it's tough for a rich person to enter God, the kingdom of heaven. Cause they gotta give it all up. They gotta trust me. And then they said, well, we've left everything for you. And then he said this.

Truly, I tell you, no one has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, or left their four quarters for me and the gospel, who will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age. In this present age, homes and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and fields, along with persecutions, let's be honest. And in the age to come, eternal life. Now, y', all, let's read this carefully. What Jesus is saying is this.

If you leave your career, you give it to the Lord. You trust God with your resources, your friends, your reputation, your health, and you give him your quarters. He says, check the. No, no, read the scripture. In this present age, you're gonna get a hundred times as much homes and brothers and sisters.

Now is it? Give a dollar and get a hundred back. And just today, if you just text in, you know, we'll give. It's not that. It's not a get rich scheme, but I promise you this.

What Jesus is saying. What Jesus is saying is, is that every time God comes and asks you to surrender your four quarters, he's gonna give you wealth. In this present age, of relationships of significance, like that young rich man, it was gonna be a hundred times. In this age, better, much less the age to come. You're gonna get eternal life.

Like Paul said, the sufferings, the persecution don't even compare to the glory. Like, it's not even in the ballpark. No one gets to heaven and goes, well, that wasn't much of a good deal. What was I thinking? We're gonna get to heaven and go, who did this?

We're all just hanging on to our four corners orders.

100 times. That's what Jesus said. I'm just reading the Bible 100 times in this age and in the age to come. So let me ask you this.

What would be one thing that if you surrendered, it might cause the biggest ripple effect?

Like, if God showed up to you today and he took his finger, like, where would you be? No, Lord, not there.

Not my daughter, not my son, not my marriage, not my. Like, where he said, touched it.

That's not easy, y'. All.

But I promise you, God loves you and he's good. It's not easy. But I tell you what, when we surrender and we trust, we give it to him. It's so powerful, powerful, so powerful. And here's the power, y'.

All. It's really just between you and the Lord. Like, there's no formula. Like, when God comes and touches that of. Maybe it's a pain from our past, maybe it's a relationship, maybe it's an offense.

Check this one out. Maybe it's a failure where you've hung on to your mistakes and your failure and your sin and beat yourself up. And he says, hey, I'm touching that. I want you to give me that. I want you to give me your future.

I want you to give me. Like, let me tell you this. When you say yes, it just opens something. And we're gonna do something a little different today. Everyone at Almas, we're doing something a little different today is this.

We're going to take a moment to respond. No one's raising a hand. No one's coming forward. I want you just to have a moment with the Lord. I want you to have a moment where you can pray and process with the Lord.

And we're gonna sing a song together. And I want you to think, lord, here's my heart, here's my life.

And maybe you'll have an aha moment a little bit, Lord, that's what I want to surrender. That's what I want to give you. That's where I want to invite you into that area of my heart and life. Let's pray. Father, thank you today that you really are a good, good father.

That you care for us, that you know us, that you love us. And I pray, even right now, Lord, that we could have a moment with you, Lord, New Year.

And just like you did for that man and came in touch, the one area that he really needed to trust you, that he was hanging on to, Lord, I pray in your great love, you could give us an invitation and we could trust. Amen.