 Yeah, yeah, Sam. Just waiting for that as well. I think it came out well, you know, these songs. We were quite surprised. The fact that in English it had a different feel, you know, but when we translated it into Hindi, it's completely different. It's like a fresh, brand new song. And of course, we had help from one of the worship pastors from the North, from Delhi. So he translated it. And yeah, so can't wait. Yes. Okay, just want to read from, you know, Second Timothy chapter three versus 16 onwards, maybe 1617 and then and also from chapter four also, right? So all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction and righteousness that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who will appear, I'm sorry, who will judge the living and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom. Preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season. Convince the buke, exhort with all long suffering and teaching. And he goes on to say why, you know, there will come a time and they will not endure sound doctrine. So he says for the time will come and they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching years, they will heap up for themselves teachers and they will turn their years away from the truth and turn aside the fables, but you be watchful in all things. Endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. So we have this exhortation and the fact is that all scripture is God breathed, is inspiration of God, it's profitable, beneficial for doctrine for reproof or correction for instruction. So we have something that's so, so valuable, something that's foundational, something that's life giving and which is the God breathed, God inspired word of God. And it is enough and well able to equip the man or the woman of God completely thoroughly and bring us to maturity and equip us for good work. So therefore, preach the word, be ready in season, out of season, convince, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and teaching. So verse five says endure afflictions, you know, there are hardships even as you are called to preach in season, out of season. There are afflictions and it is the work, you know, it is labor, do the work, fulfill your ministry. So that's the exhortation we have. So let's just receive this, see this word, see this scripture, see this instruction and say, yes, Lord, yes, Lord, make us able in season, out of season, that we will be ready, willing, able to preach, to declare your word, to be able to convince, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering, teach. So may the Lord make us into such people even as we esteem his inspired word, which is able to equip us, which is able to inspire us and bring us to maturity for every good work. So let's pray. Father, we thank you, we receive your word this morning, oh God, we thank you for your word, which is inspired, you breathe it, thought it's from you, you are the source. It's the truth, life-giving, changing, changing us or changing the very atmosphere, God, the environment when we speak it out and when we believe and when we receive God, everything changes within us, there is transformation. Yes, Lord, we thank you for your word, we thank you for this amazing gift that you've given us. What a privilege and honor to handle your word, what a privilege and honor to God to declare your word, to proclaim the truth. Father, we thank you that you are maturing us, bringing us to maturity, bringing us complete for every good work, Lord. And in all seasons, Father God, you've exhorted us to preach the word. And this morning, Lord, each one of us, we come and we, even as we receive this exhortation, even as we receive your word, Lord, we pray that you would empower us this morning, empower us, fill us, Lord, with your spirit, fill us, strengthen us, Lord, and maybe come to that place of maturity, maybe come to that place of God handling your word, Lord, rightly dividing your word. And Lord, I pray that we will be spokespersons, God, Lord, declaring your word, declaring your truth, Lord, always. And yes, Lord, in all the aspects of convincing and rebuking and correcting and teaching, I pray that we will do with grace, with your grace and with grace graciously, God. And as your word says, that a man of God, a teacher, should not quarrel but be gentle in all things. And I pray that we will not display that as well, display that Christlikeness, Lord, even as we do so. Father, we thank you. We pray that you will make us, even as we follow you, make us, God, that there be a change, that there be a transformation, that there be a equipping as we follow you. We thank you. We give you all the praise and we give you all the glory in Jesus' matchless name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Okay, so we have today's speakers. I'm not sure how many are there. Okay, we have Maxon, Sakaia. Maxon is not here. Okay, we have Chris. So Chris is here. We have Hope William. Hope William is also not here. So probably we'll have Chris to start off and then maybe Kennedy can, once Chris is done, then Kennedy can share. Right, so over to you, Chris, if you're ready, you could go ahead and share, please. Thank you. Thank you, Pastor. You have a presentation? Yes. Okay. Can you see my screen, Pastor? No, not yet, Chris, not yet. You just have to ensure that the PPT is, that that screen is not minimized, then it will show up in the list. Should be a full screen? Not necessarily, but it should not be minimized. So it will show as a separate window and then they can choose from the list to share. But if you minimize it, it doesn't show up in that list. So yeah, it's coming up. Oops. No, it's actually showing multiple images. It's kind of mirroring. So yeah, I think, yeah, good. That's one. Now you can make it a slideshow, but you may not be able to see the notes, I think. Yeah. Okay, that's great. Thanks. So you can see the full screen now? Yes. That's good. Not now, Chris, something you did. So that changed it. Yeah, now it's good. Yeah. Yeah, it's good now. Okay, so you can start now. Sorry, Pastor? No, I just said it's 11.13. So you can start now. Okay, thanks. 12 minutes from now. Yeah, sure. Yeah, so good morning, friends. The topic for my sermon is a prosperous Christian. We live in a world that has prosperity as well as abject poverty. And there's a big divide between the two. As Christians, we need to strive towards living the Jesus way, despite how materially rich or poor we are. Prosperity is a very tangible aspect of our lives. Prosperity can be seen very clearly in the form of material wealth. And this could also be extended to other areas like health and happiness. Prosperity is also relative where a person may have X amount in a village and it's considered prosperous, while the same amount may not be of much value in an urban area. Similarly, a person who would be considered very rich by most people could compare himself or herself to the super rich. People show their prosperity in different ways. Some people flaunt their wealth and it can be seen when they're driving many expensive cars, wearing a lot of jewelry and sometimes boasting about their wealth. And some people hide their wealth, may even be ashamed of how wealthy they are, feel guilty about it and live very simple lives. So what I'll be doing today is basically to provide some details about what is prosperity. Follow that with a brief on prosperity in the current times. Then what the Bible teaches us about prosperity and then summarize on how a prosperous Christian should live their lives based on biblical principles. So what is prosperity? Basically, a definition of that could be a successful flourishing or thriving condition, especially in financial respects and having good fortune. This is a life situation where most people would like to have. Besides financial success, prosperity could also be attributed to health and happiness. Having financial success without good health may not be beneficial in the long run. And it would be the same when we do not have mental and emotional well-being. There's no point in having financial success. So some ways we can think of proper prosperity and how we can relate to. For example, you have rich countries, you have poor countries. So for example, I'm just giving a personal example I lived abroad for some years in Hong Kong and Singapore and both were prosperous countries where the government provided a very high quality of life, good roads, housing, medical facilities, availability of food, water, electricity, there was pollution control. And these two countries were also places where material wealth was a primary objective in one's life. For example, I remember in Singapore, people aspire to the five C's. So there was cash, credit card, condominium, car and country club. And they caught that and they fired that. They were prosperous. And even though I lived in India before I went abroad, when I returned to India, I was for sometimes quite disturbed to see the level of poverty. There are also rich companies, poor companies, some companies that have large revenues and some companies that are struggling to remain afloat. There are rich churches, poor churches. There are many churches with large church buildings that can host large convocations. So for example, the Yodo Full Gospel Church in South Korea founded by Pastor David Yung-Woo Cho can accommodate up to 75,000 people in each of the seven services on Sunday. So they can actually practically, they can preach to about 500,000 people in one day. The other thing that has come about in the prosperity is the prosperity Bible, which is a religious belief that financial blessing and physical well-being are always will have got for them. And that faith, positive speech and donations to religious causes will increase one's material wealth. And there are quite a few churches that have based their entire sort of principles around that and have become other churches. If you compare that to some of the churches that may have closed down during COVID times, so for example, this year, ABC Church initiated a COVID-19 relief project and one area that they provided support was to pastors and they helped about 1,575 pastors were going through difficulties financially. The last area that could be related to, when we talk about prosperity is which citizens, poor citizens. So here you get these people at the workplace, at the places that we live in. We even have churches where people can position to type more because they're more prosperous and the ones who are not will type much less. So we do make valid judgments on which people and versus poor people. So coming to the Bible, you will see that there were prosperous people in the Bible who were close to God's heart. And when I was doing the research for this, it mentioned for this presentation, it mentioned the Bible contains over 2,000 verses on money and approximately 40% of Jesus' parables are dealing with money. So it's obvious that God has plenty to say about wealth and about giving. So really quickly, some of the people who were prosperous in David, who was a man of the cause on heart was fabulously rich during his life. And he generously gave to his son Solomon as his last great offering to God, the finest materials for constructing and furnishing a temporary Jerusalem. And his net worth in current sort of dollar worth exceeded 200 billion. There's Joseph, Prime Minister of Egypt, who strategized to make Egypt and himself rich. Apostle Matthew, a rich tax collector before he met up with Jesus was known to be dishonest and eventually became one of the 12 apostles and wrote one of the one of the Gospels. And Joseph of Arimatia, a very wealthy man who offered his family a tomb for the burial of Jesus' body. So let's just go through the Bible references and then summarize. The first one is Deuteronomy 818. And could I get someone to just read out that verse? And you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he swore to your fathers as it is this day. Yeah, thanks Sam. So this is where in the Bible it mentions that it is God who has given us the power to get wealth, that to be wealthy, that grace has come from God and therefore we should recognize that and give more glory for that. Matthew 624, can someone else read this verse please? Serve two masters for either he will hate the one and love the other or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. Right, so I think this Bible reference really indicates that God has to be first in our lives and we cannot serve two masters. We have to have God right there as the primary master. And that's the one thing that will help us definitely. But he who studies fine, let your conduct be without covetousness. Be content with such things as you have. For he himself has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. So this verse basically indicates that one that we shouldn't be coveting other people's good fortune. In fact that actually refers back to one of the commandments where we don't covet someone else's goods. And we have to be content with what at a present moment that is what we have. And always be assured that God has said is that I will never leave you nor forsake you. So whatever you have at the moment be contented and do not covet anyone else's good fortune. 2 Corinthians 9, 8 and God is able to make all grace abound towards you. That you always have all sufficiency in all things and may have an abundance for every good work. So this Bible reference is basically telling us that we will record and always give us something that is sufficient. Sorry to interrupt Chris. You have one more minute. So basically we need to be abundant. We need to give back. Real quick, the next one is the rule of the rich. The rich rule of the poor borrow a slave to the lender. And this one is where it's always better not to get into debt. And that is a key message over here. And the last one is a strong message and it says that basically it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man. And this is where Jesus, you know, he meets the rich man and the rich man says, I follow all the commandments and Jesus tells them what you find. So now you give up all your wealth, give it to the poor and come and follow me. And the rich man cannot do that because he's so impressed by his wealth. So some just keep some takeaways very quick. We can pray to God to make us prosperous. You don't need to feel guilty about it. And God wants us to be prosperous. Second one is first priority for us as Christians has to be Jesus. Third, we need to share our wealth and help the less fortunate. And those in debt, first place, don't be in debt. But if you are, clear the debt as soon as possible. And those who have owed the debt should consider reducing or completely raising the debt. So just to summarize again, we need to strive towards living the Jesus way despite how prosperous we are. And that's how we need to live our lives. So thank you very much for listening to my sermon. Thanks. Thank you, Chris. That was good. Some good insights. Yeah, good topic. Yeah, you can actually give a good title as well. I think your presentation is kind of mirroring a whole lot of things. Okay. Have you stopped sharing? Yes. Oh, okay. Got it. Yeah. So yeah, so it was good. Like how you described wealth, how you described riches and also made the distinction between riches and prosperity and the fact that it's more than wealth. It's a gentle term which describes thriving, to be flourishing, to be successful. So that was good. The fact that riches are tangible and something that you can, it's also relative. I think those were good insights when you think about riches. Depending on the place, the geographical location and the environment, you can consider a person to be very rich. Whereas that might not be the case when the environment changes like a person is in a city. So those are some practical things. And also that this was also good, which is displayed in different ways. Some flaunted, some hide it. So true. When you don't have the correct perspective, which is one can go into all these things. If you're too dependent on it or if your security, your image depends on it, then you begin to flaunt it because that's when you feel secure or feel empowered. But then if you have a wrong understanding of it, then you might hide it and feel guilty. Very good. And also the scriptures that you shared, very powerful, very insightful. Especially Hebrews 13, say yes to contentment, no to covetousness. So it was more of a teaching, that kind of flow, not exactly declarative or preaching kind of thing. Very good. So yeah, I guess you also need time. So very conversational kind of thing. So you need more time to just talk about things, to narrate maybe experiences and it'll all, it'll be really good. You can actually give a very different title. The prosperous Christian is good, but you can actually give a very thought provoking title. Maybe it's just ending in a question, something that really draws the person. You could consider doing that, that'll always be. And this, I'm just saying for the whole class, whatever present, you can actually work on the title and you can really improve on the title. I think it was Prabhakar Rao who's had ideal sacrifice or ideal sacrifice, something that you, which is kind of thought provoking, something that makes you curious. And I'm saying this because of the media on which you would probably put your content out, maybe on a blog. You could do that, right? On a blog, you could put it on social media, like on YouTube, Instagram, or Facebook, whatever. So a good title always helps to catch the attention. It always helps. It's not the be all and end all of things. Of course, the content is what really, it needs to be good as well. But a good title always helps, right? So yeah, thanks, Chris. That's what I wanted to share. If anybody has anything to share about the presentation, you could do that on the chat as well. And yeah, if you have any questions, you can ask Chris also, you know, I think that five C's, which is just good, Chris. Yeah, I think Charles has a question. Charles has put his hand up. Go ahead, Charles. Yes, I wanted him to repeat the five C's. I see. Okay, let me try. Let me try and recall that. Okay, cash. Okay, credit card, somebody can help me. Credit card, condominium, condos, apartments, right? And, okay, the fourth one. Anyone who took notes? Country club. Country club. So that's four. I missed out one. Country club, yeah. Cash, credit card, condominium country club. This is the fifth one. This is back to you. You won the fifth C. So it is basically cash, credit card, condominium, car and country cars. Okay. Cars, okay. Right. Interestingly, they have now changed. I think they have realized also that these are, these don't, these are kind of very sort of, you know, temporary sort of aspirations for citizens. So they are trying to change that and make it a little more relevant for the current times. I'm just going to like, I can't remember right now, but once I get that, I think it's completely different. It's not material wealth. It's a lot more, it's a lot more different. That's what they are trying to change. I see. Okay. Thank you. Crypto. Okay. I have to do a research on that actually. See all these ads and, you know, all these disclaimers about the ads and that it is not legal tender in a country like India and so on. So I don't know what it's really about. Okay. Right. Thanks, Chris. So we'll go on to the next person. And we don't have Max on here. And we also don't have, it was the other person I was supposed to share. Hope William, not sure if he joined it. Okay. We don't have hope. So, so I think Kennedy over to you, you can, you can share over to Kennedy. Am I audible? Yeah. Yes, you are. Okay. I must say I'm very grateful for that, Chris. Because I think you've done the A part of my someone. I think that's how God works. Thank you for everything. So my title today is on excellence. Majority of people in the world want to live well. And this desire has led many into catching shotguns. Many are those who want good living, good grades. So I'd like to explore more on excellence. So what is our attitude what is and the attitude for excellence? So what is excellence? Excellence is the quality way. First, always the best, always on top, always standing out. Like in most cases, we still have many adverts, you know, we need the leaders, we need the leaders, we have the best quality. The only one to give touch notion of being the best, open excellence. But as a believer, what does the Bible say about this quality? That's the main question. What does the Bible say about this quality? Because like I remember like, before I got saved, I used to cut a lot of short cuts, beating my social life, beating my finances, but I thank God now and I've seen the difference and I thank God for that. So the attributes for excellence, let's see Proverbs 22, chapter 22 verse 29. Beauty among who exels in his work. He shall stand before kings. He will not stand before unknown men. Second, it can be under the book of Proverbs dollar 31, page 29. Who can find a righteous wife? Oh what is far above rubies. Many daughters have done well, but you exels them all. So Brebren, this passage tells us more about the attributes of excellence. Excellence does not value gender. It is gender intensity, in other words. It embraces all. It's a rare gem. It's a very rare attitude. There's not many habits, like in Proverbs 31, 10. In Zavastia's wife, she's above all other rubies. The values, the attributes of excellence, values. It makes one extremely valuable. That puts one above the gem or the pressure thing. It also places you on a special demand on things for an individual. It does have no destination, and if you are excellent and dedicated to your work, you are bound to be promoted. It promotes, it brings advancement. It breaks barriers, overcoming odds. It brings one to prominence. Another thing is the attitude towards excellence. What's an attitude? One mental disposition manifests the views of her behavior. So what's the attitude towards excellence? Do you see it as a gift of God or as a man's labor? Work. So let's look how grace works against excellence. Work is your effort directly towards achieving something. Hence this defines one cannot be passive towards things and say he's working towards organizing. One should be determined and one to achieve and direct his efforts towards it. It's important not that what the Bible says about work. God works in Genesis 1 to 3. God treated man, Genesis 2, 15. Work is neither a curse nor a punishment. But what position God has for God's blessing? So what is not a curse? We should not treat work as a curse or a punishment. It's just something that position has for God's blessing. So we don't work to get rich unless we depend on God's positioning in our life. As in bitronomy at all, the one who gives us the ability and the knowledge to make wealth. So and work is personal. You have to work personally in your work. So when you look it deeply, you see that need God's grace. Grace is a favor always from the superior to the subordinate. In the Bible, it's an act of God that demonstrates his love and authority. Brethren, this is usually seen as a gift or a talent. Fortunately, God has graced everybody. So it's excellence and acts of grace or work. Brethren, you see like in the parables of the parables of talents in Matthew, it's evident that the master gave some of his talents according to their abilities, but he judged their work not talents that given them. The master rewarded their works, not their talents. Even in the case of the mature woman, the woman was described excellently because of her works, not because of her gender, no resources. This woman is said to be about even the rules. And in the case of the excellent man, this man is described in this part, in this passage, said to be an excellent in his works. So God gives talent, but makes one, God gives talent. But what makes one excellence? So like in the case, if in the book of First Corinthians 15, Paul says, it is by the grace of God. It's by the grace of God. I am what I am. And this grace was made or not in vain. But I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. So brethren, from this passage, if the following are evident, grace is the source of all we are. Grace must not be rendered useless. As a servant of God, who had talent did not make it work. So grace requires us to labor abundantly. In whatever we do, be it in our spiritual life, be it in our social life, be it in our finances, we need to labor and labor abundantly. This is to say that favor requires labor. Paul wrote about two-thirds of the books in the New Testament and planted blaming on the righteous. It is because he worked and labor. So grace makes us honor God for all our success. But brethren, with a caution here, we need to avoid things that can make us use our excellence. That's laziness and indiscipline. Like in the case of Ruben, the first born of Jacob, Ruben was destined to excel, but he did not because of indiscipline. So therefore we need to check and be careful to avoid laziness and indiscipline at all costs. Also, attitude towards excellence requires that we should have the anger, the desire, the appetite. We should avoid complacency. Like in the book, in Proverbs 16-26 it says, the appetite of the laborer motivates him. Indeed, his anger drives him on. There are two keywords in this book. Anger and appetite. Anger is that craving. It should be craving to have an intimacy with our Lord, which in terms of prayers, prayers and worship, whatever we participate in. Anger is therefore what drives us and makes us willing to pay the price. And we also need to have the appetite. On the other hand, it's how one can take, how one can take an issue. We have to have the anger and the appetite. Anger without appetite, it won't work. Anger without appetite, it won't work, brethren. It's good to be prayerful, believing God no matter what you are doing. So, excellence is being consistent, diligent and improving and adding value no matter what we are doing. Be it in our social life, be it in our places, be it in our academics, whatever we do, we need to do it with excellence, knowing that we are under pressure to deliver. And this is bad pressure. This is the theory in the case of poor, poor under pressure, but it has to labor abundantly. To be excellent, over and above one should have anger, appetite and pressure for the Lord. Thank you, brethren. Thank you. Thank you, Kennedy. God bless. Yeah, that was good. Thank you so much for that talk, for that sermon on excellence. Wonderful. Really, I think it's good. You just really hit the nail on its head, especially those things about labor and grace, gifting, which all come into play when you're talking about excellence. These are some things that really, and I think you addressed that important question. So, is it a gift? Is it a grace of God? So, if it is so, what is our responsibility? And once something is given to us, what is our responsibility? I think you addressed that well. And you also went to talk about work and how right to the garden of Eden work is established by God and so on. So, really, really good. And very insightful. You talked about the parable and how the Master gave those talents, so that is equating that to the grace and the favor the Master gave. And then it was required of them to labor with it in order to do something out of that. So, to make that fruitful, that was good. And also, yeah, I was just thinking, will you be talking about Paul? And then you referred to 1 Corinthians 15 and talked about Paul and his testimony. And yeah, one of the things is that Paul also says that, the grace towards me was not in vain in the sense, if we receive it and not do anything about it, then it's kind of, in a way, becomes wasted and not really come to its, it doesn't come to its full potential, the way it was designed or meant or means it for our lives. So, I think that was good what you shared and also all those scriptures on Prog. One suggestion, if you can, I think today also there was a lot of ambient noise from where you were presenting. So, I guess you couldn't type it in or put it, so put the scriptural references. So, I think that would have greatly enhanced if you could have put the references. Actually, I'm the same place where I was last time. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. Oh, I see. Okay, fine. Thank you. Yeah, thank you for making the effort. So, that is what I just felt that, if you put that that would greatly, because these are, these scriptural references really make sense. When you look at it, because when I look at it, when I read it, then it makes so much sense. So, you could always do that. I'm sure you'll do that if it's in a different setting. So, yeah. So, thank you, Kennedy. Thank you so much for sharing that. We were blessed. So, class, if you want to share anything to Kennedy about this, you can please go ahead and do that. We already have some comments here. So, you could do that. It's nice how both Chris's topic and Kennedy's topic were kind of linked in that sense about prosperity and about excellence and yeah, wonderful. Okay, so we'll stop here. And thank you for those who are sharing. And my suggestion is those who are going to share, you can still work on your title to make it even more impactful. You can talk about, you can work on that. Just a suggestion. And also, if you can put up the scripture, that would be helpful to the class, if you can do that. Okay, wonderful. Thank you. Have a good weekend. God bless you guys. We'll catch up next week. Bye-bye.