Pastor Brian and Jacque Lother
Brian: One of the things that we celebrate is eternal life. I was reflecting upon— I was just thinking the Lord this week that my wife is not like Job's life. God gave me a Proverbs 31 wife, not like Job's wife. The story about job is of course, was all sorts of calamities happened. Job, and his wife and his comforters, they only saw things from an earthly perspective. They didn't see things from the real perspective of what was transpiring in that story. And because they didn't see the big picture, Job's wife was upset with God. She just said, "Job, just curse God and die." Talk about like a statement that is like no hope whatsoever. I mean, curse God, and then go die. Well then what? Did anybody think about that?
I'm so thankful that we have an eternal life that God has given to us and that Job asked this really, really important question, if a man die, will he live again? And the answer is a resounding yes, because Jesus said that actually, if we believe in him, we will never die. We would never die. We just transition from one life to another. We had that happen this past week with one of our dear friends, a longtime friend. A friend of this church, Lonnie Norling is now in the presence of Jesus. We are so thankful for that. So we'll celebrate his life in a couple of weeks.
Jacque: We are so sorry, Judy. Judy Dalene is Lonnie's sister and Brian. Our hearts hurt for you and we are praying for all of you. Lonnie and Carol had been a part of Hope for many years and then moved farther out of town and then moved back in, and they've just been coming to hope the last several months. It's been so wonderful to have the chance to talk with him. We are going to miss him.
Brian: One of the things Lonnie always did was he would always come up and say, "I just love your music." He'd always say that to me. I just love your music. Every single one of us probably have a favorite song or favorite songs, especially, when you are teenagers or you are dating and the song comes on the radio and they are playing my song or our song. We all have favorite songs and we all have favorite Christmas carols too, don't we? Some Christmas tunes. I describe them as like novelty songs. They really don't have anything really to do with the Christmas story, but they have become part of Christmas tradition and so forth through the years, like Rudolf the red nose reindeer and I saw mommy kissing Santa Claus underneath the missile toe and frosty the snowman, or even grandma ran over a reindeer or whatever.
Jacque: Grandma got run over by a reindeer.
Brian: Oh, grandma got run over by a reindeer. Okay, so the reindeer ran over grandma. Whatever. Anyways.
Jacque: I'm glad I could help you understand that song.
Brian: Thank you. See, like I said, they are novelty songs and I don't always pay much attention to them. And then there are some more, what I would call, classic Christmas songs that Carol's like, oh, holy night. Keith is going to sing that for us next week, this coming week. I always love it when Keith sings that song. One of my favorites is I heard the bells on Christmas day. That song was written by a man who had suffered a lot of loss during the civil war. He was really discouraged and he heard the bells ring out on Christmas day and it reminded him that God's love is greater than all the hatred and all the killing. Oh little town of Bethlehem: I've always liked the melody line of that song. Ark the Herald, and of course, silent night; we know the story behind silent night with a mouse eating the organ bellows and the organ didn't work. And so the padre had to write a Christmas song for the Christmas Eve service, and he wrote a silent night. It has probably become the most favorite Christmas Carol of all time.
From the time I was a child until really just a few years ago, there was a certain song when it was played or sung I thought to myself, what a ridiculous song? This song makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Whoever wrote this Christmas carol, what in the world were they thinking? I thought, I'm going to find out what this knucklehead was doing when he wrote this song. And so I started to do a little research on this song and I realized that it wasn't a knucklehead who wrote it, that I was actually the knucklehead for not understanding the song. I discovered the true meaning behind the lyric of this song. And overnight it became so much more meaningful to me. I discovered that this Carol was actually written as a catechism song for new believers and young children to sing. As they would sing this song, it would remind them of truths of the story and the life of Jesus, as well as the love of God to us.
How many know that many years ago, there weren't a lot of oks for people to read. A lot of people didn't even actually know how to read. A lot of what they learned, they learned through the songs that they sang and especially the doctrines and teachings about God, they learned through many of the hymns that were written. That's why Charles and John Wesley and these guys were incredible him writers, and they wrote thousands of hymns. A catechism is kind of like a summary of a doctrine, which will help us to learn something. I'm sure many of you have gone through catechism classes and so forth when you were younger. These classes were methods of helping us understand what it was to be in a relationship with God. A lot of times we forget that from the middle 15 hundreds to the 18 hundreds, there was a lot of persecution against believers in England and in Europe.
Many of the people in those countries actually immigrated to the United States or to America for religious freedoms. Some people didn't have that opportunity to do that, and for those who didn't, who were kind of still under oppression, this song was actually written as a code song for people to sing, to learn how to appreciate all the different ways that God wants to speak to us and impart his love into our lives.
Now, sometimes we just have to understand that even if a government makes laws against about just worshiping God and true religious freedom, we just have to understand that where there is a will, there will always be a way. That's what even under communist rule, the church flourishes under communist rule, because Christians who love the Lord find a way and your "want to" has to be stronger than the voices that say you can't right. The "want to" in your heart has to be stronger than the voices that say you do this.
Anyway, someone during this time of persecution wrote this Carol, which I believe will be a blessing to all of you as you get to know the true meaning of it. In each verse of this Christmas Carol, there is a code word for a, what I would call a relational reality with God. There is a code word for a re a relational reality with God, which of course, many of the children began to sing, and as they would sing these different verses, it would remind them of this relational with God and their relationship with God would grow. But the code words and the verses had to be not so obvious that the casual listener would actually know what they were singing at the same time. Anybody have an idea what the title of this song is that I'm talking about? Yeah. The 12 days of Christmas. The 12 days of Christmas. So on the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me. So who is our real true love? Our father in heaven. Isn't he? Our father in heaven is our truest love. He's the one that has been faithful. He's the one that has put up with all of our stuff and still loved us.
On the very first Christmas, what he gave to us was described as a Partridge in a pair of tree. The code word in that verse is the word tree, and he gave us Jesus to die on the cross. There is not a greater gift. And that was the reason for the very first Christmas is for Jesus to come. The second verse says he gave us two turtle doves. The code word here in that verse is two and doves. And the two stands for the Old and the New Testament and doves are representative of peace, aren't they?
If we really look at the essence of the Old and the New Testament, we can find great comfort and great peace that can come to our lives when we apply the principles of the Old and New Testament of both covenants, third verse says he also gave us three French hens. Well, French and hens were distractions. The code word is three. The three that they are talking about, although most people might think the Trinity, but it really wasn't their Trinity. They were talking about how we are to live in this song. The three things that go together are faith, hope and love. So the three French hens were faith, hope and love.
Then he writes about four calling birds. Well, the code words here is four and calling. Birds have nothing to do with it. Bird is a rabbit trail, but the four calling birds are the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And they call out to us, don't they? There is something very special about the gospels probably because the gospels are the most prolific writing we have about the life of Jesus. It contains more of the words of Jesus than any other of the books of the Bible. They call out to us and in the words of Jesus, he says for us to follow him. There is a call that goes out to our lives when we think of the gospels and what was said in there. So this songwriter says, these are the things on the fourth day Christmas my true love gave to me: four calling birds. Four calling birds, and faith, hope and love and the old and new Testament and Jesus on a cross.
Now we come to five golden rings. What do rings represent? A marriage ring represents an unending love, a covenantal relationship with one another. The five rings that this verse is talking about is really talking about the first five books of the Bible, the Torah. The Torah is what was carried in the arc of the covenant. It really represented the essence and the word of God. It was also a representative of God's covenant relationship with us. Five golden covenantal golden rings: Genesis, Exodus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, the Torah.
Now we come to six geese are laying. Well, the geese have nothing to do with it. Again, that's a rabbit trail, but six a-laying, what was laid in six days? All of creation. So this is a reference to the creation story. Six days of creation, the foundations of the earth were laid in six days. And as they sang this song, six geese a-laying, they would remember in the beginning, God created the heavens in the earth. It didn't come about by time plus chance, plus matter. It happened by intentionality by God. In six days, the Lord created the heavens in the earth.
Then we have seven swans a-swimming, swans of swimming. That's the rabbit trail. Seven is the code word here. And you ever see swans swimming. They are majestic aren't they? They are more majestic than any other swimming bird when they swim. There is just something majestic about them and the seven represents here, the sevenfold gifts of the Holy Spirit. I want to read from first Corinthians, chapter 12. Jacque, why don't you read that verse 7 through 10?
Jacque: A spiritual gift given to each of us so we can help each other.
Brian: Isn't that great? We have been given gifts from God for what reason? So that we can look spiritual?
Jacque: No.
Brian: Oh no. Why are we given these gifts from God?
Jacque: To help each other.
Brian: To help each other,
Jacque: This is from the New Living Testament to one person. The spirit gives the ability to give wise advice or wisdom to another. The same spirit gives a message of special knowledge, a word of knowledge. The same spirit gives great faith to another. And to someone else, the one spirit gives the gift of healing. He gives one person the power to perform miracles and another to prophesy. He gives another person, the given ability to discern whether a message is from the spirit of God or from another spirit. Still another person is given the ability to speak in languages or various tongues while another is given the ability to interpret what is said.
Brian: Now, when you actually read these in these four verses, 7 through 10, and you count them up, there is actually nine. But at the time that this Christmas Carol was written, the people that understood this portion of scripture, they combined wisdom and knowledge as one and they also combined tongues in interpretation as one. So in doing that, you come up with seven swans of swimming. Isn't it majestic when the gifts of the spirit are really an operation in the body of Christ? Isn't it so wonderful when people lack, understanding, and they lack direction that we can get wisdom from God? Sometimes there is a word of knowledge that God just gives to us that helps us to understand what is really going on in this circumstance. It's not what is plain and obvious on the exterior. There is something deeper going on. And when you are sick, isn't it wonderful when someone has the gift of healing, or if you have a real need for a miracle? Isn't it great when God brings someone alongside you to bring a miracle into your life?
And then of course, prophecy, prophecy is about bringing life to people. It's not about predicting bad stuff. There is enough of that. The newspapers do all of that. One of my favorite prophecies of all a scripture is found in Ezekiel where the Ezekiel of prophet spoke to the valley of dry bones. As he spoke and began to prophesy what happened? Well, the skeletons came up and then the sinew and the tendons, and the skin and the muscles. After he kept prophesying, they basically became a valley full of live people. This is what prophecy does. It brings life to people I've been given prophecies before and it just quickened something in me. It confirms something in me. It puts a giddy up in my step when I've received prophecies. I've also had people, misuse is the gift of prophecy to try and direct my life and tell me what to do
Jacque: I call it prophetic manipulation.
Brian: Yeah, prophetic manipulation. Here is the thing: we can't throw out the baby with the bath. So we have to keep moving forward towards truth and prophecy is a very wonderful if that God wants to give to us to inspire us and to bring life into our lives.
Jacque: It's supernatural.
Brian: It's very supernatural. Another gift is a discerning of spirits. Sometimes someone has a problem that just keeps repeating and repeating and repeating in their lives, and they can't seem to overcome it. And it's become as there is a demonic stronghold there. Someone with a gift of discernment or discerning of spirits can sense what that is and begin to take authority over it. It's a wonderful gift to have. And then, of course, tongues and interpretation, another wonderful gift from God, the prayer language, heavenly language. And then there are unique situations where people will actually speak in a language that they've not learned. And it's actually a language that somebody else understands. So these are wonderful, wonderful things that happen. These seven swans a-swimming are these sevenfold gifts of the spirit that brings us to eight maids a-milking. Maids a-milking are also a rabbit trail, but the eight is actually talking about the first eight beatitudes in Matthew chapter 5, verses 3through 10. So let's read those real quickly.
Jacque: Blessed are the porn spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful for, they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart for, they shall see God blessed are the peacemakers for, they will be called children of God. And blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Brian: So obviously a person who did not read, they were taught these eight beatitudes by rote or by heart. They memorized them. And so they would learn blessed are the poor or in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of God. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They would learn these things. And then when they would sing this song, they would come to this eighth verse and they would be reminded of these beatitudes. And then they refresh their minds and go over them. And sometimes they would go, "What's the sixth one?" I can't remember the sixth one.
Jacque: The pure in heart.
Brian: The pure and heart. Oh, that's a good one for me. These were teaching mechanisms, like I said, a catechism form. So this verse is talking about the eight beatitudes, the first eight beatitudes found on Matthew 5. Now, we come to nine ladies.
Jacque: I get all confused because you have to sing it to know it.
Brian: Nine ladies dancing.
Jacque: Well, when nine comes up in your mind comes to your mind. Anybody?
Member: Pregnancy.
Brian: Pregnancy, yes. Is that prophetic? I don't know. Well, I tell you what we really need to be pregnant with is the nine fruits to the spirit fruits of the spirit. The nine fruits of the spirit, these fruit when they are evident in our lives, it's like watching ladies dance. It is. It's like watching ladies dance, like this beautiful dancing.
Jacque: Oh, like the ballet dance.
Brian: Yes. What other kind of dancing?
Jacque: I don't know. I just like to clarify.
Brian: Yes. Let's move on.
Jacque: I'm sorry.
Brian: That's all right. So let's read Galatians 5:22 -23.
Jacque: I don't know if I can.
Brian: Do you want me to?
Jacque: No, I can do it. But the fruit of the spirit is love joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things, there is no law.
Brian: So here's the thing. There is not one law that I know of made by God or even man that prohibits you from loving somebody. There is not one law by God that prohibits you from having joy or peace or forbearance. Forbearance is like a willingness to stick with something. There is not one law that God has ever made to prevent you from being kind or good or faithful. All of these, gentleness, self-control, it's such a wonderful thing. It's like a wonderful ballet when people are walking. That's beautiful in the fruit of the spirit. Isn't it?
Jacque: I remember Tracy and Stuart Palmer; they had a ministry called the dance of love. It was so beautiful. One point they brought out is our relationship with God. Like when you are dancing, slow dancing, the women have to let their partner lead and thinking of God. Dancing with God, letting him lead, then it's a beautiful dance.
Brian: Yes. It's really beautiful when the scripture says, how can two walk together unless they be agreed? I really love to watch Stuart and Tracy. It was like one person. It was like one person when they were dancing and there were dancing. There was such a flow to it. I've also seen mosh pits. Has anybody seen a mosh pit? That is like nobody in agreement.
Jacque: Okay. This is my mosh pit story. Our boys used to have a punk band and it was great. We would go to all the shows that we could in Minneapolis. One time I was standing in front of the stage, looking adoringly at my boys because I'm so proud of them, before the show. And then this guy came up to me and said, "Ma'am you might want to move because in about one minute, this is a mosh pit and you are going to get hurt.
Brian: You are not going to be safe here, so you listened to authority.
Jacque: I did. I moved.
Brian: And you are live today to talk about it.
Jacque: I am.
Brian: Yes. Let's go on. So we come to verse 10, which is 10 Lords a-leaping. The code word here is ten and leaping. What 10 things just kind of leap out at us from the scriptures? The 10 commandments. The 10 commandments really have a Lordship aspect, in a sense, in our lives. These 10 Lords a-leaping are the 10 commandments and they forever jump out at us. They forever jump out at us. God has in some respects written many of those things on our hearts. They have this power to bring truth to bear in our lives. They are these 10 Lords that just leap out at us, the 10 commandments.
Next verse, 11 pipers piping. When you think of a piper piping, it would be somebody who is playing something that is for everybody else to hear. That's how the gospel went throughout the whole world is because it started with the 11 disciples who were following Jesus. They were the first real missionaries, and of course, now we are all part of those pipes, but we, we owe a deep debt of gratitude to those first 11 disciples. Obviously, there were 12 and Judas fell away and I've often said that if he would've waited one more day, there would've been 12 disciples that followed Jesus throughout the world because he would've experienced his resurrection power and mercy.
And then we have this very strange one, 12 drummers drumming. By the time that this song was written, there was a thing that had been practiced in the church known as the apostle’s creed. There were 12 points to the apostle’s creed and these 12 points were these 12 drummers drumming. And so I just want to quickly go over these 12 points. The first is that I believe in God, the father almighty maker of heaven and earth. This is a wonderful thing that we can declare. It's a very important thing for us to learn. I believe in God, the father almighty, who had made heaven and earth.
Jacque: Those are declarations.
Brian: It's a declaration. Yes.
Jacque: Of what we believe as Christian.
Brian: Yes. Number two. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only son, our Lord. Number three, I believe that he was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilot and was crucified, dead and buried. I remember hearing the story of this little kid in Sunday school who these kids were drawing pictures of the Christmas story. This little boy had a picture of like the manger scene and Mary and Joseph and cattle and whatever. And then up in the far right hand corner, there was an airplane and the teacher said, "What is this?" And he said, "That's Pontius the pilot."
Anyways, he suffered under Pontius Pilot, was crucified, he died and was buried, but number four, he descended into hell. And number five on the third day, he rose again from the dead. Isn't it important for us to remember this stuff, to say these things? Number six, he ascended into heaven and he sits on the right hand of God, the father. And from there, he shall come to judge the quick or the alive and those who are dead. The seventh is that we believe in the Holy Spirit, the gift from God, our father, the gift of the father that Jesus said we were to have. The eight thing is the holy Catholic church. The word Catholic here means universal. We believe in the universal church; we don't believe we are the only people that know the truth. We believe God's spirit is working throughout the whole world. And it doesn't matter what culture you are in or what nationality you are from. God's spirit works in their hearts.
We may have different expressions of our worship to God because of the nature or the culture that we were raised in that we are more comfortable with than others. But at the end of the day, the promise to Abraham was through you, all the nations of the earth are going to be blessed and that all the people in heaven are going to be comprised of every nation. The ninth is the communion of the saints and this is kind of a multiple meaning here. We have communion with God and with each other, we also take communion or the Lord supper. There is a dualistic meaning here on this one with, with fellowship and communion.
And then we have number 10, the forgiveness of sins. Aren't you grateful for that today, Forgiveness of sins? Number 11, on this apostle’s creed, I believe in the resurrection body. I've said many times that when that trumpet sounds, I want to be out in our cemetery, if I'm alive and well. If I'm actually out in the cemetery, having dead, having died, I will come out of that grave because there will be the resurrection of the body. This is why Paul writes death, where is thy sting? Oh, grave, where is your victory? And then the 12th is of course life everlasting. I'm not going to ask you to sing this Christmas Carol today, but when you hear it in the future, we should remind ourselves of something very important that we need to be so thankful that we don't have to sing in code. We don't have to sing and talk in a coded language, that there are many people whose faith was very deep that made a way for you and I to have faith today.
When you hear this song in the future, when we think of 12 drummers drumming, we will think of the apostles creed that we just reviewed, or we think of the 11 faithful disciples or the 10 commandments, 9 fruits of the spirit.
Jacque: You should write it.
Brian: The first 8 beatitudes, the 7 gifts of the Holy Spirit, 6 days of creation, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, Matthew, mark, Luke and John, Matthew.
Jacque: Mark. Yeah. You've got to get the melody right.
Brian: Faith, hope and love, the old and new Testament and Jesus on the cross. We could sing it, but maybe not.
Jacque: But one thing I wish we would do, I wish we would actually say the apostles creed in church. I think that is just powerful. As a community here, saying out loud with our mouths what we believe about God and Jesus.
Brian: Yes, it's good. So on the first day of Christmas, the truest love that anyone of us could ever have gave us Jesus, Jesus on a tree. That's why he came. That wasn't an afterthought. That wasn't the result of the scheming and conniving of the religious leaders or the devil. It was prophesied as far back as Genesis 3:15, that his heel would be bruised and that he would come. The Psalmist and the prophet, Isaiah also prophesied. There were many scriptures written about Jesus and what he came to do.
I sometimes envy the two disciples on the road to Emmaus because on that walk that Jesus took with them, he opened up all of the scriptures from the law and the prophets and explained every one of them to them. And he said, "This was about me. This was me. This was spoken about me here." And many of those scriptures that he referred to were his death and his suffering because prior to Jesus opening up our understanding, they had said to him before they knew who he was. When he asked them the question, why are you so downcast? Why are you so forlorn? And they said, well, haven't you heard all that is going on and what have happened in Jerusalem? And we had thought that he was the one, but we don't anymore. That's what was implied there. We had thought, but we don't anymore.
And so Jesus takes the scriptures about his birth, but also about his life and also about his suffering, and also about his death, the Partridge in a pear tree, the Jesus on the cross and explain to those two disciples on the road to Emmaus. When he got done, their response was, did not our hearts burn within us when he was speaking to us? As the truth became revealed about why our true love sent the Partridge in a pear tree, why our true love did that, their hearts burned within them.
I would hope that in the future, when you hear this song, you'll be not as ignorant as I was some years ago, but begin to appreciate the fact that we can worship freely without hindrance. We can sing and declare the wonderful truths of God without having to use code words. And when we do hear this song, we give thanks to those people who are willing to be so creative to reinforced their faith by writing such a creative song and lyrics, and tune so that even the little kids would sing it and learn about the fact that the old and new testaments were covenants that was given to us by God, that if we would all just have faith hope and love and that if we would just permeate, let the four gospels permeate our lives, if we would understand the covenant relationship of what was contained in the Torah, and not allow ourselves to buy into the lies that this universe came into existence in any other way, other than that God created, and all the other things that we covered this morning. When we sing or hear this song, let us just be grateful for the wonderful revelation that we can have with these truths.
Jacque: It makes me think of all— we have brothers and sisters all around the world that at Christmas time cannot celebrate Jesus. Some of them will be killed. They'll be persecuted. They will be in jail if they even celebrate Jesus openly.
Brian: And maybe they can sing this song.
Jacque: Yes. But we should pray for them. We should pray for the persecuted church.
Brian: Yes. Let's just bow our hearts and heads here. And Pastor Jeff is going to come and just have a word of prayer with us. But Lord, I thank you that we can worship you in freedom and fullness. Lord, I thank you that where there is a will, there is always a way. And even in the midst of the government, and in some cases, even the church, the church prohibiting people from worshiping in a certain way, certain belief system, you have always had a people. And I pray that those who are watching online and those who are here today, that we will be that people. We will be that people that will always worship you, that we will find a way to declare your goodness, that we will a way to declare your truth. We will find a way to love as you love, Lord. We will find a way where there seems to be no way that maybe one of these gifts of the spirit would be a word of wisdom to us, that we will find a way to live a life that models following you. I thank you, Jesus, for the creativity that you give. You always make a way for your people to worship you, to honor you and to follow you. We thank you, Lord. Pastor Jeff.
Jeff: Thank you. That was something I've never heard before. How many people is that new to? It's something. Thank you, Jesus. Well, whether we sing in code or whether we are able to be open with our faith, there is always a pressure to try to subdue the message of the good news of Jesus. You might be somebody that's never really given your heart to this message. You might be listening online. You might be here this morning. But before we do anything, we want to give you an opportunity to respond to the good news of Jesus because Jesus changes their life so radically and his love is so real that as Jacque and Brian have alluded to, there are people all around the world and all throughout history who have maintained a faith, even if it had to be secretly, regardless of the threat of death, persecution, imprisonment. Because when Jesus changes your life, he changes it forever and he changes it for the good and it's worth everything.
So don't let the pressures of our culture, keep you from the good news of Jesus and everything that he's done for you. I want to give you an opportunity right now to turn your life over to him and to experience the life changing power of this God in heaven, who did everything for you, so that you could have something new. So if you are in that place where you've never trusted Jesus, I want you to close your eyes and put your hand in the air at home or here. And I want you to pray with me. And it's a very simple prayer because it's just a conversation with God where we open our heart to him. And we say something like this. We say, Jesus Christ, I believe you are God, and today I trust my life to you. I trust my life to you. I pray that you would come into my life, forgive my sins, and make me new.
It's a very simple prayer, but when we open our hearts, the God of heaven responds and everything changes. And there are many of us who are here today, watching by live stream, sitting in this room who a year ago or 50 years ago or longer ago had our lives radically changed by Jesus and that's why we are here. You are welcome to join us. You are welcome to join. And then before we go, we do want to pray for miracles because some of us need them. One thing about Jesus is he's a God of miracles. Isn't that great?
I did have to interject Jacque. Cheryl has a mosh story too. Back in the nineties, when we were pastoring, we teamed up with a ministry called source ministries. We had what we called at that time, Gloria Day Nights in our church on Friday nights and we converted our whole church. It was like Hope. We didn't have fast and down pews, so we converted our whole church into a coffee house and invited kids. We had hundreds of kids in our church. Our parking lot was fuller on a Friday night on one of those youth nights than on a Sunday morning. And 99% of them had never met Jesus. And we had invited these kids; we invited their bands to come and play in our church. And then they would mosh in the front of the church. So Cheryl got up and joined them. So she actually stayed in the pit. That was her reputation. That's pastor's wife. People would come up to like— Peter, who was the director of source. They would be doing stuff and they would say, "Does the pastor know you are doing this?"
Jacque: That's so awesome.
Jeff: The other thing I was going to say, you've probably sung them, but there is at least two worship songs I've sung that are, I believe worship songs, the apostle creed worship song. What a great way to confess your faith, just to sing it to the Lord. But if you need a miracle, we don't want to lose track of that, then we are going to trust God with you for a miracle. There are a lot of different ways that we need miracles. Some of us need miracles for our children who are wayward. Some of us need miracles for our bodies that are just not functioning like we want them to. Some of us need financial miracles. Some of us need healings in our marriages. All of these things are things that God will help us with. He is willing and he is able. And so we are going to lift up to him our needs and we are going to trust him for miracles. If you need a miracle, put up your hand because we are going to trust God with you; we are going to trust together for miracles.
Father, you see the hands that are raised at home and in here, and we just put our arms around each other in faith, trusting you to do what only you can do. Lord, we need a miracle because there is not a earthly solution. You are the only one with a solution. But thank you that we find ourselves in a place that we can only turn to you, and as we turn to you, we trust you to release into our lives the very things that we need. And so father in Jesus' name, I release healing. I release redemption, I release the restoration of relationships, I release provision. And I know that you see every hand that's raised, you see every need and that according to everything Jesus did you release into our lives right now, the very things that we are requesting. We trust you for that. We thank you for that. You are so good. You are so good. Thank you.
Brian: Thank you so much for being here today. When you hear this song now in the future, I think you'll think of it differently, won't you? And maybe even enjoy singing along with it. And so we thank you, those of you who are on livestream, for joining us today as well. You are part of our community here of faith and we are so grateful for your participation and your partnership with us. God bless you. Let's raise your hands again. Shall we?
And now may the Lord bless you and may the Lord keep you, and may the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you and may the Lord turn his face towards you and give you his peace. And may you truly know the love of our father in heaven and why he sent Jesus. Thank you. This, we pray in the name of the father's son and Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you. Have a wonderful, wonderful day. Be safe on the roads. God bless you. That doesn't go up for those of you in Florida.
Jacque: Yes, it does.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 12-05-21. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.