This is Our Moment | The Time is Now

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Join us as Gabe Kolstad brings us a message about how this is Our Moment.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Good morning. How's everybody doing today? Guys, all right? Oh, it's a beautiful weekend, and uh we're we're doing a message today called This Is Our Moment. This is our moment. And I was thinking about moments because sometimes you have a moment and it's very special. It's really special, and you're trying your best to tell somebody about it. You ever had this happen where like you have the best moment and you want someone else to experience that moment, but they weren't there, and you're like trying to, and you're and you're so excited, and you're like, and then this happened, and then they're just like, uh-huh. Uh-huh.

unknown 0:32

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

And they're just trying to get through just to so you're done with your story so they can move on with their life, right? Well, this happened the other day. We were downtown Portland for uh fireworks. It was last weekend, and it was awesome. I mean, it was like, it was really, really good. In fact, here's a picture that Melissa took of the fireworks, okay? I mean, I don't know if that just gives you goosebumps like it gives me goosebumps. Does that like get you excited? Like, because we were there. I mean, we were there, and here's what happened. Like, it was the best one they've done yet. It was it was the Memorial Day weekend fireworks. We were at the waterfront and you know, sitting on the Willamette River on the next to the Willamette River, and the boat was in the middle with all the fireworks, and they started going. And I don't know what happened if like the fireworks department got a bonus this year or what, but it was really good. I mean, they started and it was like just getting better and better, and you know, you feel it in your chest, and it's exciting, and and and everybody's kind of doing their thing, all the lawn chairs. It was just it was such a great moment. And we're getting hit in the head with the shrapnel from the sky. It was so good. And it just about three minutes before it was over, it got so big. I mean, that like I couldn't believe how fast and how many fireworks were happening. And then at this one, at the very finale, it was so glorious. I mean, just like this giant pop, the whole crowd that was at the river was like reacting out loud to this. And it was almost like somehow it was so choreographed, it was so big. And then that last moment, boom, it was 10 20 p.m. And it was like it was daylight, it was so bright. And I'm telling you, it was the best one. Do you believe me? But you weren't there. You don't care, you didn't experience it. We experienced it, and I want to talk about that today because this is our moment, and I don't want you to miss it. I don't want somebody else to go, like, remember that time, and you're like, No, I don't remember that. No, this is your moment. Don't miss it. This is the moment. Experiencing a moment with God is a life-changing thing, and that's where we're at right now. Today, here's here's what we're doing. It's commitment weekend for our the time is now initiative. We're so excited about this. God has brought so many things together. Today, we're gonna do a few things. We're gonna celebrate communion together. At the end of my message here today, there's gonna be an opportunity to receive communion. I'll explain what that means, but we're gonna take the bread and take the juice, and we're gonna celebrate and remember what Jesus has done for us. We're wrapping up a series called The Time Is Now. Uh, we are bringing our first and best gifts, financial gifts to the Lord for this for this initiative. And you'll see at the communion tables, you'll see some buckets, and that's where we're gonna put those first and best gifts along with our commitments. And um this is this is kind of like a the beginning of a brand new era, a brand new season. You know what has led up to this, in case you haven't been around or you're wondering what's going on at West Side, is that over the last few years we've been praying and experiencing God's blessing on our ministry here, and the church has grown. And for the last five or six years, every year we've seen around 20% growth or more some years. And once that starts stacking, you start to realize that you know, to follow that trajectory is gonna look a certain way, and we ran the numbers and we realized we can't see that happen again next year in this campus, and we'd be turning people away. And for us, that's just not an option. So we started praying to the Lord, He brought this opportunity, and the opportunity is to relocate about a half a mile down the street to a facility that would double our capacity, double our capacity for ministry, for serving the community, to continue to grow, to continue to welcome people in, to make room for God to continue to move in this community. And we believe it's gonna be a generational blessing to this community because this is something that can help kids and students and families for a long, long, long time. So we're very, very excited about it. And that's why we're doing what we're doing is that God opened a door and we're responding to that. And it's like we get a chance to step back in history to something that people have been doing for millennia. Since the beginning, people have been doing something, and that is to dedicate themselves to the Lord for his purposes. So that's what today is about, and I welcome you here. If you're brand new, or maybe you're you're you're like, hey, I'm gonna pop into this church on a random weekend, and here you are. I just want you to know you're sitting among and you're online here among some of the most generous people in our community. And today we're gonna demonstrate our faith as we go forward into a new season. And in Joshua chapter 24 is where we're gonna be in the in the Bible today. So I hope you'll take your notes out of your program. And if you're with us online, there's notes there for you too. But Joshua chapter 24, it says they dedicated themselves to the Lord, which is what my prayer has been for us today. And um and so uh I wanna encourage you about what a defining moment looks like. You've probably had some. I've had some, I'm not gonna say that the fireworks the other night was a defining moment for me, but it was a moment, but I've had some defining moments, you know, that like set a new trajectory for me. In fact, my nephew Jordan just experienced this as he uh became a member of the National Guard. Check this out. This is Jordan, my nephew, becoming a member of the National Guard. Crazy. I mean, this is nuts because Jordan just emigrated to the U.S. not how long ago, Rachel? Two years ago. Three years, maybe. Three years. Immigrated to the United States. He gets here, finds a job, gets a driver's license, I mean, is mastering English and becomes a U.S. citizen, and then he's like, now I'm gonna join the National Guard. Next year he's running for president. I mean, this kid is crazy, right? But what I love about Jordan is he's going, I'm gonna define myself a certain way. And he had that moment, and he's raising his hand and he's reciting these things, and he's going, This is my future. And he has that defining moment in his life. And I think God wants to give us that as we step into a new season, a new era of ministry at West Side. It's in Joshua chapter 24 that Joshua gives like his handoff speech to the nation of Israel. He's led them into the promised land. They'd wandered through Israel or through Egypt, excuse me, for 40 years. They'd crossed the Jordan River, now they're in the promised land, but they haven't possessed it yet. They haven't fully occupied it to maximize it. And so he's giving them the handoff speech to say, this is what's gonna be required for you to move into a new era. And he gives them four things. And I want you to see the four things that he says, these things are gonna be necessary for you to succeed in your future. So, first one in your notes, you can write this down, is to remember. Remember. He's like, before you go forward, I want you to go back. Before you step out, I want you to step back. I want you to look back, I want you to see what God has done for you. He essentially says, I want you to remember how God has shown up for you. And I think that's a good question for all of us to ask is how has God shown up for you in your life? To look back and to think. You know, were you ever in trouble? And God showed up. Were you ever lonely and he came and his presence just filled your heart? You know, were you ever struggling and he gave you strength? So Joshua walks them through that. I have a friend named Nick who just came and he stayed with Melissa and I for a few nights. And Nick is a uh a Brit. He's from Liverpool, England, and he um was helping with an event that we put on this last week. He's a great guy. He said that he was struggling a few years ago. He's he was a church planter, a pastor, uh, a medical doctor, a magistrate. I mean, I keep joking, he was an astronaut, I mean, all this stuff. Nick was like the the the world's most interesting man. Um, but he said he was really, really struggling a few years ago and thought he wasn't gonna make it. And he reached out to six guys. He said, I had six guys in my life, and those guys constantly reminded me that God hadn't forgotten me. He said, they showed up, they prayed for me, they helped me financially. He said, God showed up in my life through those six guys, very, very specific way. And he gives that credit to the Lord for that season getting through it. Well, Joshua does something similar with the nation of Israel. In Joshua 24, verse 2, look what it says. Joshua said to the people, This is what the Lord God of Israel says. Long ago, your ancestors, including Terah, the father of Abraham, and Nahor, lived beyond the Euphrates River. They worshipped other gods, but I took your ancestor Abraham from the land beyond the Euphrates and led him into the land of Canaan, which ended up becoming the promised land. So he's going, This is all that I did. And then before we get into the next part, I just want you to know I'm summarizing. I've had to squish a whole bunch of stuff into just a little bit of text because I just want you to see what God says. This is how I showed up in your past. And so just to summarize, he said, I gave. I gave. I gave, I sent, I brought, I did, I brought, I destroyed, I gave, I made, I rescued, I gave, I sent, I gave, I gave, I gave. God's been really active in your past, hasn't He? If you're somebody who is a believer, a follower of Jesus, He's He's been very active in your past. Now there's times God has attempted to do something for me in my past, and I've stiff-armed him. Have you ever done that to God? Like, well, no. So I've rejected his grace or his goodness or his move toward me. But most of the time, I've tried to welcome it, you know, and he's been so active in my past. And I'll bet you if you looked back, you would see God's activity in your own past, his faithfulness. We just sang about it, you know. He's so faithful, he's been so good all my life. So good. So I want to actually dig into this, and without it on the screen, I just want you to listen because I'm gonna read you what was actually said here, the whole thing. It says, I gave him many descendants through his son Isaac. Think about your own past. Has God blessed you with a child or with somebody that you get to influence? I to Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. To Esau I gave the mountains of Sair while Jacob and his children went down into Egypt. Then I sent Moses and Aaron and brought terrible plagues on Egypt, and afterward I brought you out as a free people. Has God ever set you free from anything? Maybe he set you free from addiction, from insecurity, or from poverty. God sets us free. But when your ancestors arrived at the Red Sea, the Egyptians chased after you with chariots and charioteers. When your ancestors cried out to the Lord, I put darkness between you and the Egyptians, I brought the sea crashing down on the Egyptians, drowning them. With your very own eyes you saw what I did. Then you lived in the wilderness for many years. Finally I brought you into the land of the Amorites on the east side of the Jordan. They fought against you, but I destroyed them before you. I gave you victory over them, and you took possession of their land. Then Balak, son of Zippor, king of Moab, started a war against Israel. He summoned Balaam, son of Beor, to curse you, but I would not listen to him. Instead, I made Balaam bless you, so I rescued you from Balak. When you crossed the Jordan River and came to Jericho, the men of Jericho fought against you as the Amorites and the Perizzites and all the other ites and the Jebusites. But he said, But I gave you victory over them. Has God ever given you victory in a time when you thought you were just outmanned and outgunned? And somehow he showed up. And I sent terror, he said, ahead of you to drive off the two kings of the Amorites. It was not, he said this, it is not your swords or bows that brought you victory. I love that he said that. He says, I gave you land you had not worked on, I gave you towns you did not build, the towns where you are now living. He said, I gave you vineyards and olive groves for food, though you did not plant them. And what I think Joshua is trying to teach us through this is that when you step out into a new season, that's gonna require more of you. Because let me just let me just be totally honest with you. The season that we're about to enter as a church is gonna require more of us. People are looking at you, and they know that you're a follower of Jesus, and they know that you represent God, and they know that God wants to do good things in this world through you, and they know what our reputation should be, and they're gonna expect that from you. And Joshua is saying, in a time when you're about to step into a season that's gonna require more of you, I want you to understand how faithful God has been. That it is his strength that's carried you all the way. That it wasn't even your own swords, excuse me, and bows. It wasn't even your own equipment, it wasn't even your own building, wasn't even your own money. It was his faithfulness that brought all of that together. And I think that's so powerful and so important that we would stand on the faithfulness of God in a moment where we're about to step out in a big step of faith. Second thing that Joshua gives to the people of Israel is he says, resolve. I want you to resolve. Truth is, he lays it down. I mean, Joshua gets real, real bold in this part of scripture. He's like, figure it out, decide. Don't be wishy-washy. Stop going back and forth. He's like, make your decision. Don't be that person that can't be counted on, that nobody knows where you stand. You're like jello, you know, don't be like that. He's like, decide, resolve, be decided. One of the things that we as a church have done is we've we've responded to this moment. And um, just to be totally honest, this has been probably the most inconvenient time that God could have ever brought this opportunity to us. So many things going on. And we're having to just pause and go, like, okay, let's get our ducks in a row, let's figure this out. It's been very fast. I mean, this all has happened very fast. And so you've been processing it. We've been asking our church, process, pray, let's see. How can God involve us? You know, what how how does he want me to be involved? How does he want you to be involved? Some of you have even been over to this building. How many of you guys have been to the building? We had a whole bunch of little gatherings over there. Okay, you've been to the building. Some of you haven't, how many of you have not yet been to the building? Great. You want to go on a tour right now? Okay, this is gonna be the fastest possible tour, so fast that Caleb's voice is gonna get squeaky. Check this out. There's the gym, there's Pastor Ken.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

I don't know how, but Pastor Ken is in every shot in this entire video. Yeah, he's moving around fast. We got the kids' space, there's a multi-purpose room, there's student spaces, there's community outreach spaces, there's a huge lobby, there's an auditorium that's over twice the size of this one.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

There's a parking lot that won't run out of spaces. Yay! Here's the big blessing of that space. It's all under one roof. I mean, think about it. No more raindrops from the main building to the other buildings. That's gonna be amazing. But the truth is that it's just about responding to what God has done. And we are excited about that. In fact, I think we have a picture of the outside of it, in case you haven't seen that. This is the outside of the building, and it's, you know, it's it's it's a nice big space, and we're excited about it. And we believe that God is leading us that direction. So we're stepping out in faith and we're saying, we're doing this, and let's step out together. Joshua says in chapter 24, verses 14 and 15, he goes, so fear the Lord and serve him wholeheartedly. I like how he starts that out with so, because he just talked about faithfulness. He goes, God's been faithful, so fear the Lord and serve him wholeheartedly. Put away forever the idols your ancestors worshiped when they live beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt. And he says, Serve the Lord alone. Okay, I want to pause there and say, he's talking about idols. He talks a lot about idols in this passage, actually. An idol was and is anything that takes the place of God in your life. Something that you worship, you give your allegiance to, you prioritize, you think about all the time, you you obsess over. And for those guys, a lot of times it was literally a carved image, maybe made out of wood or stone, sometimes overlaid with metal, and they would bow down to it, they would make offerings to it, they would pray to it, they would actually think that some inanimate object was gonna do something for them. And God obviously hated that. And so he judged Israel severely for their idol worship because they were putting something else in front of their relationship with him. They were trusting something to provide for them and to answer their prayers and guide them. And I don't know anybody right now, I don't know anyone who does that specific thing where they've got some carved thing that they bow down to and they pray to. I don't personally have any friends that do that. But I know that every American and every person in the world is tempted to put something in front of their relationship with God to prioritize something else. Because that's actually the same thing. It's called idolatry. When we go, you know what, I care so much about my relationship. And I and even though I know it's sinful, I can't let it go. It's called idolatry. You know, I'm so scared about my finances that I can't release control of them to God. That's called idolatry. You know, I'm so addicted to this substance that just kind of keeps me going that I can't release it and surrender it to God. That's called idolatry. We we have we have these things vying for our attention, and Joshua's going, like, put away all of those things. Put it all away because you're about to step into a season that's gonna require more of you, but also a season that God wants to bless immensely. And what must happen is we must put away all the old idols in order for us to move into this season. It's about surrender. Verse 15 says this if you refuse to choose to serve the Lord, then choose today whom you will serve. Would you prefer the gods of your ancestors beyond the Euphrates, or will it be the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now live? He's kind of poking fun a little bit, isn't he? But then he goes, But as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord. I love that line. And that's like the one liner you remember from Joshua, as for me and my family, we're gonna serve the Lord. My hope and prayer is that in this moment that we have, this is our moment that you could make that kind of declaration about your whole life. And that if you have, if you if you're a parent or a spouse, if you have a household, that you could be the person to make that declaration. As for me and my family, we're gonna serve the Lord. Like that's that's the legacy that we're gonna live. That later people are gonna look back at this moment in our church, but also I think in your individual life, and they're gonna go, that was the moment when things turned around for our family tree. I remember hearing my grandfather talk about this in his life. He he pointed us back and he goes, This is my dad's dad, faithful man of God, but not always, but he pointed us back to the moment when he surrendered to the Lord. And I'll tell you what, that was the moment that our spiritual family tree started to take shape. You could have that impact for generations. But Joshua's going, like, figure it out, make your decision, choose who will you serve? I think that's so, so important. David was another great example of somebody who made resolve, okay? David, King David from Israel, just so, so wonderful. What a great leader. We talked about him last week. But in 1 Chronicles chapter 29, he was getting ready for the temple to be built. And so it was another similar time where they were getting ready to do something big, and he wanted to do it, but God said, No, it'll be your son. And so David said, Well, then I'm gonna get all the provisions ready. And so David got all the stuff ready, and he he he he decided that he was gonna be very financially involved. And so in 1 Chronicles 29, he goes, Because of my devotion to the temple of the Lord, I'm gonna give all of my own private treasuries of gold and silver. And I thought, well, that must be nice to be that rich that you can just give all that. But he said, he he actually said what it was gonna be. He said, I'm gonna give 112 tons of gold, 262 tons of silver. Whoa. I was like, man, that's that's a lot of money. That's a lot, right? I wondered how much is that? So I wondered if this person, ChatGPT, would know how much that would be in today's dollars. Guess what? The answer was yes. 11.2 billion dollars. That's what David gave in today's dollars toward the construction of the temple. And I was like, man, that has to be the biggest offering of all time, right? To God's service. It's gotta be the biggest offering of all time. Except for then I was looking through scripture and I thought, oh, wait a minute, there is a bigger offering. It was this lady who was in the temple and she was giving her gift, and she gave two tiny, tiny coins. That was even bigger than David's offering because she gave a hundred percent. She gave everything. And I thought, that's gotta be the biggest offering. But I realized still no. The biggest offering that's ever been given was the blood of Jesus Christ and the body of Jesus Christ for your sins and mind. He paid it all. The most valuable gift that's ever been given was the. The life of Jesus Christ for your life. And that's why we're going to have communion today. That's what we're resolved to follow. In fact, I want you to see something on the commitment card that we put on your seat. Some of you are going to be relieved to show up here next weekend and there won't be a commitment card on your seat. The fact that people are laughing about that tells you that these have been on the seats for five weeks, okay? Because we've been praying about this. And so I'm going to ask you to take the commitment card. Mine's written out. I'm not going to show you what it says, but we've been praying about this. And so we're going to present these things. Let me show you a picture. So on the card, I'm going to ask you to put your contact info. I'm going to ask you to consider what is the gift that you're going to bring. And those are going to go in the buckets there in an envelope, and I'll tell you about that in a minute. What's the monthly gift? What's the math? And then what's your total commitment? And we're just saying, as a church, you know, this is going to take all of us. This is a big deal. We're bringing back $750,000 over and above our regular giving to the Lord in a short period of time. And so it takes everybody. So the the question and the challenge to all of us is, Lord, what would you have me to do? And that's between you and Him. And today we get to celebrate and commit to that. And I think that's an important step in our faith because it gives us the opportunity to invite God as the provider, as the problem solver, you know, to be the one that opens the door. So resolve. Third one in your notes, recite. Joshua's like, recite. I want you to say something. I want you to, I want you to verbalize. I want you to externalize your commitment to the Lord. You got an internal decision, but what's your external decision? Some of you do this and you don't even know it. Anybody ever been to a ball game where you had to sing the national anthem? But you were reciting something, right? How about your core values of your company? Anybody ever say, what are the core values? And you had to recite the core values. How about any Marines in the room? What's your slogan? Semper Fy. Semper Fy. How about the Portland Timbers? Anybody know what theirs is? I had to look it up, but it's Rose City till I die. Everybody's got a slogan, right? And Joshua goes, I want you to recite something. It's very, very important. And what we as a as a church, as a people, as followers of Jesus, what we build our lives on is the word of God, the truth of God. In fact, next week we kick off a six-week series that I'm so excited to start. It's called Firm Foundation. Firm Foundation, six weeks on the Bible. How did we get the Bible? How do we know we can trust the Bible? How do I understand the Bible and read the Bible? All these things, six weeks, here's what I know is gonna happen for you. You are going to become way more confident in your faith over the next six weeks. So I invite you back next week for that because this is about what's in our hearts that comes from God. Joshua says this in verses 20, uh verse 16. He said, The people replied, We would never abandon the Lord and serve other gods. For the Lord our God is the one who rescued us and our ancestors from slavery in the land of Egypt. He performed mighty miracles before our very eyes. You know what's funny? Is all they were doing was repeating back what Joshua had just told them that God had done for them. It says, as we traveled through the wilderness among our enemies, he preserved us. It was the Lord who drove out the Amorites and the other nations living here in the land. So we too will serve the Lord, for he alone is our God. He's going, recite, externalize. It is so good. Do you know what it is? Worship? Worship to express a commitment to the Lord. That's worship. And Joshua's going, This is your way of worship. I want you to tell God what your commitment is. So you say it, you believe it, you say it, you live it out. That's a life of worship. Joshua's saying, recite. And then fourth and last in your notes is recommit. Recommit. Recommitment is a beautiful thing. I remember growing up in church. I was privileged, and I say privileged, I was privileged to have parents who were Christians, who knew the value of teaching us kids about the gospel and brought us to church, and we were very, very involved in church as kids. And as teenagers, I remember we were in part of a church that did this thing called an altar call. Some of you might have been in something like that, where you're like, that was like people coming forward at the end of a service and maybe like kneeling down. They they called the stage, well, if they called the stage the stage until the end of the service, and then it transformed and they called it the altar. Okay. So people would come to the altar and they would kneel down and they would pray. And I remember that as a teenager because it was sort of a joke a little bit that some teenagers would come forward and pray and rededicate their life to the Lord, recommit, and then the very next Friday would be drunk at a party. And then the and then Sunday morning would come and they'd come forward and they would pray and recommit their life. And then the next Friday they'd be drunk again, you know, at a party. And I don't think that's what we're talking about. We're not talking about, I mean, Joshua would say, decide what you want to do, right? He'd challenge that. But recommitment is so, so important. I think this is a great time for recommitment. If God's ever gonna say to you, there's something big I want you to go accomplish, you know what he's gonna ask you to do first? Recommit. And this could be your moment of recommitting. We have a pastor's prayer team here. I've been talking more about it because it's becoming more and more important in my life because it's so helpful for me to know I'm surrounded by a circle of leaders that are prayer warriors. And I'm telling you that I, if I even so much as get a hangnail, I tell these people. And I'm like, help me, you know, pray for me. Um, but we're actually now we're praying for each other. And the other day we were gathered together and we're praying for today and some other things, and Skip was there. Skip is one of our pastor's prayer team members, and he uh he he said this he goes, you know, I gotta tell you, for 44 years I've been sober. 44 years he's been sober. And he went on to talk about God's faithfulness and all that, and how you know God's carried him through it. But he but he he he know he tells us that there was a time he made a real decision that he was making a change. And he he is like, hey, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna make myself accountable. I'm gonna get rid of all the alcohol in my house. You know, I'm going to submit myself to going to a meeting every single day. I'm gonna live by these principles. I'm gonna let people ask me questions, I'm gonna stay away from the place, you know. He had all this whole thing, he's recommitting, and God has carried him for 44 years. His life changed in that moment. And that's the kind of thing that I think God wants for you and me to do. In Joshua 24, verses 24, 25 says, The people said to Joshua, We will serve the Lord our God, we will obey him alone. So Joshua made a covenant with the people, an agreement that day at Shechem, committing them to follow the decrees and the regulations of the Lord. I mean, he's like, all right, sign here. Let's shake on it, you know? Like, let's make this official that you're committing yourself to the Lord. You're gonna serve the Lord. This point of like recommit, it's so important that we'd say, I'm committing myself to the purposes of the Lord. This is about so much more than this momentary opportunity that we have. This is our moment. I hope you remember it. I hope, like the fireworks that I'm talking about. I hope there's a point at which you look back and you go, Oh, remember when as a church we locked arms and we took that step of faith to make more room for God to continue to work in our community? Remember that? And we saw God come through and there's all that. That's gonna be a wonderful thing. But it goes even beyond that. To like your whole story. Your whole story, like your day-to-day. Who are you at work tomorrow morning when you show up? Who are you at school? How does God shine his light through you? Joshua's going, commit yourself to the purposes of the Lord. He wants to use you in such a powerful way. Joshua said, Let's make this a covenant. And then he found this giant rock. And he rolls this huge rock in front of the tabernacle. That was that temporary tent where they worship the Lord. He rolls this huge rock in front of him. He goes, This rock will be a witness between us and God. And he said, This rock has heard everything that you said. And every time we walk by here and we look at this, it's going to be a reminder of our commitment to the Lord. He said, We have a symbol of our covenant. I always ask that in a wedding ceremony. I say, Do you have a symbol of your covenant? Say that to the bride and the group. Do you have a symbol of your covenant? And I'm expecting them to say, Yes, I do. And then to reach to the best man to get the rings and to bring them out, and they put the ring on the finger. That's the symbol of the covenant. What's the covenant? Is I'm committing myself to you for the rest of my life, right? But you know, we have a symbol for our covenant too, because we're under a new covenant. Did you know that? In the Old Testament, they were under the old covenant, the old covenant with God. But God says, I'm gonna make a new covenant with you. And do you know what the symbol of our covenant is? It's not a big rock in front of the church building. Ours is the cross. The cross is the symbol of our covenant. Because our covenant with God is based on the body and the blood of the Lord that was given for us, that forever changes our eternity, forever changes our relationship with God. And that's what we're gonna celebrate today with communion in just a couple minutes. Something that Joshua did and said, actually, was so interesting. We see this recorded in the in the last few lines of this book. It says, The people of Israel served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and the elders who outlived him. But then it says this, and here's the kicker, I think. It says, Those who had personally experienced all that the Lord had done for Israel. Those were the people that stayed faithful to the Lord. The people who had personally experienced all that the Lord has done for Israel. Let me just remind you that your grandma's faith story is not gonna carry you through a hard time. If you're married to a spouse who's really on fire for the Lord, that's gonna carry them through a hard time. But the only thing that will carry you through a hard time is personal experience with the Lord is to know and follow and serve the Lord yourself. The only way you're ever gonna experience the faithfulness of God is to take a risk that requires Him to show up. And that's how He shows us His character. That's how we grow in our faith. And for some of you, that risk today, I get it. I get it. We've been processing as a family. Let me just talk to our church for just a minute. We as a family, we've been processing and praying and trusting and seeking. And we're going big on this with along with you. And we are going first on this. We gave our first gift last night at our Saturday night service. And let me tell you, as I was writing the check, yeah, I wrote a check. You don't have to do that. We've got the online stuff too. I was writing a check, I'm like, Lord, you're gonna have to show up for this thing. And we got the money in the bank, but I gotta figure out how this all works out. And as we've made our commitment for what we're gonna do every month, I'm just, you know, felt led that I I want you to know we're going first and we're going big. I mean, our family is gonna give 25% of our gross income back to God through this church this year. And I'm only saying that because I want you to know I would never ask you to take a step of sacrifice without going there first. And we do not live on some lavish salary, okay? But we believe in this and we've seen God come through, and there's no way we're gonna outgive God. He will keep pouring out his blessings, he will keep doing it, and he will keep doing it, he'll keep doing it. And we trust and we know and we've experienced. We have personal experience. I've been at the store buying groceries when somehow God made the math work out. I've gone to the mailbox needing help and the check was there. I know what it's like for God to show up. And I have no doubt, no doubt. I have no doubt as we step out in faith that we walk by faith, not by sight. That we we've heard the Lord. He's leading us, we're going there, and he's gonna make it all work out. And so I hope that you'll be a part of that. I hope that this moment is your moment. I hope you get to say later, I saw the fireworks. He showed up for me. Maybe that's for you, that's the risk you need to take, is to go, I gotta go there and trust the Lord then. Maybe for you, it's more about do you even know Jesus in the first place? I mean, are you sure that Jesus Christ is your Savior? Like, do you know in your heart of hearts that your sins have been forgiven? That you have a Savior who's with you, that when you pray, he hears you because he calls you now his child. Do you know that? And if you're not sure, to me, that's the first place you gotta start today. Worry about the rest later. Deal with this. Jesus loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life, and he's invited you to step into that relationship, and he's died on the cross to pay for your sins. And so I would like for you to bow your heads with me right now as we pray together. Would you Father? It's an awesome moment to stand here and realize that we're on the cusp of a new season as a church, but really honestly, as a city, as you're working so powerfully in our city. And so I pray for strength and faith and resolve and recommitment and all the things in our hearts. God, help us to trust you, help us to to know your presence and your power and to and to see how you're gonna carry us, how you're gonna continue to use us. God, the fact that we get to have experience walking with you, that's a thrill. And I pray that we'd grow in that. Thank you that we can do this together. Thank you that later we'll look back on this moment and we'll smile because we'll know that we we we took the right step. But Lord, I pray right now for those who are here and ready to say yes to you. If you're ready to say yes to Jesus, to make sure of your salvation, then I want to encourage you right now, wherever you're at, online or here in person, to repeat this back to God in your heart and mind. Tell him this, Jesus, I give you my life. Thank you for saving me. I believe in you, your life, your death on the cross, and your resurrection. Forgive me of my sins. Fill me with your Holy Spirit. Lead me and teach me to follow you. I ask it in Jesus' name.