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Well, good evening. Welcome to Emmanuel. I want to start by going to Revelation chapter 14, where we were this morning, and just introduce this topic of biblical invitations, its theology and practice. That's going to be my subject tonight. And in many ways, I picked up this issue not so much because I have an issue or a theological position to take on something, but more as an invitation to a discussion of how do we end our services.

And so this is more of a practical discussion, a practical teaching, trying to get our minds around what is a biblical invitation. And for years, in fact, I would say ever since I came to Emmanuel, I have not been completely pleased with the way we've ended our services.

Usually, two people or people will come to me. After being at Emmanuel for a while, and say you're not a traditional Southern Baptist church. And I say, oh, why is that? And usually it centers around two things. Number one, you don't take up an offering. And number two, or you don't pass the plates.

We do take up an offering, and thank you for those who participate and keep everything going. But the second thing is you don't have an invitation at the end. And so, and largely, I want to, that's my topic tonight: biblical invitations. And in a narrow sense, it is specifically about how do we end a service and the practice of calling people forward that maybe many of you have experienced in some of the churches that you've been in or grown up in.

But the conversation is even broader than that because it does touch upon those elements of what does God expect of a person when the gospel is proclaimed. And so it goes beyond just what you do at the end of a service, but it touches upon as you are the evangelist on the street or you are sharing your faith and sharing the truth of Scripture, what specifically should you be calling people to?

And so, what is a biblical invitation? And like I said, this is more of a theology, basic theology and practice. It is in no way going to be comprehensive on either side of that, the theology or the practice. But this morning, I read a passage. We preached through, I preached through Revelation 14, verse 6 and 7.

Let me read those just to remind you for those who were here and to tell you for those who weren't. And I saw another angel flying in mid-heaven, having an eternal gospel to preach to those who live on the earth and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people.

And he said with a loud voice, Fear God, give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and the springs of water. And so you have, just before the bowls are going to be poured out, the bold judgments, God's final judgment, before what starts that cannot be stopped, that final outpouring of God's wrath, there is the gospel that goes out.

It is an angel. The vehicle is an angel. An angel goes and he flies and he communicates, proclaims this eternal gospel. To everyone, every tribe, everyone's going to hear it. And the response, it is the eternal good news that's being proclaimed, but the response. Now, this is what God expects.

Fear God, give Him glory, and worship Him. So it's around those responses this morning, those commands that we looked at, this invitation that God gives right at the very end of human history. And yet, its application is for the whole. God, as we looked at it this morning, it's that invitation to fear God, to give Him glory and to worship Him has been the fundamental response that God throughout the ages, throughout Scripture, has expected.

And so, because I'm in that text, and because I want, I've been meaning to for a while to end our services a little differently, I want to talk about that. This is a good text to think through our own practice of inviting, maybe even our own witnessing and what is biblical to expect of people and how it should be done.

And done well. But first, let me give you a little bit of my own story about invitations. I grew up in Baptist circles, Southern Baptist circles, and there was almost always, if not every single meeting, an invitation and an offering. But there was an invitation. How many of you all know what I'm talking about that have been party to, you know, okay, so you've had some experience, the idea being toward the end, kind of like an evangelistic crusade which would call people forward, that dynamic entered into the church of a calling people forward, an altar call.

And so I grew up in those circles, and when I did frequent church, even as a little boy, they would be there. And I can remember walking the aisle one time when I was about six. I got baptized. My cousin was getting baptized, so I thought that was the thing to do.

Then later in life, I have at a camp, again, there was an altar call. Again, came. But if you looked at my life, it was certainly far from born from above, what is depicted in baptism, my walking the aisle and was. A far cry from biblical alignment with God.

And so, but then later on, as I did come to Christ, it was, when I genuinely did come to Christ, it was one of those nights where there was an altar call. And I remember the sermon, and something really did change in me. And so, it's just part of my own background about invitations.

I am not fundamentally down on invitations, but I have also witnessed a lot of abuses of those, as probably some of you. It has been seen coercion, I've seen something manipulative, and really just illegitimate, and almost as if that's the final measure of the sermon that was preached, a final measure of number, as if that was the only time that God was open to receive a person and change hearts.

And so there has been in many Baptistic circles a movement away from, and even in some circles, a reaction. Action of almost complete negativity. And when I first came to Emmanuel, we did invitations. And I was expected to give one. And I did, and did for a while.

And what I started noticing is that after preaching a sermon, I would call people forward to open it up, as had been the practice, and people would come. And I'd have several people wanting to talk, pray. And so somebody would come, and then they would start really touched and moved by the Spirit of God, convicted of sin, and dealing with some heavy issues.

And then I found myself saying, Okay, I've got two more people behind you. I also know that there's a nursery, and nursery workers are wanting to let the kids out and want to go. And not only that, we need to dismiss the service. And so I found myself in the middle of a caught between the profound and trivial.

I would call people forward to this to make this profound decision to ask for some profound spiritual help and then I would quickly say, Okay, well, that's nice, let me pray for you. Okay, next, please, next, please. And so, by the way we were set up and received them, it was almost like calling them forward and then sending them away and trivializing.

And so it was at that point that I realized I need to rethink this. And as we biblically think through each aspect of our service, there needs to be a real reason, a deliberate intention as to what we're doing and why, and a real biblical basis for and so we stopped.

And there are other reasons. We had few people. We didn't. And another reason through the years that we didn't practice them had to do with our building. Some of you may have been with us back at Emmanuel when I said, okay, we want to end the spirit, in the services, in prayer.

Well, both our downtown campus and this building over here had the main exit door right at the front. Do you guys remember? So when people when service is over, people came to not out the back, they went out the fr the front. And so I can remember saying, okay, well, let's let's end the services in prayer, in a spirit of prayer.

Let's have the first few rows. And so you can imagine you've been around Emmanuel long enough, people like to talk, don't they? And so you've got these people over here praying, trying to have, and then you've got these conversations, and then all of a sudden, shh, we're praying, shh, go, shh.

And that was like, okay, that's not really hospitable or conducive to worship or spiritual edification. And so it's like, okay, when we build a new building, we need prayer rooms before we can even talk about bringing back some sort of an invitation or a welcoming, an opening up for people to come and be prayed for, to deal with God, and to have somebody walk through that.

And so, when we designed this building, we had that in mind. That's why we have two prayer rooms. But also, and we've been very diligent about keeping musical instruments and other paraphernalia out of there so that they can be used as prayer rooms. And so that's what we have.

And so, as, but there's another component to that. You have to have care, you have to have a prayer ministry. It's not just, this isn't just an attack on practice. And sometimes we keep going through the motions of something that's been handed down without really thinking through what we're doing.

Doing with it. And I think biblical invitations or invitations that I witnessed growing up became attack on hangover instead of a real thought-through expression of worship, building up the church and calling people to do real business with God. And so now we have a prayer team. We have a prayer ministry.

You know, we have a deacon of prayer. Kevin Walton has been doing a wonderful job with that. And so part of how we end services involves people who are willing to come and pray for people and to be willing to devote whatever time that may involve. And so if we're going to have invitations, we need to make sure they square thoroughly with the scripture and that they also are very welcoming and productive.

And that is not something that is simply just carelessly done, especially with all the other dynamics and movements happening at the church. So I say that to you too. And as I'm watching the clock, I realize. This may be an introduction to the conversation. But that's okay. I welcome you to input.

And to, and by the way, while I'm on that note, been asked to bring back the welcoming time. I don't know how many of you guys remember the time of welcome that we would stop, greet one another. And so we're also looking into how we effectively do that and keep with the flow of service that is God-exalting and a movement, not jolting, but something that moves to worship and leads us, takes us all there as a body.

So with that, I want to begin a conversation. Really, maybe tonight we'll speak more just about some of the theology side of it, and we'll just see where we go and how far we get. But just very simple, and this is not exhaustive by any means, but just a few basics to really get the conversation going.

If we're going to end our services in a spirit of prayer and a welcoming environment to pray for people to be prayed for, to come and confess things, to make a connection to. The church and to respond to the message that they just heard and to have people come alongside and hear and pray with and all of that.

We certainly have to have a think through it and think through it well. So, first aspect, I would say, just as I've studied this, and certainly because the text that I was in this morning took me to a lot of various places and was on this topic. First thought, first must, I would call them three musts, and there could be four, there could be ten, and if you serve, like I said, there could be many, but several things, three musts that I'd like to talk to you about tonight.

Number one, it must be consistent with the call of God as revealed in the scripture. When we're calling people, and this is in any setting, when you're calling people to respond to God in any setting, in any capacity, it should be consistent with the call of God as revealed in Scripture.

Looked at a little bit at this this morning, and I'll give you some, I don't have the verses to put up on the screen, but I'll give you references and read them to you. You don't have to turn there. We'll move fairly quickly through some of these, but you'll get the feeling.

Some of them we looked at this. Morning. But one of the very first calls we see in Scripture is to fear God. And that was the very first thing that the angel said: fear God. Deuteronomy 31:12, I read this this morning as God's about to send the nation of Israel into the land of Israel.

Assemble the people, the men and women, and children, and the alien who is in your town, so that they may hear and learn and fear the Lord your God, and be careful to observe all the words of this law. So, fear of God leads to obedience. Without that fear, there will be no obedience.

I also read, well, 1 Samuel 12:24, in this context where Samuel is exhorting Israel, only fear the Lord and serve Him in truth with all your heart. For consider what great things He has done for you, but if you still do wickedly, both you and your king will be swept away.

So, the fear of God not only leads to obedience, but it leads to service. And so, this is a call. This is the basic call to anyone, anywhere. First, humble yourself. Fearing God involves humbling yourself before God. It involves surrendering yourself to God. And this concept, this exhortation is picked up again in the New Testament.

Remember, 2 Corinthians 5, beginning in verse 9, Paul says this: Therefore, we also have as our ambition, whether at home or present, or absent, to be pleasing to him. Our ambition is to be pleasing to him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad.

Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade men. And so he goes on to say that we must all appear. He's the judge. This should impact our hearts, as it did Paul. Therefore, we know the fear of the Lord. We know we're going to stand before him.

We're all going to give an account. Therefore, Philippians 2:10 says this, at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth. That every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

So then, in light of this, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. So, even as a saved person, let that come out with fear. Let your salvation, let who you are now come out and do so with fear and trembling.

The idea, you need to be too afraid not to obey. 1 Peter 1:17 says this: If you address as Father, the one who impartially judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves in fear during your time of stay on earth. So, when you put this together, old, new, and there's many more reference, it's a fundamental.

It's a very basic element of a right relationship with God to which everyone, everywhere, owes to God. And so, you call. It is right and good to call people to humble themselves before God, no matter what situation they're facing, to surrender their self, no matter what. What is going on in their life?

A lot of times, people are coming because of other reasons. May have a bad situation at home or a bad situation someplace else or an internal problem or whatever it may be. That's maybe what you're dealing with them on. But the call, the biblical call, is for them to humble, surrender themselves.

Fearing God leads to that. It does that. It is humbling and surrendering. And it leads to obedience. And it leads to serving. And so any invitation that we would do up here must also have as its underlying invitation to humble, surrender, obey, to fear God. Second element that the angel mentioned, and I'm just using these as launching into these, help bring a clarity to what has gone on before through all of Scripture.

But the second is to give him glory. Give him glory. Glorify God. Give glory. Glory to God. That's really the invitation. That is the expectation. That in all of your evangelism, in all of your inviting, in all of your interactions and counsel to one another, it's give glory to God.

Give glory to God. And that specifically means recognizing God as God and refusing and denouncing the false ways. So it's a recognition that God is God, you are not. Giving glory, tell of his glory among the nations. 1 Chronicles 16:24. Isaiah 24, 15. Therefore, glorify the Lord. Verse 16.

From the ends of the earth we hear songs, glory to the righteous ones. 1. So it's recognizing God as God and denouncing, refusing the evil way. Romans 15, 5, Paul says this, now may the God who gives perseverance and encouragement grant you to be of the same mind with one another according to Christ Jesus.

And there's Jews and Gentiles involved in this whole. And he says, so that with one accord you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, accept one another, just as Christ also accepted us to the glory of God. The fact that he accepted us is to God's glory.

Therefore, you be of one accord with one another. For I say that Christ has become a servant to the circumcision on behalf of the truth of God to confirm the promises given to the fathers. So Christ to the Jews sent to confirm the truth of the promises given to their fathers, and for the Gentiles to glorify God for his mercy.

1 Peter 2:12 says, This, keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing which they slander you as evildoers, they may be because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation. That is, when God draws near to them, that they may be able to, because of your good deeds, because they have seen in you a relationship in you with God, that when God visits them, that they would glorify him, that they would recognize God as God and refuse the false way.

That's give to him glory. So it is completely consistent and expected that in all of our invitation, we're calling people to fear God and to give to him glory. A third element, Revelation 14 is worship him. Worship him who made the heaven and the earth, the sea, the springs of water.

It's an interesting idea. Worship is exalting him. But what's interesting about this whole, if you had opened up, if you had your Bible, you can look over at Revelation 15, 4. Let me just read to you what happens. Just shortly after this angelic, this preaching angel goes out to the world and proclaims his message of fear, glorify, and worship.

The angels, there's a scene of heaven. There's another praise scene. And the angels, in their angelic praise, say this, who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. For all the nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.

And so here are these angels, in their praise, they ask the question: who will not fear? That's what the angel first, first message of the angel, fear God. Who will not glorify your name? Give glory to him and worship him. And so the angels are asking, who will not fear?

Who will not glorify? All the nations are going to come and worship. Of course, and the answer is going to become: there are some who respond negatively to the angel's commands, the flying angel, the preaching angel, and they're going to end up in eternal torment. Theirs will be a testament forever about the wrath of God.

God is revealing Himself. There are some things that make Him mad, there are some things that He delights in. And hell is going to be that eternal monument. This is why it is eternal, is because in the revelation of who God is, there is this eternal monument where the smoke goes up forever of what makes God angry.

And so, those who will not bow before Him, that's what worship means: bow before, welcome, welcome His rule, those who do not. Welcome that, welcome him, oppose him. And any opposition to God is futile. And so it is right to call people to fear God, to give glory to his name, and to worship him.

Because God is the creator, and God is the judge, therefore, everyone should fear, glorify, and worship him. God is to be the supreme object of our affections, and pleasing him to be our supreme goal. And so, that is the response. That is the response that every day of our life is to be growing in this fear, growing in rendering glory to His name, and growing in our worship of Him.

He is the supreme object of our affections, and pleasing Him, our supreme goal. Now, what's fascinating about this preaching angel and the eternal gospel that He proclaims is think about the world that these commands were sent out to. The commands to fear, glorify, and worship God. were sent out to a pagan world a world steeped in deception a world hardened in heart a world inflamed with the passion of their immoralities the after all the things that god had done and seen they still would not repent at the end of chapter nine after all after the six trumpets the trumpet you hear this and the rest of mankind verse 20 were not killed who were not killed by these plagues did not repent of the works of their hands so as not to worship demons even though the demons were killing them and the idols of gold and silver and of brass and of stone and of wood which can neither see nor hear nor walk and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts and it's to this people and we've already seen a great multiple to come many responded to the witness of the the martyrs and they responded a great multitude comes but here you get these hardened hardened people who won't repent even though the demons are killing them hardened heart flamed with the passion of their Immoralities, these are dead to God, and yet the eternal gospel goes to them.

I can say this, it's a fascinating passage, because there is an expectation they are responsible. Such people who are dead to God, such a people like this, they are incapable of understanding anything else about God except their accountability to Him. They do understand their accountability to God. They may be, as a person, completely dead to God, but as a creature, they understand survivability.

They understand they are not God. They understand they are ultimately accountable to God. And even though they may not understand anything else about God, this much they do know they're accountable to Him. And this is what Romans 1 is all about. They know enough about God that they should give God glory, but they don't.

They don't know anything else that they are accountable to God. And what that should do is set them on a trajectory of knowing God and figuring out God, but instead, they suppress the truth and unrighteousness and they go about serving their own desires. But this angel goes. Is when you are witnessing, when you are calling people to God, to call him to fear God, glorify his name, and worship him is a right call to make.

It is a biblical call. Even though they're dead to God, this is the call. And there is an expectation that they will respond, and if they do not respond to that, they are responsible. And so, an invitation must be sensitive to a person's capacity. If they're dead to God, you must call them.

You can't go any further than that. You must fear God. You're not God. Assume the posture of one surrendered to Him. Humble yourself before God. Give glory to Him. Recognize He is the right way. Denounce the false way. Worship Him. You see, they're not really ready to cast all their cares on Jesus until they come to Him as the Lamb of God.

And they're not going to come to Him as the Lamb of God unless they surrender to understanding who God is. If they will not. Surrender to God in the very first, they're not going to accept God's testimony about Jesus Christ. And so there is a call to fear, glorify, and worship.

And that should be part and consistent with any call that we ever make on anybody. And this is true about anyone. This is a valid call for anyone everywhere. You should fear God, give glory to Him, and worship Him. So, second must. There must involve a specific response to Jesus.

There must be a specific response to Jesus. You see, God sent His Son. God created, God created the whole world. The whole world plunged themselves into sin. And the whole of humanity would be lost if God did not send His Son. And the Son had to provide the way for mankind to be reconciled to God.

I just heard a wonderful sermon about this last week. The Son had to absorb the cost of union. Remember who preached that? 4th of July. Union. You remember Matt Gentry's sermon about the Son had to absorb the cost of this union of bringing sinful man back to God, and he absorbed that cost.

Matthew 11, 28, Jesus says, Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. John 6, 37, all that the Father gives to me will come to me, and the one who comes to me, I will certainly not cast out.

John 6, 57, Jesus says, Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in yourselves. You must come to Jesus as the blood, as the Lamb of God. You must take in his sacrifice laid down.

You must take in who he is. If you don't, you have no life in you. So any call, any invitation must involve a specific response to Jesus to see that, to agree with God. This is the beloved Son. This is God's Son. He did things that only God could do.

And so you must look to Jesus and see him as God's sent one. And he went and died, and he didn't die for his own sin. So why did he die? For his people's sin. It's in Christ that God has made a way to carry all of our burdens.

But if you haven't come to them as the Lamb of God, you're not ready to give him all of your burdens. You don't believe who he is. You're looking for a way to unload a difficult circumstance. But your difficult circumstance could be a blessed circumstance if it brings you to Christ.

And usually that's when people come to Christ is in a difficult circumstance. It's usually not in the days of smooth sailing, but in the day of trial, in the day when you have need. But God has made a way to carry all of our burdens in Christ. Psalm 55:22 says this: Cast your burden upon the Lord, and he will sustain you.

He will never allow the righteous to be shaken. In 1 Peter 5:7, cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. But before you can cast all your anxiety, you must fear God. You must glorify him. You must worship him. And how do you do that?

By coming to Christ. By agreeing with God who Christ is and meeting him there at the cross. And until you do that, you have no life in yourself. Well, third must. Any invitation that we give to people in any kind of setting must involve a turning from futility.

This is the problem with fallen humanity. We've turned to our own ways. And the good news is that God calls us away from our own ways. Remember in Acts chapter 14, verse 8, there was a Paul. Was there on his missionary journey, Barnabas with him? At Lystra, a man was sitting who had no strength in his feet, lame from his mother's womb, who had never walked.

This man was listening to Paul as he spoke, who, when he had fixed his gaze on him and had seen that he had faith to be made well, said with a loud voice, Stand upright on your feet. And he leaped up and began to walk. When the crowds saw what Paul had done, they raised their voice, saying in the Lyconian language, The gods have become like men and have come down to us.

And they began calling Barnabas Zeus and Paul Hermes, because he was the chief speaker. The priest of Zeus, whose temple was just outside the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates and wanted to offer sacrifice with the crowds. How's that for a response? But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of it, they tore their robes and rushed out into the crowd, crying out and saying, Men, why are you doing these things?

We are also men of the same nature as you. It's completely inappropriate for a fellow creature to worship another fellow creature. What are you doing? We are also men of the same nature as you and preach the gospel to you that you should turn from these vain things to the living God who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them.

Sound familiar. We are also men of the same nature and we preach the good news that you should turn. That is good news that you should turn away from your feudal way of life. That is good news that the command has come to you to turn away from a life of vanity and futility.

That's what Paul is saying. This is what we're telling you. Turn from these silly things of worshiping people, of your idolatry, serving your false gods, your false pursuits. Turn from these vain things. And so as we think about invitation, we're constantly in all of our interactions here at the church.

What are we about? We're about calling people to a relationship in Christ, to fear God, to accept His testimony about His Son and what His Son has done, and to meet Him at the cross, to turn from a vain way of living and abide in Him. To His glory and as an expression of worship to him.

I love how, as I think about this, just putting it into practice, I'm just going to go through these quickly, just if we and these aren't talked about theology. I'm going to talk a little bit about the practice of putting it into practice, an invitation. Well, if we think about it just in the narrow context of how we facilitate an end-to-service, whatever we do, it needs to be an expression of Christian hospitality and love.

That's what we're about: welcoming people, connecting them to God, and being a servant in that process. It's not to be a spectacle. This isn't about a spectacle of watching people go and do that. That's several things in practice. It is not. It is not to manipulate people. We want God to do the movement.

Listen, anything that you and I can coerce isn't going to last. We want real works of God. We want real responses that come from a stirring of God's Spirit in the heart of those who have heard the word. It's also not the measure. Of a preacher's sermon, sometimes, or the preacher, or the sermon, or the church.

I don't know how many times you hear a good message, there's no response. And I'm not including myself in this. I've seen great sermons with little response. I've seen poor sermons with great response, at least outwardly. And so it's not the measure, it's the biblical content. It is the exhortation to godliness and Christ-likeness through the words of Scripture, the Spirit-inspired words.

That is the measure. Ministry. It is not to replace baptism as a public statement of faith. One of the reasons I think it's important to make this distinction: walking an aisle never was supposed to take the place of the public confession, public statement of faith in the waters of baptism.

That is the public response we're looking for. Is that people will come, say, this is what God has done in my heart, and I will stand before you and testify. It is baptism that is the public statement of one's personal faith. It is to be a way for people to respond appropriately.

They've heard a message. We've exhorted them to godly living and a godly relationship. And there may be things that God is doing in their lives that we want to be available to help people respond and to pray with. It may be simply just somebody wants to be prayed for, to feel cared for, or a way to connect with the church.

These are just some initial thoughts of how we put this into practice. And I do intend to be working out some of these details in the days ahead and to experiment. And to do want to end our services with a spirit of prayer, at least up here. And then that way, and a spirit of fellowship as well.

So that way we don't have a problem where the two, the spirit of prayer and the spirit of fellowship, collide. We have a building now where we've got prayer rooms, but we will need people. We will need volunteers, prayers, and maybe people on the hospitality team and those who are on the prayer team, people who really love other people and are willing to take some time and pray with and listen and hear and be a connection, a real connecting person.

Point to this body and what God is doing. And so I do pray that the Lord will shape our services to be more glorifying to Him, and I welcome any input into that. But be praying, be praying for the Word of God to go deep to the hearts of people that it would be effective here, and that we would be responsible to be good stewards and servants of that Word, and be a good steward of every soul that God brings in through these doors because God is our supreme object of affection, and because He is the one who is most to be pleased.

And I know for a fact He loves people, and He loves them on a profound level, and we are pleasing Him when we do the same. So please be in prayer for us in that regard. Also, I just want to let you know that taking a mission trip this week, my wife and I, and John, and Janelle, and Amy, and Daniel Kukin, we're all.

All six of us going down to El Salvador. We're meeting with several churches there. We're leading a class on biblical counseling. Then we're going to be leading a marriage retreat. Laura Fernandez is going to meet us down there. She's going to translate for Nancy. So I would appreciate this week.

We'll be leaving Wednesday. We'll be returning Monday week. So be in prayer for us. Be in prayer for that whole trip. And thank you all. Let me pray and dismiss. Heavenly Father, we do give you thanks for this church and for the opportunity to be amongst your people and those you have redeemed and to be your hands and your feet and to be a visible representation of your love for people.

So, Father, we just ask you to be glorified and to go with us this week in Christ's name. Amen.