SPEAKER_00: It is the Lord's gracious goodness to give us the privilege to hear him speak to us through his word this morning.
SPEAKER_00: So I encourage you to take a Bible if you have one, or if you don't, there's one in the pew in front of you, and open it to the Gospel of John in chapter three, in order to listen to what our God says.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter three.
SPEAKER_00: We typically think of this passage as being about John the Baptist, but the real subject is the Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We don't know much about John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: We know he was Jesus' cousin, that he was born about six months prior to Jesus, and we know that he was an odd sort of fellow.
SPEAKER_00: He stayed away from the populated areas of Israel and lived the lifestyle of the poor, having clothes made of scratchy camel's hair, and eating a diet of organic locally caught insects.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad our diets have changed.
SPEAKER_00: We know that he preached out in the desert, but always near water because he baptized as they recognized their need to repent of their sin.
SPEAKER_00: We don't hear much from John the Baptist in the biblical record.
SPEAKER_00: What we do hear, though, is important to understand, and that is the case with the passage of Scripture before us this morning.
SPEAKER_00: It is the last time that John the Baptist appears in the Gospel of John, except for one brief reference to him by the Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So it's in this text that we get a glimpse of who John the Baptist really was.
SPEAKER_00: We see here what his purpose was, what his intentions were, and what really motivated him, what drove him as a God-fearing man.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's through him that we will get a glimpse into what our purpose ought to be, how we should form our intentions, and what ought to drive us.
SPEAKER_00: So if you have your Bible, I'm going to read John chapter 3, beginning in verse 22, and I'll continue through the end of the chapter.
SPEAKER_00: Again, that's John 3, verse 32.
SPEAKER_00: After this, Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing.
SPEAKER_00: John also was baptizing at Anon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized, for John had not yet been put in prison.
SPEAKER_00: Now a discussion arose between some of John's disciples and a Jew over purification.
SPEAKER_00: And they came to John and said to him, Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, that's Jesus, to whom you bore witness, look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.
SPEAKER_00: John answered, A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.
SPEAKER_00: You yourselves bear me witness that I said I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.
SPEAKER_00: The one who has the bride is the bridegroom.
SPEAKER_00: The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore this joy of mine is now complete.
SPEAKER_00: He must increase, but I must decrease.
SPEAKER_00: He who comes from above is above all.
SPEAKER_00: He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way.
SPEAKER_00: He who comes from heaven is above all.
SPEAKER_00: He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever does receive his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.
SPEAKER_00: For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure.
SPEAKER_00: The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: We need to remember a verse back in chapter one to be able to understand this passage properly.
SPEAKER_00: Back in John chapter one, verse twenty three, John was asked by some people who he was.
SPEAKER_00: And his answer was, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah has said.
SPEAKER_00: That's who John the Baptist was, and that was his mission.
SPEAKER_00: John has now prepared the way, the Lord has now come, and John will begin to fade out of the account and out of history.
SPEAKER_00: But it's in this portion of Scripture that we hear from John the Baptist about the supremacy of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: If we miss seeing the supremacy of Christ, we will have missed the entire point of this section of John's gospel.
SPEAKER_00: But in the midst of seeing the supremacy of Jesus, there are several challenging and convicting truths that ought to cause us to pause and to consider how important the Lord Jesus really is to us.
SPEAKER_00: To understand this, to get what's going on in this passage, we need to think about the background to this text.
SPEAKER_00: And it's pretty significant.
SPEAKER_00: You'll notice in verse 22 that it says, after this.
SPEAKER_00: And so we should then ask, after what?
SPEAKER_00: There's obviously a progression here, so we need to understand what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: And the background here is kind of bookended by Jesus' temptations on the one hand and John the Baptist's imprisonment on the other hand.
SPEAKER_00: So verses 22, 23, and 24 serve as a transition to a new location and a new time in the ministry of the Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So previous to this, Jesus was in Jerusalem during the Passover.
SPEAKER_00: That's where Jesus was when he had that nighttime discussion with Nicodemus.
SPEAKER_00: You remember the one where Jesus told him you must be born again, and he said, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.
SPEAKER_00: That's what comes before this.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was in the city of Jerusalem celebrating the Passover, and people were coming to him under cover of darkness, asking him about how to have eternal life.
SPEAKER_00: But now he has taken his disciples out of the city and has moved north out into the country, away from the populated areas, most likely to spots near the Jordan River.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where John the Baptist was.
SPEAKER_00: At a place called Anon near Salim.
SPEAKER_00: Don't ask me where that is, because we don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Archaeologists have a couple of pretty solid possibilities, but we can't be sure.
SPEAKER_00: We do know.
SPEAKER_00: We do know that it was a place with plenty of water because that's the point recorded here.
SPEAKER_00: But also because the term Anon means springs of water.
SPEAKER_00: Now, naturally, if you are John the Baptizer and your ministry consists of baptizing repentant people, you're going to be in a location with plenty of water.
SPEAKER_00: Both of the likely locations for Anon are near the Jordan River Valley.
SPEAKER_00: But they are in Samaritan territory.
SPEAKER_00: So Jesus is in Judea, but John wasn't far away in the area of the Samaritan villages, which, if you know John, John's gospel, is where Jesus will go next, where he meets the woman at the well, the Samaritan woman at the well.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus will go there, but now he is with his group and is baptizing, we are told.
SPEAKER_00: Now that's just a generalized statement because we know very specifically from chapter 4, verse 2, that Jesus himself didn't do any baptizing, but his disciples did.
SPEAKER_00: So they are ministering in a very similar way to the disciples of John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: And we should probably remember that some of Jesus' disciples were once John the Baptist disciples who left John to follow Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So this serves to move us from the city to the country and to identify what John and Jesus are doing.
SPEAKER_00: But John, the author, the Apostle John, knows that can be confusing.
SPEAKER_00: So he adds a statement in verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: For John had not yet been put in prison.
SPEAKER_00: Now that might not seem confusing to us, but what we need to know is that this particular account is not in the other three Gospels.
SPEAKER_00: It's not included there.
SPEAKER_00: And those other three Gospels have most likely already been written and put into circulation before John's Gospel was written.
SPEAKER_00: Mark, for sure, was already in circulation.
SPEAKER_00: So John wrote to clarify that what is happening here took place after Jesus' temptations, that's in the other gospels, but before John had been imprisoned and put to death.
SPEAKER_00: What that tells us is that Jesus was doing some ministry before the ministry work that's recorded in the other Gospels, which means this is very, very early in Jesus' ministry.
SPEAKER_00: Now there are some circumstances that took place here that prompted what we are about to consider.
SPEAKER_00: We're told here that a discussion arose between some of John the Baptist's disciples and a Jew, probably knowing the way John writes, most likely a Pharisee.
SPEAKER_00: And that discussion was over the issue of purification.
SPEAKER_00: Ceremonial purification was a common and important practice in Judaism.
SPEAKER_00: There were washings and purifications for many, many different purposes.
SPEAKER_00: There were also several different groups who had differing beliefs on what kinds of washings were necessary for this and for that.
SPEAKER_00: And so the fact that there was a discussion taking place is not all that surprising.
SPEAKER_00: But the word used for discussion here may indicate that the conversation got a little tense, a little bit heated.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's strange is that in verse 26, it shifts to John's disciples asking John the Baptist a question about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So on one hand, in one instance, they're having this heated argument with somebody about purification, and then they just turn around and start talking to their master, their leader, their teacher about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Why is that?
SPEAKER_00: We don't know.
SPEAKER_00: It may be that the previous heated discussion had to do with the differences between John's baptizing work and Jesus' baptizing work.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps the questioner was wondering why Jesus and John weren't working together?
SPEAKER_00: Why aren't you joining forces and having one group that works better together?
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps he was asking why all of John's disciples hadn't yet shifted their allegiance to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Why have some of you left John's baptism and now are going to work with Jesus baptizing?
SPEAKER_00: We don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever the discussions were about, the disciples of John the Baptist became irritated and upset.
SPEAKER_00: Not with the questioner.
SPEAKER_00: Not with the guy who asked them a question that turned it into a heated argument.
SPEAKER_00: No, they were upset with Jesus' success.
SPEAKER_00: Look at it.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 26 Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan to whom you bore witness, look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.
SPEAKER_00: John's disciples somehow have the impression that everyone is going to Jesus instead of John.
SPEAKER_00: Now we know that's not true because it says in the text that people were coming to John.
SPEAKER_00: But it appeared to them as if Jesus was getting all of the new people.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it was that their visitor convinced them that Jesus was stealing all the people from their ministry, and they were not the least bit happy about it.
SPEAKER_00: Now they recognize that John spoke of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And they know that John recognized Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
SPEAKER_00: But really, he has to get all the people.
SPEAKER_00: This may be the first recorded instance of ministry jealousy, but it certainly wasn't the last.
SPEAKER_00: Churches and pastors and ministry leaders can be tempted to look at what other churches and pastors are accomplishing and be jealous.
SPEAKER_00: We can all look at what God does through other people and be jealous of their effectiveness for the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If we're willing to admit it, we can all be jealous and covetous of what God gives to other people.
SPEAKER_00: We see the blessings, we see what appears to be the ease with which they live their lives.
SPEAKER_00: We see all the things that to us look better than anything that we have.
SPEAKER_00: And it starts to cause problems on the inside.
SPEAKER_00: John's disciples came to him complaining that Jesus had it better.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe they thought that they were there first and Jesus ought to cater to them.
SPEAKER_00: Who knows?
SPEAKER_00: What we do know is that their hearts were jealous and covetous and dissatisfied with where God had them at that moment in time because they were comparing themselves to someone else.
SPEAKER_00: And so their teacher, John the Baptist, responds.
SPEAKER_00: He says to them, Your view of yourself must be grounded in proper theology.
SPEAKER_00: It's true.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone has a theology, whether you realize it or not, and that theology relates to life.
SPEAKER_00: Your theology drives how you view life.
SPEAKER_00: But if that theology is off a little bit, or if it's twisted, or if it's faulty, then you will lead yourself into self-inflicted disappointment, discouragement, despair, frustration, jealousy, covetousness, and idolatry.
SPEAKER_00: John the Baptizer sets his disciples straight.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where we really need to begin to sit up and take notice.
SPEAKER_00: Because John the Baptist teaches his own disciples and us that we need to have a proper view of our place in this world.
SPEAKER_00: We need to have a biblical view of our place in this world.
SPEAKER_00: And that is, we need to recognize that God sovereignly and specifically gives everything that defines who we are.
SPEAKER_00: There is no human ability to receive anything without God Himself expressly giving it.
SPEAKER_00: Consider John's phrasing.
SPEAKER_00: Look at what he says in verse 27.
SPEAKER_00: A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to think about the parts to that.
SPEAKER_00: Cannot receive.
SPEAKER_00: Literally, John wrote, one is not able to receive.
SPEAKER_00: That is, there's no ability within us, we have no power to change what we have, who we are, or to modify our lives, to go in a different direction, or even to do what we are currently doing unless God Himself gives it.
SPEAKER_00: We have no inherent ability to do what?
SPEAKER_00: Even one thing.
SPEAKER_00: Can you get more specific?
SPEAKER_00: Can you get more detailed?
SPEAKER_00: You have no ability for even one itty bitty thing in your life without the sovereignty of God giving it to you.
SPEAKER_00: Unless it is given him.
SPEAKER_00: That tells us that we need to begin to see everything in life as being directly from the hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, John the Baptist has people coming to him because God has given it.
SPEAKER_00: If Jesus has more people coming to him, it's because God has given it.
SPEAKER_00: If Jesus has a better situation than John, and John has a worse situation, then it is because God has orchestrated it.
SPEAKER_00: You will find me running out the side door after the service.
SPEAKER_00: You will find many Christian and so-called Christian self-help gurus proclaiming to you that you have the power to change your own life.
SPEAKER_00: Preachers like Joel Osteen and Joyce Meyer and a host of others and self-help folks like Zig Ziggler like to preach that God wants you happy and full of life and that he empowers you to do it that way.
SPEAKER_00: All you have to do is to believe, to reach out and take what God has given you.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to look too long to find people that will be proclaiming that.
SPEAKER_00: But the problem with that kind of teaching is that it is false doctrine.
SPEAKER_00: And it is contrary to Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: God works in each of us differently, and his work is sovereign and specific.
SPEAKER_00: We cannot change our lives unless God has first determined to give us something.
SPEAKER_00: If you have a job, it is because God has given it.
SPEAKER_00: If you have a home, it is because God has given it.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't have a job, it is because God has not given it.
SPEAKER_00: If you do not have good health, it is because God has not given it.
SPEAKER_00: Who we are and what we have and our place in life is a direct result of God's good and gracious giving.
SPEAKER_00: And John the Baptist points this out to his followers.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I cannot have what God has not given me.
SPEAKER_00: He may give it to another, and that's okay.
SPEAKER_00: We see John resting in what God has appointed for him, even if it means less for him.
SPEAKER_00: Now notice what he does here.
SPEAKER_00: He begins to show his disciples that Jesus is supreme.
SPEAKER_00: God did not determine that John would be the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: He determined that Jesus would be the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: When we are challenged in life by what God has not given us, or by what he has given to others, we must tell ourselves the truth.
SPEAKER_00: Speak to yourself the truth, reminding yourself that God has a sovereign and good purpose in where he has you in that very moment.
SPEAKER_00: For John and his disciples, that meant that John was not the Messiah, but that he had been sent to go before the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: That he's not given to us.
SPEAKER_00: We may think and wish and hope and desire, but it may simply be that God has not given to us like he has given to others.
SPEAKER_00: And that can be hard.
SPEAKER_00: In those moments, we need to remind ourselves that God has a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what John is doing for his disciples.
SPEAKER_00: Reminding his disciples that God's purpose for him was to prepare the way for the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: And so when we are challenged in life by what we do not have, we must remind ourselves to rejoice in Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's what John does here by describing this image of a wedding.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Jesus is the groom, not me.
SPEAKER_00: John tells his disciples, because Jesus is the groom, it's my position to rejoice with great joy in who Jesus is and what Jesus is receiving as God works in his world.
SPEAKER_00: That orients our thinking.
SPEAKER_00: It orients our thinking in the proper direction.
SPEAKER_00: The world is not about me.
SPEAKER_00: But it is about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Even my own life is not about me.
SPEAKER_00: What God has given me is about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: What God has given me is to magnify Jesus, to fulfill God's purpose in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So when my perspective is right and my worldview is guided by proper theology, I can rejoice that God is doing his work to glorify Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus is glorified, my life is full, even if it means less for me or more difficult life circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: The friend of the bridegroom was similar to what we might call today the best man.
SPEAKER_00: And there are ancient regulations that suggest that the best man was forever barred from marrying the bride.
SPEAKER_00: Only the groom could have the bride.
SPEAKER_00: So if the wedding was called off for something, the best man was not allowed to swoop in and take the bride for himself.
SPEAKER_00: He was not allowed to do so.
SPEAKER_00: He was always limited in what he could have.
SPEAKER_00: John says, Jesus is the groom.
SPEAKER_00: He gets the bride.
SPEAKER_00: And even though I will never have the bride, I will rejoice that Christ gets the bride.
SPEAKER_00: In this way, we are reminded ourselves that Jesus is the groom.
SPEAKER_00: He gets the bride.
SPEAKER_00: It's our job to rejoice that he is magnified.
SPEAKER_00: Now let's be honest for a minute.
SPEAKER_00: Having the right theology and a proper worldview does not remove the sadness and the grief of not having something.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't take away the pain of having a rough life.
SPEAKER_00: Having the right belief does not keep away the temptation to have something more.
SPEAKER_00: But it does help us remember and it causes to grow in us a contentment that life is not about us.
SPEAKER_00: It is about what God is doing through Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, John says the focus of our life should be that Jesus increases.
SPEAKER_00: And I do not.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, he used a term that means that one.
SPEAKER_00: As though John was specifically pointing his finger at Jesus with emphasis.
SPEAKER_00: I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before that one.
SPEAKER_00: That one must increase.
SPEAKER_00: I must decrease.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, that one, is the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: That one is the groom.
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember this statement by John the Baptizer?
SPEAKER_00: He said, There is one coming after me whose sandals I am unworthy to untie.
SPEAKER_00: You remember that?
SPEAKER_00: John's ministry was on fire for a time.
SPEAKER_00: The perception by many was that the world, the entire world, was seeking out this weird man in the desert to enable them to be right with God.
SPEAKER_00: He was popular.
SPEAKER_00: He was the in thing.
SPEAKER_00: The authorities saw his popularity as some kind of threat to the status quo.
SPEAKER_00: But John understood that his purpose in life was to make much of Jesus and then fade away.
SPEAKER_00: Now none of us is John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to eat crickets.
SPEAKER_00: We don't have the express purpose in life that John carried because that was fulfilled.
SPEAKER_00: That was a one-time thing.
SPEAKER_00: Paving the way for Christ was done.
SPEAKER_00: But by God's grace, you are alive.
SPEAKER_00: And you are here in this world, in this place, at this time in world history.
SPEAKER_00: Everything about you is because of God's gracious giving.
SPEAKER_00: Now, obviously, you have many responsibilities in life.
SPEAKER_00: You need to make a living.
SPEAKER_00: You may have a family to care for, you have bills to pay, you have debts to cover, you have food to put on the table.
SPEAKER_00: You have a job to do, a position to fulfill in your family.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have an education to complete.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you are still young and you are still anticipating, looking forward to what you will do in the future.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever your place in life in this very moment, the challenge comes to each and every one of us from John the Baptist.
SPEAKER_00: Will you make more of yourself or more of Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: In the time given to you on this earth, will you do everything you can to increase your own wealth, your own influence, your own position, your own family?
SPEAKER_00: Or will your priority in life be to make much of Jesus, even if it means less for me?
SPEAKER_00: Now please understand, this is not primarily about amounts or positions or places.
SPEAKER_00: It's about priorities.
SPEAKER_00: There is a king ruling over this world, and it's not Donald Trump or any other world ruler.
SPEAKER_00: There is a Lord over this world, and it is not you.
SPEAKER_00: There is a savior over this world, and it is not government.
SPEAKER_00: There is someone greater, more glorious, and grander than you or me.
SPEAKER_00: And yet the way we live our lives so often is to make more of ourselves than we do of him.
SPEAKER_00: The way of churches is to make much of people or of programs of offerings instead of making much of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: John points his disciples to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He must increase, but I must decrease.
SPEAKER_00: Now from here, John goes on in the rest of the chapter to talk spatially.
SPEAKER_00: That is, he pictures something from above versus something that's from earth.
SPEAKER_00: And he's contrasting himself with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Jesus is from above, I am from the earth.
SPEAKER_00: I speak in an earthly way, he who comes from heaven is above all.
SPEAKER_00: And in this, in this section here from verse 31 to verse 36, he talks about two witnesses.
SPEAKER_00: There are two witnesses that are giving testimony.
SPEAKER_00: One of them is John the Baptist, the other is Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Both of them speak of God's promised work in the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: Both witnesses point to Jesus as the promised one, the only Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so we read in verse 31 he who comes from above is above all.
SPEAKER_00: He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way.
SPEAKER_00: He who comes from heaven is above all.
SPEAKER_00: There's some emphasis here, verse 31.
SPEAKER_00: It literally starts out the coming one.
SPEAKER_00: The coming one is above all and is from above.
SPEAKER_00: Translation?
SPEAKER_00: We are not from above.
SPEAKER_00: And we are not above all.
SPEAKER_00: We are not the priority.
SPEAKER_00: We are not the creator.
SPEAKER_00: We are the created.
SPEAKER_00: And so in order to have a proper view of life and a proper view of Jesus, we must have a proper view of ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: We are earthly.
SPEAKER_00: That's so exciting.
SPEAKER_00: Yet no one receives his testimony.
SPEAKER_00: John says, You see all those people going to Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: There's very few of them that are actually believing in him.
SPEAKER_00: Most do not listen to Jesus, but there are some who do.
SPEAKER_00: Those who truly hear Jesus in a believing way recognize the truth of Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: They recognize the truth of Jesus and the truth of eternal life in him.
SPEAKER_00: But those who do not come to Jesus remain in their condemnation.
SPEAKER_00: John says, God's wrath remains on them, and there's no escape.
SPEAKER_00: There's no escape.
SPEAKER_00: In his other book, Revelation, he saw the glorified Lord Jesus, and he records that in chapter 1.
SPEAKER_00: The conclusion of that vision is appropriate for us to consider.
SPEAKER_00: John says, after describing this vision of the exalted, glorified Christ, he says, When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.
SPEAKER_00: I fell at his feet as though dead.
SPEAKER_00: A time will come when every human being will come face to face with the risen Lord, and that will be the response of everyone who's ever lived.
SPEAKER_00: In that moment, all who have made much of Jesus will not regret it.
SPEAKER_00: Will that be you?
SPEAKER_00: Will that be the legacy of our church?
SPEAKER_00: Will it be said of you and of me?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus increased and we decreased.
SPEAKER_00: Will it be said of our church that they made much of Christ while they faded away?
SPEAKER_00: It should be our prayer that we make much of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We ought to be driven to see him increase while we might fade away.
SPEAKER_00: May that be true.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: Our Lord Jesus, we come and we bow before you, recognizing that we often make more of ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: Grant us humility that we might make more of you.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, when all is said and done, when the day comes when you take us home, may we rejoice and be satisfied because we made much of you.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Would you stand with me as we sing together?