Today we are going to celebrate the Lord’s Supper as a church family today. And for those of you that are joining us, maybe at home, we’ll invite you to participate as you can as well. So I’m going to go ahead and ask our deacons and our ministers to come and take their places so that we can serve the elements of the Lord’s Supper today to our congregation. So let me remind you of what the Apostle Paul said about this very celebration. In First Corinthians, chapter 11, Paul said, For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you.
The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread. When he had given thanks, he broke it. And he said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, after supper, he took the cup, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood.
Do this whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me. For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. And so today we will gather around this table and receive these elements. And for us, we believe that this bread symbolizes for us, it points us to a greater reality, which is the body of Christ. We believe that this fruit of the vine symbolizes for us, points to a greater reality, which is the blood of Christ.
It’s not our theological belief that these elements themselves are transformed. We’re the ones that continue to be transformed would be our theology. And we invite you to participate in the Lord’s Supper. If you know the Lord, you’ve been baptized, you’re part of a church, then you’re welcome to do that. Today you might be new to us.
So when the deacons will serve all of you, when the tray passes in front of you, you’ll notice the cups are stacked on top of each other, so there’s both. One cup has the bread, one cup has the juice. If you’ll just take that little double stack of cups and separate them, and then I will guide you through receiving the elements. In a moment, if you need the bread that’s gluten free, they’re scattered in the middle of every one of the trays, and we’ll be happy for you to take one of those as well. And so, with that said, let me lead us in a word of prayer.
We’ll ask God’s blessing upon these elements, and then our ministers and our deacons will serve our congregation. Father, we’re grateful today for this time we can gather around this table. We’re mindful of the Sacrifice that has been made on our behalf to make it possible that even as the apostle Paul says, we proclaim our Lord’s death whenever we celebrate the Lord’s Supper. So we ask your blessings upon this bread, upon this juice, upon us as we’ll receive it. We’re mindful, Lord, that it points us to the body in which the Lord Jesus lived the perfect life, taught us how to live, modeled for us how to live.
The blood that was shed on the cross at Calvary for the forgiveness of our sin paid the ultimate price for us. So we’re grateful today we’ll receive these elements with gratitude in our hearts. So we pray your blessings upon the elements themselves upon us as we recognize your presence among us. And we offer this prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.
As the Apostle Paul said, it was the night that Jesus was betrayed where the disciples were gathered in that upper room setting. And as you all know, the tension was quite thick that evening as the disciples understood that something was afoot. Obviously, they’ll reflect more on it in retrospect, but it was a fateful night. Jesus knew full well what was about to happen. And so as they were celebrating the Passover, Jesus is going to reinterpret the Passover and it is going to be transformed into something that Jesus followers will share until he returns.
And so we’ll participate in that today. So this bread, Jesus said, take and eat. This is my body.
Jesus also said about the cup, he said, this is the blood of the new covenant drinking.
Amen and amen.
Well, this morning as we get ready for the message I want to share with you, I want to tell y’ all about last weekend for Cindy and I, we had a serendipity. We were in Alabama for a wedding that I performed for our best friends, lifetime friends, really, John and Missy Morgan, who join us every week online. And John and Missy and I went to high school together. And John and I played high school football together, basketball together. We’re in each other’s weddings.
And their oldest daughter was married in Fairhope, Alabama, last Saturday. And I was able to be there to conduct that service, but I had a serendipity that I wasn’t planning on happening. And so let me just tell you how it came about. Let me just show you a photo. The Basilica of San Clemente in Rome.
This is the front of the church, and a tad more ornate than our church, you might surmise, this very famous church in Rome. It’s named for St. Clement. He was one of the pastors of the Church at Rome. He was the pastor in the AD 90s. But the churches in Rome, they don’t build cathedrals in Rome, they build basilicas.
And so a basilica is a long hall, a colonnaded hall that has an apse at the front of it. And typically the apse is decorated with mosaics. This is an ancient mosaic, dates back to the 11th century, but maybe a little bit hard for you to see. But in the heart of that mosaic, there’s a cross. And the tree of life is underneath the cross, and the cross is emerging from it, and it is filled with fruit.
And so I have sat and stared at that apse many times. I’ve been in that church probably 30 times at least. It’s one of our favorite places to go in rome. But about 10 years ago, we were getting ready to renovate this room. And I had been contemplating on how I wanted this room to look.
And one of the things that I wanted this room to have was stained glass windows. You know, I grew up in the deep south, and we have stained glass windows in our churches. So I asked our team if we could just put windows all down this side of the building. And they informed me that these walls are load bearing. I don’t really know what that means.
I’m not an engineer, but all I know is it meant no.
They said the option if you want stained glass windows is this. Just tear this entire building down and build a new one. And I said, that sounds fine to me. And I was also told no. So I just said, well, I want a stained glass window somewhere.
So we decided it could be over the Baptistry, but the question was, well, what’s it going to look like? How are we going to decide? And so we went on a hunt. And I said, well, I want one that reminds me of the apse at Basilica San Clemente on a cross with life around it, with fruit. I want Psalm 1 to somehow be surrounding this cross.
So we looked and we looked and we looked and we found a stained glass window at First Baptist, Fairhope, Alabama. So let me show you a photo. There’s the stained glass window. Y’ all recognize it From First Baptist Fairhope. And so we were in Fairhope last Thursday.
So I called the church and I said, hey, I need to come in your sanctuary and take a photo of your stained glass window. And the little girl said, okay. And I said, so I explained to her, we copied this one because what we did was we called the church and said, can we copy this stained glass window? And they said, well, You’ve got to talk to the artist. So, Terry, we got in touch with the artist, got the artist here.
So here’s Cindy and I. Did we show that photo yet? Cindy and I were standing there in that sanctuary just to prove we were actually there in front of that window. And we took it, copied it, and put it right here. And isn’t it beautiful, y’?
All, I love this stained glass window, but it’s been 10 years. I’ve never been to Fairhope, Alabama. And so while I was there, I thought, I’m going to go into that church. And one of the staff members there, been there for 30 years and kind of had a little bit of memory that somebody had copied that window. Just didn’t know who it was.
Well, it turns out it’s us, and so I was glad to get to see it, and I’m glad I get to see this one every week. Sometimes I just come by here during the week in the evenings and just flip on the light and sit right here and just pray in this room and remind myself of the centrality of the cross, the victory of Jesus. You’ll see there’s a. A crown on top of this cross and how life emerges for all of us who will embrace the full gospel. So we’ll be fruitful and productive people.
That’s a whole other sermon I’m not going to preach today, but a little bit today, actually. So with that said, let’s talk about the message for today. Our text is Ephesians 5. So if you’ve got your copy of the New Testament, let’s look at it today. Filled with the Spirit.
The text for us. I want us to begin in verse 15 of Ephesians 5. And this text is. It’s a complicated text, a little bit in Greek. As you all know, Paul wrote in Greek.
So, for example, verses 18 through 21 is just one sentence in the Greek text. And that’s so like Paul. He writes these very complex, layered sentences. And so what you have to do is you have to look for a verb. You got to look for a subject and try to find what is the.
What’s the core teaching of the text. And in that sentence, it’s interesting because there are numerous participles that are in the text in Greek, and that normally means in English, you translate them with ing endings like singing, thanking, speaking, praising, making music. But they have a little bit of a force to them. So sometimes the translators decide instead of translating them as participles, they’ll translate them as verbs into English because it carries the force, if you will, of the meaning of the text. But.
And that happens in the niv. You’ll notice that the NIV will translate some of them as verbs. I’ll point that out to you just a second. But it’s a very complex sentence structure, but it teaches somewhat of a simple, direct message. So let’s just look at it together.
Verse 15 of Ephesians 5. Paul says, Be careful, then watch is the word how you live. Peripateo is the Greek word. How you walk. Walking in the New Testament is always an admonition about how you live.
So be careful how you walk. Be careful how you live, he says, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most of every opportunity. Because the days are evil, we live in this present evil age. In other words, Paul says, verse 17. Therefore, going back to the the phrase of wise, not unwise, verse 17.
Don’t be foolish. But understand what the Lord’s will is typically in Paul’s writings, when you see the word Lord, he’s referring to Jesus. That’s his word for Jesus almost exclusively. So understand what Jesus would have you do. Verse 18.
Here’s a verb in the text. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery, but instead be filled with the Spirit. Both of those are verbs in the Greek text. Speaking to one another with Psalms. There’s a participle speaking, are y’ all still with me?
Speaking to one another with Psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit. That’s a great word. I’d say Aaron. Just about the complexity of music that it’s. It has a broad selection, if you have broad genres, if you will.
And even in the early church, they were already capturing the different musical traditions that was in their heritage, speaking to each other with Psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit. Singing or sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to one another. There’s another participle in Greek submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. So it’s a very.
As I said, it’s somewhat complex, its grammar, but it’s very direct in its exhortation, in its meaning. So let’s just look at the directives from Paul. The first one is watch your step. That’s what he says. Verse 15.
Be careful, he says, where you walk, Be careful how you walk. Not as unwise people. Don’t be foolish, Paul says. And when I hear that, what that calls to mind for me is Intentional discipleship. Paul says, be intentional about how you live.
Christians don’t live accidentally. We don’t. We don’t meander into maturity. That’s not. That’s not how it works.
As Kurt Grice likes to say, you don’t drift into godliness. That’s not how it works. You have to be intentional about godliness. And so that’s exactly what Paul says. We live in a present evil age.
That means that we’re always going to be surrounded by temptations to move in the wrong direction. So it requires intentionality, discipline. Here’s what my mama used to say. Anybody can be like everybody else. And that’s a true word.
Anybody can be like everybody else. But if we want to live Christian lives in the context of the evil age, then we’ve got to be disciplined. In fact, Paul says, if you’ll look at verse 17, you got to use your brain, understand the will of Jesus. Paul says, I’ve shared with y’ all that I’m gonna. I’m gonna make a new bracelet instead of wwjd.
Mine’s gonna be ittjw. Is the. This the Jesus way? Okay, don’t y’ all get that before I do? Because I’m on a.
It’s going to be something. Just be. Just be on the lookout. Because I think that’s the question we ask ourselves all the time, is this the Jesus way? If I’m in a conversation, is this the Jesus way?
For me, if I’m trying to make a decision, is this the Jesus way? Even if I’m battling sometimes my own thought process, is this the way of Jesus? That’s what Paul is challenging believers to do. He says, watch your step. Then he says, look at verse 18.
Mind your wine.
Mind your wine, he says. He says, and this is interesting, as I said, the Greek text is complex, but the directions are simple. Here’s a imperative from Paul. It’s not a suggestion, it’s a command. And it’s in the present tense.
Don’t get drunk on wine. Paul is condemning specifically drunkenness. Not drinking per se, but drunkenness in fact, in this text, the way it’s worded in the grammar, you have three instances of what scholars call may Allah. Don’t. May is don’t.
Allah is but don’t. But don’t do this, but do that. Don’t do this, but do that. And here’s one of the examples. Verse 18.
Don’t get drunk on wine. Be filled with the spirit, so don’t be filled with wine. So you’re drunk, be filled with the spirit. So why would Paul put those two together? It’s interesting actually to me.
And then here’s what scholars say about it. We know that in the ancient world there were various ways where ancient people felt like they got connected to gods and goddesses. One of the gods in the Greek world was Dionysius. My name, Dennis, comes from Dionysius. Y’ all remember, Dionysius was the God of wine.
That’s right. And how appropriate that I would have that name.
But in the worship practices of pagans, oftentimes they taught particularly if you wanted to connect with Dionysius, you needed to get drunk. So drunkenness would somehow connect you to this particular God. We do know some of the coinage that we have from 1st century Ephesus. There was a temple to Dionysius in Ephesus. So it could have been that there were people coming out of that practice in the church.
We think that’s possibly true. We also know we have evidence of the elite people in the first century who would serve multiple courses in their meals in their homes, and they would continually drink wine all the way through the evening. And by the end of the evening, they would be drunk. That was a common practice among the wealthier pagans. So some scholars say, well, Paul is addressing those two specific things in Ephesus.
But most scholars think actually probably more likely Paul is just in general just saying, don’t get drunk. Don’t lose self control. Think about the context. The context is, watch how you walk. Be careful, be intentional, don’t be captivated by the present evil age.
And so Paul just says, don’t act like the pagans. The Bible says in Proverbs 20, Wine is a mocker stone strong drink is a brawler. Well, Paul says what being drunk does. Look at what it says in verse 18 leads to debauchery. Now, that word sometimes is translated dissipation.
It basically means wasteful. That’s what the word means. So Paul is saying, be careful how you live. Make sure that you make the most of every day. Verse 16.
In other words, use your time. Well, Paul says drunkenness is a waste of time. Does that make sense? It’s wasteful. He’s not necessarily condemning drinking itself.
It’s drunkenness that is the opposite of intentional discipleship. You know, drinking can be a controversial topic. I don’t think that I will make the news in the morning that a Baptist preacher is opposing drunkenness. I doubt that’s going to be much news to anybody. And I’ve always heard that the difference between Baptist and Methodist is that Baptists don’t speak to each other in the liquor store.
I don’t know if that’s true or not. I. I’ve never been in one, so I’m not really sure what we do in liquor stores. But regardless. And, you know, people go make decisions about drinking sometimes there are those who are convicted that there’s nothing wrong with drinking. It’s not a sin.
But to get drunk would be. There are others who go further, go beyond the Bible, I would say, and just don’t drink at all. Cindy and I are that way. Cindy and I don’t drink. And some of that has to do with our families, because we have history in our families of alcoholism and addiction.
Well, for us, that’s just a conviction that we have lived out all of our adult life. Our church has done that. Our church actually goes beyond the Bible on this topic. Our deacons, our ministers are asked not to drink. But regardless of your take on that, all of us can agree that drunkenness is a waste of time, can’t we?
Even if social drinking, or you believe drinking in moderation is fine, which I don’t have a problem with that. But drunkenness, Paul says, don’t do it. He says, but be filled with the Spirit. There’s another direct Command in verse 18 in the Greek text. It’s also a verb.
It’s in the imperative mood. It’s in the present tense. In other words, Paul says, this is something you and I are to engage in for the rest of our lives. Be filled with the Spirit. Now, sometimes theologically, people get tripped up when it comes to the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
So I want to be clear this morning, make sure we understand what we believe the Bible teaches about that. So, for example, when you and I become Christians, when we made the decision to receive Jesus as our Savior, my understanding is, according to the teaching of the Scripture, you were baptized by the Holy Spirit into the family of God at your salvation. In other words, salvation and baptism of the Holy Spirit are not two different things that happen different times in your life. That’s what some people teach. My understanding of the Scripture is when you’re saved, you’re baptized by the Holy Spirit.
Paul says this in 1st Corinthians 12, verse 13. We were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body. So I don’t believe baptism of the Spirit happens at some point down the road after your salvation. Does that make sense? In fact, in this very letter, in Ephesians 1, if you’ll go back to Ephesians 1.
Paul says this, verse 13. When you believed you were Marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who’s a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance unto the redemption of those who are God’s possession, to the praise of his glory. Paul says, when you were saved, you were sealed by the Holy Spirit into the family of God, and the Holy Spirit was given to you as a down payment, an earnest payment, a guarantee of what is to come. So it’s my conviction that when you become a believer, you. You get all of the Holy Spirit you’re ever going to get.
Now, you’re then going to have to choose how to live as a spiritual person. Now that’s on me and you. And you’ve got to decide. Just how much of the Holy Spirit do you actually want? Now, that’s a different question.
Does that make sense? Let me show you this slide of Joseph Priestley, Carl Schiel, Antoine Lavoisier. These three men, do you know what they’re famous for? You know, in science, there’s an interesting question. Who discovered oxygen?
I mean, like, duh, right? We all did, right? Well, actually, these three men have kind of fought it out. Joseph Priestley, the one on the left, gets credit for discovering oxygen. Now, that’s not what he called it.
1774. Let me get the word. He called it D. Dephlogisticated air. That was his word. Okay, but the guy in the middle, Carl Schiel, two years earlier, had also discovered what we breathe as a natural element.
He just didn’t publish the paper yet, but he claimed that he discovered it before Priestley. But the guy on the right, Lavoisier, gets credit for naming it oxygen. That interesting that somebody had to discover. That’s like a fish saying, how’s the water? I mean, you know that old joke about the two goldfish?
One of them, the old one, meets the young one, says, how’s the water today? And the younger one says, what water? Well, I mean, how’s the air today? What air? I mean, we just breathe it.
We can’t live without it. Here’s what I’d say about being a Christian. You cannot live the Christian life without the Holy Spirit. You may think you can. You may think you don’t need to yield to him.
In other words, what I mean by that is some of us think that the Christian life is just learning Christian principles and just digesting Biblical truth. And that’s all it is. It is that. But it’s more than that. There’s a spiritual dimension to living as a Christian.
And that’s the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, and we need him. And I want you to notice the text doesn’t say, look at verse 18, fill yourself with the Holy Spirit. That’s not what it says. It’s in the passive voice in Greek. Be filled with the Holy Spirit.
What that means is, you and I, our active participation is yielding. We yield to the Holy Spirit ourselves, and then the Holy Spirit fills us. This is a discipline. It’s a matter of the will. It’s a sign of maturity.
It’s a part of God’s grace in your life. And I would contend it is a daily discipline. You and I every day should ask the Holy Spirit to fill us. Let me show you a couple of quotes about that very thing. Klein Snodgrass wrote a wonderful commentary on Ephesians.
He says this to ask us to be filled with the Spirit does not point to repeated charismatic expressions, experiences, as some claim. That’s the idea of the second blessing, the baptism of the Holy Spirit after salvation. And then maybe you’ll speak in tongues or you’ll be given a spiritual gift, all those kinds of things. That’s not, I don’t think what the Bible teaches. He says it is to ask us to focus our attention on Christ and his presence in us, to open ourselves to the continual transforming work of the Spirit, so that the presence of Christ empowers and shapes our lives.
The Spirit is to be the dominating influence for all Christians. I would say a hearty amen to that. Let me share another quote from J. Oswald Sanders. The indwelling Spirit enlightens the intellect so that there is an ever deepening insight into spiritual truth. He purifies the emotions and affections and fixes them on Christ, for his ministry is always Christocentric.
He reinforces the will weakened by sinful indulgence and imparts power to do the will of God. To me, that’s what it means to be filled with the Spirit of God. Now let me ask this question. Why do we need to be filled with the Spirit? After all, we’re Baptists.
Why do we have to do that? Why can’t we just let the assembly of God and all the Pentecostals live that out for us? Well, remember, we’re all Pentecostal people. This is Eastertide. We’re moving toward Pentecost.
We all have the Holy Spirit. Well, here’s what I would say is, you know why you and I need the Holy Spirit every single day? Because we’re sinners, that’s why. And we need the grace of God to be operative in our lives. Here’s what I’d say about me and you.
Without the work of the Spirit in our lives, I’m convinced we can’t change. We can’t conform to the image of Christ. We can’t be transformed and we can’t overcome sin in our lives without the work of the Holy Spirit. We need to be filled with the Holy Spirit on a daily basis. Acts 1, verse 8.
Jesus told the disciples, I want you to think about that for a second. These are the men and women who had been walking with Jesus. They had listened to Jesus. They had watched him model the Christian life in front of them. They had seen him perform miracles.
They had watched him die on the cross. They had met him as the resurrected Lord. Wouldn’t you think these people have got it going on? He told them, you wait until the Holy Spirit comes on you and then you’ll receive power. So even the disciples needed the power of the Holy Spirit.
Well, come on y’. All. If that group needed it, surely to goodness you and I need it. We need that power. In fact, here’s what Jesus says about the Holy spirit in John 16.
I’m going to leave you. Then the advocate will come. The Greek word is the paraclete, the one who’s called alongside. Para means to be alongside you. Kaleo means to call out the one who’s called alongside you to walk this journey with you.
If you remember a couple of weeks ago, the message I shared with you all was that we are the new temple. Well, the new temple needs to be filled with the glory of God, just like the tabernacle was and the first temple. Well, the glory of God us is a part of the work of the Holy Spirit. And so what happens when you are beginning to be filled with the spirit? You produce something.
It is spirit filled. Produce. It’s described in this very text. We still have your Bibles. Open communication, Worship, gratitude, submission.
Look at what he says. Paul says now be filled with the Spirit. Here’s how we see it lived out. Look at what he says. Verse 19.
You’re going to communicate to each other. You’re going to exhort each other, you’re going to bless each other and you’re going to do it through things like Psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit. In other words, when we come together in corporate worship, there’s a vertical dimension. Obviously we’re in God’s presence. We’re singing to God.
We are worshiping him. But there’s also a horizontal dimension. We’re blessing each other. We’re encouraging one another. I’m encouraged because of what you’re doing.
You’re encouraged because of what I’m doing. We’re speaking these words to each other as we speak them in the presence of God, even to God, they still have application across the life of this church. Paul says, that’s one of the ways the spirit of God’s alive in you. And then he says also, if you’ll look, he says, sing and make music in your own hearts. Even the expression of praise to God is a sign of being filled with the Spirit.
You know, I’m not a musician. I’m not a singer, okay? I’m not. I’m just not. And what I’ve told y’ all before, even in my mind, when I hear myself sing silently in my mind, I still sing off key.
I can’t even do it. I can’t even sing silently the way you’re supposed to. But y’ all, in my house, I have a study at my house. And on my desk, I have a hymnal. And I’m here to tell y’, all, I sing and worship God in my desk.
And I’m just trusting God to somehow make it right by the time it gets to him, okay? But when I’m there by myself, I don’t really care. I sing it how I want to sing it. I sing the songs I want to sing. You know why?
Because I’m praising God. Because I’m filled with his spirit. And I know it does something for me to express something like that to Him. And so one of the ways that I live that out of my own life is my own personal worship of God. Not just my worship with you all, but with Him.
And then Paul also says, another sign of being filled with the Spirit is you’re grateful, you’re giving thanks. You recognize that all that you have has come from Him. Isn’t that what the Bible says? All good gifts come down from Him. You realize this isn’t just all about you.
And then he says, look at verse 21. You have a submissive spirit toward each other. That means you lean towards your brothers and sisters in Christ. You recognize that these people around you have value. They may be very different than you are.
Different views on all kinds of things. They’re still your brothers and your sisters in Christ. That means you give them the benefit of the doubt. You don’t always think the worst of them. You think the best of them.
You submit you Lean toward them. Because here’s the thing, y’, all, the Spirit filled life, it is full and rich. It’s transformative. It’s communal, it’s Christ focused, it’s outward focused. It’s meaningful, it’s useful, it’s intentional.
It’s God honoring. It gives glory to God and it draws people to the Father. And so let me just encourage us. Let’s be filled with the Spirit. Now, one other thing I’d say about and I’m going to point us toward the summer Spirit filled Christians bear life fruit.
What is that fruit? Well, Paul describes it in Galatians. Love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. And I’m here to tell y’, all, none of those are natural equipment. That is not our natural habitat.
You don’t show up with all of that. Matter of fact, you and I show up with the opposite of every one of those. And so something’s got to happen. Well, the only hope for us to be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. So this summer we’re going to.
We have nine Sundays this coming summer season. We’re going to address each one of these. We’re going to highlight Biblical characters that demonstrate these. We’re going to look at how those are lived out in the life of Jesus. And then we’re going to try to figure out how can they be lived out in our own lives.
And so we have been working together. I’ve met with some of our ministers because I’ll be off a little bit in the summer. And we have other, other members of our staff who’ll be preaching and teaching. Because here’s what Jesus said in John 15, verse 8, this is to my Father’s glory that you bear much fruit proving yourselves to be my disciples. So here’s what I’m going to tell us today.
It is impossible to prove yourself to be a disciple if you’re not filled with the Spirit of Jesus. So y’, all, let’s be filled with the Spirit and let’s trust God with the result. May it be so. Let’s pray together.
Well, Father, today as we bow before youe, we’re grateful for this time we’ve spent together in worship, community and fellowship. We’ve done some of these very things. We’ve been making music in our hearts. We’ve been speaking to each other, admonishing, exhorting each other. We thank you for that and Lord, we pray that you’ve been pleased with our worship today. And so we ask now for your to speak to us. And Lord, if we’ve been living in our own power, living out of our own strength, just kind of giving into our own spirit, we want to confess that as sin. We want to confess it as low living, realizing that it’s just a reflection, further reflection of our brokenness. And we want to reflect our redemption, our transformation, your grace and so, Lord, fill us with your spirit. Show us a path forward, God, that will honor you.
That’s our prayer. We pray that in Jesus name, amen.
