SERIES BREAK: Am I My Brother's Keeper? transcript

Oh. Open our eyes, Lord. We want to see you. Open our hearts, Lord. We want to know you. Open our ears, Lord. We want to hear you. Jesus reveals his life. Jesus revealed. God is here. God is here. God is here. He is able. Be drawn near to see Jesus face to face. Oh God is here. God is here. He is faithful. We draw near to see Jesus. Oh Jesus be revealed. Oh Jesus. Oh, open our eyes, Lord. We want to see you. Open our hearts, Lord.

We want to know you. Lord, open our ears, Lord. We want to hear you. Jesus be revealed. God is here. God is here. God is here. He is able. He drawn near to see Jesus face to face. Oh, God is here. God is here. God is here. He is faithful. He's all here to see Jesus. Oh Jesus be revealed. Oh, oh sh Holy. Holy we cry. Holy hallelujah. God is here. >> Yes you are here God. We sing holy holy. We cry holy. Hallelu. God is here.

We cry holy, holy, we cry holy. Hallelujah. God is here. Holy we cry. Holy. Hallelu. God is here. God is here. God is here. God is here. He is able to see Jesus today. Oh, God is here. God is here. God is here. He is faithful. We are here to see Jesus. Oh Jesus be. Oh >> Jesus. Jesus. Yes God. We believe you are here with us today. Thank you Lord. We continue to declare your glory Lord for you deserve our praise Jesus.

Sing your word and your word is true. It will never fail. Our soul secure that he will carry us through. And seasons will change. The sun and moon they fade away. But our hope is sure that forever you reign. Let it be as you have said. Your ways are higher. You've gone ahead of us. Now we can trust in our unchanging God. Yes, Lord. Your word unshaken. Your truth. Your truth is your life. Now we will trust in unfailing God ever.

Oh see your word, your word is true. It will never fail. are so secure that you will carry us through. Seasons will change. Seasons will change. The sun and moon they fade away. But our hope is sure that forever you raise. Let it be as you have said your ways. Your ways are higher. You've gone ahead of us. Now we will trust in our unchanging God. Your word unshaken. Your truth will be our light. Now we will trust in the unfailing light.

Oh. Sing. You will never fail. You will never fail. >> You will never f You will never fail. Come on, let's declare. You will never fail. You will never fail. We trust. You will never Yes, God. We believe you will never fail. You will never fail. You will never fail. Your ways, your ways are higher. You've gone ahead of us. Now we will trust in your unchanging God and your unshaken. Your truth will be our light. Now we will trust in not unfailing fire.

Oh, oh, oh. Woah. Oh Jesus. Thank you Lord. Thank you God. You are unchanging God. Lord you will never fail. God will never fail. Great thy faithfulness, oh God, my father. There is no shadow of turning with thee. How changes are thy compass they fail not as thou has been through forever will be. Summer and win. Springtime and harvest. Sun, moon, and stars in the cores above. Lord with all nature and manifold with to thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning. You mercies I see. All I have beed thy hand have proided. Great is thy faithfulness Lord onto me. Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning, you mercies I see. All I have needed, thy hand have proided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord, on thee. Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning, new mercy. I see. All I have needed, I can have proided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.

Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning, new mercies I see. All I have needed, thy hand. Great is the faithfulness. Great is the faithful. Great is the faithful Lord to me. Oh, praise the Father. Praise the Son. Holy Spirit, make us one. Every nation, tribe, and tongue, this is our cry. Your kingom come sing. Oh, praise. Oh, praise the father, praise the son. Holy Spirit, make us one. Every nation, tribe and tongue.

This is our cry. Your kingom come. Oh praise. Oh praise the father. Praise the son. Holy spirit. Holy spirit. Make us one. every nation tri and done. This is our cry. Your kingom comes. We are brothers and sisters under the bann of your name. Mothers and fathers under the banner of your name will all your children all for the glory of your name. Or brothers and sisters under the better of your name. Mothers and fathers under the better of your name.

We're all children. All for the glory of your name. Brothers and sisters, under the banner of your name, mothers and fathers, under the bann of your name are all your children, under the bann of your name. Oh, praise. Oh, praise the Father. Praise the Son. Holy Spirit, make us one. Every nation, tribe and song. This is our cry. Your kingom come all praise. Oh praise the father. Praise the son. Oh holy spirit, make us one.

Every nation, tribe and this is our God. Your kingom comes as we are. Brothers and sisters under the bann of your name. Mothers, fathers, under the b of your name. We're all your children for the glory of your name. Dear brothers and sisters, under the bann of your name, mothers and fathers, under the bann of your name, we're all Lord children, all for the glory of your name. Oh, praise the father. Praise the sun God.

Holy Spirit make us one. Every nation, tribe and tongue. This is our cry. Your kingom come. This is our cry. Your will be done. This is our cry. Your kingom come. that we can be here today, Lord God. We're thankful for your presence with us. We're thankful for the freedom to worship and praise. Lord, we love you this morning. And Lord, we just want to lift up to you a few people in our community this morning. Lord, we know that Sherwin's nephew passed away a couple of weeks ago.

And we know that Clark's brother has just passed away today. And Erica's mom has also suddenly passed away this morning. And they're on their way over there later today. And Lord, we thank you, Lord, that you are close to those who are brokenhearted. Lord, you are the comforter to those who mourn. And Lord, we lift up our brothers and sisters today, Lord God, the extended family, Lord, all those whose hearts are heavy and sad today.

And for any of us here who have experienced loss, Lord God. Lord, we pray, Lord. Would you comfort, Lord, would you make your presence very real? Surround them, Lord, with your love, Lord. Be with them, Lord, in this difficult time. And Lord, even as they travel, Lord, would you watch over them in every way, Lord God? We commit them to you, Lord. We lift them up to you, Lord. Our hearts are with them. And Lord, even As we turn to your word this morning, Holy Spirit, would you please speak to us?

Please minister to us. Please speak through me and to each one of us. And please do what you would like to do today in Jesus' name. And everyone said, "Amen." Amen. Praise God. Okay, I'm not sure. Is this working now? Well, good morning everybody. Uh, it's really good to see you again in church. Thank you for braving the elements. Uh, I think winter is definitely on its way or at least autumn is on its way, but it's really good to see you.

And for those joining online, it's great to have you here as well. The title of the message this morning is this. Am I my brother's keeper? Now, I was as I was thinking about this, I was remembering uh arriving here in church one day and there was something really bothering me. Now, I would try not to display that as much as possible. Um, but you know, Paulo, I don't know if Paulo is here at the moment. He's here at the back, but Paulo noticed that something was wrong and he asked me about it.

And then he invited me for a cup of coffee after church and we got to go and have a cup of coffee over in the Camden Court Hotel. And I was able to share with him what was going on with me. And you know, he was a brother who noticed another brother who was going through something hard and he reached out to me and invited me for a cup of coffee and he stepped in to help and that was such a gift and Po I want to say thank you for that.

Um it was really very very helpful. I wonder, can you think of a time like that that you have experienced where you were carrying something heavy and somebody noticed, somebody cared, somebody did something to show that you that they loved you and that you weren't by yourself in that situation. I hope you've experienced something like that as well. And what a great picture of how relationships are supposed to be. That's how spiritual family is supposed to be.

A community of people united together in Christ who love and care for each other. Now, as a little bit of context to our passage this morning, uh I'd like us just to think about the big story arc of the Bible. So, of course, the Bible begins with creation. God made a good and beautiful earth. He made man in his image and we enjoyed good relationship with him. We could walk with him. Adam and Eve walked with him in the cool of the day and everything was good.

But then there was the fall or really the rebellion when man turned on God and then that brought of course the curse and so sin came into the world and as a result of sin death and then everything in creation was corrupted and instead of experiencing joy in the presence of God. Now the overarching experience of man is fear and shame and guilt. Uh we knew the first thing Adam and Eve did once they rebelled against God, they hid.

They said they they were afraid because they were naked and they hid from God. And that's very much the condition of the human heart today. So then Adam and Eve after they were removed from the garden, they had two sons, Cain and Abel. And Abel was a shepherd. Cain was a farmer of the ground. And then at one time they both brought offerings to the Lord. So this looks good. Abel brought the firstborn of his flock and the fat offerings and offered it to the Lord.

And then it says that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground. But then it says the Lord was pleased with Abel's offering. H but he wasn't pleased with Cain's. Now at face value that might you might think gosh that seems very unfair. You know they both brought an offering. What was what was the difference? And really the difference here is Abel gave his best and it was really displaying a trust and a faith in God.

With Cain, it says that he brought an offering of the ground. He brought something, but his heart was really located somewhere else. Abel's heart was trusting in God, and that's what that's what was going on. So then when Cain saw God wasn't happy with his offering, he was angry. Then God spoke to him in Genesis 4:7. If you do well, will you not be accepted? Or will God not be pleased with him? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.

Its desire is for you and you must rule over it. It's never just about the offering. God was saying, "If you do well, you'll be accepted, too." And so, God was getting to the heart. He was digging into the heart of Cain and saying, "If your heart is good, if you do well, you'll be accepted, too." And it really means to do well means to approach God in a spirit of faith and repentance. Then, you'll be accepted. But if we're trusting in something else, we won't be accepted.

Cain's heart was neither repentant and it was not in faith. And that's a dangerous place to be. And if you see that, that that's a a lioness hunting. And if you think of sin crouching at the door, picture that just, you know, and I you if you've seen them on the TV and I mean their head doesn't move, their eyes don't move. They are watching their prey and they're just waiting to go. And so after God spoke to Cain, Cain was so angry, he went, he found his brother in the field and he killed him.

Then God asked Cain, he said, "Where's your brother?" And then he angrily replied in verse 9, "I do not know. Am I my brother's keeper?" So Cain immediately lied and then he tried to defend himself. He says, "I don't know." He did know. And then he said, like, "What's it got to do with me? Am I supposed to be looking after him?" And so he was really implying, "Why should I be concerned about my brother's welfare? Why should it matter?

Should I be watching out for him? Should I care about him? I have nothing to do with him is essentially what Cain was saying." Now I wonder have you ever thought this maybe consciously or subconsciously? Am I my brother's keeper? Um we do live in quite an individualistic world. Uh you know often it can be a little bit of me myself and I and uh that can even creep into the church and that's not good. Uh has anyone watched the movie Remember the Titans?

Okay. Okay, the front row here has watched. Remember, there's a few people over there. It's a really nice movie. I I would recommend it. But the the theme of the this story is it's set in Virginia, 1971, and there's a lot of racial tension in the community between the black and the white community. And so during this time, the government had decided to merge schools, black and white schools together. And so this school was one of the first to do that to bring these communities together.

So it was very very tense. They did not want to be joined up together. And it the story follows particularly the football team, the journey of the football team as they start to learn to trust each other, to play together, and then ultimately to like each other. Now, in one of their early training sessions, so they go away on a a football camp for a few weeks, one of the white blockers wasn't blocking, and so it meant one of the black guys was getting super heavy tackles every time because this guy wasn't doing his job.

He was kind of letting the guy pass, and then this other person was was getting smashed. And so another black player noticed that and began playing then what the captain described as selfish showoff football. He wasn't really playing as a team. But he had he was watching this and nothing was being done about it. So he said, "Well, forget that. I'll just look after myself." And then the captain challenged him and then he replied to the captain and he says, "No, I'm going to look out for myself and I'm going to get mine." And that was his attitude.

Now people can end up living life a little bit like that. I'm going to look after myself and I'm going to get mine. And you can look around at you can look at the people around you and end up saying I don't really have any major part in their lives. I don't need to play a major part in their lives. I'll look after me. Let them do their thing. I'll do my thing. I don't need to care how they're doing. Why should I watch out for them?

Uh I'll look out for myself and I'll get mine. But is this God's design? And I want to speak specifically to Christians this morning. Are you your brother's keeper? The spoiler alert is yes, you are. You might know it yet, but you are. Now, let's look at 1 John chapter 3 11 to12. For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain who was of the evil one and murdered his brother.

And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brothers righteous. Now, John was speaking specifically to the church. He was speaking to believers just like most of us probably here in the room, the family of God. And he reminded them of the message which they heard from the beginning. Now, what was the message from the beginning? We're not it's not talking about the beginning of time, but it was the beginning of them knowing Christ and the message of Christ.

So, the message you heard from Christ was to love one another. That's the message. And so John then contrasts that message to love one another with Cain who was of the evil one and he murdered his brother because his own deeds were evil while his brothers were righteous. John was saying that when a professing Christian refuses to love a fellow believer, he or she is actually aligning themselves with Cain and that same spirit as Cain.

Now love Jesus the the message from the beginning love one another. That love is agapeo. It means to have great affection and care and loyalty towards one another. It's much more than words. I'm sure most of us know the song by extreme. I love the words of that. More than words is all you have to do to make it real. Then you wouldn't have to say you love me because I'd already know. And this love is expressed in the things that you do.

It's it's shown. It's demonstrated. And it's the same love that Christ showed to us. It's a love that's costly. And it's a love that doesn't look for something in return. Paul then wrote to the New Testament church as well to show them what spiritual family looks like. In Galatians chapter 6:2, he said, "Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ." Now, a burden is a difficult I mean, if you imagine carrying a very heavy load, that's a burden, but it could be a very difficult situation.

Something that's really weighing heavy on your heart. Something that's causing you to worry or to be anxious or afraid or stressed. could be work problems. It could be health problems or relationship problems, financial problems, disappointments, regrets, guilt or shame or grief or loss. These are all big things that weigh heavy on our souls. And I wonder, I don't probably need to wonder too hard, who's carrying a burden here this morning.

I suspect most of us are carrying a burden of some sort and there's a good chance that you and most of the people sitting around you are carrying a burden as well. But we were never supposed to carry those burdens by ourselves. Paul instructed the believers to bear one another's burdens. And that means to endure something difficult with somebody to say, "I'll walk with you. I'm I'm here beside you to go with you in that difficult thing." And that doesn't just happen.

I don't think that just automatically happens. I think it needs trust and a real love for each other to do that. It's much easier not to be interested. it's much easier to say, I'll look after myself and I I don't want to I don't want to get too involved in what's going on in somebody else's life. And that's the culture we hope to build here in our church in our church community um is is like that. We did something with our executive team a while ago um our cluster group and we did something we joined something.

Now I'll explain this in a moment. The fellowship of the withered hand and John Ortberg talks about this. He's written a book called steps and uh and so he this is really drawing a metaphor if you like from the when Jesus healed the man with the withered hand. And so this man had a withered hand. And in the end Jesus said to stand up in front of everybody, stretch out your hand. And it was there that God Jesus healed him.

And the point of this, if you like, fellowship of the withered hand is true healing begins when we stop concealing our flaws and we're willing to expose our vulnerabilities to God. The withered hand is representing the parts of our lives our weaknesses maybe shame that we try the hardest to hide from other people. And so really this fellowship is a metaphor for a community for for a spiritual community of broken and imperfect people of which we all are where we stop pretending that we're strong and where we're able to share our weaknesses, our burdens with one another and find healing.

It's very possible for us to show up in church and we can look good and we can sound good when in fact we might be really struggling. When we went around that room, I thought I knew the people in that room. We've known each other for quite a long time. And I began and I shared what my withered hand is. And then around the room we went. And friends, there was tears shed in that room. There was things that I heard that I had no clue about.

I thought I knew my brothers and sisters there and I realized I don't know the half. And I suspect when we look around at the people around us, we probably don't know a whole lot about really what's going on in people's lives. And so to bear one another's burdens, it means creating creating spaces where we can trust each other enough to be real and honest with each other. In the AA, Alcoholics Anonymous, they have a a saying where they say, "The worse your story, the warmer your welcome." Now, what a disarming phrase.

You know, they'll often say, "If you want to hear about miracles, go to the sanctuary." So if you think okay maybe we can't describe this as uh amazing but if you think of a big cathedral or something and it's beautiful and it's all polished and you say we can hear about miracles there but if you want to experience miracles go to the basement and that's often where the AA group is where they're at a point where they're saying I can't my life is out of control I'm not in control and I need help and when they say something like that the worse your story, the warmer you're welcome.

Oh my goodness. I don't think there's many people who wouldn't be receptive to hearing something like that. We can take down the pretense. We can take down the the show and we can actually be real and still loved and accepted by the people around us. That's something of how spiritual family is supposed to be. And so when we think of bearing each other's burdens, it's putting your arm around a brother or sister who's cav carrying a heavy load.

It's walking with them. It's doing something maybe practically for them that will lighten their load as well. And when we do that, we fulfill the law of Christ. The law of Christ is love. It's love in action. It's love that doesn't look for something in return. And Jesus is the one who showed us what that kind of love is. Jesus is the one who came to a sinful world, a world that could never repay him. There's no way we can repay him for the love that he's shown us.

The king of kings, the creator of everything. And then he took the form of a servant. And then he became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Jesus faced rejection, sorrow, spiritual attack, false accusations, arrest, trial. He was beaten. He was spat on. He was mocked. And then he died an agonizing death for us. He is the epitome of self-giving love. And then in Paul's letter to the church in Rome, he summed up God's command to us like this.

Romans 13:8. Owe no one anything except to love each other. For the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, and any other commandment are summed up in this word. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. The duty of a Christian, if you want to sum it up real simple, is to love one another.

The whole law is in that little sentence there. That's what God commands us to do. And he showed us what it looks like by his own life and the way he served us. And so to love your neighbor here means to love everyone. There's parts in the Bible that speak specifically about loving your brother and sister, fellow believers. When it says neighbor here, it's really saying everybody. uh colleagues, classmates, family, friends, stranger strangers, people who are of different ethnicity, people with different religious backgrounds, people with different social backgrounds, even our enemies.

Jesus said, "Love, love your neighbor." Bob Goff wrote a book called Everybody Always. And that's the point. He's saying love everybody all the time. That's really Christianity in a nutshell. The last point I want to make here is the proof of loving God is loving your brother. In 1 John 4:20, if anyone says, "I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen." And this commandment we have from him, "Whoever loves God must also love his brother." A Christian might claim to have a close relationship with God.

A Christian might attend church regularly and be very involved. But they might keep a distance from their brothers and sisters in church. Or they may even hate a fellow brother or sister. But part of being your brother's keeper is fighting for the relationships that we have in church in spiritual community. John here was challenging the believers. He said, "The proof of you loving an invisible God is to have a deep love for your brothers and sisters who you can see." And that's messy.

It's there where we learn to carry each other's burdens. It's there where we learn to apologize and forgive. And that's not easy. When we get hurt or when we do something wrong and our pride is affected, it's like, oh, I don't want to say sorry or I don't want to forgive. But this is really where the rubber hits the road. John is saying if you you can't say you love God if you don't love spiritual community. It also means we value relationship too much to not deal with issues when they arise.

Sometimes it's tempting anyone like me tempted tempted to avoid conflict. You know if something has gone wrong yeah there's a few people who can you know sometimes it feels easier just to keep the peace. I won't say anything. I'll just get on. You know, Joseph Greny, he he wrote a book called Crucial Conversations, and he said, "If you don't if something has happened, if I've upset somebody or done something wrong, but we haven't spoken about it, the other person, if we if we don't speak about it, they will act it out.

It comes out. We We can't help ourselves. Now, we can try. We can try and put on a good show, but we know we're kind of keeping a distance. We know if we see them across the room, I might just stay a little bit over this side and talk to these people because I don't want to necessarily go over there. And we'll be a little bit more short in our conversations. We're not going to be as warm and friendly to that person. We might be able to just keep it civil, but we know it's not right.

And so Jesus is coming back for one bride. Pastor Tina Nelly was saying this last week. He's coming back for one bride. He's not coming back for multiple brides. Coming back for one bride, the church. That's us. It means we're all part of one body. It means we need each other. And together, as we do life together, we become the perfect expression of Christ in the world. He says, "By this will all people know that you're my disciples." How?

By your love for one another. Amen. Now, Cain's statement, he said, "Am I my brother's keeper?" That was his angry denial, you know, to mask his guilt. But the Bible is really very clear that yes, you are your brother's keeper. You are your sister's keeper. Now, what are some things that we could do as we get ready just to finish? One of the things we do here in Every Nation Dublin is we have small groups. We have life groups.

And if you're not part of a life group, I want to invite you to be part of one. Go to our desk at the end of the service, our welcome desk over here, and they'll be able to point you in the right direction. But it's a great way to do life with other people, where you get to grow in your relationship with God, with other believers, and with people who don't know the Lord yet. and creating space where it's okay to be real and to share life with one another.

Second thing we could do is ask God whose burden can you help share this week? If we go to God in prayer and we say God who can I carry some load this week and share it with them. The third thing we can do, thinking about relationships and carrying each other's burdens, is to invest in relationships. And I heard Jefferson Fischer say this, which I think is helpful. If you're trying to build relationships, good, meaningful relationships with people, invite them for a cup of coffee.

You be the one to take initiative. Don't wait. Sometimes we might wait and we say, "Nobody's inviting me to go anywhere." You be the one to invite. and you say, "Would you like to go for a cup of coffee?" Then think about an informal kind of rhythm to that. So sometimes it might be just a flash in the pan and we meet once and then it never happens again. But then think maybe roughly once a month will we try and meet up.

And so don't make it overly formal, but even in your own mind, think next month I'll invite them for a cup of coffee. Now, hopefully the invitation will start coming back, but you'll figure out pretty soon where the which way the relationship is. Hopefully, it's kind of reciprocal. And then be willing to share something a little bit vulnerable. I'm not saying go real deep dive on your first cup of coffee. They might fall off their chair, but if you've got, you know, be be willing to be somehow real with the person you're with.

And maybe as you're being real with them, maybe they'll be willing to be real with you. And that's a way of just letting relationships go a little bit deeper than just the surface level of, you know, how are you? I'm doing fine. How's work? It's good. You know, all of that kind of stuff. And the last thing is, is there a crucial conversation to have thinking about, you know, the the the relationships that that we share within church?

And if we claim to love God and we don't love our brother or sister or we're not prepared to fight for relationships within spiritual family, maybe there's a crucial conversation to have. That's what this guy Joseph Grenie talks about. And so, you know, that's where there's the the the ingredients of a crucial conversation is we know that we have a disagreement. Okay? So, we know there's some sort of distance between us.

We know that the stakes are high and you know, if we don't get this right, it could be a falling apart of relationship and we probably feel strongly about it. So, those are the the three ingredients there. And so, but I want to urge you, is there a crucial conversation that you know I should have? I mean, if you're thinking about that, is there somebody in spiritual family and you know it's not really quite okay? I know things aren't quite okay between me and that person.

Would you ask God and trust for an opportunity to have a conversation, a safe conversation where you can patch it up? Um, so those are some ways that we can apply what we've talked about this morning. Now, we're going to shift gears and we're going to take communion in just a moment. And we talked about the law of Christ being love and him coming to a world that could never repay him, a world that would reject and kill him, and still he loved us anyway.

I'm going to read from 1 Corinthians 11:23. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you. That the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. We take the bread and the wine together as a spiritual community to remember Jesus' body that was broken and his blood that was shed for us. And because he loved us, he humbled himself and became obedient to death on a cross. And because he died and rose again, I love the words of this hymn in Christ alone. Because he died and rose again, there's no guilt in life, and there's no fear in death.

This is the power of Christ in me. From life's first cry to our final breath, Jesus commands my destiny. No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from his hand. Till he returns or calls me home. Here in the power of Christ, I stand. And that's our testimony as brothers and sisters, as children of God, as we take communion together. And so I want to invite us please, if we could stand, if I can invite the hosting team to just come and uh gather the elements.

And so I want to invite us just to stay in an attitude of worship. Um if you're a visitor here or if you would prefer not to take communion, uh that's perfectly okay. just pass the the bowl, the basket to the next person. And the way we do this, if you haven't seen this before, and I think we'll have the words up there on the screen, where we serve one another, and we say, "The body of Christ broken for you and the blood of Christ shed for you." And then the person says, "Thanks be to God." And they dip it.

And then, "Don't take it yet." and then serve the next person over. So, let's stay in an attitude of worship as we do this and then we'll sing a closing song in just a moment. Heavenly Father, we thank you Lord for Lord this time that we can spend together this morning. Lord, we thank you for spiritual family. Lord, we thank you that we can share communion and come around your table like this today. And Lord, I lift up all of my brothers and sisters this morning.

Lord, I pray, Lord, that you will minister to each one of us. And Lord, even as we leave here today, Lord God, I pray, Lord, that you would use us for your glory. Lord, help us to be your church. Lord, help us to be your hands and feet, your voice wherever we go. Lord, I pray that we will shine brightly for you. Lord, I pray that you will give us opportunities even in this coming week to tell somebody about you. And Lord, even as we think about one another, Lord God, I pray that you will help us, Lord, to bear one another's burdens.

Help us, Lord, to uh Lord, realize, Lord, that we are our brother's keeper. Help us to see each other and love each other well and share those burdens together. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you his peace in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. We're going to finish now. We're going to sing a closing song. After this, please collect your kids.

If you have kids, please stay have some coffee and some fellowship. And uh we hope we'll see you again next week. God bless. And if anybody would like prayer, our prayer team is going to be downstairs in the kitchen uh just through these doors down here. And so if you'd like prayer this morning, please don't leave without someone praying for you. God bless. Oh, praise the Father. Praise the Son. Holy Spirit, make us one.

Every nation, tribe and tongue. This is our cry. Your kingom come. Oh, praise the Father. Praise the Son. Holy Spirit, make us one. Every nation, tribe and this is our cry. Your kingom come. Cuz we are brothers and sisters under the bann of your name. Mothers and fathers under the bann of your name. We're all your children all for the glory of your name. We're brothers and sisters under the banner of your name. Fathers and fathers under the glory of your name.

All your children for the glory of your name. Sing praise. Oh, praise the father. Praise the son. Holy Spirit make us one. Every nation, tribe and this is our cry. Your kingom come. This is our cry. This is our cry. Your will be done. This is our cry. Your kingom come. Heat. Heat. Oh, hey. Heat. Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. N. Heat.