WEBVTT 00:00:01.120 --> 00:00:06.400 Well, we are in our second Sunday in Advent. 00:00:07.120 --> 00:00:16.800 And so maybe you come from a church that celebrates Advent, you're familiar with that, or maybe it's something that's new to you, maybe you just have heard the word at some point. 00:00:16.960 --> 00:00:23.679 Well, Advent is a the season, the weeks leading up, the four Sundays leading up to Christmas. 00:00:23.920 --> 00:00:28.079 So we celebrate Advent to prepare our hearts for Christmas. 00:00:28.320 --> 00:00:30.239 It's a season of waiting and hoping. 00:00:30.320 --> 00:00:32.320 That's what the season is about. 00:00:32.960 --> 00:00:35.600 For us, that's kind of what our lives are about, right? 00:00:35.759 --> 00:00:37.119 Like waiting and hoping. 00:00:37.280 --> 00:00:41.039 I mean, specifically, we can think about that in terms of the last nine months. 00:00:41.119 --> 00:00:48.079 I mean, it just feels like we're constantly waiting for something, some change, something, waiting and hoping for something to change. 00:00:48.320 --> 00:00:49.920 But all of life is sort of like this. 00:00:50.000 --> 00:00:55.039 Certainly the Christian life, how we like to word it in our church, is already, but not yet. 00:00:55.600 --> 00:01:07.280 You're already fully restored in Jesus, and yet you're not yet experiencing the fullness of the restoration that you have in Jesus, that wholeness. 00:01:07.840 --> 00:01:10.400 You're already free in Jesus. 00:01:10.640 --> 00:01:13.519 Already, because that was earned for you on the cross. 00:01:13.599 --> 00:01:21.519 And yet, not yet, not yet, experiencing the extent of which God intends for you to have that freedom. 00:01:22.799 --> 00:01:31.920 Already healed in Jesus, great news, but not yet experiencing the fullness of that healing that we one day will experience. 00:01:32.799 --> 00:01:37.920 So we wait and we hope, and this is Advent, this idea of waiting and hoping. 00:01:38.959 --> 00:01:41.599 This past summer, our neighbors went out of town. 00:01:41.680 --> 00:01:47.680 So our neighbors next door, they have four little girls, and we have three little girls, that's seven little girls, in two homes that are about ten feet apart. 00:01:47.920 --> 00:01:50.879 There's a lot of little girls, and they play together a lot. 00:01:51.120 --> 00:01:53.519 They play together every single day. 00:01:53.680 --> 00:01:59.840 And so everything is great until one of us goes out of town, and then the other family doesn't quite know what to do with their children. 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:09.039 And so one week this summer, they went out of town, their four little girls disappeared, and a vacuum appeared inside the hearts of my children. 00:02:09.199 --> 00:02:10.879 What do they fill this with? 00:02:11.120 --> 00:02:12.400 And so the days went by. 00:02:12.560 --> 00:02:18.080 Finally, the day came when our neighbors would be coming back in town. 00:02:18.159 --> 00:02:31.520 And so, art girls, they made a banner, welcome home, and they put it on the front porch, and they got their chalk and they filled their driveway with art and welcome back, and wrote all the family members' names and drew all these pictures. 00:02:31.680 --> 00:02:33.680 It took hours and hours of preparation. 00:02:33.759 --> 00:02:43.120 And then when the time grew near, two of the little girls, two of my little girls, they rode their bikes down to the end of the street about an hour before the family was due home. 00:02:43.280 --> 00:02:45.840 I'd let them know, hey, you don't have to go down there. 00:02:45.919 --> 00:02:49.439 Like we could just text them, you know, like let us know when you're really close. 00:02:49.599 --> 00:02:56.560 But no, they were all in, they're riding down, they're sitting there waiting and waiting and waiting for this return. 00:02:56.719 --> 00:02:58.560 And then, because they're eagerly waiting, right? 00:02:58.639 --> 00:03:00.479 Like they've been preparing for this. 00:03:00.800 --> 00:03:05.599 And then when the time came near, the car turned on the street. 00:03:05.680 --> 00:03:08.639 I mean, it was as miraculous as Jesus born in a major. 00:03:08.879 --> 00:03:13.039 This was the same status of miracle is what this was. 00:03:13.360 --> 00:03:19.680 And my girls come pedaling down the street, and all three of my girls are there in the front yard welcoming them back, right? 00:03:20.319 --> 00:03:22.400 This is a good image for us, Radvin. 00:03:23.439 --> 00:03:34.719 This image of eagerly awaiting and preparing our hearts to celebrate, to celebrate the coming of the one that can fill the vacuum in our hearts. 00:03:35.520 --> 00:03:43.360 So I want to pause before we open and look at our text to pray for us, for us as individuals and us as a church. 00:03:43.840 --> 00:03:52.960 To pray that the Holy Spirit would prepare for us, prepare in us room to celebrate, to celebrate as Jesus that the season's about. 00:03:53.039 --> 00:03:54.000 So let's pray together. 00:03:54.560 --> 00:04:00.400 God, we come before you to say there is a vacuum in our hearts that can only be filled by you. 00:04:00.479 --> 00:04:04.560 And we while we say that, we know that we do not always fill that vacuum with you. 00:04:05.120 --> 00:04:07.039 And for that we are sorry. 00:04:08.240 --> 00:04:14.159 And yet we celebrate that you love us in spite of that, and that we know that you are the one that fulfills. 00:04:14.960 --> 00:04:18.160 Not only do you fulfill the law, you fulfill our hearts. 00:04:18.560 --> 00:04:27.680 We live in the already and not yet, and we hope and we wait for the day when we will experience in fullness all that which we are tasting, just a little bit now. 00:04:28.560 --> 00:04:30.240 We pray as we open your scriptures. 00:04:30.319 --> 00:04:31.600 Would you speak to our hearts? 00:04:31.759 --> 00:04:34.319 Would we understand things more deeply, even our minds? 00:04:34.480 --> 00:04:40.480 Would our hearts be opened up in a greater way to be astonished by your love for us? 00:04:40.720 --> 00:04:42.560 In Jesus' name, amen. 00:04:43.120 --> 00:04:46.639 Our text this morning is Mark chapter 1, verses 1 through 8. 00:04:46.959 --> 00:04:48.560 John the Baptist is in this text. 00:04:48.720 --> 00:04:50.639 We got John and Jesus in this text. 00:04:50.879 --> 00:04:54.879 John the Baptist in this text, and John is this wild man in the wilderness. 00:04:55.040 --> 00:05:00.079 We'll read about how he he wore camel hair clothing, a leather belt. 00:05:00.160 --> 00:05:02.319 He ate locusts, he's out in the wilderness, a wild man. 00:05:03.040 --> 00:05:04.319 He's a rock star as well. 00:05:04.480 --> 00:05:07.360 I mean, he's preaching, and people are just showing up. 00:05:07.519 --> 00:05:10.720 I mean, this guy is being well known and followed. 00:05:10.959 --> 00:05:12.959 So Mark 1, verse 1. 00:05:13.279 --> 00:05:25.519 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet, behold, I send my messenger before your face who will prepare your way. 00:05:26.560 --> 00:05:31.920 The voice of the one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. 00:05:32.480 --> 00:05:38.959 John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. 00:05:39.279 --> 00:05:46.720 And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. 00:05:46.879 --> 00:06:00.160 Now John was clothed with camel's hair, wore a leather belt around his waist, and ate locusts and wild honey, and he preached, saying, After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to stoop down and untie. 00:06:00.560 --> 00:06:06.480 I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. 00:06:07.600 --> 00:06:10.480 Point number one is this we are recipients. 00:06:10.639 --> 00:06:15.040 We have recipients and participants in God's redemptive story. 00:06:15.199 --> 00:06:16.160 We're both of those things. 00:06:16.240 --> 00:06:21.360 We don't have to just jump into being a participant after becoming a Christian and forget that we're recipients. 00:06:21.680 --> 00:06:28.800 So easy to move into what we can do for God and forget that God is delighting in us long before we do anything for Him. 00:06:29.120 --> 00:06:33.759 And so we are recipients of this redemption story that God is redeeming us. 00:06:34.160 --> 00:06:36.879 He's doing that redemptive work inside of you. 00:06:37.439 --> 00:06:44.160 And then we go and we become participants in that story in the world, neighbors and friends and family. 00:06:44.879 --> 00:06:48.319 John's this rock star, he certainly could have made much of himself. 00:06:48.560 --> 00:06:52.000 I mean, he had the status, he had the resume, he had the following. 00:06:52.240 --> 00:06:57.040 He could have easily boasted in his own following in that regard and made a lot of himself. 00:06:57.120 --> 00:06:58.560 And yet he's saying the opposite. 00:06:58.639 --> 00:07:02.959 He says, No, I'm not even worthy to untie those sandals. 00:07:03.680 --> 00:07:10.399 Now it'd be easy to just cast religious shame here and view it as a religious shame, but that's not what this is. 00:07:10.560 --> 00:07:12.879 It's not saying I'm worth nothing. 00:07:13.040 --> 00:07:24.160 It's actually saying, even while I'm created in the image of God and hold immense beauty and worth, even then I'm not worthy because he is that worthy. 00:07:26.480 --> 00:07:28.800 And the gift to us, what a gift. 00:07:28.879 --> 00:07:38.959 This the gift to us here is that you and I, we don't have to spend our whole lives trying to make much of ourselves as to be important or worthy. 00:07:39.680 --> 00:07:59.680 And to get that, embrace that, and come into the story of Jesus' immense worth, to be free of having to make much of yourself over and over again, just to be more important by what you do, to be worthy, and to be free of that, and to be a recipient of worth, and to come into the redemption story for you. 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:01.680 What a freedom we have. 00:08:01.920 --> 00:08:03.839 That's true of me as a pastor. 00:08:03.920 --> 00:08:08.639 It's true of you if you're a teacher or a banker or a stay at home with your kids. 00:08:08.720 --> 00:08:12.319 I mean, it's just the truth that we have, this gift of grace. 00:08:12.879 --> 00:08:15.839 Verse 8, John makes this incredible statement. 00:08:16.560 --> 00:08:20.079 I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you Jesus. 00:08:20.240 --> 00:08:23.519 Jesus will baptize you with the Holy Spirit. 00:08:29.120 --> 00:08:33.679 Elizabeth this morning, and then separately, like a second time, you'll get baptized with the Holy Spirit. 00:08:33.759 --> 00:08:35.039 That's not what we're talking about here. 00:08:35.200 --> 00:08:40.159 This is beautiful imagery John's laying out for us to say, Jesus is coming. 00:08:40.639 --> 00:08:47.519 And we're moving from ritual to a relationship of gift and grace. 00:08:48.320 --> 00:08:50.000 Point number two is this. 00:08:51.120 --> 00:08:53.919 Our hearts revert to using law. 00:08:54.080 --> 00:09:01.759 That's a religious way to say works righteousness, which is another religious way to say, if I do good enough, I'll be accepted by God. 00:09:01.919 --> 00:09:05.039 If I do this next thing, then I'll be accepted by God. 00:09:05.200 --> 00:09:10.240 So our hearts revert to using law to feel accepted by God. 00:09:10.480 --> 00:09:14.000 So we must keep preaching the gospel to ourselves. 00:09:14.480 --> 00:09:18.320 The context here is these baptismal pools, mikvas. 00:09:18.799 --> 00:09:19.759 They're all over the place. 00:09:19.840 --> 00:09:21.840 They're surrounded the Temple Mount. 00:09:22.320 --> 00:09:30.879 And the followers of Yahweh, before entering the Temple Mount, that presence of God, they would cleanse themselves in these mikvas. 00:09:31.120 --> 00:09:33.519 So the key there is they would cleanse themselves. 00:09:33.679 --> 00:09:40.799 They would go into these pools of water over and over and over and over again before they went to the Temple Mount. 00:09:40.960 --> 00:09:45.360 They cleansed themselves before entering the presence of God. 00:09:46.240 --> 00:09:49.120 And can you see what John's laying out for us here? 00:09:49.360 --> 00:09:59.279 This idea of baptism or a practice that we do, moving from a works righteousness, something you do in order to be accepted by God. 00:09:59.360 --> 00:10:07.519 And then he says, but Jesus does this for you, gives you the Holy Spirit, that you are covered. 00:10:07.919 --> 00:10:10.480 That's that word baptism, to be immersed. 00:10:10.559 --> 00:10:16.879 So we poured water over busy, or we could have dunked her, or dunked you, or dunked somebody else underwater. 00:10:17.039 --> 00:10:20.000 Either way, it's the imagery of being covered. 00:10:21.840 --> 00:10:26.559 John knew that his baptism, this way of baptism that he was baptized in, wasn't quite enough. 00:10:26.639 --> 00:10:28.000 Like he's kind of in between. 00:10:28.080 --> 00:10:30.559 He's one of those prophets, like a prophet in the Old Testament. 00:10:30.720 --> 00:10:32.720 He's preaching repentance. 00:10:33.120 --> 00:10:40.399 He knows that Jesus needs to come to fulfill the law, and he's standing in between and he's saying, No, there's somebody, there's another one coming. 00:10:40.480 --> 00:10:42.799 This Jesus is coming to fulfill the law. 00:10:43.039 --> 00:10:45.279 That we don't have to live by ritual. 00:10:45.759 --> 00:10:58.639 The good news is that our Heavenly Father so desires a relationship with us, not of guilt or obligation, free of guilt and obligation, that he came through his son Jesus. 00:10:58.720 --> 00:11:00.159 And that's what we celebrate. 00:11:00.399 --> 00:11:08.480 See, the law in works righteousness assumes that if you can only do enough or do one more thing, then you would be okay. 00:11:08.799 --> 00:11:10.399 Then you would be enough. 00:11:10.639 --> 00:11:12.639 Then you'd be fine with God. 00:11:14.159 --> 00:11:15.759 But the law never works. 00:11:16.000 --> 00:11:19.440 So a quick response, you can think about this as I ask this question. 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:30.399 Has being told to wear your mask and wash your hands and socially distance make you want to wash your hands and wear your mask and socially distance, right? 00:11:30.639 --> 00:11:31.759 Those two different things. 00:11:31.919 --> 00:11:37.120 Now, maybe you would say, uh, no, you know, I'm not washing my hands in 30 seconds like I did in March. 00:11:37.200 --> 00:11:38.639 Maybe you'd be willing to admit that. 00:11:38.799 --> 00:11:40.399 We probably all should be, right? 00:11:40.480 --> 00:11:46.240 The guidance is good, the law is good, but it's not making you want to do those things. 00:11:46.399 --> 00:11:50.960 Actually, as soon as you are told to do those things over and over again, you begin to build some resentment. 00:11:51.120 --> 00:11:52.639 Now, maybe you would say you'd admit to that. 00:11:52.720 --> 00:11:57.600 You say, Yeah, that's me, I'll do it, but I am being resentful of it because I hate people telling me what to do. 00:11:57.759 --> 00:12:01.519 Now, maybe you're being told what to do and you're like, no, I'm in line with it. 00:12:01.600 --> 00:12:09.120 Like, I'm all in, and so you're all in and you're doing it, but you're resenting everybody else who's not doing it, right? 00:12:09.200 --> 00:12:10.399 Like you're just judgmental of them. 00:12:10.559 --> 00:12:14.080 Good, kind of like religious judgment, like we like to do in churches. 00:12:14.320 --> 00:12:18.720 Either way, what we see here is the law can't change your heart. 00:12:19.519 --> 00:12:30.480 Being told what to do doesn't have the power to change and create a heart that is pure to be obedient and pure to love other people. 00:12:32.080 --> 00:12:36.399 We have to have the fulfillment of the law, Jesus, for us. 00:12:36.639 --> 00:12:40.960 I was baptized as a 17-year-old at Hebron Southern Baptist Church. 00:12:41.039 --> 00:12:47.039 We talked a lot about baptism in the church, because it was a Baptist church, and so that was just part of our spirituality. 00:12:47.120 --> 00:12:51.120 And for me, it was an incredibly serious and contemplative thing for me. 00:12:51.200 --> 00:12:57.519 I really prayed about that and processed that, and my decision to be baptized was a big decision for me in my life. 00:12:57.679 --> 00:13:00.399 It was important, it was a marking moment for me. 00:13:01.360 --> 00:13:06.159 It was about me, the symbol of me surrendering to Christ, and it was that. 00:13:06.799 --> 00:13:10.159 Looking back on it, I do think I mistook it a little bit. 00:13:10.480 --> 00:13:19.919 Because I saw it solely as my statement about my commitment to Jesus. 00:13:20.159 --> 00:13:20.399 Right? 00:13:20.559 --> 00:13:23.919 Like it was about me, my commitment, my statement. 00:13:25.279 --> 00:13:39.519 Which oddly, of course, in that line of thinking and reasoning and motive, I enjoyed just as much all of the people afterward telling me how proud they were of me as much as I did enjoy the baptism. 00:13:40.399 --> 00:13:41.279 Of course. 00:13:42.879 --> 00:13:50.240 And what I was missing was that wasn't that wasn't about my commitment. 00:13:50.480 --> 00:14:01.039 That was a piece of it, but the majority of it was about being covered with God's love for me, God's pursuit of me, God's commitment to me, God's covenant for me. 00:14:04.080 --> 00:14:09.519 Fleming Rutledge, who's an Episcopal priest, theologian, incredible thinker, she's an incredible thinker. 00:14:09.600 --> 00:14:16.559 Here's what she says, thinking about John the Baptist and repentance, Advent, this comes from her Advent book. 00:14:17.600 --> 00:14:25.039 If I'm told over and over to repent, to change, to orient my life to God, nothing will ever happen. 00:14:25.360 --> 00:14:32.000 I will cling to the Gucci luggage, not that I could afford it, and the earthly status symbols more desperately than ever. 00:14:32.240 --> 00:14:35.039 I don't need to hear exhortations to repent. 00:14:35.200 --> 00:14:39.279 I need power from outside myself to make me different. 00:14:39.519 --> 00:14:54.000 A power from outside is coming, a power that is able to make a new creation out of people like us, stones like us, people who have no capacity of ourselves to save ourselves. 00:14:54.240 --> 00:15:07.039 The power that is coming is not our power, not the power of our deeds or our inner strength or our spiritual discipline or our faith or even our repentance. 00:15:07.279 --> 00:15:17.600 It is God's power that gives good deeds and inner strength and spiritual discipline and faith and repentance. 00:15:18.799 --> 00:15:21.600 What a gift it is to have proper order. 00:15:23.200 --> 00:15:23.519 Right? 00:15:23.679 --> 00:15:33.759 That God's power in us that comes to us by his grace is what enables and creates the fuel by which we might have repentance or discipline. 00:15:34.799 --> 00:15:35.840 Good deeds. 00:15:38.000 --> 00:15:41.600 So effort is not over, but earning is long gone. 00:15:42.399 --> 00:15:43.519 Point number three is this. 00:15:43.600 --> 00:15:47.200 I think this is where it could perhaps intersect our lives, definitely for me. 00:15:47.440 --> 00:15:56.320 We are free to rest our hearts in God's love and the presence of God, not politics, vaccines, or the news. 00:15:56.799 --> 00:15:59.200 Our hearts will rest somewhere. 00:16:00.639 --> 00:16:08.720 And what this is telling us is that we have a place of rest that is not the news or politics or vaccines. 00:16:09.279 --> 00:16:13.039 Maybe you just need to keep listing other things of social media or something else. 00:16:13.200 --> 00:16:13.679 Those are mine. 00:16:14.080 --> 00:16:14.720 Maybe they're yours. 00:16:14.879 --> 00:16:16.240 Maybe you understand that a little bit. 00:16:16.399 --> 00:16:21.600 Is my greatest temptation, certainly just to look for another update, another bit of information. 00:16:22.320 --> 00:16:29.200 You know, like to be baptized in the water of news again today, and that like suddenly that's gonna satisfy me. 00:16:29.360 --> 00:16:30.960 That'll be enough all of a sudden. 00:16:31.200 --> 00:16:33.039 That'll give me peace. 00:16:34.080 --> 00:16:35.360 Has it worked for nine months? 00:16:35.440 --> 00:16:38.320 I don't suppose it to work for the next nine months. 00:16:39.600 --> 00:16:43.759 There's no amount of information that can give peace to my busy heart. 00:16:43.919 --> 00:16:47.039 That has to be solved by the Lord. 00:16:47.600 --> 00:16:50.799 Oliver Bergman, who writes for The Guardian, wrote this. 00:16:50.960 --> 00:16:53.919 I heard it on the Mockingcast podcast this week. 00:16:54.080 --> 00:16:55.039 Here's what he wrote. 00:16:55.200 --> 00:16:57.360 See if you recognize this at all in yourself. 00:16:57.600 --> 00:17:08.960 Sometime around the one-two punch of Brexit and Trump, I started to notice in myself, and even more so in friends, a tendency I've only been able to describe as living inside the news. 00:17:09.119 --> 00:17:14.400 It was as if more and more people were shifting their psychological center of gravity. 00:17:14.640 --> 00:17:21.759 So the news was somehow realer to them than the concrete world of work, family, and friends. 00:17:22.160 --> 00:17:28.240 I don't just mean they were spending too much time online or addicted to social media, although they were and we are. 00:17:28.480 --> 00:17:43.440 I mean that the realm of presidencies and referendums and humanitarian crisis have become the main drama of their daily lives, with their actual daily lives delegated to a sideshow. 00:17:44.079 --> 00:17:46.559 Well, he's describing me pretty well. 00:17:47.599 --> 00:17:54.000 Certainly the news overlaps our lives and reflects it and informs it. 00:17:54.400 --> 00:18:08.079 But there is a difference, isn't there, between the news and what we hear and what we listen and the concreteness of a day, a given day, and our daily lives, our actual work, our actual family and friends and neighbors. 00:18:09.680 --> 00:18:13.839 And the Holy Spirit is not waiting for us in the news. 00:18:14.319 --> 00:18:15.839 That's not how it works. 00:18:15.920 --> 00:18:19.279 The Holy Spirit is inside of us in this moment. 00:18:20.480 --> 00:18:30.720 And so that is why we find our rest in Him before we go into the news or into something more abstract. 00:18:31.359 --> 00:18:35.680 Because God is operating inside of us in the concreteness of today. 00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:37.519 So what does this mean for my life? 00:18:37.599 --> 00:18:38.880 Perhaps this is what it could mean. 00:18:38.960 --> 00:18:40.799 Number one, listen to the news. 00:18:41.119 --> 00:18:44.559 Not saying don't listen to the news, listen to the news, please listen to the news. 00:18:44.799 --> 00:18:52.400 But rest in your immersion, that's the imagery of today, your immersion in God's already acceptance in favor of you. 00:18:52.720 --> 00:18:54.400 And that's the gift of Jesus. 00:18:54.640 --> 00:19:04.400 Many of us are missing the enjoyment of the Spirit on a day-to-day basis to walk by the Spirit because we're just feeling the vacuum inside of us with other stuff. 00:19:06.160 --> 00:19:09.359 And news is the easy thing for us to do right now. 00:19:11.200 --> 00:19:16.480 We have a resting place for our hearts, an enjoyment that we can have with the Spirit. 00:19:16.960 --> 00:19:24.640 Number two, as already accepted and righteous in Jesus, what a gift that is to start the sentence with that. 00:19:25.599 --> 00:19:30.480 You get to seek to enjoy the presence of God in you. 00:19:30.799 --> 00:19:31.759 You get to do that. 00:19:31.839 --> 00:19:34.880 And that is without obligation or guilt. 00:19:35.039 --> 00:19:39.599 It is inside of God's delight for you that He's already delighted in you through Jesus. 00:19:39.759 --> 00:19:42.480 As much as He delights in the Son, He delights in you. 00:19:43.279 --> 00:19:50.240 And so we have the secure Holy Spirit inside of us that we are buried in, immersed in. 00:19:51.440 --> 00:19:55.680 And that we get to quietly align our hearts with on a day-to-day basis. 00:19:56.400 --> 00:19:59.680 And to enjoy the presence of God. 00:19:59.920 --> 00:20:02.319 And so we wait and we hope. 00:20:02.880 --> 00:20:04.240 We wait and we hope. 00:20:05.200 --> 00:20:06.880 My brothers and sisters, Merry Christmas. 00:20:06.960 --> 00:20:08.720 What a Merry Christmas that is to hear that. 00:20:08.799 --> 00:20:22.640 That you are baptized, not by water, by ritual, by regulation, by rules, by more, something more to do, but you are baptized, immersed and buried and covered by Jesus and by the gift of the Spirit to you. 00:20:23.039 --> 00:20:24.480 Let's pray together. 00:20:25.039 --> 00:20:29.440 God, thank you for your grace and your mercy that you fulfilled the law for us. 00:20:30.720 --> 00:20:34.079 And while effort is not over, earning is gone. 00:20:35.680 --> 00:20:42.400 Guilt as a motivator is gone, obligation is gone, but we are motivated by your grace in us. 00:20:42.720 --> 00:20:48.400 Equipped, energized, fueled, empowered, animated by your spirit. 00:20:49.519 --> 00:21:05.119 God, we are people who wake up and revert back to trying to do enough, trying to be enough, rather than resting in that we are already enough in you, and forgive us for the way in which we're filling that vacuum inside of us with things other than you. 00:21:06.000 --> 00:21:14.000 Help us to move our gaze from the news and from updates to that which is secure. 00:21:14.799 --> 00:21:18.079 That we are already delighted in by you. 00:21:18.640 --> 00:21:20.400 We pray this in Jesus' name. 00:21:20.640 --> 00:21:21.279 Amen.