Scripture referenced 3 passages
The passage this message was preached from, in full, with every other passage it reached for.
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Luke 1:26-38 main text of the sermon, the annunciation to Mary, read in full and expounded throughout
26 Now in the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee, named Nazareth,
27 to a virgin pledged to be married to a man whose name was Joseph, of David’s house. The virgin’s name was Mary.
28 Having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, you highly favored one! The Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women!”
29 But when she saw him, she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered what kind of salutation this might be.
30 The angel said to her, “Don’t be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.
31 Behold, you will conceive in your womb, and give birth to a son, and will call his name ‘Jesus.’
32 He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father, David,
33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever. There will be no end to his Kingdom.”
34 Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, seeing I am a virgin?”
35 The angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore also the holy one who is born from you will be called the Son of God.
36 Behold, Elizabeth, your relative, also has conceived a son in her old age; and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren.
37 For nothing spoken by God is impossible.”
38 Mary said, “Behold, the servant of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word.” The angel departed from her.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Keep this verse
John 3:16
quoted as 'For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son' to ground the message of grace toward everyone in the room
16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Luke 1:46-50
Mary's song read during the advent reading: 'My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior'
46 Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord.
47 My spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked at the humble state of his servant. For behold, from now on, all generations will call me blessed.
49 For he who is mighty has done great things for me. Holy is his name.
50 His mercy is for generations of generations on those who fear him.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Recap
The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.
The pastor opened the third Sunday of Advent with the annunciation passage from Luke 1, tracing the word "grace" through Gabriel's greeting to Mary and drawing a line from her willing response all the way to what God is asking of this congregation today. The sermon's anchor image was a steel sculpture Ray made in art school, a headless, armless figure that turned out to be a cross when viewed from above. The whole message circled around one idea: what God is looking for is a willing body.
What was said
Ray started by acknowledging the obvious difficulty of preaching a story everyone in the room has known since childhood. Rather than reaching for an unusual text, he went straight into Luke 1:26-38 and planted himself in the language. The Greek word behind Gabriel's opening greeting, he said, is a close relative of "charis," the word for grace. Before Gabriel said anything else, he was already saying "grace to you, Mary."
The word translated "favored woman" in the passage carries the same root. The preacher pointed out that the angel used a form of "charis" three times in just a few verses, and the third time it comes with an intensifier: you have indeed found favor with God. The repetition is not accidental. The message screams grace out of the text, he said, because the gospel is good news precisely because none of it depends on what Mary had done to earn it.
Mary's confusion and disturbance at the greeting made sense to Ray for exactly that reason. Every other religion on earth is built on working for God's favor, he said, and so when pure, unearned grace shows up at the door, it unsettles us. We want to deserve it. She had not asked for any of this.
Gabriel then delivered the message itself: she would conceive a son, name him Jesus, and his kingdom would never end. Mary's question, "how can this happen, since I am a virgin," was not disbelief but honest confusion. The angel answered that the Holy Spirit would come upon her, and added that Elizabeth, thought to be barren, was already six months pregnant, because nothing is impossible with God. Mary's response was simple: "I am the Lord's servant. May everything you have said about me come true."
That response is what the sculpture was about. The preacher described the piece he welded from scrap plate steel in college, a figure with no arms and no head. He stripped away the arms because the arms were not the point. He stripped away the head because the head was not the point. What remained was a willing body, passive except for its consent. Viewed from above, it was a cross. That, he said, is what God sees when He looks at someone who has accepted Christ's righteousness.
The preacher brought in William Booth, founder of The Salvation Army, who when asked the secret of his life's work said he had made up his mind that God Almighty should have all there was of William Booth. His daughter later said the real secret was that he actually did it. That settled, past-tense decision to say "may it be to me just as you have said" is what Mary did, what Booth did, and what Ray put before the congregation.
The personal application followed directly. God has acted in grace toward everyone in the room, the preacher said, the same way He acted toward Mary, not because of anything they have done. The question is whether they will respond the way she did. He named five areas the church is organized around, serving, growing, connecting, reaching, and worship, and said he was not going to tell anyone which one was theirs. He wanted God to show each person, and for the congregation collectively to say, "may it be, Lord, exactly as you have said."
Doing a Bible study?
Here is a guide we have prepared for you: the passages in order, questions for the group, and room to write.
- The pastor talked about how Mary was confused and disturbed by the angel's gracious greeting. Have you ever felt unsettled or caught off guard by grace, whether from God or from another person? What was that like?
- The word the angel used, which we translate as 'favored,' is closely tied to the Greek word for grace, meaning something freely given and not earned. How does it sit with you that God's favor toward Mary, and toward us, had nothing to do with what she or we had done?
and 3 more questions in the guide
Read the full transcript 5,031 words
0:00
We are glad that you're here this morning. Welcome. I am excited about Christmas. I've we've got before they even slides come up up there. We've got something big going on tonight.
0:11
There's a chili cook off. And a Christmas carol singing. If you're enjoying singing these and I do, we're going to do that tonight starting at 05:00. That's going to come up in a minute but that's the first thing on my mind this morning. So, it's it should be fun and the chilies should be interesting.
0:29
So, glad that you're here. Renzi, this little deal working this morning? There we go. Kids, after the choir sings this morning, after the choir sings this morning, remind me to let you go downstairs. That's gonna be after the offering, but that's for Peak Children's Church and they have who knows what kind of Christmas activity is going on down there.
0:57
There's a connect hour between services. If you are just kinda getting here and getting to know one another, please head down the hall. There's coffee and donuts and all that kind of stuff. Probably something good for you too. But if you'll head down to hear those snacks, coffee, and conversation, and it's happening lately that everybody just kind of congregates here and that's fine too.
1:18
Goodness gracious, Renzi. Junior high and high school, there's a lot going. Meeting today from five to eight ish or so for the Buzzard Breath Chili Cook Off. That's what I was mentioning a minute ago. We're going to go Christmas caroling.
1:30
Did you all see the big wagon out here? That's one of the things that we'll be riding on around town this evening singing Christmas carols. So, we'll see how that goes. High school is meeting at 07:30AM this Wednesday for breakfast at the Reno's. It's Wednesday.
1:47
It's going to be the last breakfast till after the New Year and that's Wednesday, not Friday. So, that's why it's up there And the junior high is meeting Friday night, the twentieth for Christmas party at 06:30. So if you heard that teenagers, middle schoolers, that's for y'all. And then it's finally here, the buzzer breath chili cook off. The hat wagon, dress warm, bring a flashlight, and don't forget your chili.
2:12
So I'm excited about it if nobody else is. I think they I think everybody else is. Christmas Eve services, we're gonna have two. One of them will be kind of a sing along type family get together at five contemporary candlelight service. They will be sufficiently different if you want to come to both.
2:31
You're welcome. Certainly, please feel free. But 05:00 for the first one, then 06:30, the choir is going to present a traditional Christmas cantata, an anthology of beloved Christmas tunes, and a few updated new ones. And that's it. We're glad you're here.
2:46
There is now the areolas are gonna get up and do our advent reading. Is that right? Alright. That's next.
2:55
God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, greetings you who are highly favored. The Lord is with you.
3:13
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greetings this might be.
3:19
But the angel said to her, do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will be you will conceive and give birth to a son. And you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the son of the most high.
3:36
The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. This kingdom will never end.
3:46
How will this be? Mary asked the angel, since I am a virgin.
3:52
The angel answered, the Holy Spirit will come on you and the power of the most high will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the son of God.
4:04
I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May your word to me be fulfilled. Then the angel left her. And Mary said, my soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my savior. For he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant.
4:20
From now on, all generations will call me blessed. For the mighty one has done great things for me. Holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him from generation to generation.
4:32
Today, we celebrate the joy Jesus brings. It's the kind of joy that doesn't depend on all our circumstances being right or simple or easy. It's joy that's bigger than that.
4:47
Our joy springs up in the middle of hard times and confusion and struggle and even grief like a fountain. It floods over our sadness and mingles with our tears.
4:58
It's a joy that states that we can never bear difficulty because God is with us and he will never leave us alone.
5:06
The joy of Christmas has nothing to do with gifts or parties or even friends and family. It has everything to do with Emmanuel, For God is here.
5:18
We light the advent calendar because salvation has come. The promise is fulfilled that Jesus has changed the world forever.
5:26
Thank you. Now, if y'all would get up and greet one another and when you get up and greet one another, if you can move forward as you're shaking hands, can you move forward a little bit? We're not gonna scare you up here. Please, move forward because there's some folks standing in the back. Thank you.
5:41
God, we give you thanks this morning and we welcome you. We welcome you in this place and we thank you. And just as the song said, born to give us a second birth and how we need that Lord. We are sinners by nature and, we need a savior and you are savior and we thank you this morning. We wanna give you praise, Wanna give you thanks for entering this world.
6:03
For God so loved the world that he gave his only son and lord we claim that verse and we meditate on it this morning and we sing praises to you because of it this morning. Amen.
6:14
I'm gonna ask, y'all can be seated. Dan Tolson is one of the elders here and I'm going to ask him to come up and pray for the offering and invite the frontline team to come also.
6:28
Heavenly father, we're we're excited to be here. We're excited to be here to give you praise, to worship you, and we're excited to what you're gonna do this special time of year. We're expectantly waiting for you to show up and and be powerful to people who are hurting this year. It's Christmas and and to just bring blessing on our town and our valley and and we give back to you in abundance for what you've given us and pray that you would use it, multiply it, and and be powerful. Jesus name, amen.
7:02
So, Christmas, we have been studying Acts for a long long time now and Luke wrote both Luke and Acts. Acts is like volume two to Luke. So, Luke is the, you know, previous volume. He calls it in Acts of all that Jesus began to do and to preach. So, I'll get to that in just a minute.
7:24
Before I do, I I am I counted a rare privilege to be up here and to be able to do this. And I'm excited about it, but I'm also daunted by Christmas. For crying out loud, y'all all know this story. Inside and out, upside down, and backwards. Everyone of you knows exactly the story.
7:42
I'm not going to introduce you to a new character today. You're not going to hear anything that you haven't heard every Christmas since your childhood for most of you. So, that's a challenge for a preacher. You know what I mean? When you're going along, if you're in Acts 16 or Acts 18 for that matter, it's like, yeah, I probably read that once sometime along the way.
8:04
That's the way I felt about it. That's way I felt about it but Christmas, my goodness, that's a hard one. So, I'm going to start in a weird place. I have mentioned before a few times that I was an art major and that Tanya and I met in art school, and that's going to come up from time to time. I had a sculpture class that they happened to be redoing a building, and they were redoing this building that had a raceway of electrical stuff.
8:32
It had a bunch of quarter inch thick plate steel on the floor, and it was covering a raceway for electrical stuff. Redoing the building, turning it into an art building instead of a chemistry building. So I took all that scrap metal, and I became a sculpture major because it was free, because it was easy to get, and because it was right there and so I took a bunch of this stuff and I started making sculptures out of it and this was before we were missionaries. I was a I was a church going guy. I love Jesus and was born in church, raised in church, accepted Christ at an early age, and wanted to live for him but it was not the forefront of my being that I would do everything Christian.
9:12
You know what I mean? I didn't just listen to Christian radio and just do all this and I still don't, honestly. But those plates, I started thinking, how can I make something that will have visual impact, and it will mean something? Last week, talked about modernism and postmodernism, and how modernism had to have rational reason behind it, and postmodernism didn't really. Artists are usually ahead of the curve.
9:37
Postmodernism started in the art community way before it got into the regular community. But I wanted it to mean something. I didn't want it just to be weird for the sake of being weird. So what I was thinking about doing was making a sculpture out of a man made out of these plates, and I thought that from the front, it should look like a man. But the more that I thought about this and I started sculpting it out of this plate steel, I looked at it and I thought, it just looks like a man.
10:09
The arms were not interesting to me. So I got rid of the arms. And the head was actually not interesting to me. So, I got rid of the head. You've seen plenty of statues actually put one of them up, the winged victory of Samothrace a few weeks ago, has its head knocked off, you know, the Venus de Milo, a beautiful last, but she lost both her arms in a wrestling match over brown, a handsome man.
10:32
Do you all know that song? No arms, no head. And it was interesting. It was more interesting to me. One thing that was interesting about it is that the feet were like this and I got that from a buddy of mine who always played guitar like that.
10:49
He stood completely still on stage but he was completely at peace with the world and balanced and this was quarter inch plate steel. It wasn't going anywhere anyway. So it was just there. And when I got through with it I'll tell you more about it at the end, but when I got through with it, it meant so much to me, and it ended up meaning so much to somebody else that's now in somebody else's house. But it it meant something.
11:14
It wasn't just weird for the sake of being weird. Now, you might look at it and go, I don't know art, but I know what I like, and that ain't it. But what the name of that peace became through the process of losing the arms and losing the head was a willing body. It was just a willing body. So now we go to Luke one twenty six through 38 and it was read this morning in the advent reading which this is the reading for this Sunday.
11:43
No doubt about it and I'm not going to shy away from it. I I did want to do something a little bit weird. I wanted to go to Hebrews and say, he's the exact representation of the invisible God or I wanted to go to Philippians and say, you know, some unusual Christmas text but this is the text for the morning. And it's out of order. Let's read through it.
12:09
The birth of Jesus foretold Luke one twenty six through 38. Renzi, is it? That's it. That's what I'm looking for. In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a village in Galilee.
12:43
I'm going stop right there. The angel Gabriel. I've mentioned this before in the past. The word for angel in Greek is angolas. It is a messenger or an envoy, one who has sent an angel, a messenger from God.
12:57
That's important. I know it was an angel. It was literally an angel. It was the angelic who knows what they exactly look like. Fear not is what every one of them says when you see em.
13:08
So, they must be scary looking but it's a messenger or an envoy, one who has sent an angel, a messenger from God. So, it's an angel and that angel in this case was Gabriel. God's duly authorized messenger is delivering a message. This doodad is not working. So, here we go.
13:36
In the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, now before this, Luke has told us that he's going give us a very orderly account. He's a great historian. He tells Theophilus, the reader, and us too that that he's going to give an orderly account of everything that's happened and he starts even before the annunciation. He goes back to saying, John the Baptist's birth foretold and he gives us that and Elizabeth is John the Baptist's mother. In the six months of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a village in Galilee to a virgin named Mary.
14:06
I could stop right here and highlight virgin. It means virgin. That's what it means. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of King David and Gabriel appeared to her and said, greetings, favored woman. You might have heard it as Hail Mary, full of grace.
14:28
Greetings, favored woman. The Lord is with you. Confused and disturbed, Mary tried to think what the angel could mean. Don't be afraid, Mary, the angel told her, for you have found favor with God. I want to go to greetings favored woman.
14:47
Greetings. That first part is rejoice, be glad, rejoice exceedingly, be well, thrive in salutations, hail. That's how we get Hail Mary, full of grace. At the beginning of the letters, it's a gracious greeting, a salute. But I want you to look down below, it's a close cognate of Charis.
15:07
Do you know anybody named Charis? Do any of you know anybody named Charis? I know a bunch of people named Carys. It means grace. That's what it means.
15:16
It's grace. And so what he said to her was, grace to you when he started off. Grace to you, Mary. And then the next thing that he said, was favored woman. Now, look at that.
15:32
Are these in order, Renzy? Okay. Greetings, favored woman. That next word, I'm not even going to attempt to pronounce but when you see that and you see this in the middle of it, the kari right there, that is Caris also. Now, I couldn't help it, is the feminine, vocative, singular, perfect, passive, or middle actually.
16:03
Could be middle. It's ambiguous, but it's passive from the context. It's obvious. I'm showing my grammar nerd status again. It's a participle, which means that it has both noun things going on and verb things going on.
16:20
From the verb, which means grace unto you. It's grace. Again, to make graceful, charming, lovely, agreeable, to peruse with grace, to compass with favor, to honor with blessings. So, what the angel Gabriel said to her was, Grace to you Mary. Grace, unmerited favor.
16:55
And then he said it again, Favor. You have found favor with God. That is also Karen. Grace, it's again. I know that all the way through our study of Acts and most of the way through our study of John, grace has come up over and over and over again and I might sound kind of like a broken record up here.
17:21
I don't want to but that's what the message is. That's what the message is of Jesus and that's why it's good news. That's why the gospel is good news because you don't have to do anything to deserve it. It is about what God has done, not what you have done. Karen, it's a form of cares which is grace.
17:39
Grace. It just screams out of the text. You cannot help but see it. If you're looking at it, you can't help but see it. Now, because of our idea of favor, do me a favor.
17:50
It's like, we say that and and we lose it a little bit. A favor really is doing something I don't deserve. Would you do me a favor? I don't deserve it but I'm asking you for it anyway. She had not asked for it.
18:04
There's even an intensifier in that third time that they said it. You have indeed found favor with God. It was not of your doing. So, what have we covered so far? Oh my goodness, it's grace again.
18:16
Ray's talking about grace again. Here it goes. Gabriel, the duly authorized messenger of God is delivering a message. He's known by name which is in itself is grace. That God delivered his strong man of God.
18:32
He is the deliverer of the message. He met Mary with a very gracious greeting and immediately, she's confused and disturbed. Have any of you ever been confused or disturbed by grace? If you have experienced, you have. Because we want with all of our being as human beings, we want to deserve.
18:55
We want to deserve it. We want to work for it. We try to work for it. Every other religion on earth is based on working for it, trying to earn God's favor, trying to earn His pleasure. She's confused and she's disturbed by it.
19:13
And it says, and she wonders what kind of a greeting this might be, which is pretty funny. It's a gracious greeting. Gabriel reassures her that it's all about God's grace, not that she had done anything at all to deserve it. Now, this goes in. This is a beautiful passage about Jesus, and I'll talk about Jesus.
19:31
But this is pointing forward and mainly, I want you to concentrate today on Mary. We'll concentrate on Jesus next week. We concentrate on him every week. We'll sing about him in a few minutes. So, this is the message that he gave her after saying all of that about grace.
19:48
You will conceive and give birth to a son and you will name him Jesus and he will be very great and will be called the son of the most high. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David and he will reign over Israel forever. His kingdom will never end. Mary asked the angel, but how can this happen? Because I'm a virgin.
20:09
Remember what I said that word meant? It meant she was a virgin and she knew it. Actually, the tense of the verb there, I've been doing grammar stuff all week. When you're when you're when I'm struggling for the message and going, how do I make this new and interesting for something they've heard so many times before? It has to be text based.
20:27
I can't just invent something to go out on a limb, Can't introduce a new character. This tense of that verb is saying, I am not I'm not doing that. I'm not involved. This can't be. I don't I'm she's a young teenager.
20:47
She may have just learned about that. But she says that I don't none. I don't know what's going on. I'm confused by it. But he said the Holy Spirit will come upon you.
20:55
The power of the most high will overshadow you. It's a very private thing, very intimate thing. So the baby to be born will be holy and he will be called the son of God. What's more, your relative Elizabeth has become pregnant in her old age. People used to say she was barren, but she has conceived a son and is now in her sixth month for nothing is impossible with God.
21:22
Amen. Elizabeth, the old lady. Immediately after this, after Mary's song when she finishes, she runs. It says, takes off and goes like 75 miles and a lot of elevation change to go visit Elizabeth and see her. Mary responded, I am the Lord's servant.
21:45
May everything you have said about me come true and then the angel left her. A willing body. That sculpture was not about the arms, what it could do, and it was not about the head, it was not about what it thought, it was about being a willing body. It sits there. The sculpture just sits there.
22:09
It doesn't do anything. It's completely passive. Except for Mary's ascent, the may it be to me just as you have said. Except for her ascent, everything else is completely passive on her part. The Lord God will do this.
22:27
The Lord God has done this. If you look at that participle, I got lost in the feminine, evocative, all that sort of stuff but if you if you look at that participle, it means that that stuff had already come to pass. By the time he had delivered that message, God had already found favor with her. Now, he was bringing it to her but it had not yet happened. All of that is is kind of fuzzy in the details.
22:52
You can see it in English but it's kind of fuzzy in the details that he's announcing that she has been graced by God and that these other things will come to pass but her ascent is required. Just as Jesus was praying in the Garden Of Gethsemane when he said, lord, if there be any other way, let's do that. But if not, your will be done, not mine. Mary was in the same position at this point where God had already graced her and had chosen her, had picked her, but she had to ascend. And she did.
23:28
Everything else is completely passive on her part. She has received the message from God and said, yes. Do you all know who William Booth is? This is a bad pun, but it woke me up this morning. Does that name ring a bell?
23:46
To a few of you, it does. How about General William Booth? How about this? He was the founder of The Salvation Army. When someone asked him the secret of his service to God and how how his life had become an impact on so many others and how so many had come.
24:13
Through provision, through feeding, through actual holistic ministry. He introduced them to the savior. When asked what the secret was to his, you know, successful Christian life, he diverted attention from himself immediately and but he did say this, if I am to put it into one sentence because that's what they asked, put your secret into one sentence. If I am to put it into one sentence, I would say that I made up my mind that God almighty should have all there was of William Booth. His daughter years later would say, it wasn't that.
25:04
It wasn't only that. It was that he did it. He made up his mind though at one time in the past. He made up his mind that I will serve God. I will do all that I can do that he directs me to do.
25:17
It's completely passive on his part. Once he's made up his mind to do whatever God directs, it's passive from there on out. I will go where you send me. I will do what you ask me to do, lord. May it be to me just as you have said.
25:32
So, Mary had made up her mind that day that she wanted to be what the Lord wanted her to be. She wanted to do what the Lord wanted her to do and can we say that today? We got several minutes left. That's the whole message right there. Can we say that today?
25:49
Can we say just like William Booth, just like Mary, just like so many others have that lord today, I'm making that decision that I'm going to do what you want me to do. So, the personal application is just that. In Jesus, God has acted in grace toward everyone in this room. I get to play the part of Gabriel right now. Duly authorized messenger of God and the reason that I am is because I'm bringing it straight from the word.
26:16
I'm bringing it straight from his word. That's his message. I'm just delivering it and the delivery of this message is that Jesus through him, the fruit of Mary's womb, Jesus. God has acted in grace toward everyone in this room and how can I know that? Carl mentioned the verse earlier.
26:34
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. He gave him through Mary, through her ascent actually. He gave to us, his son. So that whoever whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. The whosoever means just that too, whosoever.
26:56
Whoever takes that message of grace and accepts it and says, may it be to me just as you have said. You're whosoever. You fit. Not because of anything that you have done. What he's looking for is a willing body.
27:15
Your ascent is the first active step that you can take. Everything else is passive. The fact that he comes to you with a message is his grace towards you. It's not because of anything that you've done. And will you respond like Mary?
27:31
And how exactly will you show yourself faithful? Now, this may come across as just evangelistic. It is good news. It is about Jesus. Please, talk to me.
27:41
Talk to anyone of the elders. Talk to anyone here that is singing out with all of their being during the last song, Joy to the World. Y'all can come on up. Because we know the message. Allow us to grace you with it.
27:58
There's another one though. How might this look? Over the next few months, we're going to go into in more detail these five things. Serving, growing, connecting, reaching, and worship is kind of overarching. We do that all the time anyway but those are the five different ways that this church is kind of designated that we can serve him.
28:24
Now, I'm not going to tell you which one it is. I want for God to show you which one of those things it is and I would like for all of us to collectively say, may it be lord with first be exactly as you have said. And I think that's it. Oh, the willing body. I put that last one in there.
28:42
That sculpture, it was made out of just kind of pragmatism really. But I had one plate going this way, a straight on view. I had one plate going this way, a profile view so you could look at it from the side and you could look at it from the front. And, you know, it filled out. You could kind of see, well, I think that's a guy with no head, no arms.
29:03
But if you look at it from above, it was a cross. That's what God sees. Once you've accepted who he says that he is, all he sees when he looks upon you is a cross from above. He sees the righteousness of Christ in each one of you who's accepted his blood. Amen.
29:24
So, that's something to sing about. Would you please track me down after? Actually, there are elders here. Elders, would you stand first? You just stand up?
29:32
The guys who are elders in this church and y'all take note of who these guys are. A lot of em are in charge of some of those areas that I was talking about and we'll talk about em over the next few months. We'll be kind of unveiling, I guess, rolling out as God leads what those different programs fall under those areas but those are the elders. The rest of them would just stand up and we're going to sing joy to the world. God, thank you that you have acted in grace towards us, lord.
55:38
Would you allow us to do the same as we go this week? In Jesus name, the only way possible. Amen. Amen. As you go out, a lot of y'all been grabbing ornaments off the tree and you have questions about when and where to bring em back.
55:51
You can bring them into the church office and bring them back as quickly as you can. Sometime this week would be good. If it waits till next Sunday, that's fine too but the church office is the place to bring em back. Thank you very much. There are probably more out there.
56:05
Praise God.
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