Transition/transition8l

The seven things I want to share with you, and a couple we've already gone over, so they'll be very, very brief. But I think our seven attributes that this submitted flock, that God's producing in us, so that we can be free enough to live how He wants us to live in the world, in a way that's going to lead you to the most incredible community with other believers that you've ever experienced, and will lead you to engage the world in ways that just is more fun than it can be said. So in being that submitted flock, and I'm just going to make some observations. I'm not saying it's a definitive list. I'm just saying these are the ones that I see. Preface that. I'm going to quote from Paul's Prayer to the Colossians. And this is from the message again. I'm going to read you a couple of things from the message, because I just think these are fun things to read as we sort this out. And he says, we pray that you'll live well for the Master, making Him proud of you as you work hard in His vineyard. As you learn more and more how God works, you will know how to do your work. Isn't that a great statement? I wasn't taught that growing up. What I was taught growing up is, you work hard and then God will come through. This is, you have no idea what you're to do until you know how God works. And when you know how God works, then you'll know what your work is. Somebody's dying over here. Yeah, smacker in the back real hard. See if that helps. And then he says this, we pray that you will have the strength to stick it out over the long haul. Not the grim strength of gritting your teeth, but the glory strength that God gives. It's strength that endures the unendurable and spells over into joy, thanking God the Father who makes us strong enough to take part in everything bright and beautiful that He has for us. I think only in the life of Christ do you have somebody in the same sentence moved from enduring the unendurable to participating in all things bright and beautiful. I'm just only in this kingdom because it is both that. Some days on this journey I'm describing to you, it will be enduring the unendurable as God sorts out a greater freedom in your life. And then path that it's participating in the most incredibly wonderful freedoms that God has for us to give out like that when you know how God does His work, then you'll know how to do yours. The seven things are number one, living by love, not by principles. We've already talked about that most the afternoon, so I'm not going to belabor it. We've talked about this one as well. Second one is I'll give the first one again in case you're trying to write them down. Live in love, not by principles. Second one, living in growing trust, not anxiety or performance. Live in growing trust. Another text from Eugene Peterson. This is from the Sermon on the Mount, but I'm going to read Luke 12 part of it. Remember I told you this was the ideal early on yesterday, this is the ideal. Jesus lived the ideal and then in that room he tells us how we can live the ideal too. This is Jesus, this is Jesus about talking about, you notice how the birds of the air and the flowers in the field they don't toil and spin but God takes care of them? Remember that? And if you can't by worrying even at an inch to your height in front of a mirror, why are you trying to do the hard things? I think that's just hysterical. Because if I could add a few inches to my height by worrying in a mirror, I would. People think I'm slightly overweight. The reality is I'm just short for my weight. If I was a good three, four inches taller, I'd be fine. So if I could grow, I would do it. I can't do it. And then Jesus says, and if you can't do the little things, what, shooting up an inch or two in the mirror would be a little thing? Yeah, a little thing. If you can't even do the little things, why are you all upset about the big things? And if God gives attention to wildflowers, most of them never seem, don't you think he'll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best work in you, and listen to this. See when I read stuff like this, I always imagine Jesus saying this stuff. I have a weird deal about that. I was with a group in upstate New York a while back that was training. I was supposed to speak to the leadership team of this fellowship, and they were spending the first hour of our meeting teaching, had an orthopedic surgeon teaching the elders how to catch falling people in services so they wouldn't hurt their backs. Now, I tell you, I think that's funny. I imagine Jesus spending the afternoon with his voice saying, listen, boys, we're going to, so the guy's doing this thing. I'm going, can I imagine Jesus doing this with the boys? And I couldn't imagine. And I just got tickled. So I started laughing. Well, unfortunately, I think I'm starting a revival because I'm laughing. And I'm really tickled by the absurdity of the moment. And anyway, so when I read stuff like, when I'm going to read to you now, when I read this the first time in the message, and I put these words in the mouth of Jesus, I busted out laughing. Here's what he says next. Imagine Jesus saying this to the boys. What I'm trying to get you to do is to relax. I just, I stopped him at the same time. Jesus, I grew up in Sunday school, doesn't use a word like relax. Right? This is not about relax. I was taught as a young boy how to prayer, pray through, press in, be committed, be devoted, buff it my body, make it my slave. I was trained to all that. Jesus was saying to all the guys, what I'm trying to get you to do is to relax. I'm like, that's the funniest thing I've ever heard. Jesus really wants these guys relaxed? Yeah, he really, really does. He says, I, he says, what I'm trying to get you to do is to relax. I said this, not be so preoccupied with getting that you can't respond to God's giving. This is all about getting. How do we get from God? This is about, God, what are you giving me today? This is the best expression of this transition I can possibly think of. What I'm trying to get you to relax. Stop praying through, pressing in, stop working, jumping up and down, God. You know, it just makes us like those prophets of Baal that were dancing, gesticulating, and doing all the stuff they could do, and Elijah's just sitting there going, it's a matter. You've gone, God, your God gone potty or what? You know, he just, he's just all over these people. What I'm trying to get you to relax. I don't want you to be so preoccupied with getting, even getting good things from God, even getting a healing, getting this, getting this freedom, getting so preoccupied with getting. Here's how you wake up every morning. Jesus, what are you giving me today? I'm in. Who are you giving me today to relate to? I'm in. What are you giving me? And then he says, you know, I love this, this is just nasty stuff here. People who don't know God and how he works fuss over all these things. Well, that's the truth. All my fussing, I had no idea who this God was. I know I didn't idea how he worked. He says, but you, this is the disciples. These are the guys that didn't get nothing. He says to them, but you both know God and how he works. So steep yourself in God's reality, God's initiative, and God's provisions, and you'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don't be afraid of missing out. You're my dearest friends. The Father wants to give you the very Kingdom itself. Does this sound like work to you? This is so good. This is how I live my life now. I love this. The third attribute of this submitted herd, I think, at least third in my list, I'm not sure this is God's list at all, but is to live by this growing trust, not our anxieties. One that flows from that, I think very directly is live in God's purpose instead of the tyranny of our own agenda. And I'm going to talk about the tyranny of your self agenda. I'm even talking about the tyranny of your spiritual agenda. What ministry you think you have, what gifts you think you need. The tyranny of any agenda destroys every relationship, including yours with God, including yours in mind, and including you in the world. The world smells an agenda a million miles off, and it is not interested. And if you've been brutalized by religion, you know what, I'm willing to bet you smell a religious agenda a million miles off. Hopefully you're the point of just saying, okay, this person doesn't get it yet, and I'm going to keep loving him. But if it manipulates you, take a step back. God's not asking you to be manipulated by other people's religious agendas. It's just I haven't asked you to. I love that. It's people that are going to follow him. They're going to live in God's purpose. God has something he wants to do in and through your life. And the best way you'll follow that is by waking up every morning in the love of the Father. And then, Father, what are you giving me today? I want to walk in that. I know it's what I'd like to have. They're just praying. If we just do this, we can have the right speaker, book, something. We'll get this right. It's just nuts. We'll get it right when we wake up every morning. And I don't mean the ritual of, oh, I didn't do it this morning. I'm a horrible believer. I just mean as soon as you think about it, you wake up at 5 o'clock in the afternoon mentally. And that's when you get to say, God, what do you have for me today? I realize I've slept the most of it. I'm in now. Have fun with this. This is not work. This is not. This is Jesus saying, relax. And we're also saying in this thing, this is another one of these, fourth, but I'm not doing it in order now at all. The fourth one is, live in the moment. Don't live in the future. Live in the moment. And Matthew 6, he talks about, let each day take care of itself. Tomorrow has enough worry of its own. Remember that language? I think what God's getting us to is I want you to just live in the moment. I want you to embrace the moment. All of your anxieties, are they not about your imagined future? Have you noticed something about your imagined future? God is never there. It's just you and your problem, you and some idiot, you and something. God's not ever in your imagined future. Why? He's in the present. He's with you right now. I've taken the time, the best way for God to get me, where he wants me to be in my life, six months from now, is by not telling me. God tells me where he wants me to be, six months from now. I love him enough. I'm going to try and get there. And I'm going to try and get there in my own strength. And about six months from now, I'm not going to be any more close to where he wants me to be. But I've taken the saying, if I wake up tomorrow, follow God, wake up Tuesday, follow God, wake up Wednesday, follow God, six months from now, I'm going to be exactly where he wants me to be. And you know what? He's going to be there too. My imagined futures, all the calamity that could happen. What if this doesn't work? I'm dying for this dream to be fulfilled. And doesn't that kill you? How fun is that? You enjoying that imagined future stuff? I'm not. I chuck that puppy. I think this verse asks us to do that. I think it just says, you know what? Live in the reality of today. What does God put on your heart today? And if God needs you to prepare something, for me, if I'm going to come here, I like at least two weekly time. Tickets are cheaper. I like going two weeks in advance, going to Harrisburg by ticket. I used to have my schedule set way out because I've got 50 invitations sitting on my desk that I have just said, we'll know when God knows. Could I book all those? I could. I could have the next year and a half of my life set and not need anybody to invite me anywhere to do anything. You know what? I used to do some of that, never booked that far ahead, but I used to be booked far enough ahead that when somebody called a group of people spilling out of some religious abusive environment or worse yet, going to start a house church together, we'd like to have you come talk to us. It's not the kind of thing you can say, well, I can get there, let's see, the fall of 07. How's that sound? The moment has passed, has it not? Whatever issue they've got, it's gone by then. I've really learned to just say, you know what, my financial security doesn't rest in my booked schedule. I have two trips booked after this one. I'm going home for two week vacation with Sarah. And then I'm going to Kansas at the end of July and I'm going to Austin, Texas in October. And the reason I booked them that far out is because I had them in March and something came up that I knew God wanted me to be a part of and I called them and said, listen, I'm going to beg out of this. Will you guys cut me free? I'll give you any other date you want. I need this one back and they said, great, we'll get back to you with another date. And then the earliest they could do was October 13. Otherwise, I wouldn't be booked that far out. I got two things after this and I've got 50 invitations, plenty of places I can go, but I'll know when I know. I'm not booking very far out anymore because I was missing things I knew God wanted me to be involved in because I was committed somewhere else. And so I just don't do it anymore. And it's scary as anything but it's fun. See, they're going to work but it's not and if it doesn't work, I need to get a real job and stay home. And that's on any day that's my best day. Staying home. So I'm always available for that. Learning to live in the moment by every word that God gives instead of by our scheming and plotting and planning. What does God ask me to do? I do it. God asked me to plan for a trip three months out. I'll plan for a trip three months. I got a call one time this was in February. Man asked me if I could speak at a conference of his in April, look at the dates and I said, that's a Thursday, Friday, Saturday? He goes, no, it's a Friday, Saturday, Sunday. I said, I'm on the wrong dates. He said, no, I'm not. And finally realized this was a year ago, I thought he meant 2005. He meant he wanted me in April, 2006. He wants me 14 months out. I didn't know the conception of it and I'm going, really? He said, yeah, I said, can you do it? I said, I don't book that far out. He said, you don't book that far out? I said, can you pray about it? I said, you know, sounds pretty good to me. Why don't we talk next February and see if it fits in? And you could tell he couldn't relate to that. He goes, hold it. He said, we're having our Bible conference this year? I said, yeah. And he said, we want to announce what it's going to be next year. I said, okay, so we need you to commit to us. I said, listen, if you've heard God say I'm going to be there, in February, I'll hear that and I'll be there. And you could tell it was kind of funny because he's like, uh, we don't do it that way because we need to we can't announce you're coming if you're not telling me you're coming. I said, I'm not telling you I'm not. I'm just telling you I won't know until February next year. And he said, I don't think you're our speaker. I said, I think that's what we both know. Yeah. It helps prune some of those things I really don't need to be part of. Here, someone picked up on my comment a few minutes ago about a group of people spilling out of something abusive and I said, or worse yet, they'd want to start a house church and he wanted to know why I phrased it that way. Yeah, because most people starting a house church have spilled out of religion and they're seeing something that we could they're seeing through the frailties of the system but they're not yet seeing house church as another system. So you're going to move religion in the home and you're going to have some of those people do it well. And just if they're going to start it, I'd love to just hang out with them and say, are we doing this religiously or are we doing it relation? I'm not saying it would always be wrong to do that. I would not want to mean to vindicate. I just meant if you want me to come. I think when in the vacuum religion is such a captive thing to us. We step out into the vacuum of not having it. One of our first reactions oftentimes is to step out and connect it to the family that was the problem before. So that's what I mean. I'd love to probe that with the group before they get too far into starting something because normally they'll call me two years later and say, we got this house church going and none of us really like it but we feel like we're supposed to do it. What's wrong and then I'll come be with them and we'll find out very much all the paradigms that they're not true. Does that make sense? Yes. Okay. Let's get back to this list because we'll not make it. I don't know where I left off now. I've talked about living love not by principles. I'm going through my list because I don't know which ones I've done and not done. I haven't done them in order. Don't give me numbers. It's not going to help me. Living and growing trust not anxiety. Okay. I'll make one more comment on the tyranny of our own agenda. That's where we were before we digressed. I want to read you another portion of scripture. This is the scripture I used to hate. This is the one even little Pharisees growing up in junior Pharisees school hate this scripture. That's what I was in. I'm going to read it to you out of one of the more accepted translations and I want you to see how the body arm yourselves with also with this same attitude because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin. As a result, he does not live the rest of his earthly life for evil human desires but rather for the will of God. Now this is not like a scripture you're going to post on your refrigerator. It's in the Bible. Wayne, it's true. Now come on, you're not saying it's not true. It's finally true. But with the religious overlay on that scripture, you suffer until you stop sinning and then you'll be free of those evil human desires. My translations growing up said lusts. I got to tell you a boy growing up lusts always sound more fun than the will of God. The will of God is going to India or something. You know? The lusts of men are kind of like you here kind of like that. I know it's bad stuff God says we can't do but you know listen to Eugene Peterson's translation I think he gets it this way. I think we live it. He says it this way Since Jesus went through everything you're going through and more. Isn't that good? He's gone through everything you're going through and more. Learn to think like him. And think of your sufferings as a weaning from the old sinful habit of always expecting to get your own way. Isn't that great? When things don't work the way I want, God is weaning me from that self indulgent, sinful, me first, me me me. It's like those seagulls in Finding Nemo. Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine. It's perfect. That's exactly it. That's as fleshy as it gets. Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine. Picking and fighting. I feel that that's it right there. That is sin at its core. Finding Nemo. And then he says this Think of your sufferings as a weaning from that old sinful habit of always expecting to get your own way. Then listen to this. Then you'll be able to live out your days free to pursue what God wants instead of being tyrannized by what you want. Isn't that good? That puts lust to the men I think in a great context. It's the tyranny of your own agenda. It's trying to be God's next man of faith. It's not even just the sinful agendas. Your spiritual agendas are as much a problem here. I'm not free to do what God wants today because it's the stuff I'm trying to get God to do for me or I'm trying to be part of and I'm working hard to find a place you'll find your place faster and not working to find it than ever by finding it. The freedom every time I read that I just go that's how I want to wake up free today to do what God wants. Even if it is to go to India then to be tyrannized by what I want and that that's first Peter four one and two. Last part of three is really good too but we digress we go there. So free to live in God's purpose instead of the tyranny of our own agenda. Free to live by His power not our efforts. That's I guess a fifth one for you. Free to live by His power not our efforts. I already talked about this a little about no confidence in the flash. It's the first Corinthians too. Your faith might stand but on the reality of God the Philippians 3 Paul saying I put no confidence in the flash anybody's got a mind too I far more but I don't it really is I don't wake up today and God says Wayne this is what I want you to do and my next thought is okay I'm going to go do it. Always my next thought is how we doing this. How we doing this what are you doing because I really ministry for me used to be waking up every wake up in the morning and I'm a morning guy so I'm awake early. I just roll over and go what are we doing today and I think if I heard God I think ministry is pretty much like this God saying hey Wayne I've got somebody touch a jury duty today you want to come yeah I'm in because I think God you know the lie of religion number 619 God can't if we won't what who is that who who who among the I sound like an owl who among the early church went and shared the gospel with Saul on the road to Damascus who nobody you don't think God asked you don't think God had a guy coming through I can talk to him about me who Saul forget it I'm not I'm thinking he might have tried but you know he found nobody so God can't because man won't Jesus said I'm going to handle this one myself I'm going to knock this guy off a horse what are we going to kill somebody I got you know how many people get saved in a shower all by themselves because God tons how many of you came to know God just God got to you not through another human being any of you look at that isn't that good stuff God's always doing this thing Jesus said my father's always working don't wake up and always oh God what are you doing no God's doing stuff what are you doing and am I involved and if I'm involved hallelujah I'm in and if I'm not involved and this is what allows you more than anything else to be free in the world to be God's child how many conversations have you walked away from in your life either with another Christian or with someone in the world and you were in this conversation it was very tense and you weren't sure what to do and as soon as you got in your car and drove away you knew exactly what you wished you had said and didn't say I raised both hands why is that because in the middle of a conversation we're so focused on ourselves instead of free to really know what God's doing in that thing that's why we know later I think one of the great joy and here from all kinds of people one of the great joys of this journey you don't go away from conversations anymore knowing better what to say because you were relaxed enough in the moment to think of it then and say it then so fine I was injured a couple of years ago it's one of my best I love this story it's actually in the jake story it's the one story in the jake book and it's in the last chapter second last chapter and after we published it on the web this guy writes me and says you know I really thought it was a very cheap ending I mean use this outlandish story no way this thing could possibly happen I wrote it back I said it's the only true story in the book it goes really yeah it's about jake being in jury duty this happened I was in jury duty it's in Inventura County in California it's an all day whether they need a jury or not you're gonna sit there in case they do so they bring us all in this big room they give us the rules we call you back come back but you can go to the cafeteria you can go outside you can go to the library all these places you can go where they'll call you back so everybody leaves the jury room so that's the best place to hang out so I'm there I've got a book I'm reading a friend of mine wrote who's an advisor to Dick Cheney it's called culture and conflict the western way of war and I was gonna have lunch with him and I saw he was gonna read his book because I wanted to talk to him about stuff and I've got this disgusting book I'm reading and I'm sitting in a row of 25 chairs I'm four rows from the center I'm four chairs over from the center aisle I've got 20 chairs that way that are absolutely empty the row in front of me is empty the row behind me is empty and I'm sitting there reading a book which is a pretty good moment for me I like reading and I catch some movement out of the corner of my eye and I look over and down the end of my row is a young woman with the tightest skirt on I have ever seen and I live in California and she's walking down that toward me and I'm kind of looking at my book kind of keeping a what's going on here she walks all the way down and she sits in the seat next to me not one over the seat right next to me and I'm thinking okay God has something in mind here or the devil does and I'm not really sure at the moment what's going on so I turn to her and I said hi my name's Wayne hi I'm forget her name it'll come to you in a minute Nicole hi I'm Nicole and I said what are you doing you're not injuring you you see the hairdresser or something and she said what do you do and I said oh I'm a writer education consultant something really we talked small talk I didn't see where this was going anywhere so I just kind of turned back to my book but I used to read a book in a room like that you know I had to read a book that says don't you talk to me you know I've got the book if you want to talk I'm in if you don't I'm not you know kind of thing next thing I knew she grabs me on the arm and I turned to her she can ask you a question and she started to cry and I said sure Nicole what's going on she said I think my father hates me I said I think your father hates you why would you say oh we had this horrible fight last night 25 minutes she runs over the whole fight I said this he said this I said in that room I have no idea 50 year old geeky guy 24 year old hottie why she's talking to me I have no idea I have absolutely no idea except God and she pours out her stuff she's crying I said you know what Nicole you might be right your dad might hate you but I tell you I got a daughter of your age my daughter and I we've had conversations like this your dad said this you took it he meant that could he admit this because if I would have said that to Julie this is how I would have meant it she goes oh and I said I didn't take it that way and she said when he said this and I said I would have meant this and when he said this and I said I would have meant this and I just was like she got it oh so you think my dad loves me I said Nicole I don't know you I don't know you dad I have no idea if he loves you or not I'm just saying you could be wrong you might want to talk to me I will she said and I got a jury I'm gonna go talk to that guy and she asked me a few more things about it and I finally I said Nicole listen fathers of daughters who are as pretty as you are we worry about them getting into all kinds of trouble and she's trying to pull down her skirt she's so funny and because that should call like a second dad now I'm ragging on her for dressing that way and I just said you know we worry about you we worry you're gonna do dumb things and we know guys will take advantage of you so fathers are gonna say you're gonna think he doesn't respect you he's trying to protect you she goes wow I never thought of that at all she said man I can't wait till I get him we'll talk to him and they were bringing us all back in they're getting ready to call the jury out and I was funner but yeah you're gonna get on the jury you're gonna be here for days me I'm going home she's no you're not you're gonna get on the jury we're just playing this little father daughter thing and sure enough they call on Nicole somebody or other and I looked at her and I said that's you she said that's me and it was before my name in the alphabet so she goes you're coming too I said no I really I've got way too much to do I can't do it today sure enough they pass my name on the list and she goes you rat now I'm just that it's okay and she starts to get up and gather things she's saying come on you gotta go you shut up and I grabbed this one was moments where I wouldn't have done this if I not had some impulse to do it I just felt like yeah I grabbed her by the hand I said no Nicole can I ask you a question before you go she says sure what do you want to ask I said how are things with your heavenly dad she had no idea what I was talking about she's like what heavenly you are you talking about God yeah I'm talking about God here's her answer I know it's not true for everybody from this tradition this is her answer man I'm Catholic yeah oh oh yeah so she said I said Nicole as wrong as you might be about your earthly dad I'm telling you you are dead wrong about your heavenly dad so what do you mean I said you have a father who loves you more than anyone on this planet ever has or ever will and you could feel it this was a Holy Spirit moment this wasn't I mean when I was saying it to her it was like she was getting it from the heart of God. It was just that kind. I don't have many of those moments. Great moment. And she looks at me and she goes, what do I do about that? And I said, and they're saying, come on, you got to leave now. They're talking to her because she's not at the door with the rest of the jury. Come on, you might say, what do I do about that? I said, Nicole, if I were you, when I walk out that door, I would just say, God, if you exist in the way this man just said you do, would you show that to me? That's it? That's it? I will, she said. I don't know what happened to Nicole. You know, I'm not in the habit of getting the phone numbers of 24 year old hairdressers. I didn't do the responsible thing and follow up. But I figured this way, if God could land Nicole next to me in jury duty, can he not take her on from that conversation? Not trusting our own efforts, not our power, but his. He'll do. I do that airplane. People say, what do you do with the people that come to Christ? Do you send them to church or anything? I don't send them to church. I tell them, so what do I do? I say, you know what, just ask God to give you, if it's a woman, ask God to give you some sisters to help you understand this. Really? Yeah, just ask him. He's really good at this. He's been doing this God thing for a few thousand years. He's got it down pretty good. This God guy knows how to get people to him. I'll tell brother, I'll tell guys, you know what, just, should I go to a church and say, yeah, you pray about it. If God puts something, if you know some folks that get together to life, do that. There's a lot of religion out there and if you get into something, it's all about guilt and don't do it. But just ask God to give you some brothers. Really? Yeah. I said, call me if you need anything. And I never hear from him. I assume he didn't all right. Okay, he's gonna hear from some of us. I just want to call him, thank you. I heard from a guy recently, as a matter of fact. He said, man, that conversation with you on the airplane changed my whole life. He said, and I met some other folks in the next couple of weeks and he's just on some kind of journey. If God can't do this, why are we trying? And if he does, why are we anxious? Why can't we just be free in the moment to say whatever comes to I didn't walk away from my conversation with Nicole as I've done many like you. Oh, I wish I'd asked her that. That would have been the perfect question. I don't walk away from conversations like they come up, I'm sitting there. I go, that's kind of fun. We'll go down that journey with her a little bit. Six, I guess we're at six living community, not independence. But again, community, what's as well as a little form I gave you as little bunch of statements, community is a gift God gives. So but don't don't live alone. If you're alone for a time on the journey, that's up to God. But ask God to give you brothers, ask him to give you sisters, ask him to connect to the people you can relate to and walk with and then walk with them not forever. Walk with them as long as God gives you to walk with him. And then if you months later, he's gonna have an ever changing group of people that I relate to where I live, not because I'm independent and I get known and then people say things and it's hurtful. So I leave because it's just horrible. So I keep finding new people all the time. No, I just think God wants me to walk with people for a while till they get it. And when they get the journey and start living it and God's bringing other people into their lives, and then you know what, we just start getting together less often. And there's other people I get with and I'm sure the people he gets with and and then once a year or so, six months, let me check in with each other. We might go out to dinner with our wives and we might do that. It's just gotta bring it up. If Jesus can't build his church, it's all in vain anyway. So this is I think this is such great freedom. And when I talk about living community, I mean that we get to live authentic open lives unmanipulated by others. We're lifting shame off of people. We're not putting it on them. My goodness, don't give people more hoops to jump through. I got kicked out of a retreat once I was asked to do. And man asked me to come pastor said, you know, would you come help our elders? We don't understand grace. And I said, yeah, I'd happy to come do that. Todd, I'm a bit on Friday night. I'm telling you what, I could have been talking to a rock. There was nothing going on in that room. No, nobody's connecting. It's dead. So I thought, well, it's Friday. It's late. They've done a long ways to get here. We'll get up in the morning, try again, go up Saturday morning, start talking about grace again and just some of the stuff we were talking about yesterday and it's going nowhere. Now see the wane of 10 years ago, I blow through that anyway. I'm going to keep teaching all day long and the next morning and then I'm going home and with my paycheck, I've done my deal. The wane of today just doesn't have time to waste. So 15 minutes into it, I just thought and said, it's making sense to you guys at all. I'm kind of sensing there's a disconnect here. I'm not sure what it is. Can you help me? And they all kind of looked like they'd gotten their fingers caught in the cookie jar. I've seen that look in my kids before and there's Oreo rim around their mouth and you know all that. And I said and they all looked at this one older man in the back is 70 year old guy that was so now I knew two things. One, it wasn't all right. And two, he's the power broker in the room. They've gossiped about this. They already know what they think. Now I'm going to get to find out. So I looked at them. I said, Is this making sense to you? He said, Well, wane, what I hear you saying is that these young bucks don't need to be jumping through all the hoops I've been jumping through for 50 years. And I knew what he meant, but I have fun with people. That's great. You are getting it. This is fabulous. And then he stops to say, and if you think I'm going to believe that you're a bigger fool than I give you credit for it. I said, oh, interesting. And this is that moment when God just gives you the right thing to say this was not it. I've never done this before. I've done it since it's a great thing when it's needed. I just I just said, wow, and I look at the other guys and I said, does he speak for you all? That was a great moment because now they were forced to align with that or not. And you could tell he didn't. You could tell they wanted what I was talking about, but they were not going to stand up to him. And they said, well, yeah, you know what that yeah means? No, help me here. But what they said was, yeah, I turned to the pastor and I said, so why am I here? He said, I told you we don't understand grace. Well, that's true. So I just looked at my this is Saturday morning of a three-day retreat. I said, we've got a couple options here. One, we can stop talking about grace because obviously that's not something you're open to. I said, I'd be open to switching the conversation to Jesus. Let's talk about him. Let's talk about what he's done for us and we might get to grace getting back to Jesus. I said, or we could admit this is a bad idea and I need to go home. And this older man says, you need to go home. And I turned to the rest of them and I said, does he speak for you all? And they all said he did, except the pastor's going, doesn't speak for me. And I said, you know, I think it really is right that I go. So I said, let me pray for you. And I prayed just, I just pray God be gracious to these people. Whatever they're going to do down the rest of this retreat. Help them know who you are. Know your goodness to them. Work in them. And I just prayed a blessing on them. And I got up. I told them goodbye and I went to my room, packed my sleeping bag, packed my suitcase. I'm thinking somebody here might stop me. No one did. Got in my car, drove off. Now Wayne of 10 years ago doing that, I would have driven off absolutely devastated. I had done it wrong. I hadn't got the wrong thing. I got kicked out of a retreat. Now I'm driving away going, this is cool. I've never been kicked out of a retreat before. This will preach. This is a story I can tell. This is great stuff. I didn't get paid a dime for the weekend. The consolation, fortunately I hadn't flown. I did leave another retreat in the middle of it that I had flown to. So I had some days that were open and that was, that's a different story. But God used those too. I ended up finding some people that wanted to talk to me. So it was amazing. I drove away from the treat. The booby prize that week was a weekend with family. I saw my kids at home. It was great. I got home, enjoyed the weekend with my kids. What happened with that group of people? Three months later, the pastor was fired. Six months later, the congregation closed. I am in touch today. This is, gosh, eight, nine years ago. I am in touch today with six of the men that were in that room that have gone on a marvelous journey. And they said it all unfolded when you were sitting there and we all came away from that retreat going, we are living a lie. We are saying one thing to a peace power and we're doing, and we're denying ourselves the very thing that we want to most, which is to know God. They've gone on on this marvelous journey. These brothers, they're sharing life together. Families are together. They're just, I just went, God, you are amazing. It's amazing what you do when we're free enough to follow instead of so tangled up and how does this make me look? What are people going to think? And I get home Saturday morning and say, what happened to you? I got fired. Got fired. Kicked me out. Who kicked you? I said, head elder. Get out of here. Go home. I said, I offered. You offered? Yeah, it wasn't, believe me, it wasn't a fun weekend. Life's too short to hang out with religious folks, unless you're helping them. Helping them, that's a different story. If you're not helping them, go home. It's okay. I have a brother. I love this guy. He's on a neat journey and he calls me now. He was in DC. I've never met him. But he goes to a Presbyterian club because he felt like God's asked him to. He's a single guy and I think it's mostly to me checks, but anyway, he's at the Presbyterian club and he says it drives him nuts really because there was one day they couldn't have communion on Sunday morning because the priest wasn't there so there was no one there to bless the elements and he said, that stuff drives me insane. But here's what a group of them on Wednesday night in a home group that they have and he enjoys this home group. They were talking about when I, how come none of us are growing spiritually? That was a question of the night and nobody was fighting the question. Yeah, we've been coming here 10 years and none of us are growing. Why is that? And they had some kind of discussion that ticked some things in his mind. So we got up and we did some searching on the internet about kids not growing and emotionally developing well. And he found, I don't know how he found this, he sent it to me, but he found a study done in Eastern Europe, not by Christians, just done by some social service agency, whatever, on the effect of kids in Eastern Europe who grew up in orphanages. And he sent it to me and he said, you'll love this. Oh, and I did love this. It got into it and saying, here's the deal, kids who grow up in orphanages don't grow up with any sense that they make a difference in the world. They grow up, they get fed when the staff feeds them, they get changed when the staff decides it's time to change them, and they get changed on a schedule, not when they need it. They get, when it's convenient for the staff, they get fed when it's convenient for the staff, they all get a bottle at the same time, nap at the same time, and what that child learns growing up, they say by three or four, that child has no sense that they make a difference in the world and they shut down emotionally. Totally. And then talked about some of the factors that when they are adopted into families later on, as I was reading this study of thinking, man, isn't this true? I was, Amy was just, you know, a few months old at that time. A few months old, Amy knows she makes a difference in the world. When she cuckoo cuckoo, we would laugh at her and she would diggle some more and she understood that she makes a difference in the world. When she's unhappy, somebody's going to try to find out, is it a diaper? Is it a bottle? What do you need? We're going to help you. Amy grows up knowing she, Amy's growing up in the family. Amy's not growing up in an institution. And at the end of this study, it was a statement like this, what child would ever choose to be raised in an orphanage? Jesus made us to be raised in family. Not just physically, spiritually. When from the youngest age a believer learns they make a difference in the world, God knows who they are. God, they're not just cogs in a machine. We've been raising Christians in spiritual orphanages for 2,000 years. It's no wonder people don't know they make a difference in the world. It's no wonder they don't know they have a father who loves them more than anyone on this planet ever has or ever will. It's no wonder they don't know. And how will they know unless they get near us? One of the things you said, bug me as a pastor was Romans 14, you who are stronger give way to the weaker. I'd read that going, okay, we can teach this as spiritual truth, but are we living any of this? What does this mean in our institution? Does it mean we put the new converts in charge of the finances? I mean, if we're going to really let the stronger give way to the weaker, what does that mean? And in an institution, it means nothing. In a family, it means everything. When Amy comes over to our house with her parents, everything about that day is shaped by Amy, particularly when she was an infant. As she's getting older, she'll be more a part of the day, and less will revolve around her. But when she was an infant, she can't feed herself. She can't tell us when she's hungry. She can't tell us if she's warmer cold, so put a sweater on, take it off. We've got to anticipate her needs. And if we want to sit down and have a meal with her parents, my daughter and her husband, then we might even schedule our meal around her nap time. So we'll feed her a bottle, we'll put her to bed, now we're free to sit down. So we're going to even hold off our meal an hour or so, so that we can have it around Amy's nap in a way to have time with her parents. Now we don't have that problem because Amy's with us. But we've got to think how, in a family, the weaker totally shapes what happens in a home, and it's not a problem, it's a blessing. Nobody's going, look at that stupid kid going to bed so we can eat. And we're all busy playing with Amy. When she goes to bed, we'll have the other time we want to have. And now you see that totally the strong gives way to the weaker. Paul talks about that when Corinth writes him and says, what about that meat offered idols? We supposed to be eating that stuff? And Paul writes back and says, well, we know the truth of it. The truth is, idols are nothing. Therefore, food offered. Now Paul is already circumventing the Council of Jerusalem. And you've got to really stretch it to say that he's not, because one of the things the Council of Jerusalem said, okay, last people, circumcision is not an issue, but abstain from immorality, remember the poor and don't eat meat, sacrifice idols. That's the three things. Paul's already changing one of those. Paul's right there. Listen, we know idols are nothing. We know eating meat idols are nothing. So we're free to eat. And then he does this wonderful thing that the apostles always did. But if you're not free to eat, don't you eat? Not, hey, trust me, I'm telling you the truth. And if your conscience is violated by eating, go ahead and eat because that's the freedom you need. No, you just said, listen, if you're not free to eat, you're not free to eat. And you know what? When I'm at your house, I'm not going to eat either. Because if you're not free to eat, I'm not free to eat when I'm with you. Now, when I go back to my house, put the pig on the, I'm not the pig, put the cow on the bar. Okay, we're going to eat the cow. But when I'm with you, I'm not going to eat it because I'm not going to be a point of view. What are they saying? See, the early church apostles, God leads us through our conscience. Even if your conscience is wrong, you need to follow it until God shows you otherwise. You get it? Because if you take that away from somebody, if you say, look, listen, you're wrong, trust me, where have I asked them to invest trust in the wrong place? But I'll say to them, as you know it, I think you're wrong there. I think scripture is pretty clear about that. But until you're free to eat, listen, let's not eat. Let's not do it. Because you need to learn how God leads you through your conscience. And if you're wrong, my conscience has been wrong about so many things and God's changed it. So I don't trust him to do it. So this community is living in family. You know, if God gives me 10 or 12 people at any given time to have a house church kind of a thing, meet intentionally, regularly sharing our journeys, I think that's the best. I absolutely love it. And there's seasons in our life when Sarah and I get that and there's seasons in our life where you know, we don't have any regular event. We don't now. So 150 folks we know around us on this journey in a fairly wide area. We intersect with them all weekly. I mean, we're intersecting in various relations. Sometimes a group of us will get together in the home for a meal. Sometimes a different group will get together and do this. We've done studies with that group. God's put our heart to take a group through Galatians. Hey, y'all want to come? We're doing six months in Galatians. And we've done that with people. We just never doing the same thing. We're just saying, God, you show us if there's an intention. We'll do it. But that's not necessarily important. And then the final, the seventh one, I think that people who do this, who live this way, the one we're going to get to the end of here, and then take some questions that we have any, or just be done. And that is to live generously and graciously in the world. John chapter 16, interesting, again, upper room discourse, interesting little bit. And when the Holy Spirit comes, he will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. You know what I like about that? I like it that he's that's in his portfolio. It's not in mine. My task in the world is not to convict the world. It's to love the world. Well, I'm loving them. The Holy Spirit's convicting them. Absolutely works. I'm telling you. Now people ask me, I give honest answer. You know, it's what I'm doing. Gay people ask me, how does God feel about me? I said, God loves you more than anyone on this planet ever has ever. How does he feel about homosexuality? He's telling you. I think he's told us clearly in Scripture that's a twist on who God's made you to be. I know it feels like God made you to be that way. I know that's true. I know you feel that, but Scripture says it's a twist of something. Something's gotten twisted and God would untwist you. God would set you free from that. I'd say that about any kind of sin somebody wants specifically raised with me. But, well, do I have to give this up to no God? Can't give it up before you know God. Knowing God comes first. Come no God. Really? Yep. I can still be gay. You're not gay. You just think you're gay. Come and love this God. He's going to convict. He's going to show you what he needs to show you. He's going to change you. But you don't think it's okay. No, Scripture is pretty clear. It's not okay. But let him deal with this in you. And I'll love you. Stand alongside you. We'll go through it together. I need to be a lover in the world. I need to convict things in his job. And he does it so well. He knows how to convict without condemning. He knows how to convict without separating himself from a person. Live graciously, live generously in the world. I know a man who feels like, one of the things God's asked him to do right now in his life is give $500 away a month. He puts $10, $50 bills in his wallet on the first day of every month. And he looks for ways to give it away the rest of the month. He thinks of it as his time. We've even had talks about that. I don't know that's the deal. But can you imagine if you lived with $10, $50 bills in your wallet that you needed to give away in a month's time? You wouldn't be anywhere but what you weren't looking for somebody that would be blessed by this until they're all gone. And then when they're all gone, if they're all gone by the 15th of the month, you know what? You might throw a few more in there just because it was so much fun. He's in a grocery line looking at someone he thinks might be a single mom pulling out, you know, food stamps to try and pay the bill. And he just says, listen, I'm going to buy your groceries today. I'm your favorite uncle from a city you've never heard of. And just put your groceries right on here with mine, takes the little partition out between them and he pays the whole bill. And he doesn't say in Jesus' name, doesn't add it. It may come up. Why are you doing this? It may come up. It may not. He just said, listen, just think I'm your favorite uncle from somewhere. Well, what do you want? I don't want it. I'm going to buy your groceries. You go on home. I just think that's so cool to live generously and graciously in the world. Look at Jesus. He lived generously and graciously in the world. And the world enjoyed hanging out with him. He didn't pull this religious crud on everybody. He didn't tell him what needed to change. What he told him was, you have a father who loves you. You figure that out, he's going to do whatever else he needs to do in you to change you. If you don't figure that out, nothing else you do is ultimately going to matter. That makes sense. Man, this is the most fun of this. I have a woman that, when I started doing this bridge builder thing, she was the top HIV AIDS prevention coordinator for the state of California. She's 55 years of age. She's retired now. She doesn't do it anymore. The most liberal woman I've ever known. I mean pro gay rights, pro abortion rights, anti-Christian rights. She had a chip on her shoulder and she kept inviting me to come and do these workshops for health education, how to be sensitive to the faith issues of parents who are in the public schools. So I was telling health educators how to deliver this curriculum without undermining the faith of kids, families of faith that are participating in public schools. She kept inviting me to do it. And I'm going, this is crazy, because I know she doesn't like a thing I do. And then we'd have lunch together. Her and me and other staff from these conferences and we'd be sitting around a table yacking and finally about five years into this. And this is my job. This is part of what I do as a job. I'm not saying they're trying to win the loss to Christ. I'm not even thinking about it, quite honestly. And one day she asked me to do a conference kind of late. I think they had somebody else cancel. She was sticking me in there late and I already had a commitment. She wanted me in the Bay Area on Friday afternoon. I had to be Friday night speaking in Sacramento. So I said, Chris, the only way I can do this is, I knew she lived in Sacramento. Are you going back to Sacramento from San Francisco? And she said, yeah, I am. Can I hitch a ride with me? Because I can't get to an airport and I can't do it. She said, oh, I'd love for you. In fact, there's been something I've been wanting to talk to you about for a long time. Can we talk about an issue? I'm going, oh boy, here we go. It's a gay right saying it's something, you know. So I forgot all about it. I flew up there, went to her conference, did it through my bag in her car. We jumped in. She starts to put the key in the car and she stops. She turns and we said, you remember we talked about an issue we could discuss on this trip? And I said, yeah, I remember. I hadn't, but I did then. And yeah, I remember now. And she says, well, we got about two and a half hours back to Sacramento. In that time, could you tell me everything you know about Jesus Christ? And I didn't do that. I laughed. I thought she was funning me because she's that kind of a person. She's, yeah, right. I just, yeah, right, Chris. She says, I'm serious. I said, no, you're not. Yes, I am. I said, I don't know if you are not. She said, well, will you tell me? You tell me why. You tell me why you want me to tell you. She said, I will. She said, this is on a podcast for you soon before I heard this story. She said, I forgot. I just told the story. Kill it. Anyway, for those of you that didn't hurt it. She said, I went forward when I was six years old at a Billy Graham crusade and gave my heart to Jesus. She said, I know I was young, but I touched something real that day. It was outside myself. My family got saved too. My parents, we started going to a church. At 12 years of age, our church went through a horrible split and things were sad. I've never seen people treat folks as badly as they were treated. My parents decided then to leave church and never go back. She said they never have. We left church. We left God. She's now 55 years of age. She said this to me that she's the AIDS prevention coordinator for St. Californ. She understands the kinds of Christians she meets, but here's what she said to me. And every Christian I've met since the age of 12 has only proved to me I made the right decision. Then she said until I met you. I said, oh, really? Yep. She said, when I was your first introduced at a conference I was at, I saw you on the agenda. I said, who's this guy? And somebody said, I think he's a minister or was a minister or something like that. And she said, I was already prepared to hate you. She said, you walked into the room during lunch. Somebody pointed you out to me and your back was turned to me. She said, when I saw your back and I turned to give you my get out of my room vibes, because I didn't want you there. So when I saw your back, she said, I felt in my heart what I felt as a six year old girl. And I went forward and I didn't know what to do with it. She said, I've watched you like a hawk these last five years. And she said, I watched the way you treat people. She said, I know you're having lunch with a couple, a gay couple across the table. I know you know they're gay. I know they know you don't endorse their lifestyle. And I watched you treat them with such love and respect and kindness. She said, I finally concluded this. If Jesus Christ were alive on the planet today, he'd look a little like Wayne Jacobson. And I busted out laughing. My wife could hear that. She would never believe it, not in a million years. That is so funny. That's what Galatian says, doesn't it? Paul says to this end, I labor and strive until Christ takes shape in you. The joy of this journey is Jesus takes shape in us in ways we're totally unaware of. And she said, so I figured you're a little like him. I want to know everything you know about Jesus Christ. What do you want to know? And we had a three hour conversation on the way back to Sacramento. She asked me about God, the author of genocide in Canaan. And I'm gonna give you some of the stuff you probably some of you would love to talk about, but I'm not. We talked about that. We talked about God and gays. We talked about abortion. We talked about all kinds of things. And I kept coming back to the cross. I said, Chris, I don't know how to answer that for you. I know when God made himself known among us, he said, listen, I'll pay the greatest price for your sin. And I'll invite you into my freedom. And then she'd begin something else. We'd come back to that. Finally, we arrived in Sacramento. I wasn't even aware of the time. It was three hours, but I mean, we were in this conversation. There was one of those things where that three hours went by about half an hour. Suddenly, we're pulling into the parking lot and look at my watch and I am already late to the meeting I'm supposed to be at and the man who's picking me up is already at the parking lot. So we pull in that Chris, I got a run. I'm really sorry. No one in the middle of a conversation here. I said, listen, I got a copy. He loves me in my briefcase. Let me give it to you. I said, the book I wrote, if you want, if you're interested, I'll say, yeah, I love you. I said, I think it answers a lot of things you're asking. So here it is. Gave it to her, jumped out of the car, didn't close the deal, didn't, you know, sinner's prayer or anything. Week later, I get an email from Chris. He said, I want to thank you for spending so much time with me and answering my questions. So I want you to know I've read. He loves me cover to cover. And I wanted you to know that today I began again the journey. I stopped this a 12 year old girl. Cool. Totally unaware. I'm not trying to witness to her. I'm not trying to demonstrate Jesus. I'm just living in the world. The way God has finally freed me to live in the world. Not with contempt. When I start this training for HIV AIDS workers, this is almost always true of religious people. When you're a religious person, you hold sin in contempt. That's where guilt comes from. You hold it in your own life in contempt. You hold it in other people in contempt. And when you try to love somebody that you have contempt for, you'll see it as compassion. They'll see it as condescension. I know that from the people I loved when I was religious and the people I've still been able to love past that stage. I had a man who was the son of the Church of Christ minister in the community I was in. He was in a gay relationship with a man we lived with whose dad thought they were just roommates. And they were not. And he was trying to get God to be okay with him being gay. And we had numerous conversations about it. And I just said, not on that page, dude. Just keep coming. Just keep coming to Jesus. Just keep the scriptures before him. Just let them say what they say. Let God make this clear to you. But I was just his friend. He wanted to bring his lover one time. Can we join your home group thing? Okay, this is going to be a problem. I said, I said, I want to offend you, first of all, because you know what? If you were coming to, if you wanted to come to our group and you guys are saying, look, we really have doubts about this. And would you guys help us sort this out? I'd be okay with you coming. But if you're coming defending it and everybody there knows you're in a gay relationship, then that's really confusing to the rest of the group. And, you know, Paul says we can't walk in partnership with that. So I got to tell you, you want to come to dinner at my house. I'm fine with that. I said, as far as the group thing goes, I'd have to say to you, unless you're reconsidering that, that's problematic. And I understand that. I knew that's what you'd probably say and all that stuff. And then one time in the course of these conversations, he said to me, you know, I like about you, Wayne. Now, I said, what's that? He says, you're not as condescending as you used to be. I don't condescending. I mean, I was defending of me condescending. Horrors. He said, oh my gosh, he said, you used to get with me and we'd have our lunch together. He said, you know what? I know you go away. You went away proud that you could be with a homosexual and be loving because it was more about you than me. And I had to say he was right. I just looked at him and I said, yeah, I do remember walking to my car just saying, in the school, I could be with a homosexual and it was all about me. I said, you're right. Compassion in the face of contempt will always be condescending. I don't hold sin in contempt anymore. He said, what God wants now? Do I want it broken out of my life? Absolutely in every way. But you know what? God's done an awful lot to get me to the place of freedom I live at today. People haven't been on that journey yet. They don't need to hear condemnation from me. They don't. They need, I'm not telling the first rock. I tell Jesus that I'm not doing it. There's convicting to do here. That's the Holy Spirit shot. Go your way and send them away. Yeah, I'm clear about what I believe God says, how we live, but I'm also clear about how we get there and we don't get there by our own performance. So I love living in community. You bet. Living, incarnating his life in the world. You bet. And you see in that little fryer I have there, it says, if you can shut up, shut up. And that's that's not about something you tell your wife to do or your husband. What that means is this, if evangelism is an obligation to you, please stop doing it. You're not benefiting the world and you're not benefiting the kingdom. And so please stop. We're trying to, we try to think of everything we can in religion to motivate people to share the gospel. Go door to door. We hate going door to door. Why? Because we feel like we're exploiting someone's time. You know what? For the most part, we are. We feel it. They feel it. And then we go, we can't do this. Well, then I'm a bad believer because I'm ashamed of the gospel because I don't want to exploit somebody. All the language of evangelism in our vocabulary, in the vocabulary of religion is incredibly manipulative language, evangelism, conversion. You know what? I don't see Jesus doing it that way. I gotta tell you, I don't see him doing it that way. The language of our engagement with the world is we get to love the way we've been loved. That's that's simple. God overlooks my sin today to love me. I'm going to overlook your sin today to love you. It's not difficult. And out of that loving, sharing relationship, now see, that's fun to share. See, we try to motivate people to do this and we do it unsuccessfully. I read one thing, one time in Leadership Journal said, you know, if we could take every believer and dangle them by a string over the flames of hell. And now they would get serious about evangelizing the neighbors. I'm going, what? This is a beautiful, this is an evangelism explosion ad. And that sounds pretty sick to me. That's the only reason you're sharing Jesus with people. I actually spoke at a large traditional congregation. They're the growing edged mega church in the town, bursting at the seams and they asked, when would you come and share with them? I'm going, why do you want me to come share? You know, reading your book, he loves me. I gotta tell you, we are all, this is what the pastor says to me, my staff is dying spiritually. Yeah, it looks all great on the outside, but we don't know who God is. So would you come and talk to it? I said, oh, yeah, you guys, the staff, he said, no, why don't you preach on Sunday? Let me get this straight. Yeah, that was amazing at a number of levels. I stood up to teach this three services on Sunday. It's huge. Before I got up, one of the elders had given this announcement about this new outreach program they had. And one of the things he said when he was making the announcement was, he said, can you imagine, you're sitting in your little, you know, bark-a-lounger in eternity and enjoying heaven and your neighbor is burning in hell. And your neighbor looks at you and say, why didn't you tell me? People, we've got to get on this outreach thing. I said, go, what? That sounded nuts to me. So when I got up, I was talking about God's love and how much God's love changes us. And I said, listen, let me tell you something. If you're going to share Jesus with your neighbor, because you're going to feel guilty if you don't, then please don't because it's still about you and it's not about your neighbor. And your neighbor will know it. The early church dragged into the Sanhedrin, beaten, threatened. Don't you ever say anything about this Jesus ever again? Have they responded? We can't help ourselves. We can't help it. We're not going to stop. Not because, oh, we're not going to stop because we're deeply committed. What they were saying was, we can't help ourselves. Jesus just kind of comes up. People get healed and people want to know it and Jesus comes up. What are we going to do? So if you can, shut up, shut up. Just know God and tell God is the guy you can't help but talk about because he's engaged your soul. You know what? God doesn't need you to say anything. It's not punishment. It's just first things first. Get the God thing right. Live loved, grow in trust, embrace freedom. Then you'll know how to live in community. God put you alongside brothers and sisters. Now this community is not all wired with religion and expectations and disappointments. Now it's just, I'm going to love you as long as God gives me to love you and you're going to love me and we're going to help each other and we're going to have fun. And now go love the world. And you'll find ways. I intentionally don't bring up Jesus in conversations with the world unless specifically impressed to. And with that impression, I have a way to do that. There's like that gal, you know, how are things with your heavenly dad? That was just a way that came out of that conversation that didn't seem exploitive to her or me. And it felt very natural and it wasn't worth doing. But I'd say 80% of the conversations I get into, Jesus comes up somehow. They usually bring up spirituality, something, a movie they saw or, you know, when the matrix was hot, he'll bring the matrix. Oh man, I live the matrix. What do you mean you live the matrix? Oh, let me tell you. Because I thought it was such a great picture of religion versus relationship and how you get suckered into seeing what really isn't there. So there's just ways. God does it. Passion movie did it for a while. But I'll let it come up in their time because the incarnation of life is not I'm putting you on my schedule. The incarnation is I'm going to get on yours. How do I help you? I think the most important question we ask people is, how could I help you with that? The bridge builder I do in public education started because we put Julie in public school because we felt like God asked us to. And God also asked us to go with her, which we, what does that mean? Means we walked down to the principal, we went down to the principal's office and say, listen, our kids are becoming through here for the next eight years. Is there anything we can do to help? Now the principal had unlimited ways for us to help. We need parents here and parents here and I said, okay, I'll take this and this. And Sarah said, she'd take that and that. And we did eight years. We served at school and it opened up so many converse. We didn't do it for evangelism. We did it to serve the school. But the doors, it opens when you serve people, when you just love them where they are, got to open doors for you to do what he's asked you to do because of that. Now I sit in Washington, D.C. and advise groups on religious conflicts between secular agenda and the Christian agenda. And it all began with a stupid obedience to do something God put on our heart to do. No idea where it would end up for us. Still don't know where it would end up for us, but anyway, sorry, while I'm talking, four o'clock. Are we done? Any other questions or comments? Okay. Oh, you're more than welcome. Thank you guys. You guys have been incredibly patient. I don't know who's done what this way, but if you've helped some of this happen financially, I thank you. If that wasn't on your heart to do, I send you free away guiltlessly. God, I have no doubt we'll have taken care of this. So that's fine, but I don't appreciate it. If you want some of the CDs from this, we have taped it. So we'll put them together at some point. I'll write you with information about it if your name is on that list. If not, check the website in about a month and you can find out from that too. That's another way to do it, lifestream.org. Some books back there if you want them, feel free. If you can't afford something and want something, take it anyway seriously and enjoy it. And I think that's it. Father, would you take all that we've said, so many words, so many hours together and so many gracious, wonderful people in this room to have sat through it all? Would you now take what in us gives us next steps with you and free us to do it? For those in this room, Father, have no idea how much you love them. Would you over the next few weeks and months make that absolutely clear? Would you give them a revelation of the cross of Jesus Christ and your affection for them? For those that are trying so hard to be changed and don't know how you change people, would you show them how you would change them? Would you teach them how you speak to them? Would you over time make them loving and gracious people in the world and touch the world, Lord, through lives that come to know who you are in Jesus' name? Congratulations, you made it to the end of the series. I'm always surprised people actually get this far. That's an awful lot of talking and an awful lot of listening. I hope you realize that this journey still continues for me as I hope it does for you. The invitation to know the Father through the life of the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit is the greatest offer that's ever been made to humanity. It's not too great for any of us to participate in as we let him lead us and guide us through the days that come. Just wake up tomorrow, ask him to make himself known to you and live in the reality of that. You'll never regret it. It's the only way to know him and live life to the fullest.