Speaker 1: 0:18

Hi, my name is Jude Goosberg, I go to Benicia High School and I'm in ninth grade and I'll be reading John, chapter 1 through 7. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched, this we proclaim concerning the word of life the life appeared. We have seen it and testify to it. And we proclaim to you the eternal life which was the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard so that you also may have fellowship with us, and our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete.

Speaker 1: 1:04

This is the message we have heard from Him and declare to you God is light. In Him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have worship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live without the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Christ, his son, purifies us all with from sin. 1 John 1-7 is the word of the Lord.

Speaker 2: 1:32

Thanks be to God, thanks, brother, appreciate it Well. Last week we didn't have power, then Friday we had a fire that tried to take us out. And then you guys came in here and you're like where'd my seat go? Like I see some of you are just angry right now. Like you moved my seat. It brings me so much joy. I'm a weirdo like that.

Speaker 2: 1:53

We're starting this new series in these letters of John. It's in the back of your new Testament. I'm just going to tell you ahead of time that one of the easiest things to do is just going to be like open up, like a pastor can said open up a Bible app or bring a Bible each week. You'll be able to follow along in the scripture I'll throw up on the screen, but it'll be helpful. So if you've ever played chess, if you're a chess person, you know what checkmate means. It means that the game is over, like your opponent has no moves left, like there's no options, there's no way out, it's final, it's done.

Speaker 2: 2:27

And what we discover in the New Testament is that is exactly what Jesus did through his life, his death, resurrection, that he made this ultimate move, that there's no longer any room for debate, that he is who he claimed to be God in the flesh. Every miracle, every teaching, every I am statement was a part of this master plan, where he says I am light, I am living water, I am the bread of life, I am the gate, I am the good shepherd, I am the door. I am the bread of life, I am the gate, I am the good shepherd, I am the door, I am the way, I am the resurrection and I am the life. And then Easter. Easter was the final proof, checkmate. And yet there's this beautiful paradox that, even though victory is his, that he still gives you and I a move. You still have a choice and he won't force himself upon you. You can live with him as king and you can hold on to that title yourself.

Speaker 2: 3:30

But here's the tension when there's two kings that remain on the board, the game can't go on. It's a stalemate, it's a draw. Essentially, it's a dead religion. And so where does that leave us? Well, it leaves us with the game of chess that could never end Two kings face to face on the board of life, where I want to call my own shots, I want to make my own rights and my own wrongs, I want to follow my own rules and I want to make my own rights and my own wrongs. I want to follow my own rules and I want to make my own guidelines.

Speaker 2: 4:02

Now, listen, I know that some of us, we might say, like I'm not against God, like I'm not like a anti-Christ type of person, like I want him as a guide. I want him as somebody who can answer my prayers, like a good luck charm, a great counselor who will maybe give me some wisdom on some things that are beyond my thought and control, or maybe somebody who can help me out of a jam that most of the time, usually I put myself into like, oh, I want a God who's at my beck and call according to my will, my desires, my life. What it does is it leaves us in this place of stalemate. There's a draw, and so we have this great board of life where we're face to face with this truth and our Christian life isn't a stalemate, it's a draw, until I actually decide to topple and fall and decide to let him be the king that he needs to be, or I'm going to have to get rid of him as king of my life, putting him back in the box and what we did together as a faith community over 150 weeks and the gospel of Matthew before this, is that we learned ultimately, god won and it's over, but your move still actually matters and that's the beauty of this series that we're actually entering into today.

Speaker 2: 5:24

Like, what do you do after studying for three years? I know you guys hung with me for three years about Jesus and the life of Jesus through the book of Matthew. Well, I thought we should probably figure this out. Like, now that we know this, how do we actually apply it? How do we actually, like, walk in it? And John he writes a gospel himself ends up writing three little books in the back of the New Testament First, second and third John.

Speaker 2: 5:50

Now, what we know is we learned who Jesus was and that, who he claimed to be, and that he was God, what he did, and we learn about the cross, we learn about the empty tomb, and so now, what Like? What does that mean for my life? What does that mean for your life? And that's what we get to learn throughout this entire series. The other thing that we know is John is an old man by the time that he writes this.

Speaker 2: 6:13

John is the last of the disciples. We know that he was the only disciple that actually died of old age. The rest of his fellow 12 colleagues all were put to death. And John is this guy now who has watched for the last 55, 60 years now, christianity come and go since the cross, and John has watched the first century world already begin to lose its grip on who Jesus was. It's already become more of a habit, if you will, more of a religion. It becomes something that you know my family disbelieves in, so I adhere to it as well, and it's no longer this life-giving source that John was like actually able to walk with and be with.

Speaker 2: 7:00

I mean, you can imagine, you know the old man gets stopped all the time in the streets all around the city and in the area of Ephesus where John will live the last of his days. People have got to be stopping him all the time. Like, can you, can you tell us about that one time? Remember that we heard that there's a time in that boat and you all thought you're going to die and the storm was just on you and so intense, and so you went and you woke him up. Can you tell us, like, how did it happen? Like, did it just end instantly, like the wind just stopped. Was it gradual? Did it just like? How did it right? He's got to get stopped all the time to ask these questions about what took place. He tells about the time where you were allowed to go into that one house where that 12-year-old girl had died and they let you in there. How did he do it? Like? How long before he said those words did she like sit up in bed? And then what were the parents' reactions? What was the crowd really like outside? Like what was taking place? John's got to be getting stopped constantly to tell these stories and to share it.

Speaker 2: 8:02

Did the leprosy just heal itself? Did it just like all happen at once? At one time? It was just gone Like? Was it gradual? Did it like fall off? Did it just disappear? Could you see the skin actually moving on into some other type of form?

Speaker 2: 8:17

And everybody wants to know. I would want to know, you would want to know. When the blind guy oh my gosh, we heard when the blind guy saw for the first time. What was his reaction? Did he even know what he was looking at? What did his face look like? Everyone wants to know the story.

Speaker 2: 8:35

And now John, as the last disciple, he now carries the weight of understanding. He's the last disciple and the last of the apostles, the last of the eyewitnesses, and in the last 50 years, since the empty tomb, the church has already started to lose it. Have you been there? That early passion, that early desire to walk with Christ, that initial feeling where now just feels like that flame, is some distant spark, a camp high, or retreat high, if you will, an ember that somewhere, every once in a while gets blown on, and the right type of service or that special song or the right kind of teaching. See, what we find here is that the church has become complacent. The church has taken this risen life of the creator and turned it into another lifeless religion, a bunch of soulless individuals simply just like, fingers crossed, hoping that they have the right God picked out and that they can get the right answers.

Speaker 2: 9:38

And John, in these five pages, writes a small letter and says you got to come back, like you got to come back to what you're missing. Jesus is actually who he claimed to be checkmate Like your God has proven everything that he needs to prove to you, but he's still giving you a choice, that you still have a move, and here's what that's going to look like. If you want your life back, if you want your purpose back, or to find it for the first time, you're going to have to come to a decision during this series Do I choose to allow him to be king or is it still going to be me? So today we start with this intro 1, john 1, verse 1. Here we go.

Speaker 2: 10:28

It begins like this and let me tell you, it starts in such a powerful way. It says this that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched. This we proclaim, concerning the word of life, that life appeared and we have seen it and testified to it. And we proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard so that you may also have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the father and with his son, jesus Christ. And we write this to make our joy complete. See, 50 years after the empty tomb, the church is like already battling different philosophies. The church has these different teachings that are kind of like starting to creep into it.

Speaker 2: 11:31

And John's right off the bat. He's got to set the record straight, not just for the church in Ephesus but the surrounding churches. This isn't just written to one person or not just to one church. It's written to be circulated, this letter, to be circulated around to all the house, churches, the small groups that are gathering. And he's saying, hey, hold on, let me just tell you.

Speaker 2: 11:50

You've heard a lot of stuff about Christianity, like what it is or what it isn't, but let me just tell you what we are writing to you, which is from the very beginning, as in like this, is way before Bethlehem. What you've heard about him, this is before Genesis 1. This we're writing you about the God that existed before time, that we've seen him he's talking about, we've heard him, we've gazed at him, we've touched him, we've walked with him. And what John is trying to do right here, right off the bat, in this letter, is he's trying to set this authority for what he's about, to teach us what we're going to be reading here in the next few months. John is trying to tell you and I, this didn't come from some story that was passed through in generation to generation. This didn't come from this old literature or scripture. This isn't some family religion or hearsay. This isn't some secondhand knowledge or what someone else taught, or some wise man or some sage or some monk in a cave wrote down this is the God that we walked with. He's saying we walked with him, we saw him, we touched him, we heard with our own ears, we touched with our own hands, we saw with our own eyes.

Speaker 2: 13:07

And what John is doing as the last of the disciples is he's actually setting up an authority on this, saying I don't care who walked into your Bible study and told you something. Saying I don't care what you Googled or what you found on the internet, what you looked up or what someone else has passed down to you. Hold on. He says let me tell you from an eyewitness account Right here, the guy who walked with Jesus for three years. I mean essentially he could say look at, I've lived every story from Matthew, mark, luke and, yes, the one I wrote, john. Right, let me tell you who he was and what he was about. And also, if you just turn your Bible just back a couple of pages, 2, peter is right before 1 John, and Peter himself was one of the other disciples and he wrote this letter. And in 2 Peter 1, verse 16, he says for we didn't follow cleverly devised stories that we told you about that the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ came in power, but we he says this were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

Speaker 2: 14:16

So here's a problem that's taking place in this first century church and it's a problem that we're actually going to see in the book of 1 John right here in the second chapter We'll get into that some next week. There's this group of people that have started teaching some things that are different, essentially kind of started making up their own Christianity, their own version, following their own thought, their own definition, their own way to apply Jesus. And John is trying to, right off the bat, what he's going to start doing is saying like hey, I'm not one of those people that you've experienced, I'm one of the eyewitnesses. And so let me tell you who Jesus was himself, the God before time, the very word that became flesh and actually dwelt among us. And the beginning we see this in the beginning of 1 John shouldn't actually surprise us, because when you read the gospel according to John, he starts it very similar he starts it with in the beginning was the word of God, and the word of God became flesh and the word was God and he was God in the beginning. Then he says and through him, things were made and without him that nothing was actually made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. And the light shines in darkness. He's using these really clear metaphors and that darkness has not overcome it. And so when John starts this letter, he's starting it in a very similar way. He says I'm writing you to these things in which I've seen that, we've heard that, I've touched from the very beginning. He's going there From before time. This was the very word of God and this was the very life of God that walked amongst us.

Speaker 2: 15:53

So, for today, I think it would be helpful if we all understand the purpose, as we're jumping in, of this letter. He's going to use this phrase four different times. You'll see this. It makes it this letter. He's going to use this phrase four different times. You'll see this. It makes it really clear. He's going to say I write you this, which is why he's writing to us. So the first one is he says we write you this to make our joy complete. So the purpose of this letter number one is that a joy that cannot be taken from us? A complete joy. Joy that cannot be taken from us a complete joy.

Speaker 2: 16:27

You can ask yourself have I ever found myself running on empty? Uh-huh, maybe has your faith become dry or lifeless or routine. You know like you still go to church. You'll hold your coffee, you'll raise your hand a little bit every once in a while during worship, but you're not really thinking about the words. You find yourself just praying before meals because it's like habit. You read your Bible when the app reminds you to, or you got your daily verse, like. You find yourself doing spiritual things, but your soul just feels numb and you're exhausted by parenting and work and grief and financial stress and burnout. And you've quietly stopped believing that God has anything new for you. You don't doubt that God is real. You just you don't feel him. You believe in him, you just feel distant from him.

Speaker 2: 17:22

And what John does in this letter is John reminds us beautifully, over and over again, that a life should be marked, a life of Jesus, should be marked by deep, abiding joy, not just like momentary happiness, but a joy that actually survives hardship and disappointment and even doubt. That's who John is writing to A people who once walked on fire, now just living on autopilot, and what he says is come back, not to religion, not to rituals, not to rules, but to Jesus, who is the source of life and light and joy. The second thing he does number two, the purpose of this letter says I write you this so that you will not sin, good luck. So the purpose of this letter is actually a victory over what sin has stolen. This is what he's talking about. I don't know if you've ever been stuck in guilt, shame, old patterns. I wrote that part for myself. Yeah, like you have things that you just don't feel like you can break free from. I don't know if you know this. You know how the Bible spells victory. It's spelled F-R-E-E-D-O-M, which is freedom. I know somebody got sorry. He writes to declare that freedom, that we get freedom over what sin has stolen. And this letter actually offers more than just forgiveness. It offers freedom, a way to live like, beyond the weight of sin and shame, and walk in this daily victory that Jesus has already secured.

Speaker 2: 19:04

The third thing that we see he says I'm writing to you these things about those who are trying to lead you astray. So the purpose of this letter number three is a truth that lies cannot lead us away from. I don't know if you're, like, aware of news and culture, but are you confused about conflicting messages that are out there? Like does it make you question what is real or what is even right? Like you've seen it, you felt it, our world is full and drowning in opinions about morality, about identity, about spirituality, about truth or truthiness. Like one, tiktok says one thing, a podcast says another, a friend says, like, just follow your heart. Another one says that's hate speech, right. So no wonder we're confused in the midst of this. But John's saying, like hold on, guys, I'm actually writing to you right now so you won't be led astray, that truth actually isn't changing, that truth isn't shifting and truth actually has a name, and his name is Jesus. And so John gives us, in this letter, this unshakable foundation of truth, so that we aren't tossed by trends or opinions or lies that sound spiritual but aren't biblical.

Speaker 2: 20:25

The fourth thing he says I write you these things so that you may know you have eternal life. So the purpose of this letter, this fourth one, this final one, is a promise of salvation that doubt cannot deny. I don't know if you've ever felt this way. I know I've felt this way before, but you ever like sit there and wonder, like, am I really saved Right? Like you're like this is this, is it, this is good? Or or a fear that God is disappointed or distant to you. I know I can often find a voice in my head full of it's not enough, you're not good enough, and shame, or you're just an imposter. And John wants to erase the doubt. He wants you to know, not guess, not just hope that you belong to God, that you are enough and eternal life is already yours, that you are enough and eternal life is already yours.

Speaker 2: 21:24

Now, how many of us right now would go like, yep, I need to have joy. That can't be taken. I need to have freedom and victory in my life. I need a truth and I'll pause just for a moment. Not just a truth, because it doesn't seem difficult Like, what is truth today?

Speaker 2: 21:48

As I was preparing this, I was like I don't even know if I can define what truth is today. And John was really helpful. He says well, I'm going to give you one, I'm going to give you a truth so that you'll never be led astray in this area and then a promise of salvation and what that's going to do is give you an assurance that you will never have to doubt again. So my question for you and as I've gone through this, is like, who wouldn't want to sign up for this? Do you want to sign up for this? Like, literally, is there anything else in this life that I desire right now more, or that would make more a higher on this top four list than these that are on this list Like this? I look at this and I'm like, geez, this might solve my life.

Speaker 2: 22:29

Like, if I'm a person of joy with freedom and victory, my gosh, if I have truth that's so ironclad in my life and a promise of salvation that doubts can't actually touch and that this isn't just hearsay, this isn't story time, this isn't just from old scriptures Like this wasn't from this cleverly devised writing in a cave that this all actually came from an eyewitness experience. This guy, john, who was there, I can only imagine he's now realizing, as he's getting ready to write this stuff somewhere in his old age, like into his nineties, that there's not going to be much time left when people are going to just stop me in the street and ask me about these stories that essentially he can only straighten out people's theology for so much longer while he's in their presence and there's a weightiness to him understanding that, like he's got to be sitting there going. I've gotta put pen to paper so others can know that you're living a stale, dead draw of life and it's a stalemate and you've literally got two kings on the board and the game cannot be played that way. I read something this last week the other week from Charles Spurgeon about joy. It was really helpful. This is what he says.

Speaker 2: 23:45

Too many Christians are passive about losing their joy. They need to realize it is of great loss and do everything they can to draw close to God and to reclaim the fullness of joy. If any of you have lost the joy of the Lord, I pray you do not think it is simple or a small loss. It is the very essence of your relationship. It is the very character of God's life in us and through us. Friends, I would just say don't allow your spirituality to end up in a religion like that a draw, a stalemate, a dead religion. So if the gospel of Matthew that we studied was offering us new life with God, then the book of 1 John explains what that life is and then how we actually can remain in it.

Speaker 2: 24:41

And the problem we see in the church was at this time that everyone began to define what their life, light and love looks like. And this is the problem that this letter is going to be going after over and over and over again. And we get these three key words as we go through this Words, which is life, light and love. You get this cool introduction in chapter one, but in chapters two, three, four and most of five, everything gets kind of amplified, it doesn't stay very linear and what's going to happen is, week after week, we're going to hear about life and we're going to hear about light, we're going to hear about love, and he's going to give us these four, four and a half chapters or so in as many different times and as many different ways as he possibly can, saying, hey, let me just tell you about life, hey, let me just tell you about light and what love is.

Speaker 2: 25:31

And it's become like very cyclical in this manner, over and over again, because the problem was, 60 years after Jesus died and rose again, the church again was getting their own definitions of what it meant to be to live this life and, frankly, we run into the same things in our culture. What does it mean that God is light? What does it mean to love and who can I love or who shouldn't I love? And everyone began to define it on their own. We're going to find that there's a group of people next week in chapter two that are actually kicked out of the church because of that. We're going to find that they're still actually going from church to church and they're teaching the opposite truth and this is what Christianity is and it's in this fight, and we don't get a lot of their teaching.

Speaker 2: 26:19

You'll see this. We get John's answer to their negative comments, but we never actually hear what they are and I love that. Like, maybe we shouldn't be exposed to what their arguments were all about? Maybe that's a life lesson for the things we're exposing ourselves to as well. Like we should just come back to the truth and John is trying to encourage people. I want you to get your life back. I want you to get your hope back, and the early church confusion and the heresy, all of that stuff honestly just led to then people leaving the church because they were teaching lies, they were creating doubt, they were creating questions about whether believers even really knew God, whether you even really had salvation. Were you even really walking with him? Were you really walking in the lights? Do you even really know what truth is? Are you really saved? So confusing, so confusing. So, friends, may this be a series that you and I come to, the eyewitness that you and I just come back to the very word of God and you and I come back to this 2,000 year old book that has stood the test of literary criticism, that has stood up against every Greek scholar over and over again and has come back to the same phrases, the exact same words. And may you and I be the king on the board that bows and topples and says it's you and says it's you.

Speaker 2: 28:04

And then, continuing after this intro, in verse five he says this message that we have heard from him now declare to you here it is God is light In him. There is no darkness at all. So John begins with this foundational, bold statement God is light, thank you. Yeah, here we go, yeah, so light. In scripture, it often symbolizes purity, truth, goodness and life. And so when John says that there's no darkness at all in God, he's saying that there's actually not even a hint, like there's not even a hint of deceit or evil or corruption in him. That not that he's mostly good or occasionally pure, no, no, he's saying that, look, he's 100%, perfectly holy, 100% of the time. This verse echoes actually what John wrote in his gospel In him was life, and that life was in the light of mankind, and so light. You know this. It doesn't just expose some things that are darkness, it actually drives darkness out, it reveals truth of what's taking place and it shows you then the way.

Speaker 2: 29:07

So then John does this, he starts here and then he continues then with this warning he says now, if we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and we do not live out the truth. So here's the tension we can say we have fellowship with God and we can still walk in darkness. That's like an amen moment. You guys know that right there. That's the scary stuff. This isn't just about struggling with sin friends, it's about living a double life. And John is saying if we're claiming to know God but we're deliberately living and hiding in sin and bitterness and lies or spiritual apathy, we're not just failing, we're just lying. We're lying to ourselves we're lying to everybody else around us, and understand this. Christianity isn't about claiming the light, it's about walking in it. Then John then moves to this really beautiful invitation. He says but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And then the blood of Jesus, his son, purifies us from all sin. Notice what happens when we walk in the light, that we actually have fellowship with others. This word for fellowship here is a word called koinonia. It's this not shallow, not Sunday-only relationships, but authentic, grace-filled community that we then together, collectively experience ongoing purification, not perfection, but it's this continual cleansing by Jesus's blood.

Speaker 2: 30:45

Now we didn't meet last week, so I'm going to really quickly grossly summarize the next 11 verses really fast. Here's your homework for the week. Read John, chapter one, verse eight, through eight in the second chapter. So eight to eight. Do that one. This is what it is summarizing. It's about just the realities of you and I as a human and that we sin, just so you know. We sin, which sin means we miss the mark, and it talks to that Like we're all in the same club. We've totally messed this thing up and we continue to do that.

Speaker 2: 31:14

So John emphasizes that when we do, because you will just FYI, and that's not permission, that's just acknowledgement, just so you know right, when you do, you have an advocate. He says you have an advocate, jesus Christ, who intercedes before the Father. God's forgiveness rests on his own faithfulness and justice, not our merit, and a reminder that no sin is greater than God's actual power to forgive and cleanse and his reputation is at stake on keeping that, because that's what he said, who he is and that is his promise. And when it comes to sin, you and I have these different options and possibilities. The first is this you can deny it capabilities. The first is this you can deny it just refusing to acknowledge wrongdoing. It's a place where we can live. The next thing is we can rationalize it, our sin, just justifying why it's acceptable in our case because you just had to do it and so you make a reason why it's taking place in your life.

Speaker 2: 32:12

Or he talks about this you can confess it, agreeing with God about our sin and then turning from it. This is such an important missed practice. Confession is literally the gateway to restored fellowship in ongoing transformation, not just between you and God. This daily process keeps believers walking in light rather than darkness Confession as you obey God's word, not out of legalistic duty but out of this loving response to his grace, you get to experience his love being made complete in you. And then this vertical relationship with God naturally then begins to extend horizontally to loving others.

Speaker 2: 32:58

And so he's emphasizing this idea of not deceiving yourself. Don't deceive yourself with the realities of who you are, and then who you are in Jesus Christ. He uses language even like don't lie to yourself. And these verses remind us that walking in the light isn't about being flawless, friends, it's about being honest. Honest, it's about bringing your whole self, the good, the broken, the hidden, into the light of God's grace. So let us glean the light of these letters, friends. Let us bring our whole self, the good, the broken, the hidden, into the light of God's grace.

Speaker 2: 33:46

Over the next Sundays we spend together. So here we are, the board is set, the pieces are in place, one king has claimed victory and the other is still standing. And maybe that king is you, your plans, your control, your truth. But the game cannot go on this way, not without ending in a stalemate. And you, friends, were not made for a dead religion, you weren't made to survive off of sparks of passion that then flicker and fade away. You were made for joy that cannot be stolen, freedom that sin cannot chain, and truth that no culture can cancel, and a salvation you have never have to question. And that's the life 1 John invites us into. And that's the life 1 John invites us into A real, lived out, spirit-filled life that walks in light and love and truth. But it starts with one move. So topple your crown, surrender the board and let the rightful king take his place, because the game's not over not for you, not yet. You still have a move, and 1 John's going to show you how to make it.

Speaker 2: 35:15

Let me pray for us, god. Thank you for these letters that, although they were not written to us, they are so for us. Thank you for your Holy Spirit that works in us and helps us understand these things. Would you give us courage to confess, to get right with you, to walk in the light of love and life? God, may we just feel joy as we leave this place. May we feel freedom and victory as we leave this place. Would we understand truth and be so greatly comforted by that? I thank you for the gift of your presence in this room and as we respond to worship to you today, in your name, we pray Amen.

Speaker 2: 36:10

Well, friends, I told many of you that today we are going to be announcing who our new worship pastor is. Let me first read to you a word from the Lord, from the Old Testament, deuteronomy, chapter 31,. Verse eight says this do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord will personally go ahead of you. He will be with you and will neither fail you nor abandon you. And I just want to say, friends, that I am incredibly grateful for the way that the Lord has gone ahead of us here at this church through and for many things.

Speaker 2: 36:47

Most organizations, or even ministries, when they start looking for someone, they look at vision first, then they look at task next and then relationships last. And the problem with that is when it comes that the vision actually then begins to change or shift. What happens is relationships then have to change, and the church is made up of people. Relationship is the only organizational currency, and so this actually forced us to dive into a model which then informs relationships first and then informs vision, which then informs task. And I believe that this is the kingdom way that relationships first, people praying, people dreaming, and we let that then inform the rest and then vision can change if it needs to and jobs can change if they need to. But with this model, relationships do all the informing. So a few months ago began reflecting and praying through this.

Speaker 2: 37:50

Who are we in deep relationship with, already Committed to already, trusting already, who is pastoring and leading us already, who have been dreaming and running with already, and it was clear that she was a part of this faith community already, and her name is Ostri Shoaz. She can come out here. Let me tell you this Ostri is humble, she is powerful. She's kind, gritty, godly, steadfast and caring. I have known Ostri for the better half of a decade and I love this woman of God. I respect her life, her wonderful husband, kyle, her girls, willow, paisley, autumn.

Speaker 2: 38:45

I'm so ready to be led into the throne room with her to worship our risen King with you.

Speaker 2: 38:53

We are ready now to be led in response with you, and so, austri, may the Lord fill you with his spirit and strengthen your hands for the work and keep your heart anchored in his love In church. The same God who has gone ahead of us in this decision is calling us to walk, then, with faith, unity and love. We're not just receiving a pastor today, not just receiving a pastor today. We're committing ourselves to walk with her in relationship, to pray with her, to pray for her, serving alongside of her, and to keep dreaming God's dreams together. And so let us be a people that not only just honor the shepherd that God has sent us, but even more a people who keeps our eyes on the chief shepherd who's going ahead of all of us. And so this is our charge. This is our charge Go forward together, strong in relationship, bold in vision and faithful in every task, knowing the Lord is already ahead of us. So, friends, would you stand to your feet and give Austria a spiritual welcome.