Following God

morning is a little bit of a different service than we usually have. There's different furniture, a little bit different order, different wardrobe. I originally was hoping that the installation service for our new elders is going to come for Joshua 1 because we would be able to to give that charge, be strong and courageous, because those commands are typically for Joshua. Most of those are for Joshua, but as I studied this passage, I realized this is a great passage for us to meditate upon as a church, to think about what it means to have leaders, to follow them, and to trust God in the midst of this. See, Joshua teaches us two basic things. God is with us, we must follow him. Those are the two truths we're going to hear about today. God is with us. We must follow him. And notice one of those is just a declaration. It's just the truth. It's the indicative. God is with us. The imperative, the command that flows out of that. We must follow him. What we're gonna see specifically is that to follow God means we follow the leaders that he puts over the church and in the church, to help the church. Oftentimes we see these two things as contrast. God is with the church and then there's leaders to follow, but I wanna make it very clear that according to God's design, these two things are necessarily related. They're connected. God is with us. He has always provided leaders for his people. And the church follows God by following those leaders. So as we think about our elders this morning, this is helpful for us. As we think about what God is doing among us, we think about how to follow him. If you turn with me again to Joshua 3, or stay there, it's on page 179 again in a Pew Bible. If you don't have a Bible, please take that home with you. That is God's word. It gives life. Please take and read. We're gonna say the two things, God is with his people, and he provides leaders for his people, so they will follow him. Now, I'm gonna look at this passage in two different ways, because it's long, that's one of the reasons I asked John and Breanne to read it beforehand. I'm first just gonna walk through the narrative, and that's gonna be very brief, and then I'm gonna pick up different elements of the story to walk through. So first, I just wanna walk through the story, This is one contained story, right? There's preparation to go through the Jordan. There's going through the Jordan. There's coming out of the Jordan. It's one story. We have to look at it together. The first half is preparing them and then placing them in the Jordan. The focus is on preparing them in verses one to six. And notice the ark is central. The ark represents the holiness of God is with his people and they have to keep a distance. The priest carrying the ark step foot in the water, and the waters separate, but first they have to be prepared. 7 through 13, there's two specific parts to this section. First, God talks to Joshua. I am with you, I will exalt you. Then notice what Joshua tells the people next in verses 9 to 13. Listen to God. Now let's just go ahead and give a little bit of a teaser about what it means to lead God tells Joshua, I'm going to exalt you. The way of the world would have a leader that says, Israel, listen to me, God is exalting me. Notice that is not what Joshua does. Joshua never draws attention to himself, even though God said, I'm going to exalt you. No, God goes to the people and he says, listen to the word of God. Leadership for God's people is always different because it never draws attention to the leader. It always draws attention to God and His authority and their need to trust Him. As John mentioned already before the reading, 14 to 17, this is the climactic, emphatic section of the passage. The language here is rich. The waters stood up. They rose. They were cut off. And the priests stood firm on dry ground. Friends, what we see here is a new Exodus. We see that the one holy God of Israel, He is sovereign over the waters and over the earth. He can be trusted. Chapter 14 is happening while the waters are still parted. Go get some stones. Go get two different kinds of stones, and one of them, they're gonna go get stones from under the priest's feet. That's the first pile of stones they wanna get. And they're gonna take those with them to stack up at Gilgal. And then the other stack of stones is ones that Joshua stacked at the priest's feet. And that's verses one through 10. There's two memorials so that Israel will remember what God did. And then 11 through 18, and quite frankly, this is where the passage gets a little confusing, okay? The crossing is completed in verses 11 through 18, and it's told in two different ways. The first one emphasizes Joshua, 11 through 14. After the people cross, he is exalted. He is trusted. He will be seen as the new leader who replaces Moses. And then 15 to 18 is the second focus. It's focused on the ark and its central role of God being with them to bring them out. And then we see again the memorial stones. And there's those very important words in verses 22 and 24. When your children ask, you're going to say, the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan, for until you passed over as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for his until he passed over, so that, this is important, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever. We see the purpose. We see the hearts of the kings melting. So that's the storyline. There's preparation to go into the water. There's the ark that enters into the water. There's Joshua, the leader, who takes them into the water. There's God who protects them. There's God who says, remember this, set up stones. And then they come out of the water and into the promised land. Now to look at this passage. In more detail, I want to focus on five elements in the story, five different motifs. First is the Ark, the Ark of the Covenant. It's mentioned 15 times. It's important and central to the story, so we're going to first look at the Ark. Second, the river. What's the significance of the water? Third, the people. The people. Fourth, the stones. And fifth, the leader. The ark, the river, the people, the stones, the leader. So first, the ark of the covenant. It's mentioned 15 times in various ways. It is central metaphorically and literally. It is central here because it represents God is with his people. It stands in the middle of the river while everybody passes by so they can remember that God Almighty is the one who parted these waters. God Almighty is with us. But what's really interesting with this passage and the emphasis of the ark is that God is with us. Look at verse 4. Make sure you keep your distance from the ark. The ark represents God being with them, but they also have to keep their distance from the ark. Because the ark represents he's the holy God. He's the righteous and true God. Yes, this one holy God, he's with you, but you're sinners and you cannot draw near to him at this time. The ark stands as a center so the people see that it is God who is poured in the waters. The ark stands as a center so that the people trust God. The people have to stay distant because they know He is a holy God. The ark for them was a visual and physical reminder of who God is and what He's doing. Now, as we think about this as a church, we don't have an ark. We don't have this piece of worship anymore because We have a new kind of worship. We have something better. You see, Jesus Christ, He has come to be God with us. He tabernacled. The ark was in the tabernacle. God Himself took on flesh. God Himself was with us, literally as a human being. He became like us in every way, yet He was without sin. The beautiful thing about Christ coming to be God with us, He, as the sinful, as the sinless man, God being a sinless man, He died on the cross as if a sinner. He died on the cross as God with us so that whoever believes in Him will not die in their sin, will not die in the judgment of God, will not die with the wrath of God. Because while we have many enemies, sin, death, Satan, the most frightening enemy is the wrath of God. We have sinned against a holy and righteous God. And until we believe in Christ who takes away our sin and washes away our sin and forgives us, the wrath of God is on us. Christ has come so that we can know God is with us and we can draw near. There's no distance in worship anymore. We can draw near because we've been freed from our sin and forgiven from our sin. So our worship, our way of knowing God is with us is better, and it actually even gets better than that. One of the most remarkable things we looked at in the Gospel of John is Jesus says, it is better if I go away from you, disciples, because if I go away, I'm going to send to you the Holy Spirit. Now, at some level, we would all love to say, it'd be great if Jesus was the pastor of this church. He's somebody I could actually trust. He's somebody I could really get behind. But no, God said, Jesus said, it's better. It's better for you if I go away, because then the Holy Spirit is going to come, and the Holy Spirit is going to dwell in every heart, and the Holy Spirit is going to give gifts to the church, and the church is going to be built up when every member uses those gifts to gather for the glory of Christ with the power of the Holy Spirit. It's better for us as God in His sovereignty gives gifts according to His will in Christ through the Holy Spirit. That's how we worship. We trust God as He leads us. We trust God as He forgives us, and we trust God as He gifts us. The Ark of the Covenant was central, and we now see the central focus of our worship as Christ in the power of the Spirit. The second element of this story that is important is the river. I want to read chapter 3 verses 14 to 17 again and make sure we hear this very emphatic language. So when the people set out from their tents to pass over the Jordan with the priests bearing the Ark of the Covenant before the people, and as soon as those bearing the Ark had come as far as the Jordan, and the feet of the priests bearing the Ark were dipped in the brink of the water, now the Jordan overflows all its banks through this time of harvest, the waters coming down from above stood and rose up in a heap very far away at Adam, the city that is beside Zarathustra. And those flowing down toward the Sea of Arubba, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off, and the people passed over opposite Jericho. Now the priest bearing the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord stirred firmly on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan, and all Israel was passing over on dry ground until all the nation finished passing through the Jordan, over the Jordan. One of the things I just want us to make sure we see, the one true God of Israel is the sovereign God over all things. Sovereign over the water, sovereign over the earth. He's sovereign over his people. He separates the waters. As soon as his presence, those carrying his presence, touch the water so that they can stand in the middle and all the people pass by Seeing the Ark in the middle. Now, this is what I would call the New Exodus. We re-read Exodus 14. One of the most dynamic events in all of Scripture. In the Old Testament, it is the key salvation event. God parts the waters, He crushes the Egyptians, He saves His people. This is a New Exodus for a new people who have a new leader who's now going into the Promised Land. We have to remember something. That previous generation that we heard grumble, Moses, well there are not enough graves in Israel. They're at the water, they're standing there, they look behind them, there's the Egyptian army, that's terrifying. So they start to grumble. Well there are not enough graves. We were better off with Pharaoh as a king than God as a king. What's amazing is that God did not let Pharaoh destroy his people as they said this. Instead, he saved them. He saved them while they're grumbling about his salvation. He saved his people from slavery. He saved them from the destruction that Egypt was gonna bring upon them. If you look back to 14.4, you'll see why. He wants his name to be known as great. His mighty works demonstrate to all peoples that his name is great. Remember last week. Why Rahab said she hid the spies? Israel, I've heard of your God. He parted the Red Sea and he crushed Egypt. If only so this Canaanite prostitute would believe God did this so that his name would be great among all the people who need to believe in him to be saved from their sin. God uses this to give this new people a deliverance experience. And at some level, this is the bookend. The salvation from slavery in Egypt began with crossing the Red Sea, but it's not completed until the people get in the Promised Land, and so they cross to Jordan. It's a bookend to show God always begins, completes what He begins. He's completed salvation, He's taken them out of slavery, He's put them in the Promised Land. God is great. He saved them from slavery in a dynamic fashion. He's brought them into the promised land in dynamic fashion. Now, as we think about this, deliverance and redemption are tied to the crossing of the sea. And these are New Testament words that are loaded and go back to these events. And we need to remember something, folks. We're not just saved from the penalty of our sin. We are saved so that we can live a new life in Christ. What He begins, He completes. We're saved from death. We're given life. We're saved from our disobedience. We're now called and saved to obey. There's two parts to our salvation. He transfers us out of the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of His beloved Son. We're not just forgiven for our sins so that we can sin. We're forgiven from our sins so we can now be free from it. To live in the rest of Christ according to his promise. Now let's look at the people. The people of Israel. This is the second generation. The first generation refused God, they rebelled, they died. The new generation has a new leader and a new opportunity to follow the same commands. Trust God. Follow God. Obey God. Do not worship another God. Now, they're commanded to cross a river that's high. That's a note from the author who knows about this river and knows the season, most likely Joshua. The waters are high, they're dangerous. The people are going to have to know they're going to trust God. God's calling them to do something that they naturally would not do. They have to depend upon God. God puts His people in positions where they have to trust Him. And let me make it very clear, this was not a blind leap of faith. They acted over against what could be considered reason. They acted over against what would be typical experience. Trusting the most faithful and reliable source, God's own word. It's not a blind leap of faith. It's a sure act of faith. Because if God says he will do something, he will surely do it. Now when I think about these people, I want to think about the two basic commands they receive. One is in verse five, in the preparation. Joshua said to the people, consecrate yourselves. For tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you. Consecrate yourselves. This is the same basic concept of God is holy, so set yourself apart. Consecrate yourselves. Notice the reason why. God is going to do wonders. God is going to do something amazing. Prepare yourself. I don't know what the consecration would look like. Maybe it was a ceremonial washing. Maybe it was purging of idols. Maybe it was, it's clearly at least repentance. And the reason why is our sinful lives, we cannot see and behold the glory of God and his wonders. And so God prepares them. Consecrate yourselves. The people needed to be changed, they needed to purify themselves so that they are prepared to see and behold and experience the wonders of God. Now look at the second command, verse nine. Joshua said to the people of Israel, come here and listen to the words of the Lord your God. If they're going to follow God, they're going to have to listen to God. That's just common sense. If you're going to follow somebody, you actually have to listen to them. If you don't listen to anybody, there's a real problem. We're all supposed to be disciples who are sheep following the shepherd, and that means we have to listen to others. Here, God is making it very clear to his people, you have to trust my word. Listen to God, Joshua says. Listen to him and trust him. And these two actions, right, these two commands, consecrate yourself and listen, they conclude in following. The people followed God. The people followed the ark. The people went through on dry ground and they followed him. Now church, I want us to think about these two commands. How are we to be consecrated and why are we to listen? These parallel for us very clearly. We're to be consecrated because we need to be changed. We're sinners. Every person in this room is a sinner. Every person's room is predisposed to certain sins. Every person's room has acts of sins. What it means to be consecrated is to say, yes, God, I need to be changed. God, I need to be transformed. God, I need to think better thoughts about you. I need to think right thoughts about myself and my neighbor. I need to have my heart changed so that my desires align with yours. What we see here is consecration leads to service. Consecration leads to enjoying and delighting in the wonders of God. And what I tell you is we're all called to serve. We're all called to participate in the wonders of God by serving, but in order to really enjoy that, we have to be consecrated. I see two basic problems with how folks think about the need for consecration to serve. The first is this. Some folks have a difficult time thinking they are worthy of service. They see all their sin, and they think they'll never be good enough to serve God. So that's the person who's usually down on themselves, despondency. They think their sin keeps them from serving. The second are the folks who have a difficult time seeing their sin and they think they are worthy to see God. Now these two problems have the same basic element to them. There's two elements. They think too much of themselves and too little of God. The first person who thinks their sin will always keep them from serving God, they think too much of their sin and they think too little of God's grace. Second person thinks too much of their gifts and talents and thinks too little of God's holiness and worthiness. Friends, it's amazing. Israel was not consecrated to be God's people. They were consecrated to delight in the wonders of God as God's people. God's grace alone calls us to be God's people. We consecrate ourselves so we can be used by God and delight in Him and enjoy Him. The clear teaching throughout Scripture is this, by grace He calls sinners and by grace He uses sinners. Again, go back to last week. God set that whole event up with the spies so that he could save a Canaanite prostitute. And what's amazing about the way he then uses that Canaanite prostitute, she is in the genealogy of Jesus. He saves her and then puts her into his great plan to save all people. God doesn't need impressive people. God doesn't need holier-than-thou people. God needs humble people who recognize their sin, who recognize that God must be with them. Now, to be consecrated means we're not sinless. It does mean you're not proactively seeking sin, you're not proactively enjoying sin. In order to see the wonders of God, we have to repent of our sin. The second command is listen to the word of God. That's pretty clear. Whatever God says, we should listen to and we should obey. Now, while that seems so clear, why is that so difficult? How many churches can we look at and say, that church clearly hears everything God says and does everything God says? It's not us. Why is that so difficult? Why is it so difficult to say that we're going to listen to God and we're going to obey him? It's because we're all sinners. We don't all fully submit to God's Word, and when I say we, I start with myself. I think a lot of the reason we don't listen fully to everything God says is that we kind of like our comfortable church. We like being comfortable. Because whenever God's Word really starts encroaching upon the body of Christ and chains the body of Christ, it gets uncomfortable. Now, I don't mean we're gonna take the padding out of the pew. I'm talking about how we relate to one another. How we talk about our sin instead of other people's sin. How we talk about the great grace of Christ. Are we willing to give up our comfort so that we can be consecrated, so that we can see the wonders of God? We, as a culture, cling too much to our comfort. If we're truly listening to God, we're not going to be comfortable. We're always going to be challenged. Our next motif, our next element of the story, the stones. Now this is mainly chapter 4. The stones are the primary focus of chapter 4 because we've already seen the waters parted. The people are going to come out, but a key here is the stones because the chapter begins with them, it ends with them. Each man from his tribe was supposed to go get a stone from the feet of the priest so that they can set up a memorial so that the generations afterwards remember God is mighty to save. We're to fear him. Verse 24, that so that is worth your meditation today. Memorial is supposed to remind us of a bigger vision of God. As we look at this, we see this for the next generation. I really want to challenge us today as to what are we teaching our kids? As our children see what we prioritize with our time and energy, what are we teaching them that we really praise? It's worthy of a little reflection right now. What do we give up? What do we prioritize? It's what we really worship. We're teaching our children what is most important by the way we spend our time, the way we use our words. You don't need to go get stones and put them in the yard. Your children are watching you. They're remembering what we say. They remember what we do. And that is teaching them. Now, we actually have memorials prescribed in Scripture. We have baptism. That is a way for the church to recognize a new believer, and every time there's a baptism, we all remember that we've been buried in Christ, and we've been washed by his blood, and we've been given new life as we rise from the dead. It reminds us of who we are. The other one is the Lord's Supper. Do this in remembrance of me. God has set up memorials. God has set up ways for us to remember that we're sinners and Christ's blood is sufficient for us. And he has given us a new covenant by his blood. I need to remind you that in order for your children to enjoy the regular singing of God's songs, the regular ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper, that you need to regularly be here. What regularly takes priority of corporately gathering to praise Christ. We do teach our children What matters? You don't need to go buy stones. You simply need to look to scripture to see what is God prescribed to give us memorials for our second generation. Finally, the leader. We look to the leader. Joshua. He's the replacement for Moses. He's a faithful man of God who's watched Moses, who's learned from Moses. He was one of the spies that came back and said, we're not gonna be afraid of these giants. We trust God. If you look to chapter 3, verse 7, the Lord says to Joshua, after he's already said, be strong and courageous. In chapter 1, now he says, today I will begin to exalt you in the sight of all Israel, that they may know that as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. We look to chapter 4, verse 14. On that day, the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they stood in awe of him, just as they stood in awe of Moses all the days of his life. Joshua's a leader who God says, I'm going to exalt you so the people will follow you so that they can follow me. Joshua gets that's the proper order, that's the proper way of leading. Again, whenever he's told he's gonna be exalted, he doesn't go to Israel and he says, hey guys, God just told me I'm in charge, listen to me. He says, Israel, the Lord your God has spoken. He's going to do mighty things today. Consecrate yourselves. Listen to Him. Our God can be trusted. Now, as I read that, I wrestle that it says, as they stood in awe of Moses, remember, Israel grumbled against Moses constantly. But here it's demonstrating the reminder that Moses was clearly seen as the mouthpiece of God, as the leader of God, and Joshua, you're going to now lead Israel into the promised land. The leader of Israel is important because throughout Deuteronomy, in Exodus to Deuteronomy, Moses led and the people were cared for. In Joshua, Joshua leads, the people are cared for. Remember what happens in Judges? There is no king. The people do what's right in their own eyes. And they keep going after idols. They keep getting themselves in trouble. The people need a leader. I want us to see something about Moses and Joshua. They're probably not the quality of leader that the people really wanted. Remember when God calls Moses in Exodus 3? Moses says, but God, I'm not that gifted. God doesn't answer his real question. God doesn't say, oh no, Moses, you have all these gifts. You're good, man. God simply says, I don't care who you are. I'm with you. I will provide everything you need. It's not a matter of finding the real professional. It's not a matter of seeking somebody who the world will esteem. It's looking for, who is God with? That's who we should follow. Now Joshua is central to this campaign. He must demonstrate a confidence in God, a confidence in his word, and lead the people to trust him. So if we look at this, there's a real clear answer to the question, church, who should we follow? Who should we follow? The answer is clear if we look at all of scripture in that the answer is Jesus. If you want to know who you're supposed to follow, it's Jesus Christ. Joshua points us to Jesus. We see it in Hebrews 3. They actually have the same name, Yahshua and Yeshua. Yahweh saves. Jesus is better than Joshua, though. Because Joshua, he took him across the water. That's amazing. He took him into the promised land and led a successful campaign of victory. That's impressive. But the people didn't have rest. The people never had final rest from their enemies. They never had final rest from their idolatry. But when Jesus came, he didn't lead us across the river. He didn't conquer our physical human enemies. No, he did give us rest. He gave us rest from the greatest enemy I mentioned earlier. God's wrath. Jesus came so that when he died, he would take away our sin, the penalty for it, the power of it, so that when we believe in him, we have rest, we have peace with God. We're now called sons of God and daughters of God. He is the true shepherd because he leads us, cares for us, and provides for us all we need. He gives us true rest. Something else Jesus gives us is the Holy Spirit, who gives the church gifts, who gives the church elders. So I want to make it very clear that as a church, something we always emphasize is that Jesus Christ, he is the true shepherd. He's the one we truly follow. But according to God's design, he gives us undershepherds. And this morning, I want to turn now to three charges for our under shepherds Specifically our five new under shepherds, and then I'm going to give three charges to the church First Elders under shepherds You need to first and forever remember that you are first sheep. I Yes, you're being called to an office of undershepherd, but you are first and foremost sheep. That means you follow before you lead. That means you listen before you teach. That means you see Christ as your leader, as your true shepherd. He is the king of love. You work for his praise, not the praise of men. You will only be a successful under-shepherd if you are seeking to follow Christ as a sheep. His worship is what must be most important to you. Because you're supposed to be leading other sheep to worship Him more purely. We must purify ourselves. so that we follow Christ, we must purify ourselves so that we know how to trust God in difficult situations. So first, elders, remember, you're sheep. You follow Christ before you leave. Second, elders, trust the church. Trust the church. That's one of the key themes we see from the ark and God's present with his people. God is with his church. Christ is her head. The church will trust God's word when we teach it. This church will follow as long as we are prayerfully following God. Trust God to lead her as we follow him. Yeah, we have to remember you can't make everybody happy. There's always going to be somebody who says something and we can't turn the ship every time there's something going on. We have to remember that as long as we are faithfully and prayerfully following God and seeking to lead his people, God will lead his people. Trust the church and the power of grace to lead the church to follow God's word. So elders, your first sheep, I want you to trust the church. Finally, we need to remember that God's word is sufficient. We must first and foremost demonstrate for the church that his word is sufficient. It's not our wisdom. It's not our special ability to think something that no one's ever thought of before. It's our responsibility to help people see what he has said is clear, it's good, it's sufficient. We're supposed to build the church's confidence that God's word is God's word and can be trusted. Let the spirit convince, convict, and convert. Now church, I have three charges for you. First, Remember that your elders are sheep. That's gonna be hard. A lot of folks, the elders is kind of like a boss, a manager. No, we're sheep. We're sinners. We fail. We forget. We're humans, we suffer. You need to remember, we're first sheep. We're simply trying to follow the same Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and by God's grace, we'll model humility and perseverance. But by God's grace, we'll also be able to lead you to follow Him as we do it together. So remember, as you're changing categories, as you're thinking about how you're gonna relate to these five men differently, do not change it when it comes to their sheep with you. We are all sheep with you. So church, remember, your elders are sheep. Secondly, as I call the elders to trust the church, church, I call you to trust your elders. Trust your elders. Okay, let's just play the fun game. Yeah, they're completely insufficient. We are completely insufficient. You don't trust your elders because you look at us and you think, wow, what an amazing, skilled, set group of people. You trust your elders because you trust God to actually give you the leaders that's going to lead you to himself. Your trust in the elders actually goes back to, can you trust God to use people that you think very little of to actually lead you to worship him? Too young, too old. Too theological, not theological enough. Too busy, too much free time, too many kids, not enough kids. These are all things folks have said about these new elders that I believe are missing the main point. Do they follow God and do they want to help you? Is God with them? Do they trust God's word and they open it to help you see the glory of God and how to worship him? That's what you're looking for in an elder. Finally, church, trust God's word is sufficient. If you have a problem that you think cannot be handled by the proper handling of God's Word, your problem is that you don't believe in the sufficiency of God's Word. This is what God has given us. We've looked for men, and I believe God has given us the men that can open this Word and apply it If your problems go beyond this Word, your problem is that you don't trust God to give you what you need in His Word. It's kind of funny, you know, we're a culture that loves specialists. Think about medicine, right? If something's wrong with us, we want to go straight to the specialist. We want to get the perfect, expert, professional opinion. And then what do we want to do? We want to go home to WebMD and self-diagnose and prescribe. We want the specialist, but we also want to make sure we know exactly what's going on. Well, church, we're not specialists. We're merely seeking to be servants that are going to open God's word, and we hope to declare it to you in a way that's going to help you grow. But you have to remember, as we seek to open his word, it's sufficient. We all have to be united in that one clear declaration. We have to listen to God together. Church, as we conclude, we are called to follow God because he's with us. His glory has come down, it has come down to save us, to make us a people that are forgiven, to make us a people where His glory remains known throughout the earth. We as a church must praise God because He's with us, seek to enjoy His presence, His glory, and follow His leadership as we trust His word. Will you pray with me? Father, we thank you for your kindness. We thank you that you have not left us alone. You have sent us a Savior. You've given us your Spirit. You've given us your Word. You've given us one another and you've given us pastors. You are the giver of every good and perfect gift. Forgive us for taking these gifts for granted. Forgive us for grumbling about these gifts. Forgive us for not rejoicing in all your good gifts. Help us to be a church that is always thankful. Help us, Lord, to be a church that's always praising you. Help us, Lord, to truly glory in you, our Redeemer. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.