Belonging precedes behavior - it's our identity as God's loved children that enables us to become more like Him. The message emphasizes four practical ways to imitate God: being real and truthful, forgiving and letting go of bitterness, saying no to our flesh, and watching our words.
Notes for this sermon: https://bit.ly/3WRBzIH
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LIFE Church
Ephesians, The Radiant Church Chapter 5
Belonging precedes behavior - it's our identity as God's loved children that enables us to become more like Him. The message emphasizes four practical ways to imitate God: being real and truthful, forgiving and letting go of bitterness, saying no to our flesh, and watching our words.Notes for this sermon: https://bit.ly/3WRBzIHWebsite | https://lifechurchww.comFacebook | https://facebook.com/lifechurchwwInstagram | https://instagram.com/lifechurchwwVida Music | https://vidamsc.com
- Duration:
- 42m
- Broadcast on:
- 04 Aug 2024
- Audio Format:
- mp3
[MUSIC] >> Thanks for listening to the Life Church podcast. We hope you enjoy this message. For more information about Life Church, visit lifechurchwww.com. [MUSIC] >> Well, I get the privilege of continuing in our series right now. If you're new to church, I want to welcome you here today. We're studying a book of the Bible in the New Testament called The Book of Ephesians. So we're in this series right now, The Book of Ephesians, The Radiant Church. And chapter five, we're taking it chapter by chapter. And my wife and I had the privilege of actually going on site to Ephesus in the last couple of weeks. We're able to go to Corinth and also biblical Ephesus, modern day Turkey. And so here's my little tourist pick. I'm there, got my headphones set for our guide talking to us. But these right here, these are the actual stones that the Apostle Paul would have walked on, that the early church would have walked on. This is walking down one of the streets in Ephesus. So there'd be shops and stores along the way. Kind of gives you an idea of what this metropolitan city 2000 years ago would have looked like. And this is I think the third largest library of the time. At the end of this road, Colosseum over here to the right. So a really quite amazing area, Ephesus is a place that people wanted to go to start a business. It was very populated and very wealthy, very wealthy city. So we're going to take off here in chapter five. Come on to stand up for the reading of God's word. Ephesians chapter five says this, imitate God. Will you say these two words with me? Imitate God, therefore in everything you do, because you're his dear children. Live a life filled with love following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God. So I'm titling today's message, the very first two words of chapter five. Imitate God. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for sending your Holy Spirit to give us ears to hear, minds to receive, hearts to be open to hear what you are saying to us out of your word today. We ask that you would help us to become these imitators of God that you would have us to be as dearly loved children. I pray for your church today online and in the room. I pray God, no matter what season they find themselves in today, watching this or being here, God, I pray that whether they are a mountaintop or a valley, the presence of the Holy Spirit to really encompass your church and strengthen them in every area of their life. And we pray, God, that when we leave this place, we will leave different than the way we came in, more like you after being together than when we first arrived. We pray all this in Jesus' name, and everybody shout it amen. You may be seated. How many of you remember this game? And we were kids called Simon Says. How many of you are willing to play a game with me right now? Let's just play. Let's see how many of you remember it. We'll see how good you are. We'll see if I can trick you. Ready? Simon says touch your nose. Okay. Simon says touch your shoulder. Simon says touch your elbow. Simon says touch your other elbow. Simon says touch your cheek. Touch your chin. How many touch your chin? You're out. So you remember that game, right? Simon had to say it, and if Simon said it, then you did it. But if Simon didn't say it, and you did it, you were out. So I think about that game, and I think about this message imitate God. How can we as sinful human beings imitate God? Very simply, hear what God says and do it. If God says it, do it. If God doesn't say it, or if culture says it and God doesn't say it, don't do it. So God says, Simon says, Paul says to the Ephesians, and we do it. It's an amazing idea for us as sinful human beings to be able to obey God and to imitate Him. Imitate in the Greek language is where we get the word mimic, which means to imitate the pattern or behavior of someone you admire. The Greek language is a little more expressive and gives us a more expanded understanding of what the original writers were trying to communicate to us. For instance, we have one word for love in our English language. And the love that I have for my wife is different than the love I have for my children, which is different than the love I have for chips and salsa, which is close, but not exactly the same. So we like, I love pizza, I love the Seattle Seahawks, I love, I don't love the San Francisco 49ers, sorry. Or the Raiders, bro, I see you back there, I see you. But in Greek, they had at least four words for love. They had love of friendship, fileo. They had romantic love, eros. They had the love of a parent and a child's storgae. But the apostles introduced another word, there was not all that common and it was the word agape. Agape is a divine love with no strings attached. The reason I tell you that is because as this chapter started, it said imitate God as dear children. Another translation says as beloved children, actually like that translation better because I think it gives the definition of the word dear in the Greek better. The root word of the word dear is agape. So you imitate God as beloved children, as kids who are loved by God. Why is that important as we begin the discussion on how do we become like God? How do we imitate Him? How do we let our behavior begin to be like God's behavior? How do we do it? Paul lays this foundation. You imitate God as dearly loved kids of his. Here's the thought. Being precedes behavior. If you approach practical Christianity from a religious viewpoint, which is I got to clean myself up so I can be a child of God, rather than a relational viewpoint, God loves me. I become a child of God. He loves me out of my sin. You'll never measure up if you approach God from I got to clean myself up in order to measure up. You'll never measure up. You'll never be able to imitate God because you will always be under the weight of shame and guilt. You'll never be free. You'll always see yourself as a slave. You'll always see yourself as a sinner. You'll never see yourself as a loved child. Loved children imitate their parents. Anybody in the house today? When you're a loved child, you imitate your heavenly father. And if you see yourself as a loved child, you will begin to more easily imitate God. Now most children, they mimic their parents without even trying. And when you're a parent of little kids, that scares you. I remember when our kids were little, and it was like, where did that attitude come from? Their mother. That's where that came from. Now you know what she's really like. No, it really is like, oh man, they're not even trying, but they're little attitudes and they're little nuances. You go, oh, that's me. Now I need to change. I want to make sure that what they're mimicking is the right thing. How do kids do that without trying? Because they're watching. They're watching their parents. They're close to their parents, and they're watching them all the time. How do you imitate God? Watch Him. How do you watch Him? You need to get close to Him. And that's why Paul is letting you know, you will imitate God as loved kids. Because loved kids will draw close to God. Loved kids will get near enough to see what He's like, and when you see what He's like, it will become without trying. Without trying, you will just, I want to be like that. I want to be more loving. I want to be more kind. I want to be like you treat me. I want to be like that. Now when we parented our kids, I wanted to parent my kids the way I saw God parent me. Because I'm watching Him, and I want to imitate Him. And so if they messed up, now my fleshly part of me would be like, "Get mad." But I realized God didn't do that with me. Now God would discipline me, and God would tell me right from wrong. But He would lovingly let me belong even in my mess. And there's something about watching closely to God that makes you become more like Him. Oh, are you getting this foundation? I needed to lay this foundation before I go into my four thoughts that Paul gives us out of the book of Ephesians on how do you practically live out your Christianity? How do you imitate Him? How do you do that? Well, it needs to be first on the foundation that I'm accepted by God. I'm loved by Him, and I want to draw near so I can see Him closely. And when I see Him closely, I have a heart desire. I want to be like you. I want to be like you. And without having to even hardly try, I become more like Him because He let me belong. Now of course, the writer of Ephesians Paul did not write chapter one and then verses. We put those in so we could find verses and pieces of Scripture more easily and readily. So chapter five, in order to get the whole idea of imitating God, I'm going to go backwards a little bit in four and then go forwards in five to encapsulate all of the context of what the apostle Paul is attempting to communicate to us about how do we imitate God. So let's talk about it. Imitating God. Dr. Chapter four, he said, "Each of you must put off falsehood." You got to put off falsehood, which is this put off is this Greek word that is really a picture of taking off clothes that you discard, you cast away. You cast away, discard that falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor. And I find this interesting that the context of what he is saying this to is we are all members of one body. He's talking about being honest in church. Now you think of pastor, what are you talking about? I never lie in church. So put off falsehood. Here's what I think. Well, here's the thought. How do I imitate God as I speak truthfully? And what is he getting after? He's getting here. Be real. Be real. Don't be religious. Be real. Be real. This is one of the things I love about our church is you get in a small group and you will find out. We call them life groups where we're going Sunday. We gather in a larger group like this. But in throughout the week, we have life groups where people can, we met in a golf course and had a blast over the summer and people meet in coffee shops or homes. But in those settings, you get to know each other a little bit more. And you find out, oh, you can be real without condemnation. And we're all on a journey to become more like Jesus. And Paul is encouraging us if you're going to imitate God. You can't start from religious quick. Take off that religious mask and be real. Go ahead and tell your neighbor. Be real. Because I'm going to be real with you. All right? I want to take you to the Old Testament to a guy. Even if you're new to church, you've heard of him, his name is Moses. And Moses had this relationship with God that he talked to God as a man, talks to his friend. The Bible says face to face. He had a real deep relationship with God. Exodus chapter 34, you can look it up and read this whole story. But it tells us that he got so close to God that the presence of God affected the way he looked and his face radiated. Think about that. You have to come out of your prayer time and your face is literally glowing. It's like, wow. So his face is glowing so much. This is, you know, prior to Raybans and sunglasses and the children of Israel, like, man, Moses, you know, put a veil over it, your face is shining. So he had a conversation with the children of Israel. He then leaves, puts a veil on. He'd go back into the presence of God, take the veil off, have this conversation and encounter with God. His face would, it would be bright again. He'd come back out, put a veil on, but here's what was happening. The radiance of Paul's face began to diminish and become more like we normally are as humans. The longer he was from the presence of God. Paul writes to the Corinthians in the New Testament and says, "We're not like Moses who would put a veil over his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing the end of what was passing away." So what he's saying is that that glory, even though it was amazing that it was on Moses, that is passing away what we have as way better. What I'm not suggesting is that Moses put a veil on so that people wouldn't recognize that he hadn't been in the presence of God for a while and the radiance was kind of diminishing. But I am suggesting we do. I am suggesting that we put veils on when we haven't been in the presence of God and we aren't walking in the Spirit, and here's how we do it. We show up to church, we're like, "Hey, we greet one another, how you doing, brother? Oh, glory be to God, doing great." When in reality, you just had a fight with your spouse on the way to church. Just kick the dog before you got in the car and your kids don't like you anymore and you haven't liked them for a year. That's the real issue, right? That's what's really going on. Well, what's happening is we put these veils on and we say, "Oh, glory be to God, hallelujah, God's good. Oh, yeah. I know God's good. I'm asking you, how are you doing?" Now, I know it's a greeting in our society and we're like, "Hey, how you doing, like good, great." But every now and then, maybe we should just get honest and then we just, it's like backing up a dumpload truck. I think people would be surprised. The beep starts happening and you're like, "Beep, beep, beep, you asked." Here's what our response would be, right? We'd be like, "I think you need to go see a pastor. God bless you." To imitate God, one of the first things Paul wants us to know, he's like, "Listen, belonging precedes behavior, but now let's talk about what that behavior should look like. It's time to get real. It's time to be honest. It's time to, you need to have relationships in your life where somebody knows you." Now, not saying you have to stand up in a room this size and confess all your sins, but somebody needs to know. Somebody in your world needs to know what you struggle with, needs to know your weaknesses, needs to know how you're really doing, because somebody wants to pray for you. Somebody wants to love you where you are. And in those relationships, when we speak truthfully, we are able to become more like God. Why is that important? Because you will never be free from that which you're not willing to admit you're bound to. So you won't be able to imitate God if you don't speak truthfully. So you have to get to a point in your life where you trust somebody, where there's somebody in your life. Some people in your life. I've got people in my life I talk to, and I share my world with, and we pray for one another. It's one of the things I look forward to every month is one of my phone calls I have with a pastor friend of mine. And I mean, it doesn't matter where we are in the world, what's going on, going through airports, whatever we're at, it's like, "Okay, this is our day. We got to find a spot. We got to find a time." And we've been in airports and we've been walking around with our earbuds in and we're telling each other what's going on and we're praying for one another. You will never be able, you'll only be able to become like Jesus if you begin to put off discard falsehood, religious pretense, acting like everything's okay all the time until you, you'll be able to really become like Jesus if you can speak truthfully. You only do that when you be real. All right. Two thought out of Ephesians is this as he says, "In your anger, do not sin, do not let the sun go down while you're still angry and do not give the devil a foothold." If you're going to imitate God and I think this might be the best way to imitate God is we have to learn to forgive and let go of bitterness. Now when he says, "Do not give the devil a foothold," the idea is this. You're thinking about shutting the door and locking out the enemy and it's nighttime and you live in kind of a sketch neighborhood and people have been broken into and you pause before you lock the door because you're just wondering about how important it is to lock it or maybe you're really angry about something and you pause before you shut the door and there's an enemy on your porch and they just put their foot in the doorway and now you can't shut the door, why? because you waited too long. You need to know this, anger has a time limit on it. He said, "Don't let the sun go down on your anger because at some point if you don't shut the door, the devil gets a foothold and now you can't lock the door." Because anger always brings his cousins called bitterness and they fester and it always turns in to something worse. I heard the story from the pastor that he went to a gas station, one of those gas stations that it kind of mini-marts where you can go in and get your Gatorade, get your snacks and do all that and he was getting gas when he noticed that someone was jogging with their Doberman on a leash and they were jogging up and they come up to the gas station and there's a park bench out there by the sidewalk and they put the leash of their Doberman on the park bench, tied it on there. And they were going in to do whatever they were going to do in the gas station store. When all of a sudden the car goes by and backfired, scared the Doberman and the Doberman lunged forward and busted the park bench out from the bolts that were holding it onto the sidewalk. Well, now not only was the Doberman scared from the backfire of the car but was scared because something was banging around behind it that his leash was tied onto and just took off running faster while the park bench was swinging into this car and then swinging into that car and going down the road just knocking one car into another car while the owner was chasing after his Doberman saying stop, stop and when all along the damage would just kept happening because the dog had something that was carrying behind it. Church, that's exactly what unforgiveness looks like in somebody's life. They're running from something wishing they could let go of it. If they don't let go of it, what's happening is they're just leaving a trail of damage behind them everywhere they go. Simon says forgive. God says forgive. There's no other way to be more like God than when we forgive because the Bible says while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. I know that's not easy but he didn't ask you to imitate somebody else. He didn't ask you to imitate the best version of you. He didn't ask you to imitate culture. He said imitate God and God's number one characteristic is he forgives. He forgives and he lets go. So if I'm going to imitate God I'm going to learn to be real and speak truthfully of people in my life that know me and then I'm going to be forgiving and letting go and let's see in chapter 5 what else Paul tells us on how we can imitate God. Let there be no sexual immorality. Now let's get the context again the Ephesian people were surrounded by the temple of Diana or Artemis whether you're Roman or Greek name and the temple of Diana was known to be among many things the fertility God and we saw while we were there all sorts of little temple of Diana figurines and the temple of Diana the goddess Diana I mean not the temple the goddess Diana was adorned with multiple breasts all over her body on the front side because she was this god of fertility she also was you know the god of huntress which that part was kind of cool but anyway so Paul is writing let there be no sexual immorality because this was rampant in their culture just like it is today in ours let there be no impurity or greed among you now it might be normal for culture but it's not going to be normal for you such what does he say here such what what's that last word there's four letters for such what sins that seems kind of harsh such sins have no place among God's people so what is Paul telling us how do we imitate God we learn to say no to our flesh sexual immorality is anything any sexual activity outside of marriage that is reserved for the covenant of marriage now this is what the world does but when we imitate God we learn to say no to our flesh these were a people who were accustomed to the worship of the fertility god of the name of Diana sexual perversion was culturally normal and so here what we have is we have a culture that is always things haven't changed the god of the culture two thousand years ago is the same god of the culture today and Paul calls sexual perversion and immorality what it is he calls it sin even if culture attempts to display men dressed like sexually immoral women as a display of tolerance and acceptance Simon says or rather God says it's sin and it has no place among God's people come on Paul why are you being so judgmental don't you love the people of Ephesus don't you you should love them and of course he is loving them and the church did love them and and the church today loves everybody that's what we're called to do but he's letting us know that what is normal among the culture is not to be normal among you and why is this important to be preached why should I preach it why did God have it declared in scripture because listen culture will always shout at people to tell them what culture thinks is right and wrong and if the word of God is not constantly preached and declared people will become deceived and people will worship false gods so some Christians think well listen it's the world and that's what the world is going to do and I agree with that a hundred percent but some people think well the church has no place to preach to the world just preach to the church okay I get that for the most part but I want to ask a question do you know how the pastor of this church of Ephesus his name was Timothy it's called the Bishop of Ephesus do you know how he died do you know how Timothy gave his life he was the one who Paul wrote to in first and 10 second Timothy where Paul wrote to this young disciple of his and said hey God has not given us a spirit of fear but he's given us a spirit of power and of love and of a sound mind so he encouraged him to rise up and Timothy obviously became more bold the older he became and at the age of 80 this old pastor ended up being martyred for his faith and I want to read to you how he was martyred if you can google some of this yourself if you'd like to got questions biblical answers so your questions biblical answers from Fox's book of martyrs and then the apocryphal of Timothy look at this here's some quotes Fox's book of martyrs how did Timothy die as the pagans were about to celebrate a feast called Categogian Timothy so this is culture is celebrating a festival Timothy meeting the procession so he was outside the walls of the church what are you doing Timothy get back in where you belong he severely reproved them for the ridiculous idolatry which so exasperated the people that they fell upon him with their clubs could you imagine and beat him in so dreadful a manner that he expired of the bruises two days after can you imagine you know the god of this world inspiring so much anger in people that when a pastor got up to declare right from wrong 80 years old they would beat him with clubs to death another another historical document states this Timothy tried to put an end and look at this put an end to a pagan festival in honor of and I just want you to notice this of this Greek god he tried to put an honor a festival in honor of this Greek god okay called again Categogian in which the participants would dress in costumes mask and partake in sexual immorality let me just pause here just for a minute I find it very interesting you know we're in this this series of of Ephesians and and it just happened to work out for my wife and I'd actually walk the streets of Ephesus and do some more research and then the Olympic ceremonies have opening ceremonies while we're gone and we're in the midst of all this and we're in the midst of teaching out of this book and these things begin to take place and people are disturbed and there's all this discussion about whether it was you know mocking the last supper or not and then they the organizers of the of the the Olympic opening ceremonies said that it that it was not about the last supper but it was this this is what they said according to USA today and their own social media website they said it was in honor of this the Olympic organizer said it was in honor of this Greek festivity which is the same festivity that Timothy stood up against where they were dressing in costumes masks and partaking in sexual immorality oh and murder it is recorded that Timothy exhorted them saying men of Ephesus do not be mad for idols but acknowledge the one who truly is God instead of oh yeah you can give God praise for that kind of boldness this is from the apocryphal acts of Timothy instead of listening to Timothy the revelers attacked and beat him while Timothy was still barely alive some fellow Christians took him away from the mob and when he died they buried him in a place called Pion in Ephesus I promise now you do with all that information however you want to do with it but I at least wanted to share that information with you since we're in the middle of the book of Ephesians and this is all going on in our culture right now here's what I promise you culture has always been at odds with God and no matter what the intentions were of those organizers of the Olympic ceremonies honestly doesn't really matter to me all I know is is there's always a God behind culture there's a God there's a God behind culture that hated Timothy hated truth hated confrontation and definitely hated for something to be called sin when all I'm trying to do is express my my own sexual identity however I want it to be now listen what does the church do we love everybody we love everybody no matter what your sexual identity is no matter what proclivities you have no matter you may be in this room and be attracted to the same sex welcome to live church we're here on a journey together but listen we're not changing the word of God and not calling something sin because I have a proclivity towards it so when Paul calls Christ followers after to not be you know the sexual morality of culture it's not to be among you or impurity he adds this and he says nor greedy and he adds that in nor should you be greedy so I've pondered how does someone know if they're greedy do they have to go and see how many you know you know store places they have and barns and how big their barns are or storage units and I don't think so because I think most people that are prideful or people that are greedy they would never say hey I'm prideful and I'm greedy I don't think prideful or greedy people know that they're prideful or greedy so I think there needs to be a question that's asked it would be this are you ever jealous of what someone else has are you ever jealous of what someone else possesses because greed is not seen by how many possessions you have but how many you want not just since we're real here and you you have to be real and you know you gotta put off falsehood let me just talk to you about my greed that I've had come up it's not about what people have I always rejoice with what everyone has that's never really been an issue for me you want to know what mine is accomplishments it's like someone accomplishes something and I'm like happy for him but I want to accomplish something like that tell let me know we can be greedy in different areas right and so we have to admit it and say God that doesn't belong among me so help me to rejoice even with everybody else's accomplishments and really really be grateful for that alright so the point is this I got to learn to say no to my flesh so here's a one way that you can do that is everything you think about purchasing every now and then even though you can purchase it say no and every meal you could eat every now and then just say no you say well why just to teach your flesh it's not in control that's where the whole benefit of fasting is the whole idea of fasting is I just tell my flesh you're not it charge God is the spirit inside me is in charge you can scream all you want I'm not listening we're imitating gone all right last but not least Ephesians chapter five and verse four he said this obscene stories foolish talk and course jokes they're not for you really come on Paul like no no no I know that's how you were in Ephesus I know that's how you were in Milton free water walla wall and Hermiston we got Hermiston pastors hanging out with this this morning right here they're amazing we love you guys so I know that's how you used to be but listen no more obscene stories or foolish talk or course jokes they're not for you instead here's what I want you to do I want you to be thankful to God I want you to learn to be thankful so here's the point watch your words watch your words so God chooses his words carefully so should you and I God chooses what he says carefully so should you and I look this don't use foul or abusive language let everything you say everything yes everything you say be good and helpful so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them all right so we're going to we're going to learn to watch our words God chooses his words so should you and I you know God created the heavens and the earth with words he could have created the heavens and the earth with a thought or say angels go out and do that and just boss people around you just have them do it but he chose to use words why because he wanted us to understand the power of words and we're made in the image of God and God has given you power to your words as well and that's why the Bible says things like this it says death and life are in the power of the tongue and those who love it will eat its fruit the new living says the tongue can bring death or life those who love to talk are going to reap the consequences you know we learned as kids Simon says games like that and then we also heard things like this sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me what a lie from the pit of hell who came up with that it's not true y'all know it's not true some of you are in your forties and you're still affected by what somebody said to you when you were 10 because of the power of words so Paul says if you hey if you're going to be like Jesus you're going to be like God watch how you talk because God's words create life your words will create life or they will create death hear this lean in culture has changed in my lifetime in my lifetime culture has become more vicious nobody plays fair anymore they didn't play fair 2000 years ago but culture throws around words like they don't matter and now we have political debates that are based on personalities and name calling rather than actual issues can you please just talk about an issue rather than just talk about personality differences and name call one another so here's the caution from scripture for us especially on an election year as a Christ follower watch your words don't play by the same rules that culture plays by they may name call they may curse not you not you that that's that's no no more obscene stories no more foolish talk no more course jokes which by the way be careful which comedians you allow to entertain you there are a few good ones out there and that that have learned that you can be funny without every other word being a four-letter word or some obscene sexual innuendo so be careful who you allow to entertain you because what happens is you'll begin to imitate that you got hurt this really funny story man he said so paul tells here's what I want you to do with your mouth I want you to give God thanks I just want you to here's what he's saying I want you to praise God I just want you to praise him so here's the admonition of Paul to the Ephesians that I think would be my admonition for you today Simon says how do I do all this God says he wraps it all up in one word you ready live a life filled with love so here's my question for us for application today how can I love others better than I am right now that's how I'll imitate God better if I'm going to imitate God better how can I love other people better than I am right now can I love them better by being real can I love them better by forgiving and letting bitterness go can I love them better by doing these things that Paul is encouraging us to do to imitate God what is the area that God would have you focus on how can you imitate him better and I just want to give us a moment 10 seconds to ask God to highlight which area of focus would God want you to focus on today in response to this word saying no to my flesh watching my words forgiving others are being honest and real with other people let's bow our heads close our eyes for a moment holy spirit thank you for being the author of the word of God giving us this opportunity to open your word so that we could become more like Jesus we now pray and ask you to highlight how can I love people better what are you highlighting to me is it about being honest and real with somebody forgiving somebody saying no to my flesh or watching my words let's take 10 seconds and listen to the Holy Spirit speak to you thank you for your voice thank you for speaking to us today now with every head bowed and every eye closed I want to pray one more prayer for somebody in the room to imitate God you must be his dearly loved child how do I become that I admit that I'm a sinner and I want Jesus to be my savior and if you're in this room or watching online and you say Bob I don't know if I'm right with God I don't know if I am with the Bible says I need to be and that is be born again then I'm going to pray a prayer for you with you that you can get your life right with God before you leave this place and you can become born again but I between you me and Jesus I want to know who wants to pray that prayer with me and I'm not going to call you forward or embarrass you in any way but I would love to catch eyes with you so that you could say to Jesus and let me know Bob I'm going to pray that prayer and get my life right with God today would you just look up at me right now catch eyes with me and wave your hand so I can see you and I'm going to scan right now awesome it's the best decision you'll ever make thank you thank you thank you thank you guys thank you so much who else would be here I don't want to thank you thank you God loves you so much his hearts for you it's beautiful thank you thank you okay all our church is going to pray with you so church come let's help out our friends and just everybody repeat after me dear Lord Jesus I come to you today in need of forgiveness forgive me of all my sins come into my heart I want to be born again become my Lord become my Father I want to imitate you all the days of my life I pray this now in Jesus name and everybody shouted amen give him praise today church come on thank you for listening to the life church podcast we want to help you on your journey of finding the life you remain for please visit lifechurch www.com to take your next step and connect with us the world. 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