The Mission of the Church

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Summary

Pastor Safrit walks through Matthew 28:16-20 to outline the mission of Pleasant Grove Baptist Church, which is to preach the word, practice hospitality, and penetrate the darkness in the community. He emphasizes that every church member is called to share the gospel and demonstrate love through actions, reflecting Jesus' teachings. The sermon encourages the congregation to actively engage in their mission by reaching out to others, fostering a welcoming environment, and being a light in a world filled with darkness.

Welcome and Introduction
Thank you for listening to Pleasant Grove Baptist Church Sermon Audio. For more information, please visit our website, pgbcronda.com, or visit on all social media platforms. Yes, I am the substitute teacher, like you said. And substitute teachers always make mistakes. Thank you, choir, for singing.
If you have a kid that wants to go to a children's church, you can dismiss them at this time, and they'll take care of them. If you have your Bibles, we're going to be in Matthew chapter 28 this morning.
Matthew chapter 28, and over the last several weeks and months, we've began to have committee meetings and deacons meetings, and I've just been observing a lot, been taking a lot, taking a lot of notes.
And in that process, I've just began to develop, through the help of the Lord, a mission statement for the church. And it's at the bottom of your calendar.
It's at the top of your notes today. And we're going to preach through that this morning and give some explanation for what that is and what that looks like. But I wanted to give a little story as a segue into that, as before we read in Matthew chapter 28.
I had the opportunity while I was in college, and also when I moved back to North Carolina to work at a, they don't call it fast food, they call it a quick service restaurant. We call it God's chicken or Chick-fil-A.
And I had the opportunity of working there for four years, some great times. I made some great friends, some people I still talk to to this day. And one of the most fascinating things about Chick-fil-A is their founder, Truett Cathy, because Truett had tons of adversity. His very first store, the Dwarf House,
burned down and did not look like he was going to succeed.
And he did not succeed in life until he was much, much older in life. Most people think that he succeeded younger, but he was in his latter days of life when Chick-fil-A became a success. And when I began working there in college and even in, when I came back to North Carolina,
they put you through a set of training and different things. And they introduced their mission statement to you, the mission statement of Chick-fil-A. And this changed a little bit over the years after Truett passed away. But this was the mission statement of Truett when he started Chick-fil-A.
And this is what it says. And I want you to put into perspective the context of the world that it's in. And this is his mission statement that he had on his wall in every Chick-fil-A that you went in. This is the thing.
To glorify God, I've been a faithful steward of all that is entrusted to us.
To have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A. It's a little bit different than probably a McDonald's. Okay.
They put in Jesus and God first and foremost. And the story goes that Truett was getting older in his years and another chicken company called Boston Market began to come into the scene in the early 2000s.
Boston Market had a huge expansion plan that they were going to have a goal of reaching $1 billion in sales by the year 2000. They were fast expanding.
They were aggressive. And naturally the executives of Chick-fil-A began to get nervous about this new threat. A direct competitor in their market space. And conversations began to surround about this threat.
And Chick-fil-A's initial response was centered on how to grow bigger and grow faster to compete with Boston Market. The whole thing culminated in a boardroom in Chick-fil-A headquarters, which I've been there.
And it's a great boardroom. I've been in Truett's office. It's a fantastic place. And all the VPs and marketing people are around. And they're figuring out about how to get bigger and how to be faster. And the head of the table was Truett Cathy in his older years. And he sat quietly,
seemingly disengaged in what was going on. And then out of the blue, Truett Cathy began to bang his fist on the table to get everyone's attention. And as he was banging his fist, the room began to get quiet.
And everyone's eyes began to turn to the head of the table. Truett, as he's sitting there in his older years. And he said this.
He said, men and women, I am sick and tired of hearing you talk about us getting bigger. What we need to be talking about is how we can get better.
If we get better, our customers will demand that we get bigger.
The statement changed the whole course of the conversation at Chick-fil-A headquarters. In the result, in the year 2000, when Boston Market wanted to reach their $1 billion in sales, Boston Market filed for bankruptcy and Chick-fil-A reached $1 billion in sales.
And I say all that to say this. It all stems from the vision and the mission that Truett had. To glorify God.
And to be a positive influence on all those who come in contact with Chick-fil-A. Now, I'm not teaching this morning or preaching this morning on how we can be like Chick-fil-A, even though you may spend thousands of dollars at Chick-fil-A in your year's time. Because it is good chicken.
But this morning, I want to preach and teach on what the mission is at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. And simply put, it's this.
Mission and Purpose
To preach the word. To practice hospitality. And to penetrate the darkness in our community.
So if you found your place in Matthew chapter 28, we're going to read our opening scripture.
And we're going to do something that I don't do often. We're going to jump around to a lot of scripture to give some concluding thoughts as well. So here's, as we stand, we'll read this verse. These verses. Matthew chapter 28. Verses 16 through 20.
This is the mission of the church from Jesus. And he says this. And the 11 disciples went away into Galilee into a mountain where Jesus had appeared to them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him.
I want you to get this because this is, I don't have time to preach this complete thought. But some doubted.
Some of the disciples that were standing there that saw Jesus rise from the dead, that spent 40 days with Jesus,
some of them still doubted. And yet Jesus still spoke to them. Jesus still welcomed them in. And Jesus came and spake to them, saying, All power is given unto me under heaven and earth. Go you therefore and teach all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things, whatever I have commanded unto you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world. Amen. Father, we love you.
I pray that you'll have your will and way in this service today as you've already worked in the worship and then through the prayer time and through the devotion, Lord, that was given. I pray, God, that you would be with this service this time.
Give me the words to say in your name we pray. Amen. As a church this morning,
we must have a mission that is geared toward God, that is geared toward what God has for us.
And it's so fitting that we're able to preach this message the way the Lord allowed us to preach it on the first Sunday of the year. We're going to be here to push us toward this next year and how we can have a vision to move forward.
You see, these three things are necessary, I believe, in every church, but specifically in this church today to preach the word and to be faithful to God's word and to practice hospitality.
And we're going to talk about what it looks like and to penetrate the darkness in our community. And the question we have to ask ourselves this morning is how can we accomplish those things?
How can we as a church say we want to be faithful stewards and we want to accomplish these three things?
Preaching the Word
And so that's what we're going to look at over the next course of the couple minutes is how to accomplish these three things. The first one is this, simply preaching the word. And I put the wrong script for reference there.
Even though 1 Timothy 3.16 does talk about preaching, I want to actually, if you want to write it down, 2 Timothy 4.2 is what we're going to look at. And this is what it says in scripture, and it's on the screen for you. It says, preach the word.
Be instant in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, and exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
One of my primary focuses as your pastor is to preach the word. It's commanded in scripture, it's not an option. It's not something that I can say, you know what, this week I don't want to do that. It's a command from God that I have to preach God's word.
And so as your leader, I'm going to do everything I can to do that. But it's also a command for every single person in here. Right?
Matthew 28, our opening scripture says that Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, All power is given to me in heaven and earth, and go therefore and teach. Some versions actually say, preach all nations.
So Jesus is saying to every disciple, it's not just the job of the pastor, but it's the job of all of us to preach and teach the word.
And that must be the ultimate primary focus of our church, if we're going to see God work in our midst, is to grow through the preaching and teaching of God's word.
And I begin to write down and begin to think through, what are some areas or ways that we have the preaching of the word, and it impacts our life?
The first way is through salvation. Romans 10, 13, and 15 says this, For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. When I was five years old, I accepted that call of salvation.
But then he continues on in verse 14, and he says, How then shall they call on his name whom they haven't believed? And how shall they believe of him whom they've not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?
And how shall they preach except they are sent? And it is written, How beautiful are them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings and good things. We preach the gospel.
The gospel of Jesus Christ coming into this world, as we celebrate the last couple weeks of him coming, and been born into a manger. That's the beginning of the gospel. But it doesn't end there.
Our Christianity doesn't end with a baby in a manger.
It ends with Jesus coming and dying on a cross for our sins, for you and for me, and for us accepting that gift of Jesus Christ into our lives, and accepting that gift of what Christ has given us, no matter whether we're a five-year-old boy, whether we're a 15-year-old young person,
maybe you're 92 or 97, or maybe you're in a nursing home. It doesn't matter. We all have the opportunity to respond. We all need repentance.
It says here, All that call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But see, they can only hear if we tell them.
If we go out and we have these cards that are printed, and I hope you took that challenge last week, where you handed out one card, they will only hear if we go and tell them.
They will only hear of that good news if we tell them. Not only is there sanctification, salvation, but there's sanctification.
Salvation brings us into this thought of sanctification. This is the growing and the knowledge of Scripture.
See, there's a thought right now, and some of our young people may have heard it. If you teach in the school system, you may have heard this before, but it's this thought of relative truth. Has any of you ever heard of the term relative truth? A couple of people.
What this simply means is, whatever you deem is true, is true.
So if you deem that I have black hair, and I don't wear glasses, and I have really dark skin, then you're right. Because you believe that. If I believe that Cole down here has a white suit on, and a white shirt on, and white shoes, and a purple tie, then I'm right.
Because I deem that's true, because I have relative truth. When in actuality, the truth is he doesn't have any of that on. He's got a black suit, and a black shirt, and a silver tie, and black shoes. And so relative truth says, whatever you think is true, is true.
The Bible says in John 17, 17, sanctify them by the truth. And what is truth? Your word is truth.
The exact opposite of what the culture is teaching today is what Jesus taught. Jesus said that his word is true. The plumb line by which we measure everything in Christianity and in the world is by his word.
We want to know what truth is. We want to know how we can accomplish this, how we can grow in our faith. We go to God's word. We let God's word impact our life, and that is through sanctification.
This is the thought of everything in the world must be judged by God's word.
Our Christianity, our Christian journey doesn't end at salvation. It is simply the beginning. We accept in Jesus.
We accept his gift, and that is the trampling, the catapult that springboards us into our Christian journey. It doesn't begin there. It begins there. It's not the ending. It is the full nation of our Christian journey.
So we see salvation, we sanctification, and then we see the third way, the way we can preach the word is through saturation. This is going into all the world.
This is not just staying right here, and this is where we get our text verse from. Matthew 28, 18 through 20, and Jesus came and spoke to them and said, all power is given to you. Go therefore and teach all nations. Teach everyone. What we have cannot be hidden just to ourselves.
We've got to tell our kids. We've got to tell our grandkids.
We've got to tell our neighbors. We've got to tell the person down the street at the gas station. We've got to tell the person down the street at the hardware store, the lady that's checking us out, the man that's checking us out at Walmart. Wherever we're at, we have the opportunity of sharing
the gospel with them. No holds back of anyone, whether they're race or gender or color, or no matter what it is, we have the opportunity of sharing the gospel with them.
As a couple people were coming in this morning, I was testing, making sure my videos were working, and God said, if you'll get that video ready, but I came across this video a couple years ago of a famous man named Penn Jillette. Have you ever seen the show Penn and Teller?
Penn and Teller has a magic show, and Penn is a very outspoken, probably one of the most famous atheists out there. He's very vocal about what he believes and why he believes it.
One day, a young man, he actually wasn't a young man, he was in his 50s, came to him and gave him a Bible at the end of one of his shows. And Penn was so enamored that this person who knew he was an atheist
gave him a Bible, and he went to YouTube and just threw up a video and said, I just want to talk about this. And so for four minutes, he talks about this guy who gave him a Bible.
And he makes one statement I'm going to pull out of it. I want you to watch it and listen to what Penn has to say. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
And he walked over to me and he said, I was here last night at the show
and I saw the show and I liked it. And he was very complimentary about my use of language and complimentary about, you know, honesty and stuff. He said nice stuff. No reason to go into it. He said nice stuff.
And then he said, I brought this for you. And he handed me a Gideon pocket edition.
I thought it said from the New Testament, but I also thought it was Psalms from the New Testament, right? Psalms from the New Testament. Just part of the New Testament. A little book about this big, this thick, you know.
He said, I wrote in the front of it. And I wanted you to have this. I'm kind of proselytizing. And then he said, I'm a businessman. I'm sane. I'm not crazy. And he looked me right in the eye and did all of this.
And it was really wonderful. I believe he knew that I was an atheist. But he was not defensive. And he looked me right in the eyes.
And he was truly complimentary. It wasn't in any way, it didn't seem like empty flattery. He was really kind and nice and sane and looked me in the eyes and talked to me. And then he gave me this Bible. And I've always said, you know, that I don't respect people who don't proselytize.
I don't respect that at all. If you believe that there's a heaven and hell and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think that, well, it's not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward.
And atheists who think that people shouldn't proselytize, just leave me alone, keep your religion to yourself. How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize?
The Importance of Sharing Faith
How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?
I mean, if I believe, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that a truck was coming at you and you didn't believe it, for that truck was bearing down on you, there's a certain point where I tackle you. And this is more important than that.
And I've always thought that, and I've written about that, I've thought of it conceptually. This guy was a really good guy. He was polite and honest and sane,
and he cared enough about me to proselytize and give me a Bible, which had written in it a little note to me, not very personal, but just, you know, like to show and so on. And then like five phone numbers for him and an email address if I wanted to get in touch.
Now, I know there's no God, and one polite person living his life right doesn't change that.
But I'll tell you, he was a very, very, very good man. And that's really important. And with that kind of goodness,
it's okay to have that deep of a disagreement. I still think that religion does a lot of bad stuff, but man, that was a good man who gave me that book. That's all I wanted to say. As I watched that,
as I began just thinking through it, he made this statement, how much do you have to hate someone to not tell them about eternity?
How much do you have to not care about someone's soul to tell them the antidote for their sin, to tell them how to have eternal life, and to tell them how they can live forever with Jesus? Because if we don't tell people,
we're simply making the statement, as he said in his own words, we hate them. We don't care about them. We only care about ourselves, and we don't care about other people.
Which leads us into the second thought of, not only do we preach the word, but we practice hospitality.
Church, if we're going to be a church that reaches people, we have to be a church that is hospitable. Every time I read any story of Jesus, almost every story of Jesus, this is what Jesus is doing.
He's sitting down with people, because he's passionate about the things that people are doing, and I'm passionate about what Jesus is passionate about.
Jesus loves people, he cared for people, and he sat down at their dinner table. It was rarely a time where I don't see in scripture Jesus is sitting down, talking, and eating. He welcomes the kids into his presence.
Jesus' Love for All
The disciples say, no, no, kids get away, you're not needed, you're not worthy. But Jesus says, bring them to me. I have need for the kids. He goes to the Pharisees' house. He eats with the tax collectors and the sinners.
The publicans look on and say, how can this man say he's religious when he's eating with sinners? Because that's what Jesus wants to do. He wants to be around those that are sinners. He wants to be around those who are his disciples.
See, this is contrary to what we would normally say, but it should be a part of our normal life. We must have this part of our normal life where we say, I am going to promote hospitality in my life. I want to be around people. I want to care for people.
And how do we do this? The first way is we'll love one another.
John 13, 34, and 35. The longer I read this verse, the more I read this verse, this almost has become one of my life commands in verse. We call it the golden rule. We've heard it before, but let's look at it again. A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another.
As I have loved you, because he gave his life for us, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you love one to another.
The way we love one another is by being where people are at, by simply showing up where people are at. Maybe it's a funeral. Maybe it's a hospital visit. Maybe it's a marriage. Maybe it's a dedication. Maybe it's a funeral.
I think I said that. Maybe it's a baptismal service. Whatever it may be, a birthday party, just simply showing up and being where people are at and showing love to one another.
Showing love to one another can look funny and strange in many different ways.
You see, the beautiful thing is, I don't have to get up here and say, these are the 17 different ways you can show love. Because we're all going to show love in different ways. Some of you may say, Pastor James, I just don't, I'm socially awkward. I can't talk to people.
For me, you put me in a room with 17 strangers.
By the time we leave, they're all going to be my best friends. We're going to all have each other's number. We're going to be in a group chat together and we're going to talk for the rest of us. That's just who I am. That's my personality.
I love being around people. People ask me all the time, do you have hobbies? Do you have like, and I've got a couple of big ones, but for me, just being around people is my hobby.
I just love people. I love golfing, but I don't golf like I really do. If I go out and I golf, I'm going to hit the ball like 17 times to get it to the hole. It's going to be really bad, but I go because, you know why? Because I'm not alone and I'm around other people.
I get to hang out with those people. Last night, I went to a concert, a Gold City concert with my son and my brother. One, I love Gold City, so that wasn't a big arm pull, but I got to hang out with my son. I got to hang out with my brother. I got to be around people.
This is what I love and so for me, it's easy. You got to ask yourself, what do you love and how are you good at that? One simple way and I haven't done this in years, but as I was thinking through Chick-fil-A,
this came to my mind because we would see this often where people would pay it forward. You've ever been in a drive-thru where someone paid for your mill that's in front of you? Most of the time, they're like, man, that's really nice. I'm going to pay for the guy behind me. It's $85.
No, never mind. I'm not going to pay for it. Okay? But you have this generosity. I've done this many times.
I'll take one of these little gospel tracks and I'll say, hey, I want to pay for the person behind me. Will you give this to them when I pay for it? All you got to do is give it one and then that person's like, you know what? That's really thankful.
I wish I could tell that person thank you because what do we always want to do? We always want to tell that person thank you, but we never have the opportunity.
Well, now they can come and they can, as Penn just talked about, they have an opportunity to come and tell us thank you if we just simply share with them. Be creative. Reach out.
Find different ways where you can just show love to one another because the Bible says that the only way, the Bible,
the only way that people are going to know that we're a disciple of Jesus is we have love one to another. But not only do we love one another, we lift each other up. We begin to care for one another by actually being there for them. passage of scripture, Luke chapter 10.
I've got a little bit of time. I'm running out. Luke chapter 10, verses 25 through 37. I'm just going to summarize it, but it's the story of the Good Samaritan. And the Good Samaritan, Jesus begins with this question, a lawyer stood up.
The Good Samaritan Parable
Put on there verse 25. A lawyer stood up and tested Jesus and said, teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus responded to this question with a story,
almost a real account, like Jesus could see this happening. And he said, it is written that you should,
that you begin to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. And then this lawyer said unto him, he answered correctly, but he desired to justify himself and said, who is my neighbor?
And he went through the story of a guy who was going from Jericho to Jerusalem and he had gotten mugged and he had gotten robbed and he was beaten half to death and the religious person came by and stepped over him and said, I'm not going to get near him.
The Pharisee came by and said, I'm going to get as far away from him as I can. But the person that had nothing to do with him, the Samaritan,
said as he journeyed, he saw him and when he saw him, he felt pity upon him and he said, I'm going to take my coat off. I'm going to give you my coat.
I'm going to put you on my own animal. I'm going to take you to a hospital. I'm going to pay for your hospital stay. He lifted him up and he cared for him. He did things that no one else would do
and this is what we must do as a church. We must lift others up and we must live the example of the Good Samaritan. We must live like no one else is going to live in order to reach our neighbor. Who is your neighbor?
It's the person that's beside you. It's the person that's near you and Jesus said this, his last command in verse 37 in this passage and he said to the one standing and showed mercy and then Jesus said to him, go and do likewise. Church, we must be a church that is doing
loving and lifting of others. We must be a church that is actively doing these things because that's what Jesus commands us to do. So not only do we preach the word, not only do we promote hospitality, but verse, the third one here in our mission statement is we must penetrate the darkness in our community.
Matthew chapter 5 will be our last passage of scripture we look at. Matthew 5, 14 through 16
says this in the original of the screen, and you are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.
Letting Your Light Shine
Neither do men light a candle and put it under a basket, but they put it on a candlestick and it gives light for the entire house so that everyone can see. And let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.
As I was reading that passage, and again, there's not many times I don't read the Bible and I don't have a memory of when I was in Israel, and I shared this thought with you before of when I was in Israel, but I found the picture and I wanted to show it to you.
This was when I was on the Sea of Galilee, and this city here is the city of Tiberias. It's right in the middle of two mountains, and I asked our God, I said, Amir, I said, is that city, would it have been here when Jesus was here?
And he said, yeah, Tiberias is mentioned 2,000 years ago with the old city, and the two mountain ranges on both sides are uninhabitable. He said, that city would have been lit up in Jesus' day.
And I want you to imagine Jesus standing on the Sea of Galilee with his disciples, and he says, a city that's set on a hill cannot be hidden. You can't hide it.
You can't hide that city. You can't hide what that city's doing. It begins to light up because people need to see at nighttime, and he says this correlation, so therefore, we as Christians must let our light shine before men that may see our good works. How do we penetrate the darkness?
The first way is this, the hope of the world. It says here in verses 14 and 15 that we are the hope of the world. We are the light.
The world is looking for something. Go back with me. Remember what Penn said. He said, I'm an atheist. I don't believe religion. I think it's bad. He said, but this guy's got something that I need. This guy's got something going on here. He's a good man. He said some great things.
He gave him hope. I'm not saying that every person you talk to, you're going to be able to lead to the Lord, and you're going to be able to say, I had 10 saved this past week, Pastor James, but I want us to be able to say, I shared with people.
I went out in our community, and I wanted to share the light with others. I wanted to share what God was doing in my life and to other people because God chose the church to reach the world. He didn't choose a community club.
Hope and Community
He didn't choose a restaurant. He didn't choose a school.
He chose the church, and he said, upon this rock, the church, I will reach the world, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it, and this morning, church, the church cannot be hidden. We have to stand up.
We have to let our light shine so that we can give hope to the world.
So often, I'll sit down with a teenager or a young person or even a young married couple, and they'll be in the middle of a divorce. I can remember going through COVID and having three different families in our church that had been married. One was 10 years.
One was 20 years, and they sat down with me and they said, Pastor, there's no hope in our marriage. My heart began to break. My heart began to crumble because I'm thinking, Jesus is in your marriage.
How can there not be hope in your marriage? And of those three, only one couple stayed together. I shared the gospel with them. I helped them out.
I wanted to tell them that you're the light of the world and that we're going to reach the world, but if we break the light down, we are no longer effective in the world.
And we begin to share hope, and we begin to, the second point is share, help for those who are broken because oftentimes people are looking for answers, and we have the answer.
We have the truth, as we talked about a couple of minutes ago. We have the truth of the word, and we have the opportunity to share that truth with them because it's the help that the broken need. The world must see our good words.
Look at this again in verse 16. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works.
And when they see your good works, what are they going to do? Or again, remember back to what Penn said. He turned, and he didn't necessarily give glory to God, but he said, there's something different about this guy. In church this morning, when we show good works,
we hope and pray that they will turn and give glory to our Father who is in heaven. But they can't give glory to God unless they see us first. Look at the progression here.
And they, verse 16, let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works first.
And then they will turn and glorify your Father who is in heaven. This morning church, are we penetrating the darkness that is around us with the light of the gospel that we have inside of us? All these three things go together. It begins by having the gospel.
Invitation and Reflection
It begins by loving and caring for people. Then it is an overflowing of that light into the world. It is an overflowing of what we have into the world that's around us.
As Terry comes and we prepare for our time of invitation, we have communion today and I want us to prepare our hearts for that. I want us to prepare our minds for that. And maybe you need to come this morning and just say, God,
I've got some things that there's some sin in my life. There's some wrong in my life I need to get right before I partake in communion. But maybe you just need to ask yourself this morning, in these three areas this year, reaching others, promoting hospitality,
penetrating the darkness, ask yourself one of these two questions or both these questions, really. The first one is this, Lord, help me to reach and impact the others that I see around them through the area that I'm most passionate about.
Right? I love people. I'm a people person. That's easy for me to promote hospitality. It's easy for me to want to have people around. Scott said this morning, having a Super Bowl party and hanging out and watching the game and just having a good time. that's my alley. I love it.
That's easy for me to do that. It may be a little harder for me to do one of the other ones.
So the first is ask yourself, which one of these is easy for me to do and say, God, help me to do it to the fullest of my ability. But then ask yourself this, which one of these do I struggle with?
Which one of these do I struggle with? Maybe it's, you just don't like talking to people and say, Lord, help me to have boldness to work in this area.
Help me to have the boldness that I need to go out and penetrate the darkness or to promote the hospitality or to preach the word in whatever way it may be and ask yourself, God, give me that boldness.
Give me that desire that I need to reach my neighbors. To look and say, who is my neighbor? Who is my co-worker? Who is the person that you put on my life, that you put on my heart, that I just need to send a text to and just encourage today?
This morning, as we have our time of invitation, you do what you see fit according to the Lord. Let's stand. Lord, we love you.
Lord, I'm so thankful to be able to stand here this morning and preach this message that you've given me. Lord, direct our church to glorify you. Lord, help us to promote
hospitality this year and for many, many years to come and help us to go out into the community and to penetrate the darkness that's around us. It's everywhere, God.
We know it's there. We see it. We experience it. Help us be the light this morning. We love you. In your name we pray. Amen.
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