The Bema Seat: Face to Face

Welcome to Tribe’s podcast. Hey. We just wanna say thank you for making this message a part of your week. Our prayer is that these messages will inspire you to make the name of Jesus famous in your life and to the uttermost bounds of the earth. If you’re ever in Jackson Hole, we’d love for you to visit our Tribe fam in person.

To learn more about us, you can find us online or at Facebook by searching tribejh.com. Worship was so good this morning, Liz. Bob said, alright. Well, preacher number two or maybe preacher number three, good luck. If if this was preacher number one, you were preacher number two.

Let’s Preacher number two. Let’s see what preacher number three can come up with. So last week, we started a series of conversations that I am expecting to last about four weeks, but we’ll we’ll see. And this series of conversation came from, either either something that I said or something that one of you said as a contribution, maybe about a month or so ago. And whatever whatever whoever said it, the Lord’s like, put a pin in that because I wanna go back and unpack that some more.

And I said, okay. That sounds good to me. So where we’re going comes from a part of a conversation that was developing here at Tribe, and I doubt any of you will remember it. I don’t even remember the, like, exactly who said it and what they said, but the Lord’s like, oh, I want to I’m gonna put my finger on that. So that is what we’re doing.

And last week, we started a conversation a series of conversations that I’m calling a full reward. And if you remember in the gospel excuse me. In one of John’s letters, he was talking he was talking about this idea of I want John is essentially saying, I’m, this is like this is Brian’s paraphrase. But John is saying he’s encouraging the church, and he says, I want you to not be deceived and not be robbed. I want you to receive your full reward.

That if there is a full reward, then by implication, what does that also leave the possibility open for? No reward. No reward. Partial reward. Or a partial reward.

Partial reward. Or a partial reward. And I don’t know if, well, yeah, let’s just let’s just jump right into a a quick analogy first. Board games. How many of you enjoy playing board games?

How many of you annoyed that your spouse always wins at the board game? I know. How many how many of you how many of you have a spouse that that reaches for the rule book and has strict tight control over the rule book? How many of you take the rule book and you’re like, that’s kind of more of a suggestion and you end up playing your What’s fun is what’s fun is, to have the joy of doing life with many of you and getting to know, your board game self, at our house or coming over to your house. Yeah.

Yeah. It should be. Yeah. So so today’s message is all about Logan. So, the the series of conversations that we’re having has to do with a full reward, but before we can talk about this idea of a reward, we’ve had to rewind and lay a a foundation to make sure that all of us are on the same page.

So the series of conversations that we’re having is called a full reward, and we are in week two. And today, we’re gonna talk about this Greek word bema, the bema seat. So if you remember, let’s, let me do I wanna jump ahead? Did it like slide wise? Let me see which will this work best.

Yeah. There’s a white slide with, like, a a graphic. Let’s put that up. And, the other white graphic that’s got, like, that’s the one. Okay.

So we wanna talk about, a full reward, which is up there. But we need to lay the foundation. You are here in this life. All of you are here in this. But there’ll come a time if Jesus doesn’t return, that’s a little bit different scenario, though doesn’t return before you die.

It’s not like he’s not gonna return. Thank you. Thank you. This is this is all of our destiny. After that, according to the Bible, we go to judgment.

And last week, we talked about judgment for anyone who has not invited Jesus into their heart, and it results in eternal punishment. And this may sound harsh. This may sound brutal, but it is the truth and the reality what Jesus has to say. And the analogy that we used from scripture last week was a parable that Jesus told that Jesus as the good shepherd will separate the sheep from the goats. Sheep that it is time to enter into the reward prepared for them by their father.

And then he’ll turn to the goats on his left, and he will say, depart from me. And then his analogy shifts from sheeps to goats to to eternity. And he says, wherever he talks about eternal forever separation from God. So we had to start with judgment, and we had to then go to talking about as much as unpleasant as it may seem or feel as much as the world wants to plug their ears and go la la la la la la la. This is a reality.

When a person stands before God at judgment, there is only one criteria that God is looking for. And what is that? Righteousness. Now there are two kinds of righteousness. Yeah.

Yeah. You’re you’re you’re following me. What’s one of them? Self righteousness. What’s another kind?

Yeah. Jesus. Jesus righteousness. Alright. Now tell me about the difference between the two types of righteousness.

Since you jumped to self righteousness, tell me about self righteousness. I guess I think of self righteousness as, kind of doing it on your own, making lift lifting yourself up Mhmm. By your own means. And what Trying to look good. There you go.

Trying to look good. When you come you can’t have judgment without a judge. Judge. When you stand before the judge with your own self righteousness, what might that look like? We’re kind of using our sanctified imagination here.

Yeah. I think just, like, all cleaned up and proud and, like, look at me and I and I, you know, didn’t I do a wonderful job of living life? Didn’t I do a wonderful job of living life on earth? And and the judge says, tell me a little bit more about didn’t I do a wonderful job. What do you mean by that?

The judge says. And the self righteous person would respond. Well, I always, I always tithed perfectly, and I always, you know, you know, showed up to, you know, do meals at the mission. And I always I laughed at pastor Brian’s jokes. At pastor Brian’s jokes.

Really, I never beat him at a board game. God’s like, okay. Now, I’m gonna give you partial credit for that. Alright. What is the other kind of righteousness?

Jesus righteousness. Righteousness in Christ to be theologically accurate. What does that look like? This is you, then this, and what does the Jesus kind of righteousness look like? What would a person say?

Think it would go something like, I’m a miserable sinner and I can’t fix myself, but I thank you for coming and paying my price. Pretty good. There’s nothing about myself that I could say or do that would ever qualify me In this life, I placed my hope and trust by faith examines the books. We’ll talk more about the books soon. But he will legally look to see if you have asked for the blood of Jesus to be applied to your life.

And we are for the people that have invited Jesus into their heart. The Bible says the righteousness of Christ. And then we go to a different type of judgment. So we talked about this last week. We’re gonna go up and talk about this work this week.

So would you go back to the title of this week’s conversation, week two, the BEMA Seat. Let’s read from God’s word together as a starting point. If you have your Bible with you this morning, would you turn to the book of Romans? Do you like it when I say, if you have your Bible with you this morning, would you turn to For me, there’s great nostalgia every time I say that. It is a little nod.

And, thanks for mentoring to my mentor in ministry for many, many years. He would always start every Sunday with, if you have your Bible with you this morning, would you turn to? Romans. There we go. And we’re gonna look at two passages.

When you get there, would somebody please read Romans 14 verses seven through 12? And then somebody else can be flipping ahead to second Corinthians. He’s trying really hard for that prophetic word of encouragement. And there it is. For we we don’t live for ourselves or die for ourselves.

If we live, it is to honor the Lord, and if we die, it is to honor the Lord. So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. Christ Christ died and rose again for this very purpose, to be the Lord, both of the living and the dead and of the dead. So why did you condemn another believer? Why did you look down on another believer?

Remember, we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For the scriptures say, as surely as I live, says the Lord, every knee will bound bound bend to me, and every tongue will confess and give praise to God. Yes. Each of us will give a personal account to God. Oh, okay.

We go back to that, that that graphic. As I was creating this, there was so much that I wanted to fill in and and perhaps it will become more decorative, in in the future. But that’s happening that’s happening right here that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess. Think about the most stubborn, hard hearted, rebellious, what do you call a person that, atheist, thank you, not agnostic. There could be.

I’m not quite sure. Atheist is like, definitely not. The the most rebellious person that you can think of currently that’s in the Venn diagram circle of your life currently or in history. Every tongue will confess. And every knee will bow before God.

They will be held dead to right. They may not like it. But they will be like You’re right. That is such an incredibly powerful moment. Have you ever, been a parent of of two littles, or been a teacher or a camp counselor or something, and one kid comes to you telling their story and you’re like, oh my gosh.

Wow. That other person is totally wrong. And then the other kid comes up to you and shares their side of the story and you’re like, oh, wait. No. No.

They’re wrong and you’re and then you’re like, oh, great. Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Or if you’ve ever been or if you’ve ever tried to be or if you’ve ever believed a lie from a person, or if you’ve ever tried to if you’ve ever been the victim of manipulation, or you’re like, like, you you know, you’re in a position to arbitrate truth, but you’re like, it’s so confusing or it’s so hard or I’m not quite sure or none of those thing. God is never ever ever in that dilemma.

And, if you’ve ever every good parent works at creating fences for their children so that the only path that a child can take with their free will is, as a parent, what you have desired for them or intended for them. You can either have carrots or broccoli tonight for dinner. You get to pick. You know, that’s a silly example. We’ve created these fences to allow them to make good choices.

So so in a in a similar way, because God is so smart and he sees everything, there’s no game that that any person can ever run on. You cannot pull the wool over his eyes. You cannot trick him. You cannot plead with him. You cannot manipulate him.

You cannot lie to him. You cannot deceive him. You will be it will be as if you are standing in front of him in your birthday suit. Nothing to hide. And even if people don’t like it, they will be like, I can’t argue with it.

Let’s go to the next verse. Would you put those two verses back up? Second Corinthians, five ten. And for my two friends in the back that are reading your Bible from your phone, just quick question for you. What, app do you read from, or do you have an app that you use?

What do you what do you got? What do you use? Yeah. Yeah. Is it The Bible app.

Yeah. Yeah. And it’s like kind of brown. Yes. Okay.

That’s good. So you can you can select, like, what book of the Bible you want to go to, what chapter, and then you scroll down. And then at the top, just to the right, there’s another button, and you can select what version to read from. That’s great. I love that question.

Go help her. List. Go help her. Right now? Yeah.

Here I come. I love love love love love this. What’s the reason that you That is a fantastic question. I have a deeply profound answer for you. So, so I grew up on the NIV, because my mom always took she was Baptist.

She took me to Baptist church in in the default, NIV. And, I was a youth pastor for several years and my friend, Megan of Megan and Seve, she’s like, oh, I got this. She’s a really good gift giver. She’s like, I got you this Bible. And it was in like a metal case.

And, you know, like open it up and like, oh, it’s kind of like a trick thing. But that translation was the New Living Translation. And so all of my years as a youth pastor, I read from the New Living Translation, like, okay. And then that’s why. I still read from the New Living Translation.

But when I study, I always bounce around to try to get, a more rounded, balanced perspective on what any passages say. I would suggest to you that no translation is is absolutely perfect. Not because the Bible isn’t perfect, but because people translating the Bible are are humans. God is wonderful and amazing and sovereign. And and the the Bible is inspired, but it helps me to study to just look at a couple of different versions.

Oh, yes. Please. I’ve had I’ve had a lot of good conversations lately about, like, translations and stuff like that. I think it’s important to just recognize that English is a limited language. We think about, like, love like, the word love being the obvious example.

Like, we have one word, and it’s love. And so many other languages have multiple words for that, for, like, the different levels and stuff. So that’s why I love using different translations. It’s just not because, like, a translation is wrong, but that the Hebrew or the Greek can be translated differently because English is just a limited language. Oh.

And so getting it’s a it’s a square versus a cube. And so you get to see all the sides. There we go. Well, let me give you my favorite example of this. Okay.

We have some friends who are missionaries in Costa Rica, with the Quebecer Indians in the jungle, almost on the border with Panama. And the Quebecers, have no bible, and these guys are down there trying to translate the English bible into Quebecer. The Quebecers have lots of gods. There’s no single god. There are probably 20 gods.

And so they’re trying to translate the word god from the English into Quebecer, and again, they had to pick one. Yeah. So they they spent years on this project, but they picked the wrong god. Oops. The god they picked was a nasty, evil god.

So so redo. Take two. Take two. Yeah. So if any of you, go into bible translation, be careful.

Be careful about that. Thank you, Bob. Let’s look at second Corinthians five ten. Would Kat, would you read that since you got the mic right there? For we must all stand before Christ to be judged.

We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we have done in this earthly body. Okay. Do I have that whole, Joe, do I have that whole verse, that we can put on the screen? There it is. Okay.

Let’s look at this. I am now talking to Christians. And I always say this. I I I come at this from a lot of different angles so that so that in an attempt to try to be precise. Christians, a person who has invited Jesus into their heart, a person who has been born again, a person who has made Jesus the leader of their life, Some denominations would say their personal Lord and savior.

Are you picking up what I’m putting down? Are you sniffing what I’m stepping in? Christian. Okay? This this verse is for Christians.

For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. Now, this is really important because I think that just out of maybe a little bit of confusion, a little bit of ignorance, like, and also laziness, that many Christians have thought, okay, before I was saved, before I came became a Christian, like, I was gonna I was gonna, like, stand before God as judge and then I would go to hell and, that would be awful. But now that I’m saved, as soon as I die, everything’s great. Yes. And Yes.

And you will stand before Jesus to be judged. I underlined that word to be judged. And in the Greek, it says that the phrase is a little bit different and perhaps in your translation it could be a little bit different. It says the judgment seat of Christ. Maybe that’s what your version says.

We will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Okay. We need to have a better understanding of what’s happening. First of all, that word judgment seat is a Greek word bema, b e m a. The bema seat of Christ.

Now, when you picture that scene playing out, I don’t know what comes into your mind. Maybe a courtroom because you think about judge. Judges do their job in a courtroom. So maybe you’re thinking that it would be scary and in court and even if you’ve, like, had to go to court for, like, a parking ticket or something, you’re like, like, what if, like, what if they he finds out about that overdue library book from, like, eighth grade and well, now I’m going to prison. You know, like, I don’t know what’s gonna happen when you stand in front of the judge and you, like, you use words that you’ve, like, never ever used before.

Like, your your honor, your highness, your royal, I don’t know. I mean, that’s never happened to me. But here, I I want us to this is what we fought, but I want us to shift our thinking a a little bit. The Bama seat of Christ, the Bama judgment seat for Christians looks way less like a courtroom and looks way more like the medal ceremony at an at the Olympics. Now, Brian, where are you getting this?

I’m not making this up to try to, like, soften the edges for you. I am being biblically accurate. So, back in Jesus’ day, they already had, like like like a version of the Olympics. The Olympics and and games and trials and competitions had been going on for a long time. And so in the same way that the Olympics or any competitive sport is in our collective consciousness, When a reader in Jesus’s day read those words, he would think of something similar to what we think of.

Do not think of a courtroom, but think of a winner’s podium. Will you show that picture, right here? First of all, what sport is this? Cycling. Yes.

There you go. Cycling. Do you know what cycling event this is? There’s a big hint right there. Okay.

So so, do how many of you know, why there are four different colored jerseys? Yes. There are different teams, but, Logan, what do you got? Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Very good. This is why.

Very good. So the overall the overall winner of the whole tour is in the yellow jersey. In French, they call it the. And then the green jersey, he’s won all of the sprints in there. The polka dot jersey is called the king of the mountain jersey, and he has the fastest time up all of the climbs.

And then the white jersey is for the best young rider under 24 or 25. And these guys are on the podium. Now before the Milo Jean steps up at the end of the Tour de France, does he know that he’s won the Tour de France? Yeah. It’s not a surprise.

It is a confirmation. It is a it is a recognition of what he’s already attained. Think of first place as being judged as the winner. The judge, the the, officials of the Tour de France, Called this man up on stage. They pronounce their judgment.

I judge you to be the winner. This is the Bama seat. Question. How I don’t know if you’ll I might be reaching a little too far just yet, but how What is the Method or the mechanism for the judgment seat of Christ? How will we be judged?

What will the method this is a good okay. I’m there. I’m there. What is the method of Christians judgment at the Bema seat of Christ? What is it that judges us?

And if you don’t know do you wanna you wanna take a shot? Washed in the blood. Okay. Alright. Alright.

So so you don’t need to turn there, but back you can you have your that graphic spun up in your mind. So, at Judgment, books, multiple books are open. The Book of Life, sometimes referred to as the Lamb’s Book of Life, your name is written in there, but then the book there’s an there there are other books that are open. But then when we go to the Bema Seat of Christ, there’s another method of judge okay. I’ll give you I’ll give you a hint.

First Corinthians chapter three verse 10 through 15. Let’s read this together and then I’ll ask you the same question. What is the method by which Jesus judges us at the bema seat? First Corinthians chapter three verse 10 through 15. Would somebody please read that?

Yes. There I mean, it’s literally right there. Because of God’s grace to me, I have laid the foundation like an expert builder. Now, others are building on it. For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have.

Jisus, right? Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials, gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward.

But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames. What is the method of judgment? Fire. Fire.

Fire. Let’s be a little more let’s see what hyperlinks may be in your mind about standing in front of Jesus at the Bama seat of judgment and be judged by fire. Where does that fire come from? Or, Connor say it, his eyes. All he has to do is look into your eyes, and he’ll see and know everything.

Just let that moment sit. In the book of Song of Solomon, Jesus says, Let me see your face, my beautiful one, my dove. I see you hiding in the cleft of the rock. But let me see your face because you are all together beautiful to me. The cleft of the rock is analogous to the cleft in Jesus’s side that when he was pierced, blood and water flowed.

Just as when a mother gives birth, Blood and water flow and the new life emerges. The church was born out of Jesus’s side in the same way that God took Eve out of Adam’s side. And Jesus says, you have loved me. You have loved my church. And you are beautiful and wonderful to me.

Come look me in the eyes. The eyes of Jesus that burn like fire, that we can’t hide anything from him. How terrifying and simultaneously wonderful that will leave every Christian trembling with fear and love. Two types of building materials. What’s one type?

Gold, silver, jewels. A type that won’t burn. What is the other type? Okay. Now, what will we be judged on if the methodology methodology of judgment his eyes that burn like fire, he just looks at you, and he sees you, and he sees you, and he his eyes that burn like fire.

He just looks at you and he sees and knows everything. And if you’ve ever encountered Jesus on this side of and you’re like, oh, you’re you’re you’re you’re undone. Like, I can’t hide from you. Right? If the methodology is fire, what will be tested, judged, evaluated?

Our works. The Protestant church has done an incredible job for hundreds and hundreds of years to separate our theology from Catholic theology that would say that our salvation is conditional upon our works. The bible is so clear for it is by grace that you have been saved, not by works so that no man can be what was the word that we started with earlier? Self righteous. So that no man can boast about their self righteousness.

I did this. I did this. I abstained from this. I It’s like, We have been saved by grace. So the Protestant church has done amazing job at that.

But we fall short with an accurate understanding of what will happen to Christians at the Bama seat of Christ. We will be judged by fire. And what will be judged? Our works. Here’s a better way to say it than works.

We will be judged according to our assignment. Jesus will say, how well did you do with the assignment I gave you? What is the big question that immediately jumps up in everybody’s heart and mind? What is my assignment? Last verse.

Psalms one thirty nine. Oh, I have Psalms one thirty nine up there because I wanted us to read all of Psalms one thirty nine. Just do that on your own. Let’s go to verse 16 of Psalms one thirty nine. There it is.

You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. That’s the other book, Connor. You’re exactly right. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.

Now, how do we reconcile this seemingly contradictory realities of God and predestination and all these things and our free will, like, which is it? This first does a really good job to explain it. This book of your life is all of the things that God has for you. We go back to every man’s works will be tested by fire. The eyes of Jesus will look at you, penetrate deep into your soul.

He’ll know the had laid out for you before the foundations of the world. And he will compare. Or, Or in board game terminology, this is the scoring round. So there’s a there is a, there’s lots of games that have this, but, in in some board game like resource gathering board games. You could be super stocked up on wheat, but wheat scores for zero points.

But but but who do you who do you try to arbitrate with in a board game? Just the rule book. That’s that’s the that’s the judge. That’s the final word to say. But but but but I have 50 bushels of wheat.

Kate, let’s look up scoring for wheat. Wheat is worth, zero points. Oh, rats is right. So we’re we’re we’re gonna land the plane here, but I wanna I wanna take another run at what we just talked about it from, creator’s idea, his take on what this judgment seat of Christ will look at, what it will look like. There’s a a video that I wanna show you about how we lived our lives compared to the assignment that God had for us.

Would you roll that video and you might need to you probably will need to bring the volume up. Yeah. Way, way, way. Keep going. Keep going.

Helped churches with their finances, and those churches would have impacted 751,300 and 21 souls. Sister Smith, I never called you to burst the nations. I never called you you to This is our bottom line for this whole series of conversations. Every moment matters when forever is your measure. Every moment matters when forever is your measure.

For the Christian, judgment is coming. Winners podium. Judgment will happen by fire. Anything that is built with wood, hay, or straw, consumed, burned up counts for how many points? Zero.

Gold, silver, and jewels, the Bible says, will be counted and refined by that fire. So that reward will be granted according to that which you built with eternity in mind at the leadership of Jesus. In crafting the landing strip here today, did I want to land on the side of what are those things written in God’s book for your life, the assignment that you had? If you don’t know, now would probably be a good time to to go on a journey of discovery for that. Did I want to land on The Bible is so clear.

If you even give a cup of cold water in my name according to the assignment that I have for you, you will receive your reward. But Jesus doesn’t really roll like that, does he? So I want to leave you with this tension to wrestle with. And so many people can this is probably have to be a conversation series of conversation after this, but your gifts, your skills, your your calling, your occupation, your vocation, we tend to, like, confuse all of those things. But it’s not confusing to the Lord.

Remember, it says that the Word of God is sharper than any two edged sword. He just slices right down but you Oh, you were good at that, but that’s not the assignment that I had for you. I know my assignment. My assignment is as a shepherd. I’ll stand before Jesus someday and he’ll say, Shepherd Brian, step forward and give an account for your life.

I will not be judged according to my vocation of being a local church pastor. I’ll be judged according to how well did I shepherd the souls that God brought to me? Whether that is in a church as an assignment as a pastor or the relationship, for example, I’m just speaking to you right now, for example, the relationships that that I that we develop with those Navy guys that come in every day. They they step into my world. I’m like, I’m gonna shepherd them.

What is your assignment? Psalms one thirty nine verse 16, that’s what you will be judged according to. So with all that we’ve said today, Holy Spirit help us. I pray for, I mean this in a super loving pastoral way, all my little sheep in here this morning and those that are watching the live stream and that will, tune into the podcast. I pray for all my precious little sheep that you have given me here today and that you’ve given me charge over.

Lord, that in whatever way I’m able to help me to convey this important message. And Lord, I pray for my sheep that you would help them to press into you, to reveal to them their assignment on what and how they will be graded. And there are, the Lord would say, because I can see your wheels turning and I want to affirm you in this John, your particular missions will will change throughout life. Here’s my here’s my current assignment. This is what I’m doing.

God’s like, okay, good job with that. Here’s the next thing. And and so you’re good. But you’ll also be able to see see a theme woven throughout all of that. You are let the Holy Spirit knows better than my feeble words can say it.

Reveal to us Holy Spirit our assignment so that we may receive a what? Full reward. Connor, let’s, I’ll let you lead us in the next part of worship then. We’ll probably have people starting to queue up downstairs soon. We’ll finish out today with one other form of worship, and that is bringing our tithe and our offerings to the Lord.

We serve such an incredible God who is so faithful to do so much with what we give him, even when we just give him a little bit. And it makes his heart so happy. And because we’re limited on time, I won’t go down the rabbit hole of the parallels from all that we talked about to our obedience and tithing, but there is so much. And it makes God so happy when he sees us surrender ourselves to him, in tangible, tangible ways like our finances. So why don’t you join me in praying over, the tithe and above and beyond that, our offering.

Father God, we thank you so much that you are a god that is so much greater than we can even wrap our brains around. You are just so magnificent and spectacular and so worthy of our obedience, god. And so we we come before you, god. We present ourselves fully to you. We surrender all that we have, and we ask you to do abundantly more with it than we could ever ask or imagine.

And in the area specifically of our finances, God, in this town, we pray that you give us the strength and the boldness and the faith necessary to trust you with our finances when things are tight, God. And, the discipline and remembrance to do it when things aren’t. We give it all to you, Lord Jesus. Use it to make your name famous and further this kingdom here in this valley, God. We pray this in Jesus we don’t pass buckets here at Tribe, but we got a little lock box at the back, black box outside.

You guys know the drill. Throw some cash or check-in there. You can give online at our website, or throw a text to this number. Super easy to just throw that into your contacts if you haven’t already. If you look around the room, there are connect cards.

Most of you here have already done that. But on the backside, we have prayer requests, whether that’s a need or a praise, we would love to be able to join with you as a staff. So please throw something in that onto that and then throw it in the box in the back on your way out so that we can join you guys in prayer, each week. It’s such a blast and a blessing to be able to do that. We got a bunch of serving opportunities.

Everything’s up on the fridge, just like, every good family. The next big thing that is coming up is next week, we will be doing church in the park at Powderhorn followed by baptisms, and we’ll all go over and do a bunch of celebrating baptisms, bring a chair. We’re gonna have pizza right afterwards. It’s gonna be such a blast. Great opportunity to invite people.

It’s a huge draw to just be like, hey. Come out for church and park. It’s a blast. And that will be at 10AM. So we’ll just have one service there.

We just did, which part? Powder horn. Yeah. I thought I said that. Yeah.

Last week, we had a whole team go out and serve with the Good Samaritan Mission. We will be doing this again as well. It was an awesome opportunity. We heard amazing, amazing things. And just really cool to get to be involved in serving here in this community.

And if you didn’t get to come out, we would love to have you for the next one. And that next one is August 20, and there are sign up sheets for that as well. And then we got ministry and worship nights for the good Samaritan ministry as well. And then coming up in October, we’ll be going to Wind River Reservation. And that is always a special time, so if you could block that off in your calendar, we’d love to have as many of us go as possible.

And, again, sign ups are all on the fridge. Anything else? That’s it. Yeah. Come up and press out.

I got it. Jesus will say to you, John, Jesus will not say to you, entrepreneur John Mickus step forward. He will not say sunglass store owner step forward. He will say, worship leader, John Mickus, step forward. I have a terrible singing voice.

I know. He’s he’s I’ve actually never heard it. He’s speaking for himself. I I I I can’t play the instruments very well and Jesus will be like, from when you got saved, your worship to me was a pleasing aroma and fragrance in your whole life. All you’ve done is lead people to worshiping the King in your young and rowdy days in the mountains telling people about me and, inviting them to Bible studies and to church.

Your your season with your daughter and teaching her how to love and worship me, how you’ve led your wife in, causing her to blossom and to flourish in worshiping me. As you went to, Kansas City and the season there, how you worship me, how all the businesses that you’ve owned or led, it wasn’t really about you making money, but you making money, but you used the position as an employer to bring your employees into a place that they could step in to worship me. Your your The prayer movements that you’ve led, Bible studies that you’ve led, the men’s group that you’ve led, worship leader John Micas, come and stand before you and receive the reward prepared for you by my father in heaven. Now stand up everybody. Lord, help us, help us, help us, help us.

Every single one of us to max out points on that score on that scorecard of life. Help us, help us to live our lives in alignment, in accordance with the assignment that you have for us. Psalms 25 is just coming to my mind. I I don’t know where in Psalms 25, but it says, fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And with those who fear his name, he shares his secrets.

Meaning, mysteries. Meaning, not a mystery or secret to him, secret knowledge, but what may be unknown to you. Fear the Lord. Press into him. Receive a full reward.

I command a blessing over each and every person here this morning. God, I ask that you would give them a great week and have the words of this conversation today, not my words, but your words, Holy Spirit, ring in their ears for the rest of their life. I pray these things in Jesus’ name, the strong son of God. And everybody said, amen. I love you.

Have a great week. And remember, score high. You got this.