Reformed Baptist Church in O'Fallon, Missouri
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The Wheel: Fellowship Part II

Sermon Transcript

The following is a lightly edited transcript generated from the audio; it may contain small errors.

A Report from Belize

Let’s all stand. We’re going to dismiss the kids for catechism. Lord, we thank You just for our ability to come together and worship You freely. We don’t want to take this for granted. We don’t want to take for granted the blessings that You give us through Your church, through Your body. We ask today, Lord, that You minister to us really through one another. We thank You for Your presence here through Your Spirit. We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.

All right, if you’re going to class, go ahead and be dismissed. Also, I need a microphone, I need a handheld mic. You’re pointing. Thank you. All right, we’re going to have Becca Emmon come up, and Becca went to Belize for five weeks. Let’s all welcome Becca. And Becca and I are going to have a chat. Let’s stand over here. You want to hold this? Sure. Sure. So, no, I have one. I’m wired.

We had our team come up that was there for a couple weeks, and they all shared. But the problem was, Becca went down early and came back late, because she was there five weeks, and she didn’t get to share with the team. So I thought I’d give her an opportunity to share a little bit with the church about her work in Belize. So we had a chat the other night. We just thought we’d chat here, she could share with the body about her trip. So tell us how long you were there, five weeks?

Five weeks. And you were on, go on? June 28th, I think, and got back August 3rd. Okay. So I’ve been back for a few weeks. And now you were working for PPM? Yes, I had an internship with Praying Pelican Missions. I was technically titled an assistant trip leader. So basically what I did was, generally Praying Pelican will put a trip leader and one or two, maybe three ATLs with each team that comes down. And basically what we do is we help facilitate the church’s—assistant trip leader. Oh, ATL. Sorry. But yeah, so basically what we do is we just kind of are down there, and they have people in the States actually that coordinate the trips that go down there and talk with the pastors, and we kind of just help. You just help lead the team.

So what cities—our team generally goes to Libertad because we’ve kind of adopted Libertad. But what cities were you in? Well, Libertad is actually up, it’s one of the most northern villages. It’s in the Corozal District, which is the most northern district. I got to work in all but, I think all but one district. Districts total. Is a district like a county or a state here? It’s kind of like a county, yeah. I mean, it’s almost like the United States, we have states, they have districts, but it’s much smaller. It’s like the Hunger Games, District 9 or whatever district. Yeah. What was that district? I don’t know. Anyway.

But yeah, so my first week I was in Orange Walk, which is just south of Libertad. It’s the next district down. Orange Walk? Orange Walk, yes. Is that like an orange? I don’t know why it’s called Orange Walk. It’s not spelled like it sounds, like Orange Walk. No, it’s spelled orange, like orange, like, [audio unclear] It was actually smaller than Libertad, for those of you who have been to Libertad. La Democracia is even smaller, which I didn’t know was possible. But it was interesting because we had a team of almost 40 that week, and the body of the church was basically the pastor’s family plus us. And then for vacation Bible school, we had like maybe 20–25 kids show up, which was nice because we definitely had plenty of people to do the VBS and stuff. But it was interesting because you’d have like four or five of the kids from the team to each kid that was at VBS. So it was really cool. That was a great team. They did a great job with the kids.

My third week I last minute got switched on to Liberty’s trip in Libertad. So that was awesome getting to be with you guys, and getting to be with my church. And it was my fourth year back in Libertad, so it was really great to see that life there. It was awesome. I’m really good friends with the pastor’s family and his brother’s wife. But it was awesome. Fourth week? Fourth week. Where was I? Where was I? You were in Belize. Oh, I was in Belize City, yes. Belize City. But yeah, that was interesting, because going from the previous two weeks to working [audio unclear] But that was very interesting. It’s definitely a very different dynamic. It’s more modern in a way, but there’s also a lot of crime, so that was interesting. I mean, it’s still safe because we’re not exactly walking around alone at night. Don’t scare your mom now. She’s been, she knows what it’s like. But yeah, so that was really interesting. That was a good week. The pastor was very [audio unclear] year-olds in the church, and there were a 16- and 19-year-old girls that I got to connect with that week, and it was really, really awesome to get to see that age still in the church. It was awesome.

What about the fifth week? I was in Ladyville. Ladyville? Ladyville. Yeah, there’s lots of something in the—really spelled Ladyville? L-A-D-Y-V-I-L-L-E. Which is actually right where—I’m not sure what goes on in Ladyville, but it sounds a little sketch to me. It’s actually a really sweet little town. For those of you who have been to Belize, that’s where the Global Hotel is. That’s where Praying Pelican’s mission headquarters is. In Ladyville? In Ladyville, yes. It’s where the airport is too. So is that where Rob’s headquarters is? Okay, I want to tease Rob about that, but go on. But it’s like 15 minutes outside of Belize City. That’s where the airport is. Lots of people think the airport’s actually in Belize City, but it’s not, it’s in Ladyville. And that was fun, because I had been like 15 minutes away the week before, so it was like, oh, this will be cool, two weeks and kind of almost the same location. But it was awesome. That was an amazing week. We had, it was one of the churches that Josh Edmonds, he is the guy at Praying Pelican, [audio unclear] This is going to be really interesting. But they just did an awesome job. It was cool to get to see. I’ve never seen this before, because we generally don’t bring down the younger kids. But it was cool, because the kids got to play with the kids from the church. I think it was different for the Belizean kids, because they’ve never seen missionaries their age before. So it was awesome to see that. And these kids are just like some of the most far along in their walk kids that I’ve ever seen at that age. Oh my gosh, they were awesome. And their parents were just a reflection of that.

Let me ask you this. So as far as the teams that came down, what was the spectrum in terms of just Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran? What kind of groups came down? You get a lot of Baptist, and I’m talking about the teams a lot, because my main job while I was down there was to work with the teams and facilitate their ministry work down there. I mean, I got to hang out with the Belizeans and work with the pastors. A lot of the groups were Baptist. I think I did have maybe one Methodist, and it’s the one that starts with an E. Episcopalian or something? Episcopalian? I don’t know if it was Episcopalian. But you have a lot of different groups. I did not have any Catholic groups, but one of my friends had 12 girls from a Catholic school and they were priests. So I haven’t worked with—I had a great joke, but I’m not going to say it. I’m not going to say it. But yeah, so you do get a lot of Baptist groups, though. And non-denominational, there’s a lot of non-denominational. Like Liberty. Like Liberty.

So how many teams did you actually facilitate? Oh, so it’s one per week. One per week, yeah. Okay. So you were pretty much all around the country. Pretty much, yeah. I did not work in the Cayo District, but that’s one of the most—Cayo? Cayo. Cayo. You have Corozal, and then Orange Walk, then Belize District, and then you have the Cayo District, and then Stann Creek and Toledo are in the bottom. I have not been to Toledo. I’ve kind of almost been in Stann Creek, but I have not worked in either of those districts down there. Okay, so Toledo is the most southern part of Belize. I think so. Okay. All right, Justus? Okay, Justus has been down to this one. You nodding? That’s where all the jungle bugs? Ask Mike Bond about the jungle bugs. But I’m not a butterfly. That’s his nickname. Oh, yeah. I was—oh man, no, but flies for me. Yeah. But yeah, so it was really cool. The Cayo District is very beautiful.

In summary, what did the Lord teach you through these five weeks? And that’s a long time to be down there. It was. In a way, though, it almost didn’t seem like I was down there for that long. But I don’t know. But while I was down there, I think God taught me a lot about just being a humble servant, which at times in my walk, you know, I’ve had lessons that I’ve learned about that before. But I think generally when you, I mean, you get to go down there and you have five weeks, you’re going to get a very, very diverse group of people that you’re working with. And you’re not always going to like everyone that you’re working with. Really? No. I met like hundreds of people I was down there. So, but I think it was just very different for me. And I’m not absolutely terrible with this, but just having to adjust to, I mean, and it’s in the policy agreement that Praying Pelican had, so you’ve got to roll with the punches while you’re down there, and everybody knows how to do that. So it was just interesting, just kind of having to work with some of the teams, and some of them had younger people on them. My main thing with the teenagers, they don’t always know how to cope very well, which sometimes are really, really, really awesome to work with though. And just having to learn how to work with people more, which I think is an awesome skill to learn. And especially when it comes to working in the mission field, just having to adapt.

Let me ask you one more question. And by the way, that’s not a little lesson, servanthood. That’s a huge lesson. Really, one of the most important things we could ever learn, really. So are you planning on going back? Oh yeah, eventually I will. My schedule is a little unpredictable with school right now, but I mean if God willing I would love to go back down next year and do the same thing. I could do it over and over again. It’s just great. The Praying Pelican staff is just amazing, amazing people. Most of you know Rob Graham and his family. I did not get to work with Rob while I was down there, but I got to work with Annie. And it’s just so amazing getting to work with people who have that kind of a passion, and just the pastors that are down there. Oh my gosh. I have to say that I got really close with some of the pastors down there, and just being a pastor down there, it’s not a profession. Like you don’t get paid to do it. I mean, there’s not really a whole lot of donation from the church, because sometimes you’re a pastor down there and your church body is all of five people and they’re all poor and barely get food on the table every week, so I mean you have to have an actual, like, another job. Like Pastor West, a lot of you know him, he is a taxi driver. Another pastor I worked with my first week, Pastor Ed, he is a translator. And a lot of the pastors—in my fourth week the pastor, he was a contractor or like a builder. He actually built his own church. So, but it’s just really interesting because they have multiple things that they do, and just seeing them take care of their life like they have—they [audio unclear] The pastors are just an inspiration to me every day down there.

Awesome. Cool. Let’s pray a blessing on Becca. Lord, we thank You for Your work through Becca in Belize. We pray that You confirm Your call to send her back. We do pray that not only her labor, but the labor of all the teams that went down, the labor of our Liberty team that went down, we ask that all of this effort would bear fruit in the churches and in Belize. We pray a blessing upon them. Even this morning as they gather, we ask You to bless them. In Jesus’ name, amen. All right, we love you. Thank you. It was awesome.

Guarding the Unity of the Spirit

How are you all doing? Good. All right, good. I’m glad to hear that. Ephesians 4. Look at the Bible. Is that all right? You sure? I never know these days. We were talking about community last week, and we want to continue that discussion. Talking about the spoke on the wheel that’s often labeled fellowship. I called it work because community takes a lot of work. Real community takes work. Real fellowship takes work. And the call of community is really a call to ministry, which is labor.

In Ephesians 4, we looked at Ephesians 4 last week and began to point out some aspects of community there, the most important being that the foundation of community is Jesus Christ. Because the church, which is the community we’re talking about, the church is His body. And so it’s the creation of the church by the work of Jesus which is the foundation of community. And because of what Jesus has done on the cross by redeeming a new humanity that is His church, in the Scripture it’s called the new man. This is a spiritual reality. It’s not something we generate, but it is something we are to guard and to protect and to nurture. And if we notice last week in Ephesians 4, Paul says in verse 3, to endeavor to keep or guard the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Now notice he does not say create the unity, but to guard it. God creates it through the work of the Holy Spirit, but we are to guard it.

How does He create it? When you are born again, you enter into a relationship not only with Jesus Christ, but when you’re born again, you enter into a relationship with His body. And those who are spiritually united to the Head, Jesus, are also spiritually united to one another. So we become members one of another. And so that’s why Paul stresses here in Ephesians 4 the sevenfold unity in verses 4 through 6: there is one body, one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. He says there’s one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father of all who’s above all and through all and in all. So there’s only one true church, and that true church is the body of Jesus Christ that we have been baptized into through the Holy Spirit.

The community, our fellowship, is something that exists by the very nature of the work of Jesus and the new birth. The goal of guarding this unity is that the body would grow up into Jesus Christ. Notice he says here, he says Jesus in 7 through 11, He gave to the church for this purpose, in verse 12, for the equipping of the saints, for the [audio unclear] Now that man there isn’t the individual person. The complete man is the body of Christ. It’s the new man. It’s the church. So Jesus gifts His church so that the body can build itself up unto the measure of Jesus. The body would grow up, and then reflect the fullness of Jesus in the church. [audio unclear] He isn’t talking about the individual Christian growing and being mature. That’s not what he’s talking about. He’s talking about the body as an organism, as an entity, as a man, the one man. He’s talking about the body growing and maturing. Now the individual Christian growing and the body growing are related. But the focus here in this passage isn’t the individual. The focus is the body. And he says here in verse 16, he says, “from whom,” meaning from Christ, “the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes the growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” He’s not talking about the growth of the individual, per se, but he’s talking about the growth of the body.

A New Humanity

What Paul is trying to get us to see is that God’s purpose in redemption was to create a new humanity. Remember, the old humanity fell, right? Adam fell, and in him we all fell. And because we fell, we’re going to go to hell. Right? It rhymes, but it’s true. That humanity is under condemnation. That humanity is judged. That humanity is old and corrupt. So through the work of Christ, God calls people out of that humanity, calls them out of Adam and puts them into Jesus. And there’s a new humanity. And that new humanity is called the church. So now in this phase of God’s redemptive history, we have two humanities, the old man and the new man. And those who are lost or unsaved or not born again, they are still in Adam. Those who are born again are now in Christ in the new humanity. And so when Paul is talking about the stature of the fullness of Christ, and when he’s talking about the body building itself up in love, he’s talking about this new humanity. And he wants us to understand that we have a role in building up this new humanity. We have a part to play as individuals in building up the new humanity.

The Body over the Individual

But the thing we have to understand is that the new humanity, the body of Christ, is more important than the individual. And that’s the revolutionary part. We think by nature, and I believe by cultural influence, that the individual is more important than the body. But in Scripture, it’s not so. In Scripture, the body or the church is paramount over the individual. In other words, the function of the individual is to build up the body. It is not the function of the body to build up the individual. So this is why often when we read Scripture, we see passages that we see—I do it too—we individualize these passages, when in fact they’re not supposed to be individualized. They’re speaking in the plural and they’re speaking corporately, but we make them individual texts for us as individuals.

Now there’s a very fine line here, because the irony is—it’s not even the right word—but the thing we have to understand is that in the body of Christ, and I think this is truly true in life in general, but in the body of Christ, the path to growth is actually self-forgetfulness. The path to growth is not to put your own growth first. The real path to growth is to put the growth of the body first, and then through putting the growth of the body first, you actually grow. When we put our growth first, it actually retards our growth, it retards the growth of the body of Christ. And this is one of my—and I’ve said it before actually recently—I think one of the things I realized after years of reading classic Christian books on spiritual development is how often they didn’t deal with the corporate aspect of the Christian life. In other words, we tend to think of the Christian life as my relationship with God, me and God, or maybe me and my family and God. But we don’t think about us and God. And when you look in Scripture, what you find is that so much of the teaching in the Bible is about how we as a community are supposed to interact with one another. I mean a lot of it. A lot of the teaching in the New Testament is about what God has done through Christ, and then there’s a whole lot of teaching about, based upon that, how the body is supposed to act in the context of community. A whole lot of it. And so the overriding focus in the New Testament isn’t the individual. It’s actually the church as an entity that God is creating.

This is so contrary to human nature as well as to our cultural conditioning that I believe that it requires a revelation to see it. That we have to have our eyes open to see what Scripture is really saying regarding the value and the importance of the church. And you know as well as I do that the church is not important today. It’s just not important. It’s not important culturally. It’s not even important in the lives of many Christians. Many don’t even go to church. And of the other 60% that do, we know that many people attend sometimes, and even those that attend regularly very often are not any more involved in the church than attending on Sunday, singing a few songs, hearing a sermon, and going home, and that’s the church. Well, that’s not the biblical church. That might be the cultural church, but that’s not what the Bible describes as the church. When you look at Scripture, you see a living community where people are intimately involved in ministering to one another because they understand that they are members one of another. And we have lost that in the modern church. Even though much is being written today about community and how—what do we need to do to cultivate community, etc., etc. And that’s because it’s pretty clear that by and large we have strayed from the biblical teaching on this matter.

The problem, though, is not primarily geographical. It’s not primarily social. It’s rather a problem of us understanding, with the eyes of faith, the biblical teaching on what it really means to be a Christian—to be a Christian as a whole, a corporate and communal side that is so interwoven with my individual relationship with Christ that if I sever that, if I sever my relationship with God from my relationship to His church, I’m not really living the Christian life the way it’s defined in Scripture. And so I become impoverished, but so does the church. The church also becomes impoverished because God has called me and you into His church because I and you have a function in His church. I and you have gifts to give to His church. I and you are part of building up the church, the body of Christ. So every Christian is called to do this. Not just the pastors or deacons or whatever, but every Christian is called to do this. Now, that was my introduction. You’re supposed to laugh at this point. You think, you know, that’s not really funny, actually.

Enemies of Community

So what we need to understand is that there are forces at work which mitigate against true biblical community. I want to mention three of them. The first is the world, worldliness. What is worldliness? Very simply, it is an attitude or a worldview or a value system that reflects the temporal over the eternal, the physical over the spiritual, and things over people, and man over God. It’s very simple. There are many worldly philosophies, but in the final analysis, worldly thinking is thinking that is not conformed to [audio unclear] It is thinking that is shaped by our temporal and social environment, not thinking that is shaped by Scripture. In our day, there are many philosophies which shape our thinking and mitigate against community. One of them is this notion of individualism and rights and things of this nature in our culture, which breeds a—what’s the word? It breeds almost a dislike of genuine community, because we have fostered this strong sense of individualism. It makes us hard to see beyond ourselves.

The second enemy, if you will, or force mitigating against this community, is the flesh. This is obvious, I think. The thing about the flesh is that at the heart of what the Bible calls the flesh—and that doesn’t mean the body, it means the sin principle in us—the heart of the sin principle is the ego. In other words, the driving force of the flesh is self. So the main manifestation of the flesh is simply selfishness or self-centeredness. And self-centeredness is the antithesis. It’s the opposite of community. A selfish person cannot really be in community. Now they can sit in a group, but selfishness is the opposite of the true spirit of community, which is a spirit of sharing and a spirit of oneness. The philosopher Richard Weaver said this. He said, “The sin of egotism always takes the form of withdrawal.” Listen, the sin of egotism always takes the form of withdrawal. “When personal advantage becomes paramount, the individual passes out of community.” In other words, when your desires, your goals, your needs are placed as paramount, then you would withdraw from community, because the other people in the community are a challenge to getting your wishes and needs met.

I think it was—was it Albert Camus, the French philosopher, who said other people are hell? I want you to think about that. It’s very perceptive. It’s very perceptive because if—and this is the worldly guy, right? See, I think he understood the ultimate implications of all of our rhetoric about rights and personal claims and all that. Ultimately, if I’m the ultimate and you’re the ultimate, then we have a war. We’re at war. Right? So other people become hell. The flesh by its very nature is self-assertive or selfish. That’s part of how you even define it. That’s what it is. And if it’s permitted to put itself first before God and others, the result will be strife, faction, disunity, and things of that nature. That’s what the flesh does, and it always will.

The third enemy of community, of course, is the devil. He understands better than we do that a house divided, a house divided cannot stand. And many Christians lament the decay of our culture, our society, and many lament the lack of impact of the church on society. But the problem is what’s going on inside the church. The church is divided. Christians are divided. And Christians are at war with one another. And because of that, the church lacks power. And the church lacks credibility in the eyes of the fallen world. Jesus said in John 17, when He prayed for the church, He prayed that the church would be one. And He says, so that the world may know—He’s praying to the Father—that I [audio unclear] I want you to see this.

Renewing the Mind

In Romans 12, we have a beautiful, beautiful passage about what we call body life or fellowship, whatever term you want to use there. But how Christians are to, in verse 9, love one another, how they’re to be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love, to honor one another, to serve one another. All of these—it’s a beautiful snapshot of the body truly being the body. But the interesting thing is that what precedes this beautiful picture is the call in verses 1 and 2 of Romans 12. This is why you’ve got to read the context when you read your Bible. The call in verses 1 and 2 is a call to surrender and dedication. It is a call for you as an individual to place yourself on God’s altar. And as you place yourself on God’s altar and surrender to God, then Paul says that you are to renew, not be conformed to the world. How? Remember, the world is an enemy of community. How do I not be conformed? By renewing your mind, he says. Renewing your mind. We have to [audio unclear] How do you know how God sees people? By His Word. And so when you’re looking at a fellow Christian, you have to look at them through what’s true of them. So as we renew our mind, which means we begin to see what God sees, this will lead us to love and serve the church, because God loves His church.

God loves the church. And so as we hold a worldview, if you will, we realize that the church as an institution is a divine thing that God created. And we’re called to edify this thing, this church, to serve the church, to love the church. And so as we renew our mind, we realize that the modern myth of rugged individualism is a lie. We see that every member of the body needs the body. As we renew our minds, we realize that our personal rights need to be—as we renew our minds, we realize that things pass away and people are much more important than things. As we renew our mind, we realize that eternal things are much more important than temporal things. And all of [audio unclear] Here in Romans, since we’re in Romans 12, he pointed out that these are preceded by a call of self-surrender, a call of dedication. [audio unclear] I want you to see this pattern because it’s very important.

Put Off the Old Man

Go back to Ephesians 4. In Ephesians 4 we saw Paul, this wonderful text in verses 1–16 about the body and building up the body, the body becoming the full measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. But then notice this.

This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.

(Ephesians 4:17–19)

Now this is odd, because in verse 16, the body building itself up in love, and then all of a sudden he says, don’t live like pagans. And the reason is, is because that is how you do it. What we have to understand is that we can’t live in the flesh and live in community at the same time. You can’t. [audio unclear]

But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind.

(Ephesians 4:20–23)

What did Paul say in Romans 12? Be renewed, renew your mind. Right? Here this is again. So we’re called into community. We’re called into service. Therefore, renew your mind. Therefore, sanctify your heart. Therefore, dedicate yourselves to God. Our personal sanctification is not something that is of only personal interest. It has a profound impact on the community in which we live. Are you hearing me? You all know this from the family. Because your spouse’s spiritual or moral condition has a profound influence on you, doesn’t it? Of course it does. You see it up close and personal. They’re out. They’re out of fellowship? Yuck. No fun. Right? But it’s the same way in the community of the church. So he says, to put off the old man, renew your mind, verse 24, and put on the new man, which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. And then in verse 25 on, then he begins to address these sins. And at first reading, you think, well, what’s the connection? What are you doing? He’s just jumping around. He’s not jumping around. He’s saying, you are called to build up the body of Christ. You have an important role to play in bringing the body of Christ to maturity. And because of that, you have to deal with your own sin. Because if you walk in the flesh, you will not fulfill your role in the church. And Paul’s concern is that the church becomes what it was created to be.

We see the same pattern in Colossians. Look at Colossians 3. We see the same thing where Paul is—if you look at verses [audio unclear] He’s talking about the church, the new man in verse 10. Notice what precedes it. That’s what precedes it in verse 5: “Therefore, mortify or put to death your members which are on the earth. Fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, covetousness, which is idolatry,” etc. We see this pattern in Galatians. We see this pattern in Philippians. The same pattern. So we’re called in the community to be a part of a body, to build up a body, to bring the body to its God-ordained calling of reflecting Christ so that He is all in all, but in order to do that, you’ve got to mortify your own sin. So sanctification, my personal sanctification, then needs to be seen not just as my own personal [audio unclear] these are seen as a requirement, if you will, with one another.

The last thing we need to do is we need to put on the armor of God. We have to understand that the spiritual battle is real. And that spiritual battle is not just an attack on the individual Christian, it’s an attack on the bride of Christ, the object of Jesus’ love. And so it’s a very real battle. The battle with your flesh is real, the battle with the world is real, the battle with the devil is real. It’s all very real. And we need to understand that it’s real, and we need to understand what’s really at stake here. What’s really at stake in the way the church lives out its calling is the souls of men and women and the glory of God. That is what is really at stake. It is not the things that we talk about in our culture that are important. What is really important are the souls of men and women. And [audio unclear] endeavor to live in community. That means we have to endeavor to grow in grace. We need to endeavor to renew our mind. We need to endeavor to sanctify our heart. We need to endeavor to [audio unclear] But because we are called as Christians to be part of bringing the body of Christ to maturity. That’s what we are called to do. The Christian life, by its very definition, it’s not just about you. It’s about us. Your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Closing Prayer

Lord, I thank You that You have called us into Your church. And I pray, Lord, for us to have our minds ready so that we can see the church the way You see it. I pray that You would help us to see our brothers and sisters in Christ the way You see them. I pray, Lord, that each one of us would [audio unclear] each other. And I pray that we would do this because we want You, Jesus, to be all in all. We thank You for the privilege of knowing You and the privilege of being a church. We pray these things, Lord, in Your name and Your glory alone. Amen.