 This is part three of our Advent series entitled Prepare the Way of the Lord. Prepare the Way of the Lord. And today I wanna bring part three of this series to you called Looking for Jesus. And by the way, Pastor Stephen Davis knocked it out of the part last weekend. We are blessed to have him here at Richland broadcasting to all of our locations. We love you, Stephen, great job. And this morning we're gonna talk about Looking for Jesus. And we're looking, I'm gonna read two texts to you this morning, the main one, Matthew chapter two and then Luke chapter one. But in Matthew chapter two, beginning in verse one, it says, now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold wise men from the east came to Jerusalem saying, where is he who was born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled and all of Jerusalem with him and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. And they told him in Bethlehem of Judea for so it is written by the prophet. And the prophet said, and you, O Bethlehem in the land of Judea, are by no means among the rulers of Judah, for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel. Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them, what time the star had appeared and he sent them to Bethlehem saying, go and search diligently for the child. And when you have found him, bring me word that I too may come and worship him. After listening to the king, they went on their way and behold the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest in the place where the child was. And when they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother and they fell down and worshiped him and then opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh and being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way. Now I'm gonna also read to you one verse out of Luke, chapter one, verse 17. And it's describing the ministry of the forerunner of Jesus, John the Baptist. And it says, and he will go before him, talking about Jesus in the spirit and the power of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the Lord a people prepared. What's interesting about the story of the wise men at Christmas time, we focus a lot on some of these major themes. We focus on the shepherds and we focus on the nativity, the prophetic words spoken to Mary about giving birth to Jesus. And we also talk about the wise men. One of the things that most of these Christmas stories or these Advent stories have in common is they are all stories of people that are looking for Jesus. So we see the shepherds who receive the announcement by the angels and the choirs and the choruses in the open heavens as they're singing, glory to God the highest and on earth goodwill towards men. And the shepherds go into Jerusalem or go into Bethlehem looking for Jesus. And we see here two different individuals or two different groups of people also looking for Jesus. One is the wise men or the magi who have come from the east and they come to Jerusalem looking for Jesus, the king. But we also see Herod who's looking for Jesus for other reasons, is looking for the king for other reasons. These magi, these wise men, when they come from the east, there's a lot of speculation about where they are coming from. Most likely they're coming from Persia or from formerly Babylon, Persia area. And they're most likely Jewish because when Israel came back out of captivity out of Babylon and out of Persia, really only about 20% of the Jews who were living in what you and I today know as Iraq and Iran, only about 20% of the Jews actually came back into the land. For many centuries, there was a thriving Jewish community in Iraq and Iran in that area and that was no different in Jesus' day. They were still Jewish in their orientation but they are in the east. We don't know for sure, but it's very likely because we know that they were familiar with the scriptures in anticipation of a king coming. However, it is that they came across it, whether they were Persian and were familiar with the Jewish scriptures, a promise of a coming Messiah. We don't know for sure, but here's what we do know for sure is that when they saw the star indicating that the king had been born, they weren't looking for him. And they went on a long journey. This is a several week journey that they go on. Looking for the king or Jesus. They don't know that his name is Jesus, but they're looking for him. And when they're looking for him, they go where you would assume a king would be. They go to Jerusalem. After all, this is the capital city of the Jewish people. This is the city that David reigned and ruled in. This is the place that it is prophesied that the Messiah will suddenly appear in his temple. And so if you're looking for the king, you go to the city of the great king. But in this particular case, they went to the wrong place because Jesus was not yet in Jerusalem. They had to go to Jerusalem. And there when they encountered all the scholars and the theologians and the leaders and they asked the question, where do we find the king? They said, well, yeah, Jerusalem is where the king is gonna reign and he's gonna rule from, but that's not where he's going to start. That's not where it begins. He's actually going to be born in Bethlehem. And so that sent them on a continued journey to find him. And when they found him, as we just read, they went in and they worshiped and they gave gifts to him. And then they went back on their journey, avoiding Herod because they knew that Herod had ill intentions. Herod wanted to get rid of the competition. But what's interesting to me is when you read this, this account of how they went to Jerusalem looking for the king, a lot of us in not even just people that are in church are actually looking for God. They're looking for Jesus. They don't maybe know that it's Jesus that they're looking for, but they're looking for what Jesus came to do, which is to give peace, which is to reconcile us to God, which is to give us purpose and meaning. There's a lot of people that are looking for Jesus from a lot of different perspectives. There are lost people that are looking for Jesus to be their savior. There are Christian people that are looking for Jesus to intervene and to do something and to provide something into their life. And then there are a lot of people that grew up in church and have been outside of the church and they get to certain points in their life where they're like, all right, I think I made a mistake. I think I need to make a U-turn and I need to go back to where I started. But when we go on a quest looking for Jesus, just like the Magi or anyone else in the particular Christmas story, when we go looking for Jesus, if we're looking for Jesus in the wrong places, it's possible for us to love him, want him and need him, but actually miss him. And especially those of us who are in Christ, we're Christians, and we're saying, Lord, I want you to use me. I want you to become more real in my life. It's possible for us to actually miss Jesus because we're looking for him in Bethlehem. We're looking for him in Jerusalem, but we're missing him in Bethlehem. See, Jerusalem is the big, it's the obvious. And so if we're constantly looking for Jesus to show up in our life in the big, in the powerful, in the grand and in the obvious, we very well might miss what Jesus is doing in obscurity because that's what Bethlehem is. Bethlehem is the beginning, it's not the end. Bethlehem is the obscure and the subtle, it's not the grand and the obvious. And part of what God is wanting to do in his people that I talked about in week number one is prepare us, that's what I read from Luke. Prepare us to be a people who are ready for the Lord, his first coming and his second coming. But part of the way that we prepare the way of the Lord is we allow him to prepare us, a people prepared. We have to allow God to prepare us. And so when we're saying, God, okay, I want you to prepare me, I want to be prepared in this hour. I want to be prepared in this season. I want to walk in all that you have for me. I want to walk in the victory that Jesus won for me. I want to be closer to you. And I'm looking for you, Jesus. But yet sometimes Jesus doesn't show up in the obvious ways in our life. Jesus doesn't show up in the things or in the places that we think he's going to, but it doesn't mean that he's not there. And so this morning, what I want to communicate to you is this, if we're going to find Jesus, we have to know where to look for him. If we're going to find Jesus, listen, how many know you can go through Christmas this 30 days or however many weeks, four weeks of Advent, you can go through it and actually miss Jesus. And you can also go through many days of your life, of going to church, reading your Bible and never experiencing freedom, never experiencing maturity, never experiencing a heart that is prepared for him, even though for many, many years intellectually and in your heart, you would say you believe in him. I'm thinking of the words that we sang this morning, joy to the world, the Lord has come. Let earth receive her king, let every heart prepare him room. How do we prepare him room? We have to know where to look for him. And he's not going to always be in the Jerusalem's of our life. What are the Jerusalem's? Well, let me throw some things out to you that are obvious Jerusalem's in our life. Number one is we're constantly looking for Jesus in the places of our life where we think he would be, which like number one is like our sin. Well, I really want to grow and I want to mature in being a follower of Jesus, but I think Jesus is really mad with me about this thing that I've done or this thing that I continue to do. What if Jesus is actually not so much focused there as he is in the more subtle arena of what's causing that sin? When we look at Jesus, his whole life, why he put him in Bethlehem before Jerusalem is because Jesus first had to go through a process of preparation. The Messiah went through a process of preparation. Luke chapter two, verse 52 says that Jesus as a child increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man. So Jesus went through a process of coming into maturity or being prepared to be the Messiah. Why do we think that we are going to be ready on day one to experience the fullness of what God wants to do in our lives without going through a process of preparation? Why are we looking for Jesus in places that seem to be obvious, but really he's working in subtle places of our life? Let me throw out a couple of places that I think are the Jerusalem and contrast them with the Bethlehems of our life. Number one is, as I said, our sin. And here's, this is the obvious place. We think Jesus is zeroed in on our sin. By the way, in all of our locations, if you have ever in your entire life sinned, I want you to raise your hand. Just go ahead and raise your hand. By the way, if you're not raising your hand, welcome to the club, you just sinned. What I just saw with all of our hands raised is I saw a lot of people qualified for the grace of God. So because a lot of times when we think the Jerusalem of my life, where's God working? As we think of the obvious, we think that he is zeroed in on our sin and we say things like this, God, I know I should stop, but I don't know how. I know I shouldn't do that anymore. I know that this disappoints you. And all of that is true, but there's a greater reality. There's a Bethlehem to the Jerusalem and the Bethlehem, which is the subtle, the Bethlehem, which is where he's at work preparing us long before he ever reveals us and manifests us, is instead of being so focused on our sin, God is working on the hidden roots of our lives that are causing that sin. The hidden roots, the under the surface roots that keep driving that sin are insecurities, excuse me for just a second, our insecurities, our fears, our pride, our broken belief systems, our trauma, our wounds that are perpetuating and underneath the surface of our life where we don't show and where we don't go very often, we're trying to manage sin. We're trying to manage it. We're trying to say, God, I know you're irritated with me. I know that you're mad at me. I know that this upsets you because you're a holy God, but just give me another chance and I'll fix it because we're looking at the Jerusalem and God is saying, no, I want to start by preparing you by going deep into the surface of your heart in healing and revealing those things that are driving the fruit on the branches of your life. You see, can I just let you in on something? Nothing you do is gonna shock God. God doesn't look at your life and your sin and God didn't see that coming. Whoa, how did they come up with that? Or God knows the beginning from the ends and God also knows that you can't manage your sin. If salvation were nothing more than a self-improvement plan, Jesus would not have left heaven. He would have just sent an angel to tell you what Isle at Barnes and Nobles to buy the best self-help book that will make you a better version of yourself. God is not interested in just making you a better version of yourself. He wants to make you a new version of himself in you. And that begins with dealing with the roots. We can all stop and look at our own lives and the things that we wrestle with and the sins that we wrestle with and the shame that comes with that. And we can either cover it up or we can expose it to the Lord and let Him do in us to prepare us what He did with His son Jesus. And I'm not saying Jesus sinned, but Jesus still, even though He was without sin, still had to go through a process of maturity. And part of our process of maturity is dealing with those broken root systems that are driving our sin. This is one of the obvious places that we're looking for Jesus to be. What does Jesus do when He goes to the root systems? He calls us to repentance. I don't know about you, but I grew up in a church where when I heard the word repentance, I thought tears, I thought of sorrow, I thought of shame, I thought of promises that said, I'll never do it again. And running to the altar and getting saved every Sunday and God, I'm so ashamed and the more shame I allowed myself to feel and the more guilt connected to that sin, I allowed myself to feel. The more I felt like God was like, okay, He's sincere. Okay, we'll give you another shot. That's a very, very 1% version of what repentance really is. Obviously there's a godly sorrow that we experience because of our sin that separates us from God, but there's actually more to it because the word repentance means to change your belief systems or to change your thinking. And when God calls you and I to repent, He's not pointing his finger and going, repent, like I can't take it anymore, I'm about to growl. No, He's saying, I want you to change the way you're thinking because your belief systems are the roots that I'm focused on. This isn't sin management. This is, God wants us to become more righteousness conscious than we are sin conscious. He wants us to become more focused on who we are in Christ as new creations than we are by the identity that our sin tries to shape us in. Romans two verse four says, or do you presume on the riches and the kindness and the forbearance and patience of God, not knowing, and listen, that it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. God is so kind, what He wants to do is He wants to rewire us in the secret places of our life, in the Bethlehem's of our life and cause us to think differently. One of the scriptures that we often think of when it talks about how God has built us and equipped us and made us is Psalm 139, where David's writing, he says, for you form me, my inward parts, you knitted me together in my mother's womb, I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made, wonderful are your works, my soul knows it very well. But then think about this next part, he says, my frame was not hidden from you when I was being made in secret. Do you know how God makes you physically? He makes you secretly in the hidden place of your mother's womb. He knits you together in your mother's womb from embryo that's just growing and doubling in size and has a heartbeat and feels pain and has a brain and a nervous system, but it matures and it grows in the mother's womb. Nobody sees it, but you're there and the Lord is the one knitting you together until the day of your birth and your manifestation. Do you know that God also knits us together in our identity in Christ, in the secret place? The place with him, the place of submission to him that becomes a spiritual womb, where he's dealing with the root systems. And replacing our sin consciousness with a righteousness belief system. What's the second Jerusalem that we look for God obviously and think that must be where he's at. That must be where Jesus is at versus where he really is. Well, I think it's this, I think it's, we're looking for Jesus in breakthrough moments. This is gonna be controversial, okay? We're looking for Jesus in breakthrough moments and here's what we say. It's like, I know my life is broken. I know things are messed up. I know that I'm going through hardship. I know this is a test of trial. It's even sickness at times. And we say, Lord, give me a miracle in a moment. Let me just start by saying, I believe that God is a miracle working God. Does God heal instantaneously? Yes. Does God deliver instantaneously? Yes. Can God set people free? And does he, from demonical oppression, yes. I'm not saying he doesn't do those things, but I am, here's what I am saying, that it's far too easy for us when we're dealing with any difficulty in any struggle in our life to say, God, change it now. And then it doesn't happen. And then what we say is, I guess he either doesn't care or he's not strong enough or he's saying no. Instead of realizing that very often, instead of breakthrough moments, God wants us to renew our mind and our way of thinking that brings about change. It's obvious to look for him in Jerusalem. That's like the breakthrough moment. Everybody loves that moment. But God's like, I'll give you a breakthrough starter kit, but now I want you to walk that out. Romans chapter 12 verse one says, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly unacceptable unto God, which is your reasonable act of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind so that you might prove what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God for your life. He's saying, I want you to renew your mind. I want you to change the way that you think and can I just tell you that that is not a singular moment. That is a process. In the Old Testament, in Judges chapter three, God is bringing the children of Israel into the Promised Land under Joshua. And it says this, it says, and when God brought them in, he did not defeat all of their enemies all at once. He didn't defeat all of their enemies all at once and he did not give them all of the inheritance all at once. It says, so that those who had never learned to make war might learn to fight. In other words, if God had brought the children of Israel into the Promised Land, fought all their battles for them, cleared it out, two things would have happened. In the vacancy, before they could possess the Promised Land, it would be overrun with wild animals. That's what it says, it'd just be overrun because all these people are keeping that at bay. The second thing that would happen is a generation would quickly rise up that doesn't know how to fight. You and I live in an amazing nation. And one of the, I think the greatest treasures of our country is what's referred to as the Great Generation. Those who fought World War II, those who went overseas, faced pure evil, came back and built families and to me, I love hearing the stories of the people who came back from that greatest generation, what a national treasure it is. But you know what, they saw things that my generation never saw. And now we're a couple generations away from that and it's amazing to me how culture begins to instantly shift back towards the very ideologies that they actually fought against in order to preserve our freedoms in this nation. And it's because they don't know the price that comes with fighting for that. And I think that that's true both in Israel going into the Promised Land. And it's also true with how God oftentimes is preparing us as a people. We're saying, God, change everything that is wrong in my life. Change, give me a breakthrough. Give me a miracle in my marriage. Give me a miracle in my finances. God, I'm in debt up to my ears. I can't pay my bills. I don't know how to buy Christmas presents. I got nothing. And what we're saying is, God, all I want is I want a $100,000 check to show up in my mailbox tomorrow, amen. How many would like that to happen, by the way? All right, praise God. But most of the time how God answers that prayer is he's like, let's renew your mind about your budget. And let's renew your mind about your work ethic. Let's renew your mind about that second job and selling a car. Let's renew your mind about investments. Let's renew your mind so that you can get there and get out of the hole that you're in. It's easy to say, God, show up and get me out of this hole. And God says, no, let's renew your minds about all of this. And that's something that happens daily. Second Corinthians chapter four, verse 16 says, we do not lose heart, though our outward man is wasting away, our inward man is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory that cannot be compared. So think about that. Paul's saying this light momentary affliction, nobody in this room has probably had more difficulties than the apostle Paul. He was bitten by a snake. He was beaten with rods. He was beaten with cat and nine tails. He was shipwrecked. He was treading water for a day and a half. He was light about. He was put in prison, ultimately beheaded. He was starving at different times, chased down by wild animals. I mean, people posted negative things about him on social media. It was horrible. I mean, he just went through every, and yet he says this light momentary affliction. Why? It's because his perspective was everything I'm going through right now is preparing me to be able to carry a greater weight of God's glory. And nothing that I'm enduring right now is worthy to be compared with what God's ultimate purpose in my life is. So instead of God being the God of the breakthrough all the time, sometimes he is. Other times he's like, I'm actually going to teach your hands to war. I'm actually going to challenge you to renew and change the way that you think about your life, how you think about me, how you think about others, how you think about all the different dynamics where you need breakthrough in your life. God's like, I want you to renew your mind. Another one of our Jerusalem's that we look for Jesus in instead of the obscure, subtle, progressive things that he does is we're looking for him in church. Now listen, I'm so glad you're here today. Church needs to be a regular rhythm of our life. Every weekend, I mean, every Sunday we worship the Lord. We raise our kids up to do that. And I don't say that because I'm a pastor, I'm a pastor because I believe in church. I think every Christian needs to be plugged in to the local church. Coming to church is not optional. Online is not the same as in person. We need one another. We need to sit next to people that are different from us. We need to be an encouragement. We need to serve. We need to be irritated with one another. We need all those blessed things that happen when we gather together as living stones. But if we're looking for Jesus only in church and saying things like, oh, I believe this is where God lives. So I'm going to church. We're missing the Bethlehem, which is that God lives in us and with us every single day. And very often where he's working in our lives is in our homes, in our families, in our living rooms, at our dining room tables, in our neighborhoods, and even in our workplace, in our coming and our going. That's where God is really working and really preparing us. Yes, this is awesome, but we can't come here every Sunday and go, okay, God, you've got an hour and 20 minutes, maybe an hour 30, depending on how long Pastor Lee goes. You've got an hour 30 to do your work in me. And then I click the time clock and I go back to my regularly scheduled programming. Now the good news is that God doesn't dwell in temples. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit, according to 1 Corinthians. And you are being built up to be a dwelling place for the Lord. Do you know that 90% of the things that we see God do in the book of Acts took place out of church services? They took place in people's homes, on the roads, on missions trips, out in the marketplace, even in some of the darkest corners of society and culture, in the marketplace, in the workplace. This is where God was working and this is where God is moving. And it's possible that we can miss what Jesus is doing in us and through us if we're looking at the obvious. Obviously God works at church, but can I just let you guys all in on a little secret here? You ready? It's a little secret of the ministry. Jesus doesn't live in this room Monday through Saturday and not out there. The reason why he comes here and manifests himself when we all gather together is because we are living stones and when we gather together, we're creating a dwelling place for his presence. But when we go out these doors, Jesus doesn't wave at us and go, bye, buddy, I hope you find you're dead. I mean, he goes with us. Cause he's in us. He's in us. Everybody take your index finger, raise it up. Now turn it and point it at yourself. You're pointing at God's dwelling place. He lives in you. That means everywhere that you go, he goes. And God wants to manifest himself. He wants to work in your life every single day in every single environment because 2 Corinthians 4 or 7 says, we have this treasure in these jars of clay. You might not think much of yourself but let me tell you, you are a carrier of the presence of Jesus. Everywhere you go, you can talk to him. He's working in you. And he's not just gonna work through sacraments. He's not just gonna work through the obvious religious things. He works through conversations. He works through relationships. He works through circumstances. He works through conflict. He works through laughter. He works through joy. Fourth thing that is a Jerusalem in our lives, it's the place where we are looking for Jesus but don't find him because he's really in Bethlehem, the subtle places of our life is we're constantly looking at God for an audible voice. Saying, God, if you would only speak to me. God, if you would just speak to me, I'm listening. I have served Jesus since I was 12 and I've never heard an audible voice. I've heard him speaking here and I will tell you there's been a few times where he's spoken internally in a way that every fiber of my being has been shaken but nobody else heard it. But maybe twice in my life has that happened but he has spoken to me every single day through his word. The ironic thing is that in America, we have more Bibles per capita than the rest of the world combined and yet most of them are closed. We're still looking for truth. We're still looking for peace. We're looking for answers. We're looking for change and transformation. God, please change me, transform me, forgive me. I want to be closer to you. I want to draw near to you. If you would just speak to me, everything would change. If I could just hear the audible voice of God that would clear up all doubt and I would never deviate again, I would be so confident and so bold in my faith and can I just tell you that is just absolutely not true. Because there's four gospels full of people that heard God's audible voice and they still miss Jesus. But yet the Bethlehem of our life, which by the way, the name Bethlehem means house of bread and Jesus said, man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from my mouth. He called the Bible, the scriptures, the bread of life. This is our daily bread. Give us our daily bread. He's given it to us. And every single day he's like, if you'll come to me and if you'll open and give me your full attention to the word, listen, he's speaking to us 24 hours, seven days a week, but it's subtle, it's Bethlehem. But to the one who has ears to hear, he's speaking. To the one who's hungry, come, eat. James 1.21 says, therefore put all filthiness and rampant wickedness away and receive with meekness the implanted word of God that is able to save your souls. Psalm 119 says, your word, O Lord, is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. Oh, how often we miss the voice of the Lord. We miss Jesus because we're waiting for him to speak like thunder. When he's whispering in the pages of scripture every single day for us, wisdom cries aloud in the street. It says, come in this way. And yet we're distracted, we're busy, or we're looking for him to do something big and profound. He's spoken to us every single day. When God spoke to Mary about partnering with him in bringing the living word into being Jesus, her words to God were, I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word. Do you know that that is the greatest statement that we can make to God? James 1 says, receive with meekness. In other words, we humble ourselves and we say, God, your word is true. Mary said, I'm your servant, whatever. It doesn't make sense. I don't know how this is gonna work. How can I carry God? I'm just, I'm not even married. I've never known a man and I'm a human being, but it doesn't matter. Lord, let it be to me according to your word. What if we said to God, Lord, I don't know how you're gonna bring change into my life. I don't know how you wanna use me. I don't know how to overcome the things that have kept me bound or limited me for many, many years, but I'm saying this, Lord, let it be to me according to your word. I humble myself. And as we do that, we will find ourselves, listen, if we'll come to his word, we'll find ourselves just like the Magi coming and actually finding Jesus. There he is. And a manger in Bethlehem, the living word of God silently and lowly. That same Jesus would grow up and mature and become the son of the living God, the savior of the world and our soon incoming King. What starts small in seed form in our life of the word of God will grow into the kingdom of God and will bring about maturity and bring about a life and a heart that is fully prepared for him daily and in his coming. I wanna invite you all across the room and all across the locations if you would just stand with me. Lord Jesus, today our heart, like Psalm 84 says, is set on a pilgrimage to find you. Jesus, we wanna find you. Your word says in Jeremiah 29, that if we seek you with all of our hearts, then we will find you. Lord, today I'm praying across this family that you would more than anything give us hearts to seek you. Give us hearts to pursue you. Lord, soft, pliable, hungry hearts that are willing to go on a journey just like the wise men and the magi that takes all the days of our life but we say, Lord, we wanna find you. We wanna find you daily and we wanna find you in the obvious but we wanna find you in the subtle and we surrender to you. We surrender to you, to your process and to the subtlety of your commitment to us that daily we are not alone, that daily you are with us and that you are working in the big things and in the subtle things, in the big and in the little, in the Jerusalem and in the Bethlehems of our life. Holy Spirit, we submit to you. Jesus, we submit to your word. Have your way in us, prepare us, prepare us so that you can manifest us as your sons and daughters to the world, carriers of your presence and the good news. I wanna invite the prayer team to make their way down to the front this morning and here's how we're gonna dismiss this morning. Today, there might be, I'm convinced that the Holy Spirit is doing this where he's highlighting some areas that you've been looking for Jesus in the wrong places or there's some areas that he's calling you to yield to submit to. And today my challenge would be part of what repentance looks like is humbling ourselves and actually coming to the conclusion, I can't do it on my own. Maybe you're listening to me today and you have never personally invited Jesus Christ to be your Savior and your Lord. Today's the day. Maybe today you're a Christian but there are areas that you keep cycling through because you're trying to manage your sin but today it's just surrendering it. Or maybe today you're just asking for God's grace to meet you and you do need him to show up in a significant way in your life. We believe that God does that when we pray together and when we confess to one another and I'm just gonna open the altars. I'm gonna pray and dismiss. And if there's something that the Holy Spirit is highlighting maybe you need to come to Christ. Maybe you need to repent and come home and reset your relationship with Jesus. Maybe there's an area of surrender and maybe you just need someone to stand and pray with you and believe God for him to begin to move and to give you eyes to see where he's moving. I'm just gonna invite you to come and receive prayer because God will meet us as we step closer to him. If we draw near to him, he draws near to us. And so Lord today as we go from here, send us with hearts that are expectant and looking for you. And Lord give us hearts as well that receive your word with meekness. Meet us as we pray for one another. Lord it's by your grace and by your grace alone that we stand and we ask this today in Jesus' name. Amen.