The Forgotten Family

How can the church be like a family? Here are five characteristics.

Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash

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Transcript

The Forgotten Family

Good morning. If you've ever been to a hospital, chances are that you've had an EKG done. An EKG is when they put leads on your anterior chest  to find out the electrical conduction of the heart.  usually they put three leads or three stickers and they can see the electrical conduction of the heart, but sometimes they put six more stickers to see it even better.

Why do you need more leads or more stickers to see the heart ? Well, because one sticker is not enough. One lead is not enough. The more leads you have, the better you can see the heart. The heart is a complex organ. And just to see the entire electrical conduction in the heart system with one lead is not enough.

Similarly, when we look at God and we study about God, we need multiple images, multiple illustrations, to understand about God.   this is because God, is an infinite being and we are using finite illustrations. So God is seen as a father. He is seen as a husband. He's seen as a friend, he's seen as a creator, he is seen as a deliver and we use all these images to understand who God is.

Similarly, when we look at the church, which has its origins in God, the same thing happens. We need multiple images to understand what a church is. So church is seen as a body, it is seen as a family. It is seen as a community. It is seen as a bride.

 This morning in a summon entitled the forgotten family. I'm going to look at the church as a family.

 I'm going to point out five characteristics of the church as a family. 

1. Common Goal [00:01:53] The first one is what I'll call a common goal. Every family has common goals, unsaid probably, but unsaid, common goals. so for most families, it is, it is to keep the family honor and, avoid embarrassing the family and maintain the smooth running of the family.

 that's why kids cannot share whatever they hear at home.  So every person in that family does whatever they need to do to keep the common goal of the family. And this is an easy, common goal. Every church and institution should have a broad, common goal, which they need to follow and not having that broad common goal can derail the family.

Of course, we have broad goals, and we have focused goals.  What is the broad common goal in a church? What is a broad common goal in a Christian  institution?  it is to please God, and to bring him glory.  in Psalm chapter 34, verse three, it reads, glorify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name together.

The reason why the goal of every person, of every church, of every Christian institution is to please and glorify God is because that is God's goal for himself. So in Isaiah chapter 43:7, it reads everyone. Who's called by my name whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made. Romans 11:36 for from him and through him and for him are all things to him. Be the glory forever. Amen. 

Making anything else as the broad common goal will result in collapse because it is not lined up with God's goal. So if a family's goal is to maintain the family, It will collapse because the broad, common goal should be to honor God. If a church's broad common goal is to maintain the church or to please the leadership or to please the members or to please the culture, it will collapse because the broad common goal should be to please God, and honor God.  the first commandment  is love the Lord, your God. In Matthew 6:33, it reads, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. Once we seek God and we please him, then everything else fits into place.

 like the spokes in a wheel, once they are related well to the hub of the wheel, they relate to the wheel itself and to each other well. A common illustration that I like to use about goals is that of a soccer team. A soccer team has multiple positions, multiple players, but the broad, common goal of a soccer team is that by the end of the game, they have put in more goals into the opposing net then the opposing team has put into their net. So to make that happen, they dribble more, they pass more, they attack more, they defend more, they do whatever they need to do. But at the end of the day, at the end of the soccer season, There needs to be more goal in the opposite net, then the opposing team into their net.  so whatever disagreements they may have, whatever positions they may have, whatever importance of position they have. It doesn't matter. The broad, common goal is the main goal.

So we cannot lose sight of the broad, common goal. Once there is a broad, common goal, it brings together unity. In fact, one of the best ways to unite people is by putting them with a common goal. And that's why you can take a player from Argentina and a player from Brazil, which are traditionally opposing countries and bring them together to a European football team, for example. And  because they have a common goal, they will work well together. Also once there is a broad, common goal, it works with disagreements. If we have disagreements with people, as long as we keep our focus on that broad, common goal, we can keep our disagreements to one side and continue in the pursuit of that common goal.

Of course, when we have a broad, common goal, we also have multiple short term focused goals that should line up always with that broad common goal. 

2. Individual Responsibility [00:06:52] Secondly is individual responsibility. Each person in a family has a responsibility. So for example, in our family, my six year old son has a responsibility of when the dishwasher is done, his job is to take the clean spoons and forks and put them where they're supposed to be.

Every person has a responsibility. The younger you are the less your responsibilities, but the older you get, you pick up more and more responsibilities. Why should everyone have responsibilities in the family? Well, it's because some people can't do everything. It is better for everyone to do a little bit then for some people to do everything. 

It is also because some people in the family do certain tasks better than some others. So it's easier for the right people to do the right thing task. It is also important for ownership. Everybody gets ownership if they are all doing some responsibility, which has lined up to the broad common goal, and the same is true in the church.

Every person in the church should be given a responsibility. We need to make it a culture in our churches, that everybody has a responsibility. Why? Because there'll be more ownership. There'll be more desire for outcomes. There'll be more desire for growth. There'll be desire for improvement. And then there is also more efficiency because more people are now free to do the things that they want to do, or they're qualified to do as we shall see in a minute.

Also, it is very hard to be critical  and judgmental when you are part of the team, when you have a responsibility and you are working. It is much easier to find fault in a church when you have no part of it. Responsibilities of course are now skewed in this day and age with our virtual churches.  so we have to pick up new responsibilities that we did not have before 

many issues result from people staying as spectators.

In this soccer stadium there are no spectators. Everyone in the church should get in and should be playing the game. One of the biggest causes for inefficiency in a church is the option of being a spectator; is the option we give to people to be spectators in the church. Let me ask you a question. Are you part of a church and have not taken up any responsibility.

Why? If you do responsibilities in your home, why not do responsibilities at church? Let me ask you another question. Are you a leader in a church? If you are a leader in the church, are you giving enough responsibilities, enough tasks to people ofe very kind. Are you giving enough responsibilities to every person in the church?

There are two kinds of responsibilities. And I talked about this about 10 years ago in a sermon on evangelism. I think there are two kinds of responsibilities. 

First is what I call a gift. We all know what a gift is. A gift is what you are gifted to do, and people who are gifted to do, do all kinds of ministries in the church.

There are singers. There are musicians. There are instrumentalists. There are speakers. There are preachers. There are teachers, there are miracle workers. There are organizers, all kinds of gifts are used in the church. 

Then there is what I will call a role. A role is something that you are not gifted to do, but you still do it because a task is there.

Back when I was in India, we had a small church growing up. My dad was a pastor. We had kind of a home church and then we,  met at a building, but it was a very small church.   there was a need to teach Sunday school to the small kids. I was the only person available. So I taught Sunday school to these little kids for almost 10 years.

I didn't like it very much. I don't think the kids liked it very much, but  I did what I had to do. The good thing is I still maintain contacts with some of those kids, and it's good to see that they are still growing spiritually and they're staying in fellowship with God. That is a role when you do something that you are not gifted to do. 

Why should you take up a role?

Well, you take up a role because there are some tasks that don't have the right gifted person yet. And so if nobody takes it up, the task won't be done. So you take the task until the gifted person comes along, or you take up a role or a task because you haven't found a way to use your gift in the church.

until you find some gifts that you can use in the church, take up some roles rather than being a spectator and saying, well, I'm not a forward, so I'm not going to play this game. Pick up some role until you find something that you are gifted for. 

The other reason why we need to take up these tasks as roles is because then we can distribute all these tasks.

If one person does all the tasks and he's not gifted for it, it is very draining. It is true that when you do something that you're gifted for, you are energized by it. But when you do something that is a role, you are not energized by it. It actually drains you. So if some people are doing all the roles, they will be drained by the end of the day, by the end of the week.

So it is easier to distribute the roles so that  nobody is drained too much.

So every member has a responsibility to pick up gifts and to pick up roles. let's look at a example. In Acts 6:1-4. The context is that the young fledgling church at that time was growing rapidly and they had some growing pains.  some widows of one culture in the church was not getting fed like the other widows in that church.

 this is the problem that they had and they were addressing the problem. Let's read. Acts chapter six verses one through four. In those days, when the number of disciples was increasing the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebrew Jews, because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.

So the 12 gathered all the disciples together and said it would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and we'll give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.

You see what they were doing. They were redistributing some of the roles, so that gifts could be used. Nowhere here. Does it say that these seven men should have a previous experience in the food and hospitality  job? No, it doesn't say that. In fact, the only two things that says is that they need to be full of the spirit and wisdom.

So these seven men took on these roles. While the others were doing their gifts because if the other people also took on all these roles, nobody would be able to do their gifts.  this is in acts chapter six. In chapter eight, we find that one of the seven men had multiple gifts. Phillip had the gift of preaching and evangelism and miracles.

In fact, he was responsible directly for the gospel going to  Africa for the first time in acts chapter eight.  he had multiple gifts, but he took on the role as a server to serve the widows. It may be that you may have multiple gifts, but you don't know it yet. And so you pick up different roles as you are figuring out what your gifts are.

What if you made a comprehensive list. If you're a church leader or a institutional leader, what if you made a comprehensive list of every single task there is in the church. If it's a small church, if it's a bigger church, give responsibilities to the ministry team leaders to make a list of every task  in their field and give it to the church members and see how many people can pick up gifts and roles so that all the tasks can be distributed throughout the church.

 that will free each person to also do what they are gifted for. 

3. Rules and Freedom [00:17:14] Thirdly rules and freedom. Rules and freedom. Every institution has rules. Every home has rules. There are rules in our house. Some of the rules are no screen time unless you've done your homework and your home responsibilities. Or first dinner then dessert.

Obviously that rule is only for kids. Adults have earned the right to have dessert three times a day. And the kids, once they've grown up, once they've suffered through our parenting would have earned the right to do that as well. But for now the rules are first dinner, then dessert. 

Rules are important and necessary.

British photographer, Timothy Allen, best known for his work on BBC is human planet decided he wanted to explore something challenging. So he joined with the nomadic Nenets tribe in Siberia on their 800 kilometers Sojourn across the Siberian wilderness. And he walked with them in minus 45 degrees, Celsius weather for 16 days as he stayed outside with them.

 there were certain rules that they had, including drinking reindeer blood to survive the bitter cold. And he said that if they made one mistake, you could die in 10 minutes.

So rules are important and necessary, but  making rules has never been the problem. There are plenty of rules. In fact, the problem is that there are too many rules. The more rules we have, the more control we have. So those people who are in power, they prefer to make rules so that they can have more control of the people that they are overseeing.

 we need freedom. With the rules on one side, we need freedom on the other side. in the garden of Eden, God made Adam and Eve put them in the garden of Eden. They had only one rule and that rule was to not eat a certain tree. That's it. There was no other rule. They had complete freedom otherwise. 

Yes, you could argue that they hadn't sinned . And so therefore they did not need the rule, but as you read the Bible,  in the old Testament, there are a ton of rules that are manmade.  as you come to the new Testament, Jesus gets rid of a bunch of rules that were completely unnecessary.

 This is something that I'm personally working on in my family. I'm personally working on by trying to give more freedom to my family, to my kids. Because of my profession, because of my temperament. I am inclined to be managing and detail oriented.  rules are great, but too much micromanaging can be very constricting.

Lack of freedom can be miserable. Yes giving freedom is risky and there can be mistakes, but not having freedom will backfire both on the leader and is very miserable for the people that are under that leader. Some people err, on the side of having more rules, some people err on the side of having too much freedom.

So we need to strike a balance.  as long as we know that we need to stay in that center lane even if we go back and forth, we at least are aware that we need to intentionally give more freedom. One of the most important things  is to find out what the essential rules are. Only the essential rules are essential.

So the 613 rules of the Sabbath, Jesus took and condensed them into two rules. Love the Lordy our God. Love your neighbor as yourself. Once you know the rules that are absolutely necessary, then you can let go of the rules that are not absolutely necessary and give freedom.

4. irrational love and permanent disagreements. [00:21:42] Fourthly, what I will call irrational love and permanent disagreements.

Irrational love and permanent disagreements. Jesus was asked, what is the greatest commandment? And he responds this way in Matthew chapter 22, verse 37 to 38. Jesus replied, love the Lord, your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like, it love your neighbor. As yourself. 

So the first commandment is love the Lord, your God, with every faculty you have. And the second commandment is, love your neighbor as yourself. You see there's a third kind of love mentioned in this and that is self-love. But in this case, self-love is assumed Jesus assumes that you have self-love because everybody has self love.

I suggest that self-love is an irrational love. Self-love is an irrational love.

 C S Lewis in his book, mere Christianity on the chapter on forgiveness talks about self-love. Well, how exactly do I love myself? Now that I come to think of it. I have not exactly got a feeling of fondness or affection for myself.

And I do not even always enjoy my own society. Do I think well of myself, think myself a nice chap. Well, I'm afraid I sometimes do. And those are no doubt, my worst moments, but that is not why I love myself. In fact, it is the other way around. My self love makes me think myself. Nice. But thinking myself nice is not why I love myself in my most clear sighted moments.

Not only do I think myself, a nice man, but I know that I am a very nasty one. I can look at some of the things I have done with horror and loading, however much I liked, I might dislike my own cowardice or conceit or greed. I went on loving myself. They have, I've never been the slightest difficulty about it.

In fact, the very reason why I hated the things I did was that I loved the man that did it. Just because I loved myself. I was sorry to find that I was a sort of man who did those things. 

We tolerate ourselves and love ourselves way more than we tolerate anybody else and we love anybody else. Self-love I think is the most irrational love.

But right next to self-love, the next irrational love is family love.  I think family love is also an irrational love. Not as much as self-love. Let me give you a couple of examples. Our family is involved in drug and alcohol rehab, and we've done for the last almost two decades now.   we have people who come to our centers who have been on drugs or alcohol for 10, 20, 30 years, and their lives are completely messed up and now here they are. After the first few years of using drugs, a person's resources are kind of used up, but what happens after that is that their mother or their parents give them the money to go buy drugs. They know in their mind that that's not the right thing to do, but yet they cannot see their child suffer and so they enable that habit and that goes on until they have used up all their parents' money as well. You see, it is an irrational love. Let me give you another example. Let's say that your 18 year old son was driving his car for the first time. And in a lonely road, he accidentally hit somebody and the person died.

Your son comes back home and says, nobody knows about it. Nobody saw me. No matter what you think, what is your first instinct?  Is your first instinct to call the police on your son. That's the right thing to do, but usually the first instinct is to protect your son, right? There are many examples where family members protect criminals because of family love.

It is irrational, but family love is irrational. So when Jesus says, love your neighbor as yourself. Yes. We have self-love and it is irrational. We have family love. That is also irrational. It's all we need to do is love our neighbor, like our family and like ourselves, just in the irrational way that we love ourselves.

I'm not suggesting that you cover up crimes for your neighbor and church member and help them escape. Nope. That is not what I'm saying. 

If the church is a family, do we have an irrational love for the church members. Do we have that kind of an irrational love for our church members that we have have for ourselves or for our family?

On the other side of irrational love is disagreements. Do you have disagreements in your family? Of course you do. Every family has disagreements. in Luke chapter 22:24. It says, a dispute, also arose among them as to which of them was to be regarded as the greatest. And the Greek word for dispute is the word ready to argue.

These are the disciples that have left their families. They've come together. Now, this is their family. Who's the head of the family. The head of the family is the Prince of peace. And yet these disciples have disagreements, disputes and readiness to argue. I suggest that a family that has disagreements has a closer bond than a family that has no disagreements whatsoever.

Why? Because we are fallen human beings and as fallen human beings, we have our own idiosyncratic tendencies and our own individual quirks and the moment we come closer to somebody else, we have the tendency to annoy each other. That's just human. You just have to get close to anybody and you can be annoyed and annoy somebody else. It doesn't change whether we are believers or not. 

In fact, if you and your spouse are Christians, believers, growing, do you have disagreements? Of course you do. So it doesn't matter whether you're believers or not. The fact that we're human makes us have disagreements as we get closer to people. 

In fact, in our houses, you can have a disagreement that keeps recurring. Do you have a disagreement with your spouse where you had the disagreement and several months later, the same disagreement pops up and several months later, the same disagreement pops up. It's not like you had a disagreement, you came together, you understood each other's side and you agreed and now you are in agreement on that one topic.

No! you are in disagreement, you disagree and you move away and continue to disagree. So doesn't matter whether we are believers or not. If that is true, then we should allow for disagreements in the church. I suggest that a church family with disagreements is a closer church family, than one that has absolutely no disagreements.

Why? Because it shows a closer bond. I'm not suggesting that we go out and start fights with people that we don't like. We should allow for disagreements in the church because it shows a closer bond. And if we allow for disagreements in the church, then people won't think there's a problem when there's a disagreement.

Right now, we think everything has to be smooth and calm and quiet and a spirit filled peaceful life. And we don't allow for disagreements. So when something happens, people think there's a problem. And also by allowing for disagreements, We can learn to live together with the disagreement, just like we live together with disagreements in a family.   It may be so that the same disagreement may keep popping up again and again in the church between the same two people, just like it does in the family, but that's okay.

If we have talked about it. And if we have agreed that it's okay to disagree and continue to live. 

But both go together, irrational, love and disagreements go together. If we get close to people enough to have irrational love, then we will have disagreements. But if you are having disagreements only, but not irrational love, well, then there's some other problems.

5. Daily Adoption [00:31:43] fifthly is what I will call daily adoption. Some of you may be adopted. Some of you may have siblings that are adopted. You may have a family, that you know, somebody in your family is adopted a friend who's adopted. I have a friend who has four kids and  he and his wife were foster parents to another kid, two or three years old.

They were foster parents for two years, and then they adopted that child. So now they have five children. Let's say that you're planning to adopt a child. Adoption is messy. There's lots of waiting. There's lots of phone calls. There's lots of paperwork you need to fill out. It's a long, arduous, tedious process. Lots of people to contact, lots of hoops to jump through. And after you've jumped through all the hoops, now your child comes home. And finally, when the child comes home, is that the end of the story? No, that's just the beginning of the story, because now you see, they have to learn to live with each other.

There is a change of routine. There's a change of the status quo. The adopted child needs to learn how to live in this new family. It may be a new culture. It may be new language. The existing family needs to learn how to live with this new other person that was not a family before, but now they have to consider as a family.

 Similarly evangelism is messy. We forget that evangelism is messy and we are surprised by the mess in evangelism. We may have personal or cultural reasons that prevent us from doing or having evangelism in our churches.

And that's probably because it is messy. Let me give you an example. The church that I talked about that I grew up in, in our home church, back in India, we had the church for many years, and then we had this ministry among drug and alcohol addiction. Some of you see where I'm going with this.

On Sunday morning after we started the ministry with drug and alcohol addiction on Sunday morning, what happens? The former drug addicts and the former alcoholics now need to come to church to worship. So they do come to church to worship. Does that go smoothly? Absolutely not! The existing people. Some of them cause a problem because they didn't want drug addicts to mingle with their family. Evangelism is messy. Adoption is messy. Living together in a family situation with people that are, that were not your family before that is messy. And many times we forget that we ourselves were outside the family of God and we were adopted and we were brought in and we were accepted and we were made part of the family.  so Paul has to keep reminding us to remember that we were once sinners. So in Ephesians 2:13, it reads, but now in Christ, you who once were far away, have been brought near Ephesians 5:8 for you were once darkness, but now you are the light in the Lord.

Colossians one 22. 2122 for once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of evil behavior, but now he has reconciled you. It takes a while for things to become normal. Doesn't it? In an adopted family. When the new kid comes in, it takes a while for the two groups of people to learn, to adjust to each other.

And it may take many years. In some rare cases, it'll never get normal again.

Let me ask you a question. What if you adopted a child? And it's not normal. It takes a while for it to get normal. What if in your house you had a daily adoption, things would never get normal. Things would always be messy and things would never fit together. Being messy would be the new norm. Being imperfect would be the new norm in a house that has daily adoptions.

If the goal of the church is evangelism, it will never come to a place of being perfect.

A church that is truly fulfilling its mission and purpose will always be an imperfect church.

in a way, having a steady culture is a sign of spiritual decline and having a changing culture in church with imperfections and difficulties as the old family works with the new family, the old family accepts the adopted people, and that imperfection is a sign of spiritual growth. 

Three year old, Michael Brown found himself unable to be with his biological mother. So he was sent to a foster home at the age of 18 months. for his three years, he lived in three foster homes and he was destined, it seemed to live in foster homes for the rest of his life. But on December 20th, 2015, Tara Montgomery, the third foster parent decided to adopt him. As expected, he was ecstatic and a photograph of him at the courthouse where the adoption was settled, went viral.

There are many people outside our churches waiting to be adopted that need to be adopted into the family of God. 

There is a need for the church to be as a family. Let me give you two examples. One from the East one from the West. 

In the West, there is increased loneliness in spite of the social media and the portrayal that we have on social media, there is a deep seated need for fellowship. The increased individualism leads to increased loneliness in the West. In the East, the issue is that individual conversions from non-Christian families brings a need for family. And so whether you're in the East or the West, there is a need for family. And so secular  groups are creating this family system because of the need for family. So there are many clubs and groups of different kinds.

Almost any group can become a family if they choose to come together that way. Unfortunately, the church has forgotten that it needs to be a family and the love of the people within should be one of the attractions  in the world in which the church is. 

Let me end with the story. 

On April 22nd, 2008.

Two Marine infantry battalions were switching out in Ramadi Iraq. One battalion had just finished its combat tour and they getting ready to go back to the U S when the other one came for their seven month combat tour.  they would overlap for a few weeks in this one building in Ramadi.   there were 50 of them and in the same building, there were hundred other Iraqi, officers and policemen, and some other allies.  Two Marines, corporal Jonathan yield, 22 year old and Landscope road, Jordan Harker, 20 year old, one Marine from each of these battalions. We're given the task to watch together the entrance gate of this building, where these 150 army people were staying.

Jonathan Yale was a very poor kid  with mixed ethnicity from Virginia. He had a wife and a daughter, and he was very poor with his 23,000 yearly salary. He was supporting his sister and his mother who lived with him. Jordan hotter on the other hand was a middle class, Caucasian kid from long Island and these two could not be more opposite. They were from two companies, legally different worlds and their lives would never have crossed if it were not that they were both part of the Marines. Right. But here they were as one for the first time they are seeing each other because they are from. Two different battalions and their mission was to stand the post and let no unauthorized personnel or vehicle pass.

So they relieved two other Marines and took up the post at the entry control point of the joint security station Nasser in the Sophia section of Ramadi Al Anbar. Iraq.  A few meters behind them in the barracks are 150 people.

two hours later, a large blue truck. Turn the alley about 60, 70 yards and made its way through the barriers. Pass the 17 Jersey walls. And came to words, the gate where these two men with 10 Iraqi policemen were stationed, it stopped short of two Marines and exploded and killed them. Both catastrophic, only 24 brick houses were damaged or destroyed a mosque.

A hundred yards away was demolished the engine of the truck.  was kicked out because of the blast and fell a hundred meters away and destroyed a house. The blast was made of 2000 pounds of explosives. The next day in an interview, one of the Iraqi policemen said. No sane man would have done what those two Marines did.

A normal man would have turned and run away. They stood there and saved our lives. You see the security camera showed that it took exactly six seconds from the time the truck came onto the alleyway before it, Detonated. Six seconds. Those were the last six seconds of their young lives.

John Kelley, former commander of all U S and Iraqi forces said putting myself in their heads. I suppose it took one second to realize that this truck was dangerous. One second, no time to discuss with each other, no time to call their Sergeant get advice. Just enough time to remember what their task was left, no unauthorized personnel or vehicle pass.

They had five seconds left to live. They took another two seconds as they carried their weapons. Two came and opened up. In that time, the Iraq, the policemen fire, their achy 40 sevens. And as the truck was halfway down, the barriers they turned and started running. In fact, in these security cameras, you can see the Iraqi policemen run in the opposite direction, away from the truck.

While these two Marines were standing still, they have three seconds left to live. For the next two seconds, the Marines stand and fire continuously at the truck that was hurtling toward them. There was a lone suicide bomber inside the truck and they fired. Continuously their feet was spread apart wide and they did not back down.

They did not step away. They did not hesitate. They stood forward, leaned in and fired continuously. And there was one second left to live. The truck detonates, the security cameras go blank. And two young men go to meet their Baker,

  but by countering the force that came upon them, they prevented the deaths of 150 people behind them. Six seconds, not enough time to think about their desires, their dreams, their families, their country, their plans, their lives, or even their deaths, but enough time to stand there and do the duty that they promised and we're called to do.

  Ladies and gentlemen. But people outside, the people around us are too precious. Our time is too short for us do anything else but the task that is at hand,   my prayer is that we stand together and at any cost we do the calling that has been placed upon our lives and the reason for which we were joined together. Amen.