Oh, crossing family. It is so good to be with you.
I hope somebody's already told you this past week, but if they
didn't, I want you to know I love you.
God loves you, this church loves you, and we are so thankful we
get the opportunity to gather together every single week.
I want to welcome those of you joining in our physical
locations and I want to welcome those of you who are watching
online, and I want to send a special shout out to all of you
who are part of the crossing inside.
Yesterday morning, I got invited by a group of wonderful
volunteers out of our Hannibal campus to go to the Vandalia
women's prison, and I got to preach the Easter message for
three different services. There's over 200 women that were
in there, and they are part of our church.
And when they worship, when they listen to the sermon, when they
are taking their communion, it just helps you realize how good
our God is that no matter where you are, no matter what you've
done, no matter what you're going through, our God has not
and will not give up on you. And I'm so thankful that I get
to be a part of a church with people like you who are making
sure that moments like that maintain a reality that even if
you're in jail, well, the gospel of Jesus Christ will find its
way to you. So the Hannibal crowd, we want
to give you a big round of applause.
Thank you. Thank you, thank you.
And to all of you who serve in our inside ministries, God bless
you. You're doing a very special
work. I also want to welcome those of
you who are joining our church for the first time or the first
time in a long time. And one of the things I want to
constantly remind you of is anytime you come to our church,
take advantage of that QR code on the seat in front of you.
It'll give you access to lots of different ways for you to
connect to our church, but also join us in making a difference
in this region. And Speaking of making a
difference, this upcoming week we will be celebrating Easter.
And if you want to figure out which service time, you should
attend because we're going to have a lot more service times at
all of our different locations, There it is,
crossing.net/easter. We're going to be having 36
services that are different locations.
We're going to be having five online services and depending on
your campus, your service times, maybe not just having an
additional one, but they might be moving the time you normally
go to. And as we're preparing for
Easter, there's four things bring someone park far away,
serve somewhere and pray. I finished up the Easter message
on Thursday. I'm going to probably retool it
a little bit, but you can be praying for the message.
You can be praying for all the people who are going to be
making invites. You can be praying for people
when they're walking in. And you might be going Clayton.
Why do you guys make such a big deal about Easter?
Well, it has to do with our mission as a church.
Our mission is to help people find an intimate, personal
relationship with Jesus Christ. We believe to the very core of
our being that there is nothing better than finding and
experiencing the love of God through Christ Jesus.
And on Easter weekend we get a chance as a church to minister
to more people than any other weekend of the year.
Many people, many people that you know, that you love, that
you care about, are going to give church a try on Easter
weekend. They're going to give God a
chance and they're going to say yes when they would otherwise
say no. And when they walk into our
different locations and they see it full of people just like you
who look like them, and it will encourage them and it will
inspire them and help them realize that there really are
people all over our communities and region who are having their
lives changed by Christ. So that means that the way we
worship, the way we engage in the message, the way we storm
the steps in prayer, sends a message to their heart that
there is hope in this world and that hope is Jesus Christ.
And we want to make sure that as a community of believers, we are
ready to love them and care for them.
You've heard us talk about the spiritual spectrum before.
We had to kind of switch it up because we flipped the TV
around. But God loves absolutely
everybody on this spiritual spectrum, whether you're a -, 5,
and let's say you hate God and you're a + 5.
And you know you were with him when he created the heavens and
the earth, right? You were just, you've just been
walking with Jesus that long. Everybody on this graph matters
to God. Every person on this graph God
loves. And then as a church, we need to
make sure that we are doing our part to help move people.
So no matter where they're at on the graph, if if +6 is where
Jesus is, any time someone is taking a step as a church, we
want to be rooting them on. Every time they're getting ready
to take a step, we want to be guiding them and helping them
and directing them to move in the direction of Jesus.
You might know somebody who's a -, 5 and they don't believe in
God at all. Or you might know somebody who's
a -, 4 and they know about God, but they're not, You know, they
don't really care all that much. Or a -, 3 might be somebody who
knows about God, but they're not really interested in spiritual
things. It's just kind of a back burner
dealer. You might know somebody who's a
-, 2 and let's say a -, 2 is someone that believes that God
exists, but they really wrestle with what it means to trust him.
We can relate with that. Or maybe they're a -, 1 and they
believe that God exists, and they believe that God loves
people. They're just not sure if he
loves them. And then maybe a person who's a
zero is a person who's just starting to really place their
faith in Jesus Christ. Or perhaps A + 1 is someone
who's taking their first baby steps.
You know these these are people who who they know a little bit
about God. They obey a little bit, but they
share a lot. Like they're always telling
people about Jesus. Or a + 3.
It might be somebody who knows a little more, obeys a little more
and shares a little more. Or a + 5 might be somebody who
has a really long spiritual journey with God.
And not only are they obeying a lot and knowing a lot and
sharing a lot, but they've helped other people to do the
exact same thing as a church. When we talk about discipleship,
what we're really talking about is moving people this way,
helping them take their next step of knowledge, obedience,
and sharing and passing that on to other people.
The reason why we have to do this, or the reason we have to
share this, is because our love for God and our love for people
compels us. The very beginning of every
discipleship journey starts with someone sharing the good news of
Jesus Christ being an evangelist, evangelizing,
telling people the good news. Look what it says in Romans
chapter 10. Everyone who calls on the name
of the Lord will be saved. How does that happen?
Well, how then can they call on the 1:00 they have not believed
in, So you can't call until you believe.
And how can they believe in the one in whom they have not heard
well before? You can believe, you have to
know. And how can they hear without
someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless
they are sent as it is written? How beautiful are the feet of
those who bring good news, the beginning of every discipleship
journey, of everybody taking a step of faith?
It begins when someone who looks exactly like you and exactly
like me takes seriously our part in God's plan to tell the people
around us about what life with Jesus looks like when we take
seriously the gospel message and we tell people what God has done
on our behalf and on their behalf as a church.
If we are going to be people about the Great Commandment and
the Great Commission, this is inescapable for us.
Because what are the Great Commandment and the Great
Commission? Tell us you already know this.
Mark chapter 12. Love the Lord your God with all
your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all
your strength. The 2nd is this.
Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater
than these. And remember what it says in
Matthew chapter 28. Then Jesus came to them and said
all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and
teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you, and surely
I am with you always to the very end of the age.
How can we as Christians possibly say that we are loving
God with our all? How can we say we are loving our
neighbors as ourselves if we keep silent about what God has
done for us and what God wants to do in others?
I know many times we have this desire to talk to people about
starting relationship with Jesus and then all of a sudden our
feelings take over. Maybe from time to time you've
said something like this. Man, I really want to talk to
them, but I just don't feel like it.
I don't feel like I'm ready. Or, man, I really want to talk
to them, but I'm nervous about what they'll say.
You've had the desire to talk to your friend about Jesus, but
you're worried about what they might think about you.
You want to talk to somebody about Jesus, but then you're
concerned that you might not have the answers to some of
their questions. All of a sudden, we have this
desire to do something for God, And then our feelings take over.
Our emotions take over. But I've been hammering this
home During this series, Steve Weatherford taught us this.
Amateurs make decisions based on their emotions.
Pros make decisions based on their commitments.
If you and I want to go pro in our faith, we're going to have
to make a commitment that I'm going to care more about the
eternal destiny of the people around me than about the
temporary feelings I might have about sharing my faith.
Because if we are going to be governed by our emotions, we
will never make the difference that we were called by God to
make. We will never make the
difference that you and I were created to make.
However, if you and I were to make decisions based on our
commitments to Christ and our belief that God is real, Jesus
alive in the Bible is true. There is no way that we could
keep silent. We would be praying.
We would be looking for opportunities every single week
at our church. You guys get to see the baptism
videos and we tell you every single week that behind every
single one of those baptisms there is an incredible story.
And today what I want to do is I want to zoom in on just one of
them. So that way you can see the
power of 1 Invitation and how God can take a small sea that's
planted and produce an incredible harvest.
I'd like you to watch the baptism video of Colin Clay.
Hi Church, this is my friend Colin.
Today he's, he's taking that step, he's taking that step out
of darkness and into the light and he's ready to start taking
ground for the Kingdom. So.
That's why I give the. Name of the father of Son.
Isn't that great? So Colin was going through a
rough time and he was kind of posting some stuff and somebody
saw it and they reached out to their brother and said, hey, I
think we should talk to him about Jesus.
And so Colin came to church and he ended up getting collect
connected to our college age ministry and eventually our
college age ministry collective had him hop on stage and share
his testimony. And I would like you to hear
Colin's story and Colin's own words.
Would you watch this video? Thank you, Sir.
So good evening. I'm Colin Clay.
As he said, and I'll just get right into it.
So before I found Jesus, I was always a believer in God.
I never lived though the way he intended.
My life was full of sin, such as wild parties, drinking, lying
and other sinflax. These led to depression, anger
and even suicidal thoughts, causing me to lose things such
as my home when my parents kicked me out because I was
turning into a man they could not control and my family not
happy with the example I'm creating for their children.
And even promises, empty promises that I was making, even
friends, started to question the man I was becoming.
I was out of control and I was on the verge of losing
everything. That all changed one day when I
ran into an old friend. He asked me how life is going
and I couldn't lie to him. The man I was, not, the man I
was, not someone to be proud of. Instead of pushing me away, he
asked me if I would like to go to church with him and his wife.
At first I thought church was not a place for a man like me,
but I also thought, what do I got to lose?
So I attended The Crossing in the winter of 2022.
I sat in the farthest chair from the stage and didn't talk to
anyone. But it's hard to walk around
here and not talk to anyone due to the amazing staff and the
volunteers we have here. We were doing the Reclaimed
series and some of you might remember the motto was restoring
what what was lost and fixing what is broken, and I was both
of those. Slowly I started to get more and
more comfortable and eventually got baptized by the same man
that invited me here. But I was still not 100 with
God. And all that changed on January
25th of 2023. That morning I was involved in a
bad car accident after hitting a tree at 50 plus miles an hour,
an accident I shouldn't have walked away from, but something
greater than me was watching over me and I walked away with
only a bruise. This led me to not only believe,
but to know that God was bigger. God had bigger plans for me and
it was time I walked with him and not only live the way he
intended, but also to spread his word and becoming a follower.
This took away all the bad, the depression, the anger, the
suicidal thoughts. I quit the drunken nights and
all the other sinful acts I had been involved in and when I feel
those feelings I turn to God and I pray.
I pray daily. I can honestly say now I'm a man
that my friends and family can be proud of and someone they can
go to for help. I'm hoping I can help others
find Jesus the same way that I found him.
I pray that someone hears this and knows it's OK to not be OK.
Give your life to him and I promise God will turn it around
because if he can forgive a man like me, he can forgive anyone.
You just have to turn to him to close this out.
Some people ask me, I wish there was a playbook to life on what
to do and how to do it. And my reply is it's called the
Bible. It'll tell you everything you
need to know. God can move mountains.
God can part the sea. You just have to believe in him
and talk to him. Walk with him and you and him
can do anything. Because like Clayton always
says, God's way is the best way. So I would like to introduce you
to the person who invited him. This is Colt Doyle.
Would you guys give Colt a big, warm welcome?
So Colt is one of my favorite people at The Crossing, and I'll
tell you a couple of reasons why.
One, he goes to us on a lot of our uncommon conferences.
He's been to South South Carolina.
He's been to Indiana twice. We just got back from doing one.
Our team won in football. For those of you who are
wondering, when we were at that men's conference, we won.
And then, But one of my favorite things about him is he has a
serious heart for the Lord. And every time when Jerry or I
get done preaching, Colt goes to the steps and he doesn't leave
the steps until the first song is over.
And no matter how bad the sermon is, he's there praying for the
next service. For Clayton not to suck as bad
as he did the previous service, that's not the real reason he's
up there. He's up there because he wants
to humble himself. He's up there because he wants
to have that time with the Lord. And God has been doing a very
special work in Colt's life for the last couple years.
I had an opportunity to be with him on the highest of highs and
the lowest of lows. And when I'm working on sermons,
I think of different people in our church in a positive way.
And I always am making sure that I'm writing a sermon for the
people that Colts can be bringing into our church,
because that's what Colts trying to do.
He's trying to help people find an intimate, personal
relationship with Jesus. So, Colt, tell me, what was it
like baptizing Colin? Yeah, so this was the first time
baptizing a non family member. And you know over the last four
years, you know our family's gotten really serious in our in
our walk with Christ and resulting in my mother, my
sister, my two brothers, my wife and I all being baptized.
But this was, this was different from being baptized to to
baptizing someone. It was real and it was like
almost didn't feel worthy. But that was Colin's decision,
and I had the the privilege to walk alongside him and see the
story that God was writing in his life.
And when you think about it, I mean you you went from reaching
out to him to making sure he was OK to inviting the church.
And you probably never thought that you'd be getting the phone
call to like, hey, I want you to be the one who baptizes me.
Well, I also know you've invited people to our church.
How many people do you think you've invited to church?
A lot. I try to do it as often as I
can, to the point now where I I feel guilty if I if I pass up,
you know, an opportunity, is it going to be awkward?
Do I get nervous 110%? You never know.
I mean, again, we don't want to be told no, right?
But you got to keep coming back. But it's my responsibility to to
to reach out and to ask that person and and to get them, you
know, get them connected with with the church or with Jesus.
But it's their responsibility to, you know, they got to make
the decision. What's next?
That's exactly right. It reminds me of the story of
Lee Strobel, who many of you guys have probably heard of his
books. He wrote Case for Christ, Case
for Creation and The Case for Easter.
He used to be a a journalist for the Chicago Tribune and he was
an atheist and he went on this journey and he became a
Christian and one of these days he was getting ready for Easter.
He really felt a prompting from the Holy Spirit, from God, to go
into the business office and invite his atheist friend to
church on Easter weekend. And he's thinking, oh man, this
is going to be great. God's obviously leading me in
this direction. And so he walks into the
business office and he turns to his friend and he says, hey, how
are you doing? And his friend goes, I'm doing
great. And he was going, oh, I was
hoping that maybe his life would be falling apart and I would be
swooping in at the right time. But his life was doing great.
And I said, well, listen, I want to invite you to my church for
Easter. And he goes, Lee, you know, I'm
an atheist. I don't believe in the
resurrection. And then Lee goes, well, I
happen to have a lot of evidence to believe in the resurrection
of Jesus Christ. And he starts to walk him
through that evidence, And his friend looked at him.
He goes, I'm not going to your stupid church.
And Lee walked away distraught and frustrated.
He tried to present the gospel to him.
His friend kind of shut him down, and he walked away kind of
bummed. And to this day his friend is an
atheist. And Lee wondered, why did God
lead me in there to have that conversation with my friend only
to get shut down? Well, years later, Lee is a
pastor at a church. And after the service, someone
comes up and says, I just want to shake your hand and thank you
for the profound spiritual impact you've had on me and my
family. And Lee looks at this guy in
front of him and goes, OK, that's great, but can you tell
me who you are? And he goes, Well, years ago I
had lost my job. And I was worried about whether
or not I was going to be able to keep my home and keep my car.
And so I reached out to a friend of mine who worked at the
Chicago Tribune and I said, I need some work.
And he goes, well, can you, what can you do?
He goes, I've got some tile work that needs done.
He goes, yeah, I've, I can lay tile.
And so I was in the business office one day on my hands and
knees behind this really big desk, fixing some tile.
And you came in and you started witnessing to the guy who was
working at that desk, and you couldn't even see me.
And he was shutting you down. He goes, But as you were talking
about God and the reason to believe in the resurrection, I
started going, I need God. And my heart started beating
really, really fast. And so you walked out of there.
And I called my wife up on the phone.
I said, honey, we're going to church this Easter.
She goes, what? He goes, we need God in our
lives. And she goes, OK, And so we went
to church that Easter at your church.
And I got baptized, and my wife got baptized, and my teenage son
got baptized. When you were witnessing to that
guy, you had no idea that you were changing our lives.
And when he took that step of faith, it's like Ricochet
evangelism. He just reached out to one guy,
but God used it to point another person to Jesus Christ.
And when we say no for somebody by not inviting them, we never
give them the chance to say yes. But when we invite people, we
give them at least the opportunity to say yes.
So let me What advice would you give to the people at all of our
different locations when it comes to talking to people about
Jesus or inviting them? Absolutely.
So first of all, never pass up an opportunity to to acknowledge
someone. A simple hello.
Whether you're open a door or just in passing, just saying
hello, that's the end is going to lead to your next opportunity
of, hey, how can I impact that person?
You got to be real and you got to build relationship.
You know there's going to be, there's going to be people that
you're comfortable with. There's going to be people that
God places on your heart, and there's going to be people that
God puts in your path. And each one of those
individuals, they deserve to know that that God loves them.
So we've talked about this before.
Talk about the strike. Zone.
Oh, yeah. So, absolutely.
So we've got to open up the strike zone a little bit also
because again we got to give people time and I know you've
preached about it before, you know time and there's biblical
time and this, that and the other, but we got to give people
time because they've got to make the decision.
It's not, it's not, you know, we don't make the decision for
them. Again, we it's our
responsibility to get them here. They've got to make the
decision. When when he talks about opening
the strike zone, I think sometimes there's a really
narrow strike zone that we think of people who are ready to say
yes to Jesus, but we don't get to know people's hearts, only
God does, and we open up the strike zone.
We give people an opportunity to make the decision for themselves
about whether or not they want to start a spiritual journey,
and you have no clue how God can take one simple act of obedience
on your part and transform somebody else's life.
This isn't especially true in this story because in a tragic
twist of fate in on February 20th of this year Colin died in
a tragic farm accident. And so two years ago he didn't
have faith in Jesus Christ. And two years later he goes to
be with Christ and the family reaches out.
And they don't ask one of the pastors to do the funeral.
They ask you, talk to me. What was that like?
It was the IT was the hardest, easiest thing I've ever done.
Hard because he's gone, but it was easy because I knew where it
was going. Yeah.
A real thought that I had that I wrestled with as I was leaving
the gravesite and driving down Hwy. 79 is that I I got to tell
everyone that I love. Please don't ever put me in the
position to do your funeral and not know where you're going.
Colin loved being a part of this church.
And as Colt was getting ready to do the funeral, his family
brought Colin's 50 for 50 book. Colin had started the journey
with us here on earth and he got to finish it in heaven.
And these are some of the excerpts from his book.
One of the things I love, he says this is right here.
This is day one, that my relationship with God could be a
lot better. How many of you would agree your
relationship with God could be a lot better?
Yeah, Colin was one of us. I fight temptation and lust and
drunkenness and then he says something incredibly vulnerable,
something that I've said myself I want to be someone God can be
proud of. That was Colin's heart.
That wasn't his heart 2 1/2 years ago, but because someone
was willing to take a risk and make an invite.
That's what Colin was saying before the Lord.
Look at page 2. The challenge was that day is he
reached out and he talked to an atheist about God.
He was looking at the people around him and he was giving
them the same grace that Colt had given him, that he wasn't
going to say no for him. He was going to talk to them
about what it means to have a relationship with Jesus Christ.
Look what it says on the next page.
God put air in my lungs. God did not turn his back on us.
That God loves me for me. And then there at the bottom, he
wants to follow Jesus's word and spread and prepare people for
Jesus coming back like he wanted to start passing on the very
blessing that Colt gave to him. But perhaps my favorite thing is
what he wrote here is that my hope is in a blood stained
cross. So when Colt got up to preach
that funeral message, he was standing over a person whose
salvation was in the precious hands of Jesus.
And he was able to stand there and look at that family and
friends and tell them beyond the shadow of a doubt, where Colin
was. Because Colin's hope wasn't in
himself. Colin's hope is in Jesus.
And someone came up to you and told you something pretty
powerful before you did it. Talk to us.
About that, So the mother of one of Colin's close friends.
So they were at the Hannibal campus and they were visiting
and Colin had had told her. My goal is it is for all of my
friends to feel the way that I feel.
So Colin had started this relationship with Jesus and all
he wanted was for everybody close to him to find what he has
found in Jesus Crossing family. You've heard me say this a
bunch, that we want to make this region the hardest place on
planet earth to get to hell from.
And in order for us to become that kind of church, it requires
people that look exactly like you, exactly like Colt, and
exactly like me. Having the faith to share our
story, having the boldness to share our story and allow God to
use that to transform a person's life.
Colin's eternity would have been drastically different if Colt
hadn't had the courage to talk to him and a life was
transformed and an eternity is forever different because of
that. Charles Spurgeon had this
prayer, and I read it recently and it kind of shook me.
I'm trying to figure out if this is going to become my next
tattoo. This is what he says.
If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our
dead bodies. If they perish, let them perish
with our arms wrapped around their knees, imploring them to
stay. If hell must be filled, let it
be filled with the teeth of our exertions, and let no one go
unwarned and UN prayed for crossing family.
God wants to do a work in us, to partner with us and His saving
work. I'm not just talking about this
Easter, but especially this Easter.
And every week after that, you are going to have opportunities
to share, to talk to someone, to invite them to pray for them.
And God will use those small seeds of faith to produce a
beautiful harvest in our presence.
I got a phone call on Friday and one of our the our Lima campus
pastor he from time to time he he drives Lyft and he picks
people up. And so he flips on his left and
he picks up somebody and she hops in the car and they start
having a conversation and then she and says where are you going
for church on Easter? And he started to answer the
question. They go back and forth and he
goes, well where do you go to church?
And she goes, I go to the crossing and he goes, well,
that's where I go, that's where I work.
She goes, well, you are my first invite.
I went to church on Thursday, and I made a commitment that I
was going to tell the people I know about Jesus and I was going
to start by inviting them to church on Easter.
And she goes, my first Test was going to be this lift ride.
And little does she know that the person she was inviting
already worked on staff at our church.
But I love the fact that she wasn't just moved by the
emotions of the message or Colin's story.
She made a commitment that the people she runs into need the
hope of Jesus in their life. They need to know where they're
going to spend eternity. And as a church, we must care
about them. I'm asking you guys, would you
join us in this beautiful mission?
We're moving to a time of decision.
I know there are many of you in this room right now or watching
online, and you have not yet started an intimate, personal
relationship with Jesus Christ. Maybe you've been around for a
long, long time, or maybe this is your very first time and
you're here today and you're wondering in the back of your
mind whether or not you are ready, whether or not you are.
Have all your questions answered so you can start a relationship
with Jesus Christ. And I want you to know it's
completely OK and normal for you to have questions and doubts and
concerns and worries. But I want you to know that
there's nothing keeping you from starting that relationship
today. And if you're here and you don't
know where you're going to spend eternity, it is impossible for
you to have peace. And if you're here today and
your family doesn't know where you're going to spend eternity,
you are robbing them of an incredible gift.
Your family deserves to know that when you die, you will be
in heaven waiting on them. And may Colin's story serve as
an inspiration and as a warning, that if we don't have a
relationship with Jesus Christ, hell is our future.
And you and I do not know when we will take our last breath.
Our days are numbered. We just don't know how many
numbers there are. And so don't put it off.
I say this frequently, but I'm I'm just becoming more and more
convinced of it during this invitation time.
This is a battleground for your soul and there are thoughts that
come running through your head. And some of the thoughts that go
through your head are maybe next week, maybe next month, or you
start going well after I get this figured out, after I get
through my divorce, after I kick my addiction, after I navigate
this habit. And I just need you to know that
all of those things that are going through your head are not
of God, they are of Satan. Because Satan wants to prolong
and put off you coming to faith in Christ.
But the voice inside of you that's saying right here, right
now, that's the voice of Jesus, he says Come to me, all of you
who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
And if you're here today and you're thinking, man, I've
messed up so bad, there's no way that God could love me.
I'll just tell you, there's just too many testimonies, too many
stories of people who are as jacked up as you could possibly
be, who were transformed by the power of God's love and the
indwelling of the Holy Spirit. You are not supposed to change
you. God is the one who makes you
new. And if you're here today and
you've never started an intimate, personal relationship
with Jesus Christ, I implored, you don't put it off.
And in just a few moments, the people around you are going to
stand and they're going to begin singing, and some of them are
going to come to the steps and pray.
And I want to encourage you to walk right over there by that
baptistry. Underneath that screen, people
won't be able to see you. And there's going to be people
over there who'd love to talk to you, answer some of your
questions, pray for you, and help you begin that relationship
with Jesus Christ. To the rest of you in the room,
those of you who call yourselves Christians, it's time for us to
pray. It's time for us to storm the
gates of heaven on our knees, begging that God would open
doors into the lives of the people that we care about and
that we love. But I want to encourage you to
do something that the early church did.
The first church, did you know what their number one prayer
was? Boldness.
The people who were standing and proclaiming God's word in the
midst of opposition, you know what they were praying for?
They were praying for boldness, and we should probably be
praying the exact same prayer that at times when we don't have
the answer, we pray that God would give us the boldness to
share the gospel anyway. The times when we feel a little
uneasy stepping into a conversation, that we would be
praying for boldness. That we'd step into it knowing
that God would hear us and answer our prayers and help us
navigate those conversations. But this week, as you go out and
you bump into people, every person you bump into, every
person that you lay your eyes on, is a person that God sent
his Son to die on the cross. For.
There is good news. There's not a person you've ever
looked at that God doesn't love, that God doesn't want to be in
heaven with him. And we have the glorious
opportunity to taking their hand and bringing it to God's hand
and helping them find the relationship that changes
everything. There has to be a place that's
committed to helping people who are far from God find God.
And I say it's here. I say it's with you.
I say it's with us. Would you join me in praying for
that? Would you stand?
Heavenly Father, I'm asking you to move in a mighty way in this
church right now. Gather you would shift our focus
from our feelings to our commitments.
God, that we would be overcome by the depth and width of your
love. And God, that we would make sure
that we display it and tell people about it.
God, you've always done great things with just a little With
just a little bit of bread and a little bit of fish.
You fed 5004 thousand God with faith the size of a mustard
seed. You said we can move mountains
and God through Colton Collins story.
We've seen what you've been able to do with just one invite God.
I pray that you would take our prayers for boldness and you
would do a mighty work. And you name my pray.
Amen.