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So uh it's almost summer. Summer's almost here. My kids finished up school, and uh some of your kids are starting to finish up school this next week. Parents are excited but nervous, right? It's like, good, they're done with school. Oh, they're done with school. Uh uh. So what are we gonna do, right? Uh anybody gonna make a road trip? Have you travel plans? Vacations planned? Nobody? Few people? Okay, a few people. There we go. Okay, good deal. I see, yeah, there you go. Uh so I I'm guessing that in this room, some of you are planners, and some of you are just along for the ride. Right? Uh, how many of you are the planners? You like to make an itinerary, like to have everything figured out, you know exactly what to do. Or how many of you like to let somebody else do that and just be along for the ride? That's good. It's about 50-50. That's what I expected. So uh I I like kind of being along for the ride. In some ways I'm spontaneous, but when it comes to like planning a trip like that, uh I really get into it. I like searching for the like, you know, the best deals on plane flights. And so I'm looking at kayak and hipmunk and I'm going through all these different sites. Like, some somebody's gonna give me $5 cheaper, $10 cheaper, right? I'm like fighting for this the best flight price. Uh, I'm looking at all the details, I'm gonna figure it all out. Uh, but then once I'm there, I just want to like be spontaneous and just enjoy the process, right? Uh, but but planning is part of uh having a good trip, uh, typically. It's important that you plan it out, think through some of that. And some of you guys like that. Others again, you know, it's like, okay, I'm good. I don't have to do that. What's interesting about the section of Philippians that we're in today is that Paul's gonna give us a little bit of itinerary. Uh, it's kind of in a weird place because we've been right in the middle of the book of Philippians, uh, where he's been teaching us these great truths about who Jesus is and how we should live our lives worthy of the gospel we have received. And now he's gonna just put this itinerary sort of in there, and he's gonna talk about two of his good ministry friends and partners, uh, Timothy and Epaphroditus. So we're gonna read this section together from Philippians chapter two. And if you haven't been with us, we're working our way through the book of Philippians, verse by verse, and asking God to teach us through that. The hope is that, on the one hand, um, you will personally engage with scripture daily. Like we don't want you to come just on Sunday and read the Bible and go, okay, I've got my Bible reading for the week. So in our worship guide that was handed out to you, there's a reading guide there. You can read some scripture daily, it goes along with what we're teaching on Sunday. We invite you to continue to participate in the Sunday gatherings. We obviously want you to be here, but we also want you to every day know that you can hear from God. You can read his word, you can he can speak into your life. There's also a scripture for memory that's there. We we put that in there for you guys and encourage you to put the to uh maybe even do that with your kids. Memorize these verses with your kids. I know a couple families that have. Uh, and so we want to continue to learn uh the scripture. It's not that we worship scripture, but we do learn about God who is in scripture, the God who wrote scripture, and it was written directly to us uh by men uh like Paul, who God inspired to write, so that we can learn more about who God is, who we are, and how we should live. Okay? So we're in the middle of this letter that Paul's written to the people at Philippi, and he has said some phenomenal things to them, especially the first uh part of chapter two, which we're currently in chapter two, where he's called them to live a very different kind of life, a life of humble uh ambition, which almost seems like an oxymoron. Uh humility mixed with ambition. But he says you should be humble in your ambition, not selfish in your ambition, and you should look to not not only your own interests but the interests of others. And then he said that we should stand out like uh like stars shining in the darkness. So Harley last week taught a little bit on that and how that when we follow Jesus, our lives will stand out in contrast to the culture around us. Not that we are the moral police of the culture, because that's silliness for us to go around and tell people who don't believe in Jesus how to behave, right? Because they need Jesus. That's what they need. Just like I need Jesus. That's what changes us from the inside out. But we are to be different. Our lives should look different. We should value things differently, we should parent differently, our marriages should be different, and those should be stark contrast to the world in which we live. But now we're gonna get to a section where, as I said, Paul's gonna give us a little bit of an itinerary and tell us about two of these buddies, uh, Timothy and Epaphroditus. So if you guys would read along with me, verse 19 and chapter 2. Here it goes. Now I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I may also be encouraged when I hear the news about you. For I have no one else like-minded who will genuinely care about your interests. All seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. But you know his proven character, because he has served with me in the gospel ministry, like a son with a father. Therefore, I hope to send him as soon as I see how things go with me. I am convinced in the Lord that I myself will also come quickly. But I considered it necessary to send you Epaphroditus, my brother, co-worker, fellow soldier, as well as your messenger and minister to my need, since he has been longing for all of you, and was distressed because you heard that he was sick. Indeed, he was so sick that he nearly died. However, God had mercy on him, and not only on him, but also on me, so that I would not have one grief on top of another. For this reason, I am very eager to send him to you, so that you re you may rejoice when you see him again, and I may be less anxious. Therefore, welcome him in the Lord with all with joy, and hold men like him in honor, because he came close to death for the work of Christ, risking his life to make up what was lacking in your ministry to me. Alright. So, two big ideas I want to pull out of this text today, okay? The first idea is this idea, again, that planning is a big deal. It's an important part of our life. And the second part is that the friends that we do life with, the partners in life that we have, is an important part. In fact, in your in your worship guide there, as you're going along, the first thing I want to say to us is that two things that deeply impact our daily lives are how we make plans and the friends that we have. You agree? Uh the Bible tells us this all the time: how we make plans and the relationships, the friendships that we have will deeply influence our everyday lives, how they go. I see this to be very true in my own life. Umy, many times I make plans, those plans don't work out, and I'm frustrated. Right? That's part of the plan-making process and just experiencing life happening. I also know that in my life personally, I've got friends who really help me get through hardship, help me get through difficulty, help me uh just process this thing called life. That when the life plans get outside the rails that I want them to be, I've got friends that are there to help me, to encourage me, to pray for me, to support me. And I hope you do too. Paul had them, and we need them. All right? So let's look at a couple things that are here. First, Paul. Notice in verse 19, he says this. It's pretty significant. Maybe we just jump over it pretty quick, but he says, I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon. And then going down to verse 23, he says this. He says, Therefore I hope to send him, this is Timothy, as soon as I see how things go with me, I am convinced in the Lord that I myself will also come quickly. I want you to notice how Paul plans. And this is a perfect example of how we should plan in our life. Paul plans with confidence and humility. Both confidence and humility. And when I say confidence, I'm not talking about confidence in himself, but confidence in God. Confidence in who God is, and confidence in God's sovereignty, confidence in the fact that we know God loves us. Paul was confident that God loved him, cared about him, and it was for his good. And so Paul would plan with confidence. Now remember, this is Paul who's writing from uh from jail. Under house arrest, being uh basically chained up to an elite guard in the Roman Empire. Okay, so he's there in this position, and he's writing with a very confident spirit that God is good and that God is for his good. And so he he plans this and he says, I hope to send Timothy to you soon, but he says, I submit this in the name of Jesus Christ. So he not only has confidence in God's goodness, but he also has an awareness that he doesn't get to call the shots. He's not in control. Now, I don't know about you guys, but there's a lot of times I want to be in control, like every minute of every day. Um, and and I fight God on who's in charge. I fight God on who's in control. And so as a result of that, rather than being peaceful about my plans, I'm always anxious and uptight and worried. You know why? Because I think God's gonna get it wrong. You ever been there? I think God's gonna actually get my plans wrong. You see, here's the deal God has a way of making sure that we know we're not in control because control is an illusion. It's a mirage, right? It's a figment of our imagination. We don't really have as much control as we would like to think we have. I know this as a parent, right? There's so many things in my life as a parent where I think I've got control. I mean, let's be honest, we're the land of the padded life for the little kids. We want to make sure that we protect them, and that's okay. It's like okay to want to protect our kids, but you realize pretty fast you can't protect them from everything, right? I mean, as much as you try to protect them, they end up falling and hurting themselves. Now, with the first kid, this is really evident as a parent. Because, like, man, you're like, you're doing everything, right? This is when you still boil the passy when they drop it on the floor, right? Like, you do everything to protect their life, to make it good, to make it easy, to guard them. And then, you know, they still bust their head open and get stitches, and you're like, Man, I was doing everything. You know, I had they had a helmet on, right? And it's like it's still hurting themselves. Because the truth is that you can't pad life and protect from everything that's gonna happen. That's just not how life works. Things happen outside of our control. Even this week, some things happened with one of our sons. It's like, what could we do? Like, we just couldn't even control the situation that was going on. And we just have to say, God, all right, we trust you. We we pray over our kids all the time, and we remind ourselves that they're his ultimately. We're just stewards and that we're gonna do our best to be a parent to them, to love them, to serve them, to care for them, but they're in his hands. And that that brings that brings confidence and it brings a sense of humility, a sense of dependency on God, a sense of awareness that I don't have everything in my nice, neat little box that like I'd want it to be in. And so many people get anxious over the future, they get anxious over these different things that could happen, the possibilities. And, you know, listen, as a believer, we should live differently. We don't have to live in anxiety because we know who holds our future. And so we can have a hope. And whenever the Bible talks about hope, I hope you guys know this. That's pretty funny. Uh I hope you know about hope, right? Um that when the Bible talks about hope, it's not talking about hope and possibilities, it's talking about hope in promises. Hope in promises that are that come from the mouth of a God who has always kept his promises, who's always faithful. And so Paul has that kind of hope. He has that kind of belief that God is a God who is good and he keeps his promises, and so he can rest in that. And he has confidence and he has humility. Listen to this verse from Proverbs 16, verse 9. It's a verse that I come back to every time I have to make a big decision in life. It's a verse that I really rest in. It's a verse that I really rely on, even as we as the leadership of this church pray for God's desire and his plan. Uh, we we really come back to this verse regularly. It says this a man's heart plans his way, but the Lord determines his steps. That's good, isn't it? A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord determines his steps. We know that God has a plan and that his plan will be accomplished. In fact, the Bible tells us that his plans won't be thwarted. His agenda is gonna be accomplished. And my guess is his agenda probably is gonna look different than ours, which is where we kind of get confused and frustrated and angry and bitter, and we struggle sometimes because God's plan looks different than our plan. I'm just being honest about my own life, right in that. In James chapter 4, verse 13 through 15, it says something I think that's very profound. This is James, Jesus' half-brother. He's the pastor in Jerusalem. And as to his church, he says this. He says, Come now, you who say today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a through uh spend a year there and do business and make a profit. You don't even know what tomorrow will bring, what your life will be, for you are like smoke that appears for a little while, then vanishes. Instead, you should say, If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or do that. Now I had a guy in my life when I was early in ministry, and I would say stuff, and he'd go, if the Lord wills, and I'm like, Quit telling me that, right? Stop it, Holy Spirit. You want to try to be like the convictor in my life? He was trying to make a point, you don't know. And the truth is we don't know. But we should pray always with the sense of God, if it's your will, then let it be done. We'll trust and we'll walk in your will, right? If the Lord wills. So we can make plans. It's good to make plans, and all the planners said, Amen, right? You're like, yes, we need to make plans. You can't just go by the seat of your pants every day. But from the time you wake up in the morning or the Monday morning when you set your week, we always start where? We start in prayer. When you make plans, you make plans from a place of prayer on your knees. That's the best place to make your plans from. To be a prayerful process where we seek God's wisdom and we follow his lead. Planning for us as believers is a prayerful process. Man, how I wish I would learn this sooner. And I wish I would, there's still days where I just kind of move on. You see, the reason I don't start in prayer is because I'm too self-reliant. I'm too independent of God. I'd like, God, I got this. I've done this before, I know what this needs to look like. Just let me do my thing. And then I kind of wake up and realize maybe God had a better plan. Maybe his agenda was better than my agenda. Maybe he sees things I don't see. Maybe he's smarter than maybe. Maybe, right? You see, we we start in prayer where we really get in tune with God. Prayer is not just this religious activity we do, it's a relationship with Jesus. It's a conversation with God. It's a conversation with our Heavenly Father who loves us and cares about us and who knows better what we should do. And I believe that when you pray and you see God's face, even if he's somewhat silent, you don't hear anything. Proverbs 16, 3 says this. It says, Commit your plans to the Lord and they will succeed. Commit your plans to the Lord, they will succeed. The weight is off our shoulders, the weight is on God's. And he can bear it. Right? That's a good place to be. On our knees, on our faces, giving it over to God, committing our plans to him. You know, some of you guys know the story of Point Community Church. Some of you may not, because you're new. Uh, maybe you're even a guest today. My family and I, and uh some other families moved to South Austin back in 2012 to plant a church. And we had a 12-page document that I handed to many people and shared with them. Here's what the plan is. We feel like God's called us to this. I had prayed over that plan. I'd spent many hours reading, processing, talking with people, interviewing other church planters. Had this brilliant plan. It was amazing. Let me see, it was awesome. It was the best plan ever for planting a church. Okay, just kidding. Humility, right? It was a it was this plan, and so I'd sit there and I would say, but here's what I would always say at the end of the conversation. I'm not joking. I'd say at the end of the conversation, in about six months, I'm probably gonna throw this plan in the trash can and say that's the dumbest plan I've ever read. Right? And now that might seem odd, might seem silly, but here's why. Because I knew that even though I could make a plan, God just doesn't work always in our plan. But if I didn't have a plan, nobody was gonna support us. And so they wanted to know we had a plan. And we had prayed through that plan, and we submitted that plan to some elders, some leaders, and they gave us good feedback, right? And the truth of the matter is, is that in many ways, I look at it now and I'm like, that's a silly plan. Look at what God did. Like as in about two years ago, two and a half years ago now, we were doing our thing, and we had told our team we would never have a building. We would always be nomadic, we would probably be in some either uh some either shopping space or in a school. We were gonna partner with schools, and that's what we were gonna do. And this guy named Josue, we sit down over breakfast and he says, Hey, listen, I'd like to be a part of what you guys are doing. How can we work together? How can we partner? And I'm like, that's not in my plan. How does that supposed to work? That isn't that there's nowhere in that 12-page document does it say that somebody's gonna ask me if we can like work together and they have a facility and they have land. That does not in my plan. It took me three months to get there, right? Three months of praying, processing with our elders, asking God for his will to be done until we finally realize, yes, God's plan is that we're supposed to come together and be one church. Listen, my plans are not always God's plans. Your plans are not always God's plans. But you know what we can do? We can always come with a trusting heart and an open hand. God, we trust you that you know better than we do. Our hands are open, so if you want to lead us somewhere else, God, if you want to deter, you do with that. We're with you. Because we'd rather be with you, like Moses said. If you're not going, I'm not going, God. But if you're going, I'm going. And that's the kind of people we want to be. And Paul was that kind of person. Paul was that kind of man. And he teaches us that we need to be a per people who are prayerful. We seek God's wisdom and counsel from other believers, from his word, and just from simply sitting in his presence and waiting. That's a good place to be when we plan. Now, some of us are like, you got it planned out when you're gonna get married, you got it got it planned out that at the 27th month of your marriage, you're gonna have your first kid, you got it planned out, you're gonna have this job at this point, and this thing at this point. Listen, God has a way of obliterating those things to remind us that he is in control and he's good, okay? So don't be surprised when your plans don't work out the way you think they should. But also know that he is for you. He's not against you, he's for you. He knows what's better for you and for me. All right. Not only did Paul have uh planning, but as I told you, he talks about two friends in here. And I think these are significant relationships for Paul for obvious reasons. They were partners in the ministry, the mission that he'd been given. And in the text, he talks first about his brother Timothy. Now, if you guys know anything about Paul and Timothy, this is a really, really cool relationship, significant relationship. He even says here it's like a father and a son. But Timothy is Paul's protege. He's his young pad one, right? And so he is basically investing into him, he's pouring into him, and he writes a couple letters later on in the New Testament, 1 Timothy and 2 Timothy, to this young Timothy and trying to encourage him and to build him up and to instruct him on what it means to be a good pastor, a good leader of God's church, God's people. And so we see there in this text that he says about Timothy. He says, I'm just gonna reread verse 19. Now I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I may also be encouraged when I hear the news about you. So Timothy's gonna go, he's gonna get kind of an update on what's going on in Philippi, and he's gonna bring that message back to Paul, and Paul's gonna be excited about that message. That's kind of what he's he's saying here, right? He says, For I have no one else like-minded who will genuinely care about your interests. All seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. I'd love for someone to say that about me. What a great word from Paul about Timothy. Paul is saying about Timothy that Timothy is a very humble, selfless person. Now, where have those same words been seen in this book before? In this letter? Well, just above, Paul said, do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others better than yourselves, right? Look not only to your own interests, but to the interests of others. And now he's saying that Timothy is that kind of guy. Timothy is a man of compassion. He is a selfless, compassionate servant, and he has a like-mindedness to Paul. And who's Paul trying to be like-minded? Jesus. So you see, Jesus is our example. Paul is showing an example, he's discipling Timothy, and he's reproducing that in Timothy. Paul's got this like-mindedness with Timothy. Timothy's got this like-mindedness with Paul. And so Paul feels totally confident sending Timothy because he knows Timothy's this kind of guy who's mature, who is walking with Jesus, who genuinely cares about these people. Now, there is part of this conversation that's important, and that is that we mentioned earlier in chapter 1 of Philippians that some of the folks back in Philippi, uh, there had been a little bit of an uprising, there had been a little bit of an unsettling. Even though Paul's not writing this letter to reprimand them or to correct them on some major theological issues, he is trying to remind them that some of these leaders that had risen up were saying bad things about Paul and bad things about Timothy. And so he's telling them, hey, no, Timothy cares about you. Timothy is legit. You can follow him, you can look at his life, he is a great guy. Okay? And so he's building a case for why they should listen to Timothy when he comes. And so the first thing, like I said, that we see out of Paul's friends is that they display compassion. Timothy displays compassion for them. He cares about them, he cares enough to go to them. The second thing we notice is that it says that Timothy was a man of character. We need friends that have character. And we need to be friends with character, right? We want to be the kind of friends, the kind of ministry partners that have character, and we need those kind of people around us in our lives if we're gonna accomplish the work that God has called us to. Notice what it says. It says in verse 22, but you know his proven character, because he has served with me and the gospel minister, a gospel ministry like a son with a father. Hopefully, when people watch your life over time, they go, man, that person has character. They're the same person at home as they are at work, as they are in the park playing with their kids, as they are driving down the road in traffic. Right? Wherever we are, we should be the same person. We don't change based on our situation, our circumstances, the groups of people that we're around. But we're the same people. That's character, right? Who you are when no one else is looking. I heard a story this week about a young man who was in college, and there was another guy who was an atheist, and he came and he said, Hey, listen, I have no real reason to believe in God, except for the fact that when I look at your life, there's something different about you that stands out. Everywhere you are, you're consistently the same person, and you seem to be putting your trust in something other than yourself. And his character was so strong, this young man's character was so strong that this other atheist comes to him and says, What is different about you? Oh, that people would come to us and say, Man, what is different about you? You look so different from us. This goes back to last week's message, right? That our lives would stand out because we're people of character. Timothy was this kind of friend. He was this kind of man of character. And Paul says, You guys need to know he is he's legit. He is the real deal. You can trust what he's gonna say to you, what he's gonna speak to you. He's a messenger on my behalf. I have been like a father to him, and you can trust him. Therefore, I hope to send him to you as soon as I see how things go with me. So Timothy was that kind of guy. He was humble. He had proved himself faithful over time to Paul by being a servant to minister to Paul. But also we see that Timothy is a man of commitment. Timothy is a man of commitment. Paul's sending him, and uh Timothy goes, knowing that he could be walking back into a hornet's nest. There could be issues there. There could be people that are there that aren't so excited that he's coming back, and yet he goes, He's committed, he's willing to go, he's obedient even to that, and humble enough to do that. And so he commits and does that. But that really transitions us to even Epaphroditus here because uh we know that Epaphroditus is this servant of Paul. And by the way, Epaphroditus, you probably hear in his name. Uh he was from a pagan family, and he'd come to faith. Um, the word Aphrodite is in there because he comes from this Greek background, and uh his name uh we know even has some connotations to this gambling game that they would play. Uh, and they would say Apaphroditus as part of that game, is as if hopefully Aphrodite would have like some favor as they threw dice. And so this is the very interesting character that God has changed. He has He has transformed him, and he's become one of Paul's closest friends and companions. And notice what it says it says that I considered it necessary, this is verse 25, to send a Paphroditus, my brother, co-worker, fellow soldier, messenger, and minister to my need. Man, that's pretty strong. Like he's given him five things in which you can see commitment from this guy, Paphroditus, who grew up, again, pagan, not Christian, and now is his friend of Paul, servant of Paul. And Paul says to him, he is my brother. So he's like family. That's as Christians, we are family with one another, right? He is my coworker. He's like laboring with me in this mission, this gospel mission, to share the, to make sure that the gospel is taken to the nations, to all the world, wherever Paul was led. He's my fellow soldier. You guys know that to take the gospel out is a battle? It's a war. He uses this idea of fellow soldier because they're in a war. They're in a battle to get this message out. And we know that even Paul's in prison because they didn't want this message to go out. They didn't want this gospel to disrupt the harmony that they had. But also he says he's not just a fellow soldier, he says he's your messenger, which is actually the word apostle there. This idea, not that he's an apostle like the 12 apostles or like Paul and the disciples of the apostles, but that he's a messenger. He's taking this message on behalf of Paul to the people, and that he's even within that, he's a minister. How did he minister? He ministered specifically to Paul as he's there in jail. So he takes risk in coming to Paul because if he identifies himself with Paul, guess what? He could also end up in jail, right? Could happen. And in the process, we're told that he gets sick. Indeed, he was so sick that he nearly died, is what verse 27 tells us. So this guy's life is on the line in order to serve. He is committed. He is a committed servant to Paul. Now, let me just say something here. The church, I think this is just a great message from both Timothy and Epaphroditus. You would not have thought of Timothy or Epaphroditus particularly as any kind of rock stars. Any kind of like superhero Christians. They wouldn't have been in the limelight. Not everybody's thinking, oh man, these guys are so talented. They're great communicators up front. They're the, you're, you know, of our day, we've got all these celebrity pastors. These guys would have been just ordinary Joes, right? Average Joes. And you need to know that the church is not built around celebrity pastors. It's built around the people of God all doing their part for the kingdom of God. And the fact is that Epaphroditus was willing to just do this simple task of taking this message to Paul. And he gets sick and almost dies in the process, and yet he stays faithful. Listen, every single week we gather as a church, there are people who make what this room looks like, make this happen. They do things, and people don't know it. And they're unsung heroes, right? They're doing menial tasks, and they're not going to get a lot of glory for that. But you know who sees it? God sees it. He sees people serve in the simple ways. You guys don't know it, but there's a group of people that every Monday they show up here and they clean the toilets. They scrub the floors, they pick up the trash. And every time I see them walk through the door, I'm like, that's the kind of heart I want to have, God. They don't get paid for it. They just do it because they love Jesus, they love this church, they want the gospel to go out. So they do that menial task. Every time I walk into these buildings on the outsides, I hear this preschool building and this elementary building, and I see these leaders in there with my kids, because I have six kids, and so most of my kids are in every one of the rooms, right? There's one of them in there. And I see what they do to love and serve those kids, which, by the way, is such an incredible stewardship of our church. And it's such an incredible thing. So don't hear me saying that I think that that's a terrible job. It's an awesome job, an awesome responsibility. To tell the next generation about God is one of the most important things we could ever do. Psalm 78 says that we should tell them about the glorious deeds so they don't forget. It's our job. And I'm so thankful that there are leaders that are out there right now doing what a lot of people would say. I'm not doing that. No way. You put me, no, I'm not going in that preschool room. Are you kidding me? I'm not gonna go in there and deal with that leaf shock doing flips all over the room in there. Listen, here's the thing. I love Point Community Church, and one of the things I love about Point Community Church is that we have such a group of servants. People just say, put me to work, show me how to work, let me move a chair, let me sweep a floor. Like, that's what the church should be. We we we get to get our hands dirty together. We get to just serve one another together. And I'm so thankful for so many Epaphroditus Timothy type people who go to church here, who serve and do the little things that no one knows about, except for God, maybe a few leaders. Thank you. Thank you for that the A V team in the back that, you know, when they're doing their job, we don't even know they're there. And so we're so thankful for people who do those kind of things and serve so well. So Paul has these friends, these ministry partners. Every time Paul talks about a friend in uh the book of a Philippians, he's always tying it to this idea of koinania. He never he never just says they're an acquaintance. He every every time he talks about this idea of quininea, which is a Greek word for fellowship, but it's a fellowship that's built around the gospel, which built around God's mission. And so what he's saying is that every one of these relationships he has has an eternal significance because they're built around the purposes of God. Listen, if you don't have godly friends in your life, if you don't have friends who are helping you grow up in the grace of the gospel, get some. Find some. Quit isolating yourself from them. And also be the kind of friend who is encouraging, prodding, like Timothy, like uh like Hebrews, the writer in Hebrews says that we should spur one another on towards love and good deeds. We need that in our lives, don't we? I need that in my life. I'm so thankful that I have um a man like Harley Rathel who walks alongside of me as a ministry partner. When I called him way back seven years ago and said, Would you move to South Austin or to Austin, period? We didn't even know where we were gonna be to Austin and help us plant a church. Would you be my ministry partner in that process? And it's gonna be hard, and you're gonna have to take a pay cut, and you're gonna have to fundraise, and we're gonna have to do all these crazy things, but it's gonna be worth it. And I'm thankful that he came alongside of us. Before that, I had a friend named Keith Ferguson. We planted a church in Round Rock together, and I'm so thankful for his partnership in the ministry and the way we were able to serve alongside each other. God has now brought other people and all of our elders who've faithfully served, and not just elders, but ministry leaders and small group leaders, people that we get to partner with in the mission. Man, what a gift! What a beautiful gift. This is how the church is run. It's not built around Nick Shock. This is not my church, this is Jesus' church. It should be built around a community of friends who are focused on the bigger picture of accomplishing God's mission. Ecclesiastes 4, 9 through 12 says it this way. Two people are better than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble, right? Likewise, two people lying close together can keep each other warm, but how can one be warm alone? A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back to back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple braided cord is not easily broken. Did you notice that? Like, it wasn't a modern phrase, I got your back. That was from the Bible, right? I got your back. We stand back to back and we fight. Proverbs 18, 24 says this way A man with many friends may be harmed, but there is a friend who stays closer than a brother. That's the HCSB. Maybe it's like, what do you mean? Do you want me to have friends or not? Many friends. He's talking about acquaintances. People who say they're your friend, people just kind of know, but they're not really committed to you. Not kind of the character and compassionate friends that you need who will say things like the scripture says that as iron sharpens iron, so as one may sharpen another, or wounds from a friend can be trusted. They're way better than kisses from an enemy, right? That's what it says in the Proverbs. So we know this to be true: that we need friends and we need legit friends. And I want to tell you this morning that even in that verse, we're reminded that we have a friend that sticks closer than a brother. You know who that friend is? This is gonna sound hyper-spiritual, it's gonna sound churchy. That friend that's above every other friend is Jesus. Jesus is that friend who sticks closer than a brother. He laid down his life for us. Listen, the gospel message this morning, if you don't hear anything else I said, you need to hear the gospel message. This is the good news. That God created us for a relationship with himself, that we rebelled against God. We chose to do our own thing and we broke that relationship. But that God, in the person of Jesus, pursued us. Jesus laid down his very life for us at the cross. He was dead, he was buried, but then he was resurrected. And if we put our hope, we put our trust in that, we can be saved. And we can be with God forever, our for our friend forever. We can be with him forever. God has chosen to call us friends. And we can have a friendship because of what Jesus did. You see, Jesus is a friend that sticks closer than a brother, and his plan is for our good. So all fits together, doesn't it? When you know you've got a friend that sticks closer than a brother, then you can trust his plans. Even if it's not your plan, you can trust his plan. You can trust that Jesus is the most compassionate friend you will ever have because he sees how broken and messed up I am, and how broken and messed up you are, and he loves you still. He is compassionate and gracious and merciful. That's Jesus. He is the He has impeccable character. In fact, he is perfect, holy, and sinless. That's the kind of friend we have in Jesus. One who is perfect in every single way. Yet still compassionate. And he is committed to you and to me like none other. He is committed to us as his people and calls us friends, even though we chose to be his enemies in our flesh. That is powerful this morning. Listen. If you are a Christ follower and you've lost sight of the friendship you have in Christ, you're just doing life. My prayer is that this afternoon, this Memorial Day weekend, you might hit your knees and just say, Jesus, I want to be your friend. I don't want to just go through life and survive till I get to heaven. I want to be a friend of God like Abraham was a friend of God. I want to be with you. I want to have a personal, living, breathing relationship with you. And I want to be a friend to others that points them to Christ, that serves them, that cares about them, that has compassion, and has I show them character, and I'm committed to them and to the purposes you have for those relationships. I want to have that kind of friendship. And I want to trust God that as I plan, I can come with you with a trusting heart and an open hand and realize you're gonna lead me where you want me. You're gonna use me how you want to use me. So I don't have to stress, I don't have to be anxious, I don't have to be freaked out that you're gonna get it wrong. I can trust you, God, because you are better than anything I could ever come up with on my own. Your plans are better. You guys probably know verse from Jeremiah 29, 11. It's kind of yanked out of its context, but it is a it is a true verse where he says, For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. Even though that was for the people of Israel in that day, I think that's a true statement for us now that God's plans for us are good. And we find his ultimate plan and success in a personal relationship with him. Let's pray.