Pastor Brian and Jacque Lother
Jacque: Beautiful. Yes. Thank you for that beautiful piece. The name of that song was “In your presence.” Yeah, in your presence, God. It's so good to have everybody here today in person. There is a nice group of people here. It's so nice to see you all tonight. It's a blessing to worship together, to focus on God. Bill is here from Arizona. Hi Bill. It's just so good to have you here. It's so good to have all of you here. Some people even told me yesterday, you know what? I'm with you tomorrow, but I'm with you at home. And so we appreciate you being with us at home too. It's so good to have us all together all in one accord. I love that, in one accord together in unity and in one accord with God; unity, all of us. It's beautiful. I'm just asking you to continue to pray for the Koethe family, Sandy Koethe. Today at two o'clock is John's celebration of life service because that's what we are going to do: celebrate his life. Keep praying for the family. If you are visitors today, we have visitor bags. Is that Leeann?
Brian: That's Leeann.
Jacque: Hi Leeann [inaudible 36:53]is here right by Sandy. It's so good. It's good to have you here.
Brian Jesus and Leanne are here today.
Jacque: Jesus and Leanne are here. We are in good hands. I'll stop talking. Well, I'll just talk to everybody here.
Brian: That's all right. This is a welcoming place. It's a place for people to belong. It is. I'm proud to have known John. I've known him for many years. Sandy probably doesn't even know this, but— I was a poor kid in college over at the University of Minnesota. About 10 o'clock at night, I would go out because I had a key to my professor’s studio and I would practice late into the evenings over there. And then I would go out to my old VW and it wouldn't start. I would call my dad and he would drive all the way over from New Hope and told me to a heated garage, and then it would start the next day and the next day we did the same thing all over again during the winter time.
My dad said to me, "Brian, you know, even a dumb dog doesn't kiss a hot stove twice." He said, “So why do you keep doing the same thing?” I said, "Well, dad, I don't have any money. I'm paying myself through college and everything." So anyways, we went to Northside Mercury and John was working over at Northside Mercury at the time. We got a car; it was a Ford Fairlane 500, and man was at a nice car. John went through the whole thing and my dad was working with John on it. He said, "Brian this will last you." And it did. We had it when we got married and stuff. I sold her Mustang so we could keep my Ford Fairlane 500. She has never forgiven me. Can you tell?
Jacque: It was red. It was a red Mustang.
Brian: Yes, but my car worked.
Jacque: Your heat was better.
Brian: You had no heat in your car. Anyways, John was such a special guy and we have such great memories of John through the years.
Jacque: Gospel Ranch.
Brian: Gospel Ranch in your youth.
Jacque: Church... the life of the party
Brian: We are celebrating his life today and I'm sure that he would have some wonderful things to say to us about what we can expect in the future. I was thinking about going to school. School has been a big part of my life over the course of my life. This thought hit me that there are no schools without tests. There are no schools without tests. I even think a school of fish has tests because if they don't learn how to avoid sharks, they are going to be dead. There are schools everywhere. I never thought in my life that I could go through a whole year of school without having to take a test. I never thought that. Even pop quizzes come up from time to time. You have college and you have high school, grade school, middle school, you have driving school. Boy, you do tests if you go to driving school.
Jacque: A couple of hard ones,
Brian: A couple of hard ones. If you go to med school, there are tests. If you go to law school, there is a bar exam. There are tests. If you go to computer school, there are tests. If you go to plumber school—Warren can talk about that. Warren goes and takes tests to make sure he can keep his plumbers’ license. Electrical school, remedial school, whatever; every school has tests, every school has tests.
The thing that we always forget in our lives is that we are all enrolled in a school. We don't know it, but we get enrolled in that school the day we take our first breath and we are in that school until the day we take our last breath. It's called the school of the spirit. It's the school of the spirit. The school of the spirit is a school you never graduate from. You just keep learning. Our heavenly father is the headmaster of that school. Every school has instructors.
Oftentimes, we think that God is against us when we are in a test, don't we? Where is God? What did I do wrong? How come this is happening? And we think that somehow God is against us, but I believe this kind of thinking has to change. We have to change our thinking about this because number one, tests show what we've learned. It also shows us what we have yet to learn. Another interesting thing about tests is it shows our instructor what we learned. He learns things about us in tests. But tests are not in our lives because God is against us. God is always for us. He is always for us.
There are a couple of great stories in the scriptures that I think can bring this concept to come alive to us today. The first, we find in the person of a man whose name was Abram, who later became Abraham. But at this point in time in Genesis chapter 15, verses 1 through 6, his name is Abraham. I would like you to read the first six verses of Genesis chapter 15.
Jacque: From the NIV. After this, the word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision: do not be afraid, Abraham. I am your shield, your very great reward.
Brian: God says that he is our reward. In some respect, we are all to be like the tribe of Levi, the Levitical priesthood, because all the different tribes got land as an inheritance, but to the Levites, he said, "I'm your inheritance." That was a test for the Levites because you know, the Levites saw with their eyes, heard with their ears. It was really easy when the other tribes were getting all this land and being able to build homes and being able to do all these things. It was really easy for the Levitical tribe to think, well, look what they are getting, and not understand how much we are valuable it was for the tribe of Levi to actually have God as their inheritance. But what God is saying to Abraham here is that I am going to be your reward. How many of you would like to have Jesus as a reward for something? Is there a better reward there than Jesus? No, there isn't. Let's go on.
Jacque: But Abraham said, sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless? And the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus.
Brian: Eliezer was like a servant, like the head servant of Abraham.
Jacque: And Abraham said, you've given me no children, so a servant in my household will be my heir. Then the word of the Lord came to him: this man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir. He took him outside and said, look up at the sky and count the stars, if indeed you can count them. Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be Abraham believed the Lord and he credited it to him as righteous.
Brian: Later on, we find in the scriptures that God has given names to each and every one of those stars. He has given them names. So if he gives a like a rotating piece of dirt or rock in outer space, a name don't you think he is more concerned about us as living beings? Of course he is. And so the first thing that God wanted to do here with Abraham was to change his paradigm. Abraham's paradigm was I don't have an heir and that my inheritance is going to go to my servant, Eliezer. So God had to change his paradigm and that his servant was not going to be an error and that God saw his belief in this situation. He said, I believe you, God, I believe you. And this was counted to him as righteousness. Now, here is the first test that always happens when God promises you something, you have to wait.
Jacque: That is so true.
Brian: Say that in the mic.
Jacque: That is so true.
Brian: So now time passes and it continues to pass. This is the first test. Both Abraham and Sarah are cognizant of the fact that this promise came from God. God doesn't always tell us everything. So they get together and they think to themselves, maybe we need to fill in the blanks here. Maybe we need to kind of figure out how this promise is going to come to pass. And so Sarah comes up with an idea that Abraham should have relations with their servant girl, Hagar and they conceived. After this conception, Ishmael is born which by the way, the name Ishmael means God hears. It's interesting, this name, God hears. Abraham and Sarah came up with a human plan to fulfill God's promise. How many times do we do that?
Jacque: It always causes problems.
Brian: Yeah and it causes great problems. No sooner had this child been born and now Sarah is angry. So she kicks Hagar out with Ishmael and she is sitting on the backside of the desert and God comes to her and actually makes a wonderful promise to her about Ishmael that Ishmael is going to be great and his tribe is going to grow tremendously and that God's not going to forsake her. But he realizes that this is not God's plan. Abraham is now 99 years old, and God says, you are going to be the father of many nations. God changed his name from Abram to Abraham at that point in time. And Sarah was now 90 years old.
I want to show— do we have that picture? This is a picture of a tree in Israel called the Oak of Mamre. This is right where Abraham met three men who came and promised Abraham that the promise that God had made to Abraham when he was 86, now he is 99, was still going to come to pass. Let's read this. It's found in Genesis 18, verses 10 through 14. One of these three men began to talk to Abraham, and this is what he says.
Jacque: Then one of them said, I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah, your wife will have a son. Now, Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. Abraham and Sarah were already very old, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, after I am worn out and my Lord is old will I now have this pleasure? Then the Lord said to Abraham, why did Sarah laugh and say, will I really have a child now that I'm old? Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year and Sarah will have a son.
Brian: So this conversation happened right at the location where this tree is. This tree is allegedly 2000 years old. We don't know if it is or not. It's probably a descendant.
Jacque: It's probably a descendant.
Brian: It's probably a descendant of the original Oak of Mamre. But anyways, one of the things that we have to learn in our season of waiting is to say this is anything too hard for the Lord? Let's say it together. Is anything too hard for the Lord? And the answer is what? No, nothing is too hard for the Lord. A year later, the promise comes. When our promise arrives, you know what we think? We think this is the end of the test. Aren't we naive? Aren't we naive? This is the end of the test. Our promise came; we persevered. We hung on; the promise came. Now my tests are done. Let's go on. Let's read Genesis chapter 22 verses 1 and 2.
Jacque: Sometime later, God tested Abraham.
Brian: Okay, here we go. Sometime later, God tested Abraham. Well, how much later? Well, a year later Isaac was born. It's interesting if you go read this from the time the guys came, these three men came and talked to Abraham and Isaac was born was about a year because he said a year from now, I'm going to come back and you are going to have a son. But during that year is when all of the controversy happened with Sodom and Gomorrah, all of that took place with Lot and all of that. But a year later, Isaac is born and they are holding this beautiful little boy. And now this little boy starts to grow up. So my guess is that Abraham's now around 110. You think if you reach the age of 110, there is nothing left to learn. But sometime later, God tested Abraham. And he said to Abraham, what?
Jacque: He said to him, Abraham. Here I am, he replied. Then God said, take your son, your only son whom you love Isaac and go to the region of Moriah, sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.
Brian: Now, this is a real test. I mean, this is a real test because here is this promise that came very supernaturally. They are both way beyond childbearing years and this child is born to them and now God is asking the unthinkable.
Jacque: Can you imagine how they doted on him and loved him.
Brian: I can't imagine them not being spoiled. Abraham goes from this place where this tree is to Jerusalem, which is where Mount Moriah ultimately became. Once there, he prepares an altar, wood and so forth. I can just see Isaac being maybe 10, 11 years old, 12 years old. And Isaac saying, "Well, where is the sacrifice, dad?" Here is the wood, here is the whatever, where is the sacrifice. At some point in time, Abraham says, you are the sacrifice. As an 11 year old I would run. I would try and have my 110 year old dad try and catch me.
That says something about Isaac too. I think there was a trust factor in Isaac that we never talk about. There is a trust factor in Isaac that because I do believe that Abraham and Isaac said to him, threw out his entire life, you are a promise from God. You have a destiny. Out of you will come many nations, et cetera. You will be a blessing to many nations. And so I believe even though he was a young boy, I believe just like Samuel at the age of 5, he was hearing God speak to him when he was brought to the tabernacle and the holy place. I believe that there was a trust factor in Isaac that often we don't think about. Isaac was trusting just like Abraham was trusting. So we jump down to now the verses 9 through 12 and we see when the sacrifice was just about to happen, God speaks again.
Jacque: Isaac learned trust from his dad. It's beautiful. When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son, Isaac, laid him on top of the altar on top of the wood. Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son, but the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven: Abraham, Abraham. Here I am, he replied. Do not lay a hand on the boy, he said. Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me, your son, your only son.
Brian: Sometimes we learn in our tests and there are sometimes our instructors learn some things about us in our tests. And that's what this portion of scripture seems to indicate. But after all is said and done, what we end up needing to learn from this is that God's favor never left Abraham during this test. This test wasn't an absence of God's favor. It was an opportunity for Abraham to go deeper in his reliance and his trust on God. God's favor never left Abraham during the test or because of the test. God's favor never left him.
It's really interesting to me, there is a similar story 2000 years later that we read in the New Testament of two people, Zachariah and Elizabeth. We read their story in Luke chapter one verses five through seven. And there are a lot of parallelisms between Abraham and Sarah and Zachariah and Elizabeth here. So let's read it.
Jacque: In the time of Herod, King of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah. His wife, Elizabeth, was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them are righteous in the sight of God observing all the Lord's commands and decrees blamelessly, but they were childless because Elizabeth was not able to conceive, and they were both very old.
Brian: Let me kind of paint this picture for you. The scripture says that these were really two very righteous people, that they observed all of the Lord's commands and the promise that they had was a distant memory to them. It was a distant memory, probably so distant that they had given up on it. Have you ever done all that you know what to do? Have you ever done all that you know what the Lord wants you to do, yet your prayers have gone unanswered? Has that ever happened? You've done everything you know how to do over a long period of time, not just for a day or a week or even a month, but maybe years. You obeyed the Lord, you worshiped the Lord, you sought the Lord, you prayed, you tarried, you claimed, you bound, you loosed, and at the end, the promise has still not arrived. It's so easy in those seasons to think that somehow God is no longer for you. It's so easy to think that. Let's keep reading the story. We see another portion in verses 11 through 12 in the same chapter. Let me set the stage for you. Zechariah is now chosen to serve in the holy of holies. He is a priest; not the high priest, but he is a priest and he is serving at the altar of incense and it's in the holy of holies. There is nobody there except for him.
Jacque: Nobody is allowed in there.
Brian: Nobody is allowed there except for him at that moment. He is going through the ritual of prayers and so forth of the day. He is going through the ritual prayers and so forth of the day, interceding on behalf of the nation of Israel, and all of a sudden, there is a guy there with him, the angel of the Lord,
Jacque: Then the angel of the Lord appeared to him standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zachariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him, do not be afraid, Zachariah. Your prayer has been heard.
Brian: What prayer is he talking about? What prayer is he talking about? He is talking about the prayer he prayed years and years ago about wanting a child, the prayers that probably Zechariah and Elizabeth themselves had forgotten they prayed.
Jacque: Our prayers have a long shelf life.
Brian: That's right. Our prayers have a long shelf life and God— in spite of the fact that we have forgotten much of what we have prayed for God never forgets what we pray for. Every prayer we've ever prayed has been held in the hands of God in heaven to be poured out at just the right time. And so he was startled. We would all be startled if this angel of the Lord just appeared next to us, but he comes with good news. And the good news is—
Jacque: You wife, Elizabeth, will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is to never take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born.
Brian: Remember when that happened, when Mary showed up with Jesus and John leaped in his mother's womb and was filled with the Holy Spirit? I gave a message about that prior to, I think it was Christmas time about how sometimes we need somebody to kick start our dreams. She had a dream, but probably he didn't feel anything in her for a number of months. And then all of a sudden Mary shows up with Jesus. Of course, Elizabeth didn't even know that she was pregnant. Mary comes and tells us the good news and what have you, and this baby is filled with the Holy Spirit. Just sometimes we need a Mary to come alongside of us to kick start our drinks. This is what happened. He was filled with the Holy Spirit in his mother's womb for a great purpose.
Jacque: He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord, their God, and he will go on before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. So Zachariah asked the angel, how can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.
Brian: So again, Zechariah is questioning and his questioning is rooted on human understanding, not spiritual understanding. His questioning is based on just the natural order of things. I'm convinced that we see so little miracles in America because we have to have everything make sense. We have to have everything explained. I have said this on numerous occasions, but I think it's worth repeating the story of the apostle Paul when he was bitten by the viper right at the end of the book of acts. When he was bitten, the people who saw this attributed some kind of a spiritual connotation to the situation. They said, ‘Ooh, he must have been an evil man must have committed some sin," whatever. And then when he didn't have any negative effects from the viper’s poison, then their response was, "he must be a holy man. He must be a righteous man, so God, therefore, is protecting him." There was this spiritual application to that.
Now let's have that same scene happen in America. Paul is giving the fire started, the snake comes out, bites them, and nothing happens. You know what we would say? It must have been an old snake.
Jacque: Not much poison.
Brian: Not much poison in that snake. We wouldn't put a spiritual connotation on the story because in America, in the Western world, we have to explain everything. Everything has to be explained rationally to our minds, and therefore, because of that, we oftentimes miss the opportunities of the supernatural, which goes above and beyond our ability to necessarily comprehend even the laws of science. God can go above and beyond the laws of science. That's how miracles actually do happen. That's how he could walk on the water. That's above and beyond the understanding of science. That's how he does it. We see Zechariah now falling into this Western, as I would call it, mindset. Well, how is this going to happen? I'm an old guy. It's too late. You showed up 40 years too late. What did you get a detour here, Gabriel? And so he said, "This is not going to happen." And I love Gabriel's answer to this.
Brian: And the angel said to him, I'm Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God. Look at me. What are you looking at, man? I’m Gabriel.
Jacque: And I've been sent to speak to you and tell you this good news.
Brian: I stand in the presence of God. I'm going to go out on a limb here.
Jacque: I'm glad he didn't say I'm taking it back.
Brian: Back in the day, I thought it was one of the most wonderful movies that had ever come out. It was many years ago, the movie “Oh God” came out. Do you remember any of you watching that movie, Oh God? Not very many. It's so old; most of you haven't seen it.
Jacque: You would enjoy watching it.
Brian: You would enjoy it. Here is why I loved it: George Burns played God. He comes to John Denver, who is a guy that just works in a grocery store, and he has got a message for John Denver to bring to the world. So he tells him what he wants him to do. He makes it rain inside the car while it's sunshiny outside and all this stuff to prove he is God.
Jacque: All kinds of miracles.
Brian: All kinds of miracles. John Denver believes this is God. One of the things that George Burns does as God, he hands John Denver his card, and it has got God written on it. Here is my card. And he says, "Well, what if these people don't believe me?" And he says, well, just show them my card. Just show them my card. He goes and tries to explain that God is really not happy with all the things that are going on, all the fighting in the world and whatever, and that's not what he intended. So then George Burns comes back and he connects with John Denver again and says, “So how's it going? Did you talk to the news media? Did you talk to all these people?” And he said, “Yeah.” He said, “Well, what did they say?” He said, “Well, they think I'm nuts. They think I'm nuts. They think I'm talking to God, but they don't believe in God.” George Burns says, “Well, did you show them my card?”
Well, it's like, this is the same thing. I'm Gabriel, man. Here is my card. I come from the presence of God. I come from the presence of God and everything got does doesn't have to be explained by the natural mind, but you have to keep trusting him. You have to just keep trusting him. Elizabeth's barrenness was actually not a punishment even though she felt it was and everybody around her felt it was.
Jacque: It was even a greater miracle when it happened.
Brian: Yes, look at the next verse, verse 25.
Jacque: Can I finish this?
Brian: Okay, sure.
Jacque: I want to read that again. I'm Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God and I've been sent to speak to you and tell you this good news. And now because you didn't believe, you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time.
Brian: Now, I'll tell you what the cross I realized we have lower natures and the angels don't. But if we would have been that angel coming to Zechariah, we would have said, well, it's your tough tuna fish. No child for you. No child for you. But there was a consequence to Zechariah for not believing that consequence was he couldn't speak for this nine month period of time. When he finally wrote out his name will be John, and when John was born and then he was able to speak.
Jacque: There is wisdom in this because when we are going through hard times, it's so good to not keep rehearsing the hard time. It's so good to not keep speaking words that are not faith-filled, so maybe it was God's blessing to him to stop his talking.
Brian: There is a good point there. There is a good point. So here is—
Jacque: You should do that to me, maybe
Brian: You said it; not me. So anyways, we see now Elizabeth conceives and she is carrying this child, John the Baptist, and we see what she has to say in verse 25.
Jacque: The Lord has done this for me, she said. In these days he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people.
Brian: She felt disgraced. The disgrace didn't come from God. Elizabeth's bareness was not a punishment from God. It was simply a circumstance that allowed her to remain faithful in her trust and faith in God through difficulty and adversity. It wasn't a penalty or punishment from God. Oftentimes in our lives, times of testing create in us the temptation to pull away. We pull away from God. We get mad at God. We pull away from each other because we don't want people to know what we are going through. Because if we were really spiritual and had faith, we wouldn't be going through this. We feel it's an indictment on our faith, so we don't share with anybody, what we are really going through in our tests, in our difficulty, in our adversity.
Let me just encourage all of you today, all of you who are hearing, all of you who are watching on live stream, we are all part of a faith community. Many of you are part of this faith community and others of you who are watching are part of other faith communities and you are part of this faith community as well. I would just encourage you today: don't pull away from your faith community when you face tests. Don't pull away from your faith community when you are facing trials and when you are in the middle trouble because one of the greatest ways we can bring joy right to the heart of God is to trust him during trials and temptations. One of the greatest ways we can bring joy to God is to trust him when the circumstances seem impossible, because the angel said with God, all things are possible. Nothing is impossible with God.
What an opportunity for us to know that God is for us as we continue to trust him during seasons of not understanding and seasons of our prayers not being answered still coming to a place of saying I trust in you implicitly, Lord, I trust in your promise to me. I know that you will come through. We can trust him in the midst of circumstances that would try to dictate otherwise to us.
I think bringing joy to God's heart is one of the greatest gifts that you and I can give him. In the same way that your grandchildren or your children, when they just come around this morning, Charlie and Finn came in here; I was just here by myself and they were the first ones here after me. They came running in and they just ran across the auditorium, ran up to the piano, threw their arms around me and gave me a big hug. What do you think that did in this heart? One of the greatest gifts my grandchildren can do for me is they bring me joy. It's not the money I hope they make that they will give to me. It's none of that.
There is nothing you and I can really give to God, but we can give him joy. He said that you and I were created for his pleasure, that we have this ability to bring pleasure to God. We have the ability to put a big smile on his face. If God where to send you an icon today, what would it be? Is that what you call those things on here? An emoji, okay. Not an icon, an emoji. See, I don't even send them. If God were to send you an emoji today in a text message, what would it be?
Jacque: A big smile.
Brian: It would be a big smile.
Jacque: And a big heart.
Brian: Yes, and a big heart to you. When we realize this is the power and effect that we can have, I don't want to say over God, but on God, I believe that our trust in him in these circumstances can bring great joy to his heart. So don't think of a test or a trial because we are all in this school together. Don't think of a test that God is against you or that somehow you failed or that somehow there is a lesson that you are learning the hard way. Some tests are just hard. They are just hard.
Jacque: And they are long.
Brian: And they are long. Some of them are very long and they are very hard and it's not because the headmaster is trying to punish us. He is trying to infuse all this stuff into us to help us become successful in whatever field we are studying. Here is the verse: I waited patiently for the Lord. So let's wait patiently when we are in these tests, when we are in these trials and let's be committed to one other thing. Let's not skip class when there is a test. We all know how to do that, don't we? Tomorrow I've got this big test; ooh, I woke up with a stomach ache today. And "Mom, I'm just sick. I can't go to school today." You know what ends up happening when you miss those big tests, now you have to do makeup tests and the teacher's ticked off at you because he had to do a different test because he couldn't give you the same test because he was afraid you were talking to some of the other classmates getting the answers.
So let's just go through it. Let's just take the tests. We are in this school together and God is for us in these seasons. As we trust him, as Abraham trusted him, it was accounted to him as righteousness. I believe as we trust him, we now have the righteousness of Christ, of course, but one thing we can do is we can bring a big smile to the face of God because we are trusting implicitly in him. Let's pray together.
Father, I just thank you. I thank you that, Lord, we are given opportunities to bring you joy. And I think that even though there is great joy brought to your heart when we give and there is great joy brought to your heart when we serve. There is great joy brought to your heart, Jesus, when we become like you. But the greatest joy I think that we can bring to your heart is to trust you in those difficult times and seasons of testing, those difficult times when you have made a promise to us, either from your word or through a revelatory promise. We are in this season of waiting and we are growing old in our waiting and time passes, and we begin to question, did I really hear from you, God? Is this really what your word says? But Jesus, your smile on your face is so big when we will with steadfastness in our heart, say, I trust you. I believe in you, Jesus.
And so today we, once again, commit to being trusting children of our father in heaven. We will trust you, Lord. You have proven yourself to us so many ways. So may your peace now flood our souls in our season of waiting as we trust in you. May the enemy never rob us of the peace that you gave your life for that we could have in our souls while we are waiting for your promises to happen. This, we pray Jesus in your name and for your sake.
For those of you who are here today at the end of the service, Dave and Lou will be serving communion over here to our right. So anybody who would like to have communion, they will serve you communion after the service. For those of you who are watching by live stream, we thank you for joining us today. We just value your part of being part of this community. Now we would like to bless you all. Let's stand together, shall we?
Jacque: Oh, I just wanted to say again that every step of the way, through every trial, God is holding our hands right with us. Our strength, our help, our support, our wisdom and sometimes I just need more faith to believe you, God. Help me believe.
Brian: We just need more of him.
Jacque: Every moment he is there.
Brian: So let's raise our hands together. Now may the Lord bless you. May the Lord keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and may the Lord turn his face toward you and give you his peace in your season of testing and waiting this. We pray in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you. Have a wonderful, wonderful day.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 4-25-21. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.