SPEAKER_00: This podcast is a ministry of Grant Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about Grant Parkway, visit GrantParquay.org.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus, let no one caught in sin remain.
SPEAKER_01: Remain inside the lie of inward shame.
SPEAKER_01: Let that resonate in our hearts and our minds today, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, fix our eyes upon you and upon your work, your securing, life-giving, death-defying work on the cross.
SPEAKER_01: And let us, God, be responsible enough to run to you.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because you've showed us great love.
SPEAKER_01: Love that never ends.
SPEAKER_01: Love that never gives up.
SPEAKER_01: Love that pursues and love that holds.
SPEAKER_01: Let our eyes be open this today.
SPEAKER_01: Let our hearts be molded to this today.
SPEAKER_01: Let our ears be pricked today.
SPEAKER_01: Let our minds be molded and shaped and be renewed by the truths of your word and of who you are, God.
SPEAKER_01: Let this not be a religious exercise today, but let us come, be refreshed, be renewed by the relationship we have in you.
SPEAKER_01: And God, let us have clear insight as to how to apply this message today in the coming week.
SPEAKER_01: So we submit ourselves to you, God.
SPEAKER_01: We are laid open.
SPEAKER_01: Asking for you to speak because that's what you do.
SPEAKER_01: And asking for you to perform miracles in our hearts and our minds because, again, you do that.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing we ask, God, is beyond you or beneath you.
SPEAKER_01: So we just come.
SPEAKER_01: And we receive today, God, your goodness and your grace as we give you glory.
SPEAKER_01: It's in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: You can be seated.
SPEAKER_01: My name is Lance Williams, and I'm the spiritual formation pastor here at Grand Parkway.
SPEAKER_01: As was mentioned at the beginning of the service, we've got prayer cards for our team in Costa Rica, which includes Neil, and that's where he is today.
SPEAKER_01: And so it's my privilege to be before you as we continue on in the book of Romans.
SPEAKER_01: And we are in chapter 14 today, and we will cover the first 12 verses of Romans 14.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't have your Bible, we are we would love for you to use the one at the end of your row.
SPEAKER_01: And we are on page 948 of the Bible there that you can ask your neighbor to pass on down to you.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm uh again excited to preach today, uh, mainly because I think this is the first time that Neil asked me to preach uh quickly, uh, I guess kind of back to back in a way.
SPEAKER_01: I get to actually preach from the same page of the Bible, uh, which is actually really nice for me.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but then he told me what uh what he wanted me to preach on and where we were at in the schedule, and it was like, yeah, hey, so you know, we're gonna do this and do that.
SPEAKER_01: And it's, oh, by the way, Romans 14, you know, not judging others.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I just laughed.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, okay, yeah, because yeah, you know me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm really good at not judging other people, so that's perfect.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01: I'm on that.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I got that mastered.
SPEAKER_01: Not so much.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and so I laughed and giggled and cried a little bit along the way, but we're gonna make it today.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, because here's the reality: nobody's mastered this.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, thank you.
SPEAKER_01: Nobody's mastered this.
SPEAKER_01: I heard this in seminary, and it's always uh continued to sit inside of me.
SPEAKER_01: No one masters this, it masters you.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and so that's the beautiful thing about the Bible is I don't stand up here qualified to tell you that because I've mastered it.
SPEAKER_01: I've stand up here qualified to tell you because that's what God calls me to do, uh, an exercise of my priesthood.
SPEAKER_01: So it's a great thing, even outside of my comfort zone.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and speaking of outside of our comfort zone, the day the day's talk is basically entitled this Why thinking of yourself is godly.
SPEAKER_01: Why thinking of yourself is godly?
SPEAKER_01: And I know that many of you right now are going, okay, God first, others second, me third.
SPEAKER_01: You're wrong.
SPEAKER_01: No, why thinking of yourself is godly?
SPEAKER_01: And we'll unpack that today because the reality is this we spend way, way too much time thinking of how other people have sinned, wronged us, not looked at us the right way, didn't greet us on the way in, didn't shake our hand, missed giving me a bulletin, br- and on and on the list could go.
SPEAKER_01: And so why thinking of yourself is godly is because there's a recent study that went out by a guy by the name of David Kinneman.
SPEAKER_01: He is with the Barna group, and he wrote a book called Unchristian.
SPEAKER_01: UnChristian.
SPEAKER_01: And basically the whole premise of the book is basically this.
SPEAKER_01: It's built on this, is that we um obviously grew up and we were raised this nation, America, U.S., uh, the one that's going to dominate the Olympics over the next few weeks.
SPEAKER_01: Uh we were raised basically underneath the premise of Judeo-Christian principles, and basically we're at the point now in our society, in our culture, where we're just kind of over that.
SPEAKER_01: We're over the whole Judeo-Christian thing.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't know this, turn on any news.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, no local network doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01: We're over the whole Christian thing, and so basically we live in a culture now what people are calling post-Christian.
SPEAKER_01: After Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of the kingdom is come and gone, and this, that was great, and everything, hey, you guys had your day in the sun.
SPEAKER_01: Now it's our turn.
SPEAKER_01: Post-Christian.
SPEAKER_01: So David Kinneman wrote this book called UnChristian, and he basically did a bunch of different studies.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Barna does.
SPEAKER_01: They do a bunch of studies and find a bunch of statistics.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and one of the statistics I found um that resonated with us or should today is that he surveyed uh uh uh a lot of different people uh not from that were born from 1965 to 2002.
SPEAKER_01: So that's anywhere between 12 and 49 years of age, and basically uh uh uh come down with this.
SPEAKER_01: Um and it's it this is the uh the statistic.
SPEAKER_01: 87% of people said that the term judgmental accurately describes present-day Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: 87% of people they surveyed would say that we are judgmental.
SPEAKER_01: He kept going, and he said, actually, what the good news is that the of the non-Christian surveyed, the ones that don't agree with the faith that we hold tightly to, he said, 84% of those people personally know at least one committed Christian.
SPEAKER_01: So the good news is we're rubbing elbows with non-believers.
SPEAKER_01: That's that's the great news, is that 84% of non-believers can identify someone in their life that calls Christ Lord and follows them.
SPEAKER_01: The bad news is only 15% of us, they would say, that does that actually make a difference in your life.
SPEAKER_01: So there's this huge gap between, yeah, they know who we are, but only because we profess it and not because we live it.
SPEAKER_01: And so basically, two things.
SPEAKER_01: We're great at giving lip service to what we believe, the statistics would say, and then we're also really good at telling people what we don't believe.
SPEAKER_01: That we're judgmental or we disagree.
SPEAKER_01: Not that we are making right judgments, but the way in which we do them is judgmental.
SPEAKER_01: The vast majority of what he found is that we are a judgmental people, and so it's no wonder that today we're talking about why thinking of yourself is godly out of Romans 14.
SPEAKER_01: And as we do so, let us catch us up on basically what God's gonna say to all of us.
SPEAKER_01: He is gonna basically instruct us on the gray matters of faith.
SPEAKER_01: Not the black and white.
SPEAKER_01: He's gone chapter 12 and chapter 13 doing very black and white instructions.
SPEAKER_01: These are some of the things that he's talked about.
SPEAKER_01: Issues of worship.
SPEAKER_01: How is it that we should worship?
SPEAKER_01: Living in grace, loving others with a genuine, unhypocritical love, submitting to authority, which we all love, and walking the Christian walk.
SPEAKER_01: That's basically where we've been, Romans 12, Romans 13.
SPEAKER_01: And now he turns from essential manners in the faith, black and white.
SPEAKER_01: He says, this is how we must behave concerning non-essentials, the gray matter of the faith, where maybe the Bible isn't as clear as we would like for it to be.
SPEAKER_01: How do we behave?
SPEAKER_01: How do we how do we live in that gray area?
SPEAKER_01: Let's just read Romans 14, 1 to 12, and Paul will give us his own instruction.
SPEAKER_01: We'll unpack it.
SPEAKER_01: He says, As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions.
SPEAKER_01: One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables.
SPEAKER_01: Let not the one who eats who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him.
SPEAKER_01: Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another?
SPEAKER_01: It is before his own master that he stands or falls, and he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
SPEAKER_01: One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike.
SPEAKER_01: Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.
SPEAKER_01: The one who observes the day observes it in honor of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.
SPEAKER_01: For one of us lives to himself, uh for none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself.
SPEAKER_01: For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's.
SPEAKER_01: For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord, both of the dead and of the living.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 10.
SPEAKER_01: Why do you pass judgment on your brother, or or why or you, why do you despise your brother?
SPEAKER_01: For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God, for it is written, As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.
SPEAKER_01: So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.
SPEAKER_01: There's at least three reasons why thinking of yourself is godly that you can find in these first twelve verses of Romans 14.
SPEAKER_01: The first one is this first reason why thinking of ourself is godly is because God has welcomed all believers.
SPEAKER_01: And I had somebody come up to me after the first service and they said, and then you should just add like a comma and go, not you.
SPEAKER_01: It is God, not you, who has welcomed all believers.
SPEAKER_01: And let me just unpack that a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: Uh Paul is clearly talking to the family of God.
SPEAKER_01: He talks about brothers.
SPEAKER_01: Why do you judge your brother?
SPEAKER_01: Why do you despise your brother?
SPEAKER_01: This is talking about believers, not non-believers.
SPEAKER_01: This is you and me, those that call on Jesus as our king.
SPEAKER_01: And you'd be surprised, by the way, at how much the Bible doesn't talk to non-believers.
SPEAKER_01: Like he just is silent to non-believers.
SPEAKER_01: And the reason for that is because uh the Spirit of God is not in them, and he does not expect them to hear him or do anything that God would instruct them to do.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, he instructs his kids because we're his, and so we're gonna respond in that and actually be obedient to what God says.
SPEAKER_01: So these types of things, especially this today, he's calling us to respond in a responsible and in a mature manner that has eyes to see and ears to hear.
SPEAKER_01: But this is basically the problem, and it's gonna come down home hard on us here in just a minute.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the problem that Rome was understanding and living through.
SPEAKER_01: The early Roman church.
SPEAKER_01: Basically, it was this they were hearing the same words.
SPEAKER_01: There were two groups of people.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible wasn't written yet, but let's just say that they were reading the Bible, they were, they were still being written, they were hearing the words of Jesus, they were hearing the words of the apostles, they were quote unquote reading the Bible, and these two groups of people were applying it in radically different ways.
SPEAKER_01: And so the stronger Christians, those that what most people think is of Gentile background, that would be probably most of us in this room, came from all types of faiths, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And they grew up and they were in a pluralistic society, and so there was a lot of freedom in all of that.
SPEAKER_01: And so, where the Bible was silent, all of a sudden they filled that silence with freedom.
SPEAKER_01: Responsible freedom.
SPEAKER_01: And so for them, the Bible, Jesus didn't ever really say anything about what to eat, how to eat it.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what do we have to cook it to 165 degrees?
SPEAKER_01: What do we do here?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is silent, and so for the stronger, more mature believers, the Gentile believers, they filled the silence with freedom.
SPEAKER_01: They're like, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus didn't really say this, but I'm gonna eat it because I'm gonna do it to the honor and glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, come on.
SPEAKER_01: And then all of a sudden you have the quote-unquote weaker believers, and most people think they came from Jewish descent, and the reason why they were a little bit weaker, so to speak, for Paul, and oh, by the way, he was one of them, uh, is because they they came from a background of rules and regulations and law.
SPEAKER_01: And so where Jesus was silent, where the apostles were silent, all of a sudden they filled that silence not with freedom, but with more rules.
SPEAKER_01: And so where Jesus basically didn't talk about, hey, what you can eat, if this is the Sabbath day, I mean, people talk to him all the time, hey, it's a Sabbath day, and goes, I'm the Lord of the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, but I'm now I'm years later now, Jesus, and you're you're I'm the Lord of the Sabbath, really cool saying.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't help me.
SPEAKER_01: What am I supposed to do with the Sabbath now?
SPEAKER_01: And the stronger ones filled it with freedom, and the weaker ones, quote unquote, filled it with rules.
SPEAKER_01: And so those that that saw all the silence, like, oh, Jesus didn't say meat or whatever, so you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Only vegetables for me.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus didn't say anything about what to do on these holy days, the Jewish holy days and the holidays and the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_01: So you know what?
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna go to all of them, I'm gonna do everything I can, do whatever.
SPEAKER_01: So there's where there's silence, where it's gray, where it's not so black and white as the Bible tends to be in most areas, two different people apply it in two radically different ways.
SPEAKER_01: And if we think we're different than that, uh let me ask you about 21 things that either you can agree or disagree on uh very quickly, uh, very quickly.
SPEAKER_01: And don't raise your hand to this because we will test the whole judgment and despising thing rather quickly.
SPEAKER_01: But here if you do you would you invite somebody over for dinner that thought differently or believed differently strongly than you in any or all of these?
SPEAKER_01: So here we go.
SPEAKER_01: What do you believe about drinking?
SPEAKER_01: What do you believe about smoking cigarettes or cigars?
SPEAKER_01: What do you believe about gambling?
SPEAKER_01: How about dancing?
SPEAKER_01: How about R-rated movies?
SPEAKER_01: Or how about secular music?
SPEAKER_01: Or how about KSBJ?
SPEAKER_01: Flip it.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's mine.
SPEAKER_01: If you're coming to me and you're like, oh, I'm only listening to KSB J.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta work through a little bit of despisement in my own heart.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, what is what how do you listen to those songs?
SPEAKER_01: They are the same songs from 1990.
SPEAKER_01: I don't get it.
SPEAKER_01: How about watching MMA or UFC?
SPEAKER_01: How about using birth control?
SPEAKER_01: How about tattoos?
SPEAKER_01: How about piercings?
SPEAKER_01: How about sending your kids to public school?
SPEAKER_01: What about private school?
SPEAKER_01: What about homeschool?
SPEAKER_01: How about owning a luxury car?
SPEAKER_01: What do you drive?
SPEAKER_01: You made a theological decision about that?
SPEAKER_01: Or how about how many square feet do you have in your home?
SPEAKER_01: How many bedrooms you got?
SPEAKER_01: How about working on Sunday?
SPEAKER_01: By the way, I work on Sunday, don't judge me.
SPEAKER_01: How about observing Halloween?
SPEAKER_01: Or how about Santa?
SPEAKER_01: Or how about the elf on the shelf?
SPEAKER_01: How about Harry Potter?
SPEAKER_01: How about magic?
SPEAKER_01: What about politics?
SPEAKER_01: Republican, Democrat?
SPEAKER_01: What about your spiritual gifts and the use thereof?
SPEAKER_01: What about baptism of the Spirit?
SPEAKER_01: What about hymns?
SPEAKER_01: What about a song that you didn't just know right off the bat?
SPEAKER_01: How dare he?
SPEAKER_01: What about modern worship?
SPEAKER_01: What about real wine or grape juice at communion?
SPEAKER_01: What about the role of women in the church?
SPEAKER_01: And finally, what do you believe about Justin Bieber?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm with you.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: These things are unessential, non-essential things that the church has split over.
SPEAKER_01: I say unessential, except for the Justin Bieber reference.
SPEAKER_01: That's completely essential.
SPEAKER_01: You better know it.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: But I mean, all these different things, we have created denomination after denomination, church after church, split after split, and the world looks at us and goes, Why can you not agree on anything?
SPEAKER_01: Your God can't even unite brother and sister.
SPEAKER_01: Why would I go to that?
SPEAKER_01: And it's an indictment on us because we cannot, we've done really well at getting other people to apply the Bible and pointing out how other people should apply the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: We're doing really poorly of just thinking of ourselves in a godly manner and applying the Bible for our own self.
SPEAKER_01: So Paul responds to that and he basically just says this two things.
SPEAKER_01: Welcome one another.
SPEAKER_01: All these things that you could get caught up in in this gray area of life, welcome one another.
SPEAKER_01: And the reason for that is because God has welcomed you.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 1 says, hey, receive one another.
SPEAKER_01: Welcome those that are weak in the faith, but do not quarrel over opinions.
SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness, do not quarrel over opinions.
SPEAKER_01: And the word there for welcome, not just to tolerate, but to invite that person into our inner circle, into our home.
SPEAKER_01: So question that just came and rising up in me.
SPEAKER_01: When's the last time I've invited someone that I know I disagree with to come and put their feet under my table?
SPEAKER_01: And the reason for this, again, because God has welcomed us at the end of verse 3.
SPEAKER_01: For God has welcomed him.
SPEAKER_01: Don't judge, don't disdain.
SPEAKER_01: How much, and this is again another question that just came up that I think is relevant for all of us, what would it look like?
SPEAKER_01: How much criticism, how much cynicism in my mind would be silenced if I simply saw myself and others through the lens of God has welcomed you.
SPEAKER_01: Just as He has welcomed me.
SPEAKER_01: He has leveled the playing field in a good sense, brother and sister.
SPEAKER_01: Nowhere in here does he say older brother and younger sister.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe stronger, maybe weaker, more mature, maybe immature.
SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
SPEAKER_01: But nowhere in here do we get the recommendation to just go, hey, I'm I'm I'm ahead of you.
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
SPEAKER_01: Too bad for you.
SPEAKER_01: How much criticism in our mind would be silenced if we just simply saw ourselves and others through the lens of God has welcomed us in, invited us in to our inner circle.
SPEAKER_01: Not just tolerate, not just, okay, yeah, you're here, can't really acknowledge you.
SPEAKER_01: No, I'm talking enjoyed you and therefore calls us to do the same for others.
SPEAKER_01: In verse 4, we continue on.
SPEAKER_01: It basically says this who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another?
SPEAKER_01: It's before his own master that he stands or falls, and he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.
SPEAKER_01: What Paul is basically saying for all of us is that we've got to focus on what God has done for us.
SPEAKER_01: If we're going to get past the judgment and the despisement that we may have for one another, whether it be weaker or stronger, or wherever we kind of fall out on all those issues that I just talked about, only thing that's going to get us past that is thinking of ourselves in a godly manner.
SPEAKER_01: But more importantly than that, thinking and focusing on what God has done for us.
SPEAKER_01: Just in verse 4, he says that he's our Lord, he's our master, and I'll talk about that more in just a bit.
SPEAKER_01: He promises to uphold us.
SPEAKER_01: You know, there's a Bible in the Old Testament, or there's a verse in the Old Testament, Isaiah 41, it says, Don't panic.
SPEAKER_01: I'm with you.
SPEAKER_01: There's no need to fear, for I am your God.
SPEAKER_01: I'll give you strength, I'll help you, I'll hold you steady, and I will keep a firm grip on you.
SPEAKER_01: He causes us to stand, and in fact, he sustains all things.
SPEAKER_01: I had somebody come into my office this week and go, man, I'm gonna be out of my office, I'm gonna be out of my job, I'm gonna be doing this, I'm gonna be doing that, I'm gonna be going over here, I'm gonna be going over here, don't know how they're don't know how I'm gonna handle this, don't know how they're gonna handle this, not really sure what's up.
SPEAKER_01: And a couple things just started coming to my mind.
SPEAKER_01: The first one was this is that Colossians 1, 16 and 17.
SPEAKER_01: The things that he's done for us says this, Colossians 1, for by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, and all things were created through him and for him.
SPEAKER_01: And oh get this, he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
SPEAKER_01: When I was uh teaching on the sufficiency of Christ up in a Bible community a while back, maybe a year ago or so, I had the strongest guy in the room uh stand up before the class and take one chair and just hold it over their head.
SPEAKER_01: I said, just do that for as long as you can.
SPEAKER_01: And then I just started reading Colossians 1.
SPEAKER_01: And we got to this part where he says, and he holds all things together.
SPEAKER_01: I looked at that person, I said, How you doing?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I'm getting tougher.
SPEAKER_01: Big dude, strong dude.
SPEAKER_01: You'd know this guy.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, really strong guy.
SPEAKER_01: Definitely works out, not like me.
SPEAKER_01: Somebody asked me earlier, you've been working out, do you know me?
SPEAKER_01: I can't stand it, but thank you for asking.
SPEAKER_01: But this guy, he got to about three minutes, and then I just said, Dude, you're done.
SPEAKER_01: He was never gonna give up, but it was kind of going from here to one of these, it was getting lower and lower, and I was like, All right, we're done.
SPEAKER_01: That's about three minutes, and he couldn't hold one chair over his head for more than three minutes.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus sustains whatever chaos is in your life, whatever chaos is in my life, and everywhere else, and he holds it all together.
SPEAKER_01: Like a zip tie over the whole earth.
SPEAKER_01: Just holds it all together.
SPEAKER_01: These are the things that God says that he does for us, and it's no wonder that if that God welcomes me in, if that God welcomes you in, though I may differ in opinion, then goodness gracious, we can get along.
SPEAKER_01: We can do this, we can act like the family of God.
SPEAKER_01: The second reason why it's a godly thing to think of yourself in this context is because Jesus is Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Again, adding the comma Jesus is Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Not you.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is Lord, not me.
SPEAKER_01: And so let me just read verses five to nine, and what you'll find in this little section, five to nine, is that the word Lord is used seven times.
SPEAKER_01: He must be trying to tell us something.
SPEAKER_01: One person esteems one day as a better than the uh as better than the other, while another esteems all days alike.
SPEAKER_01: Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind, and the one who observes the day observes it in honor of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Since he gives, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.
SPEAKER_01: For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself.
SPEAKER_01: For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So then whether we live or die, or whether we die, we are the Lord's.
SPEAKER_01: For to this end Christ died and lived again that he might be the Lord, both of the dead and of the living.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is Lord.
SPEAKER_01: It is something that we say, it is much more difficult to live out.
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you what I mean and why I mean it, it's because the word Lord is kurios in the Greek.
SPEAKER_01: Curios, not curious.
SPEAKER_01: Curios, again, used seven times in that little section alone.
SPEAKER_01: And this is what it literally means in the Greek.
SPEAKER_01: The one who is in charge.
SPEAKER_01: The one who is in charge, and oh, by the way, by virtue of possession.
SPEAKER_01: He bought you.
SPEAKER_01: That's what 1 Corinthians would say.
SPEAKER_01: That he bought you with a price, you are not your own.
SPEAKER_01: Actually, that's exactly what verse 8 says, the end of verse 8.
SPEAKER_01: We are the Lord's.
SPEAKER_01: We are his possession.
SPEAKER_01: And so if he's in charge by virtue of possession, he owns us.
SPEAKER_01: It would go on to say, he is the one who is in authority.
SPEAKER_01: So it's no wonder and no question that Paul just got done in chapter 13.
SPEAKER_01: And chapter 13 is all about submission and authority.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden, he just brings it on home for all of us that don't know what to do in the gray areas of life that either judge one another or despise one another.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Oh, by the way, I'm Lord of that too, and I'm Lord of you two, and I'm in control.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm calling you to obey because you're my kid.
SPEAKER_01: It's no accident that he does that and builds that argument.
SPEAKER_01: What I love about the Bible and might frustrate some of us in this room is that God doesn't give a whole lot of prescriptions.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, there's black and there's white and there's do this and don't do that, but all those things that I just talked about, 21 or so things, he doesn't give us prescriptions.
SPEAKER_01: He says don't get drunk on wine, but he doesn't ever say don't drink.
SPEAKER_01: He certainly doesn't say anything about dancing.
SPEAKER_01: And yet we've made that like the ultimate thing in the Baptist faith.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, if there's one thing that people know about a Baptist faith, they don't know anything else about it.
SPEAKER_01: Well, you don't like uh drinking and you don't like dancing.
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing in there about all of that, and so uh I get a lot of emails.
SPEAKER_01: Actually, the last time I preached, um, I uh I guess I made a mistake, I'm not really sure.
SPEAKER_01: But somebody said, hey man, I'm not really sure about what you mean by uh genuine love is hateful.
SPEAKER_01: Help me out.
SPEAKER_01: Give me a text on that one.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, All right, well, yeah, you were here, you listened to it, and I saw all y'all's eyebrows rise up higher than mine can go in response to that first point, but that's okay.
SPEAKER_01: I think I still think it's relevant.
SPEAKER_01: But real, genuine love is hateful, and I said, All right, here's my deal.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not gonna answer your question.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, I want you to go back and I want you to read that section of scripture, Romans 12, 9 to 21.
SPEAKER_01: And I want you to tell me what you think that means, why I said it.
SPEAKER_01: And a couple days later, that person went back and they go, All right, I got it.
SPEAKER_01: Real love hates evil.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, baby, now we're talking.
SPEAKER_01: So if I was a prescriptive type of a person, I would go, well, real love hates evil.
SPEAKER_01: Just, yeah, it's right there.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 9, verse 21, done.
SPEAKER_01: But I think the way that the Bible engages us is at a heart level and a mind level, and he says, Hey, I want you to figure this out on your own.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to read the Bible, be convinced in your own mind, and then honor God with this.
SPEAKER_01: As a matter of fact, that's exactly what he says next.
SPEAKER_01: No matter where you shake out, there is a filter that Paul and God are telling all of us to kind of just lay over our lives.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe we can be less judgmental, maybe we can be less despising, uh, an intense criticism.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe we can be those people that we want to be if we just lay this filter over our checklist of everybody else doing right or wrong.
SPEAKER_01: And it's basically this: verse 5 says this one person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he says each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.
SPEAKER_01: So the filter that you and I can just lay over our minds.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, what does the Bible say?
SPEAKER_01: What does the Bible say on the matter?
SPEAKER_01: Number two, have I investigated or researched or looked into this enough to be fully convinced in my own mind, my mind, not your mind, mine.
SPEAKER_01: And then finally, the last piece of that is, now how can I honor Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: Be fully convinced in your own mind, verse 5 and verse 6 says, hey, whatever you do, it doesn't really matter.
SPEAKER_01: Just honor the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Whether you abstain, whether you eat, whether you do the Sabbath, whether you don't do the Sabbath, hey, honor the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And no matter if it's 1 Corinthians 10 or Colossians 3 or Romans 14, 1 Corinthians 10 says, So whether you eat, whether you drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: And speaking of doing things for the glory of God, a couple last Saturday or so, I went grocery shopping with my girls recently, and we're in the cart and we're all the way at the end of this beautiful box of groceries called H E B, and we get to the end of this thing, and there's a wall of cookie dough.
SPEAKER_01: Have you guys been over there?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it is like a whole deal of cookie dough, and I'm like, oh man.
SPEAKER_01: And my wife is very much not a checklist person and very much not a list person, and I am.
SPEAKER_01: Like, we go to the grocery store and she picks something off the shelf that's not on the list.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, hello, why did you not put this on the list?
SPEAKER_01: You did not think ahead far enough.
SPEAKER_01: This is not gonna happen today.
SPEAKER_01: And then I lose immediately.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but that's okay.
SPEAKER_01: And so we got to me and Reese and Ellie, and my my wife was not there this day, so I thought, hey, might as well just, you know, break my own rules.
SPEAKER_01: So Ellie looks at the cookie dough, she's like, You want to get some of that?
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, Do I want to get some of that?
SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: So we get some cookie dough and we bring it home.
SPEAKER_01: And you know what?
SPEAKER_01: They forgot about it.
SPEAKER_01: And a day later they forgot about it.
SPEAKER_01: And another day later they forgot about it, and it was disappearing somehow.
SPEAKER_01: Some magical person was going into our refrigerator and eating that cookie dough at a rapid pace.
SPEAKER_01: And it was me, and it was delicious.
SPEAKER_01: And I loved every I loved me some cookie dough.
SPEAKER_01: And y'all will come up to me afterwards and go, you know, you can get salmonella from the raw egg and that cookie.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: It's delicious.
SPEAKER_01: And so a couple days went by, a couple days went by, and here's my wicked heart.
SPEAKER_01: Speaking of not honoring the Lord, because I did not do it with my cookie dough incident.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I I all of a sudden a couple days went by and half of it was gone.
SPEAKER_01: Another day went by and I took it out of the package so that no one could recognize it and put it in the back.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna save the last.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saving the last for me.
SPEAKER_01: You don't get none.
SPEAKER_01: You haven't you haven't remembered by now, you ain't getting, you haven't deserved it.
SPEAKER_01: And so, yesterday, before I go to the grocery store again, Reese looks at me and she goes, Hey, where's the cookie dough?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, no, uh, you didn't suppose remember that.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, where's the cookie dough?
SPEAKER_01: I go, Reese, we're out.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you know this, but we ate it all.
SPEAKER_01: And because she's five, she bought it.
SPEAKER_01: And when she listens to this when she's 15, she's gonna doubt everything I've ever told her.
SPEAKER_01: But I got to the end and I just thought, man, honor of the Lord, whether you eat or drink, because I did not honor the Lord and some cookie dough this week.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't buy it yesterday, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: Just checks and balances and accountability.
SPEAKER_01: I really wanted to, but I didn't.
SPEAKER_01: But maybe that's a funny way that we just, okay, whatever we do, we just gotta honor the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what does the Bible say?
SPEAKER_01: What are we fully convinced of?
SPEAKER_01: And then how do we honor God with this?
SPEAKER_01: That was a funny example.
SPEAKER_01: Man, a one that hits home for me in the way that God's been just, mmm, mmm, you might want to pay attention to this to me all week long, and even this morning, was basically this.
SPEAKER_01: I I live underneath the illusion that God needs me to do his bidding.
SPEAKER_01: And and the way that that works out in my life is through my mouth.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and so, you know, recently, last couple of months, I called a friend out on something, and I just said, hey, I don't know about this, but I'll tell you what, let me, I got about four things for you here today.
SPEAKER_01: And he was just like, Okay, can you turn the fire hydrant off?
SPEAKER_01: And my friend is now an acquaintance, at least for a season.
SPEAKER_01: And the reality is, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Here's what the Lord's been telling me through all that.
SPEAKER_01: Why didn't that go better?
SPEAKER_01: What in the world?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what is going on here?
SPEAKER_01: It's because I I I basically just broke the golden rule.
SPEAKER_01: Not the golden rule that Jesus says, but the golden rule of friendship.
SPEAKER_01: And we can find that back in the Old Testament with Nathan and David.
SPEAKER_01: Guys, remember this?
SPEAKER_01: David has just gotten done with like Bathsheba gate and basically had her husband killed and committed adultery, and all of a sudden there's a guy named Nathan who's a prophet from God, and he confronts David, and David repents afterwards.
SPEAKER_01: But here's the part that we sometimes miss Nathan was sent from the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: I, however, probably was not.
SPEAKER_01: How many times do we get in a situation where we just go, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: I see it, so I must say something.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, God, you want to use me?
SPEAKER_01: This is easy, I got it.
SPEAKER_01: Nailed it, not nailed it.
SPEAKER_01: And so God's just been forming that in me all week long.
SPEAKER_01: And this is where it just punched me in the gut is when I read this.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, a commentator basically said this about this type of a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: How do we work this out in the gray areas of life?
SPEAKER_01: We kind of confront our friends or our acquaintances or whatever.
SPEAKER_01: He said this God cares about that mercy person's maturity much more than you do.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden, my knees got a little weak, and I thought, man, how I have put myself in the place of the one who must be God's instrument.
SPEAKER_01: And God is just going, uh yeah, maybe not.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe I can use somebody else.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe I can make or or maybe my spirit's in that person.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm the Lord of that person too, not just you.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe that's how it gets worked out.
SPEAKER_01: It's not just in cookie dough, but in how we relate with one another, how we say what we're saying to one another.
SPEAKER_01: And again, the Bible says many different things on this issue.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is Lord, not just over me, but over you, and I am not.
SPEAKER_01: Thank Jesus for that.
SPEAKER_01: The final reason why uh it is a godly thing to think of yourself is because Jesus is not just the Lord, but Jesus is the judge.
SPEAKER_01: And we might think the vat and go, oh, I'm not really comfortable with that.
SPEAKER_01: Gentle Jesus, I mean, he wasn't really judgmental when he was here.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not talking about being judgmental.
SPEAKER_01: He will give judgment to right or wrong, good or evil, of his son or of the devil.
SPEAKER_01: There's really not a lot of gray in that one.
SPEAKER_01: It's just the way it is throughout the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: And so he says this, because Jesus is judge, again, not me.
SPEAKER_01: Again, not you.
SPEAKER_01: And so verse 10 and 12 says this Why do you pass judgment on your brother?
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: Or you, why do you despise your brother?
SPEAKER_01: For we all stand before the judgment seat of God, for it is written, As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.
SPEAKER_01: So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.
SPEAKER_01: The entire reason that judgment of the stronger and despising of the weaker is prohibited by God is because we are not the judge.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus is.
SPEAKER_01: And so why is it that we kind of play that role so often in the church, so often in our families, so often with our friends and in our lives and in our coworkers?
SPEAKER_01: Because it puts us in charge.
SPEAKER_01: Number one.
SPEAKER_01: It elevates us to a higher position.
SPEAKER_01: It's on our timeline.
SPEAKER_01: Now I don't have to wait for Jesus to do it.
SPEAKER_01: I'll just go ahead and do it for him.
SPEAKER_01: No problem.
SPEAKER_01: You got it, buddy.
SPEAKER_01: It's all up to us.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, who we welcome at our table and the table of fellowship, it's all up to us, whether they're in or whether they're out.
SPEAKER_01: We make the call.
SPEAKER_01: It removes the hard work of self-awareness, removes the hard work of reflection, removes the hard work of repentance and confession.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden, we start to be really blinded by the own evil in our own hearts.
SPEAKER_01: That's why Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this in the cost of discipleship.
SPEAKER_01: He's going to turn basically about 110 this week if he was alive.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, at the age of 39, that's not so older than me, he was killed in a Nazi concentration camp for, among other reasons, living out his faith the best he knew how.
SPEAKER_01: And he said this about judging others and kind of living in this gray area where some people might differ in opinion than you.
SPEAKER_01: He said, judging others makes us blind.
SPEAKER_01: Whereas love is illuminating.
SPEAKER_01: Love tears back the darkness in our own heart.
SPEAKER_01: Judgment blinds us.
SPEAKER_01: He says, by judging others, we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as we are.
SPEAKER_01: See, a lot of us that struggle with despising other people or judging other people, we know we're entitled to grace.
SPEAKER_01: We just don't necessarily give that grace to others.
SPEAKER_01: Or, or better yet, acknowledge that God has given his grace to that other person.
SPEAKER_01: It's just no wonder that a guy by the name of Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book Cost of Discipleship, and certainly he knew something about that, who lived in a concentration camp.
SPEAKER_01: He knew something about judging and being blind and living in love so that the light of life could take over.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul would say basically this hey, Jesus is judge.
SPEAKER_01: It's real convenient for us to judge, but let me tell you, it just gets us nowhere.
SPEAKER_01: And here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because we're all gonna appear before the judgment seat of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And that word for judgment seat is bima.
SPEAKER_01: It's only used here and in 2 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_01: And basically, it's not talking about salvation.
SPEAKER_01: So this isn't talking about, well, if I don't do all the right things at the end of my life, and Jesus is gonna go, hey, 51% of the time you were evil, so you're out.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's not what's going on here.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, you are accepted.
SPEAKER_01: You're in the race, you've been qualified.
SPEAKER_01: All the things that he said, he's the Lord because he's gotten you.
SPEAKER_01: He's gonna uphold you, and he's gonna keep you steady.
SPEAKER_01: All those things are true.
SPEAKER_01: We're kids of Christ, and because that's true, now he's saying, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: There's a judgment seat, and we're all gonna face it.
SPEAKER_01: So he's not talking about salvation, but he is talking about what he desires to give us as a result of our obedience, as a result of our abiding in Christ, as a result of our faithfulness to him.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what 2 Corinthians 5, 10 says about the judgment seat.
SPEAKER_01: He says, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.
SPEAKER_01: And so it's no wonder that at the end of Romans 13, he basically says, Hey, I want you to shake off and put off the darkness and put on the light.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to live as children of the light and submit to the governing authorities.
SPEAKER_01: Because, oh, by the way, when we do that, we actually are submitting to Jesus as the governing authority of our own life.
SPEAKER_01: So this Bima, this judgment seat, is basically the seat that it reminds me of the Olympics, really.
SPEAKER_01: It's the officials' seat that kind of disqualifies or gives people the prize based on their race, based on how they run the race.
SPEAKER_01: Uh if you've been watching the Olympics at all, uh, and I'm uh I've realized this last week that I I don't know what it is, but the Winter Olympics don't nearly as excite me as the Summer Olympics.
SPEAKER_01: Uh figure skating doesn't do it for me.
SPEAKER_01: Uh nothing about it, but just for me, doesn't do it for me.
SPEAKER_01: Uh speed skating, I can watch.
SPEAKER_01: Moguls, I can definitely watch.
SPEAKER_01: However, my ACL hurts whenever I watch it.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know what that's about, but man, those girls last night going down the mountain, I'm like, okay, my knees are falling apart just watching this thing.
SPEAKER_01: Woo! But can you imagine someone getting to the starting line and they've been qualified, they're in the Olympics, they're doing this, that, and the other, and they get to the finals, uh, much like that girl last night, whomever it was, I forget her name, Carney was her last name.
SPEAKER_01: She gets the she's the last one up.
SPEAKER_01: She's got gold in front of her, she ends up getting bronze, but that's cool.
SPEAKER_01: And she gets in there, and all of a sudden, what if she got there and she's like, all right, ready, set, go?
SPEAKER_01: And she got off the mountain, she was like, woo-doo-doo.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, snow plowing, uh just kind of wandering around, not doing a whole lot.
SPEAKER_01: And then somebody goes, hey, what are you doing?
SPEAKER_01: You're in the race.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, my bad, I heard the guy go, but I just totally forgot about it.
SPEAKER_01: That's what happens in here.
SPEAKER_01: That's what happens in the church.
SPEAKER_01: Is that God has put you in the Olympics, God has put you in the race, God has put us on the starting line, and then said, now go.
SPEAKER_01: And we're like, okay, I don't know what that means, but woo, these moguls are kind of intimidating.
SPEAKER_01: I think I'll stay up here at the front.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden we forget that we're in this race.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus says, there will be a time when you stand before the judgment seat of Christ, and he's gonna go, yes to all this, no to all this, with a heart of grace, with a heart of compassion, with a heart that says Romans 8, 1, hey, there's no condemnation here.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not heaping guilt on you.
SPEAKER_01: Not at all.
SPEAKER_01: And here's really the point in this context.
SPEAKER_01: Not that that's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01: We know that's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01: There's other parts in the Bible that talks about that in uh in more length, specifically 2 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_01: But this is what he says in this particular context.
SPEAKER_01: He refocuses our attention that when God pulls us before him at the judgment seat, he's not gonna ask us what we think about what Bill did, or about what Christian did, or about what Carl did, or about what Robert did.
SPEAKER_01: He's not gonna ask us about those people.
SPEAKER_01: We might like him to, but he's not gonna ask us about those people.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, he's gonna ask him, he's gonna ask you about you.
SPEAKER_01: That's what it says in verse 12.
SPEAKER_01: So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.
SPEAKER_01: Himself, herself.
SPEAKER_01: So when I get there one day, Jesus is gonna go, hey, you remember that guy that was in your growth group?
SPEAKER_01: Hey, how do you think he's doing?
SPEAKER_01: Hey, remember that guy that you used to say hi to at church?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, y'all went to church forever.
SPEAKER_01: How do you think that guy's doing these days?
SPEAKER_01: How's he doing in the faith?
SPEAKER_01: Give me, just you know, give me your evaluation.
SPEAKER_01: He's not gonna do that.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, he's gonna see, I'm gonna stand before the God and King of the universe, the Lord, the He who's in charge, he who's purchased me, and he's gonna go, all right, now I want you to give an account for your life.
SPEAKER_01: I should have focused more on that, I guess.
SPEAKER_01: And not on what you were doing, and not on what you were doing or wasn't doing or what you believed and how it lived out, but on myself.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's what God is gonna ask me to give an account for.
SPEAKER_01: We see this all the time.
SPEAKER_01: If you've got kids, you see this.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, my kids, uh Reese's five and Ellie's three, and they're at the point now where all they do is argue.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, dude, okay, we had you kids like together so that you would like talk to each other and play with each other, and I don't know, just hang out and do whatever you're supposed to do and not bother me.
SPEAKER_01: That's what it's supposed to happen.
SPEAKER_01: But you don't do that.
SPEAKER_01: What is the problem?
SPEAKER_01: And so, Reese, just yesterday, we're in the we're I was in the kitchen, I think I don't know what I was doing, maybe doing the the dishes or the groceries or something, and she's in the living room, she goes, permanent marker, permanent marker.
SPEAKER_01: She's in the living room holding it up, going permanent marker, and I go, What are you doing?
SPEAKER_01: What is the problem?
SPEAKER_01: Permanent marker?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I see it.
SPEAKER_01: Ellie had a permanent marker.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't ask her how it got there, because I can guarantee you it wasn't Ellie.
SPEAKER_01: I said, How did what was Ellie doing with the permanent marker?
SPEAKER_01: What's the big deal?
SPEAKER_01: She goes, she was drawing on the post-it note right there, in that little square, like a three-year-old.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, who does that?
SPEAKER_01: So she's doing pretty good then, huh, Reese?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, give me the permanent marker.
SPEAKER_01: It's the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna get before the judgment seat of God and we're gonna go, permanent marker.
SPEAKER_01: Woo! And God's gonna go, what are you talking about?
SPEAKER_01: Why should I care about that right now?
SPEAKER_01: I'm talking about you.
SPEAKER_01: It's the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: So because all that's true, how does this, and this is the final question I'm gonna ask, and then we're done, believe it or not.
SPEAKER_01: How does this challenge you?
SPEAKER_01: How does this challenge me to refocus our attention?
SPEAKER_01: How does this how does this uh challenge us to with the space that's in our mind that we have carved out to carve up others, how can that energy be redeemed and used to honor God?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, we spend a lot of time and a lot of energy.
SPEAKER_01: If you did an inventory this week of what you thought about others, I wonder how that person is doing.
SPEAKER_01: That's good.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, that person's not doing so good.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, that person over here, they need a little help.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, that person, and not like in a helpful way, but in a judgmental or despising way, if you just did an inventory on that type of talk of this week, I wonder what you'd find as far as how much time you actually spend thinking about, exacting vengeance, getting back at that person, shooting an email over here, I'm gonna call that guy over there.
SPEAKER_01: How much time and energy do we focus on things that are just so beneath the foot of the cross?
SPEAKER_01: What would it do to your life if you refocused your attention that God's calling us to do basically a couple different things?
SPEAKER_01: Know what the Bible says, be fully convinced in your own mind, and then honor the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Not worried about what somebody else is doing, not worried about how they're living, just you.
SPEAKER_01: Live in community, live in the context of a Christian, uh, faithful church.
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01: And when necessary, spur one another on, encourage one another.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to disparage the one another of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, first, yourself, then someone else.
SPEAKER_01: With that, would you all stand with me?
SPEAKER_01: Let me speak a word of blessing over you.
SPEAKER_01: Hold your hands out like this.
SPEAKER_01: The God of the universe that holds all this together has invited you into his inner circle, into his family, and welcomed you again.
SPEAKER_01: Go now and welcome those that disagree.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.