MAY 17 2015 | John 17:20-26

Sea Change Church · "John 17:20-26" · Joe Brandi · May 17, 2015
John 17:20-26
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

This is from John 17, verses 20 through 26. My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me that they may be one as we are one.

I in them and you in me so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory. The glory you've given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you and they know that you have sent me.

Amen. Right on. Well, let's welcome up Joe Brandy and then I'm going to pray for him. Joe, come on up. Yeah, Lord, we just want to thank you for Joe, God. We just thank you that you just prayed an anointing be poured out upon him, God, as he shares from his heart, Lord Jesus. Give him every word, Lord, that you would have him. Knit our hearts to his, Lord God.

And I pray for his ministry in this church and around the world, Lord Jesus. In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Thank you. Can we lower this podium a little bit? I'm not six foot four or whatever. Wow. Wow, here I am. Here I am. So we read the scripture. I guess we'll just start. All right. An eight foot green monster with muscles.

A dude that has like zero body fat in a uniform like the American flag. This eccentric mad scientist genius in an armor of metal that's red and gold and can fly. A model like assassin woman that is in there, you know, for making some money. Um, and then what else? Uh, what's the other person? And we have this God like person, um, from some other world that has a big hammer and golden hair and all the girls love him.

Who, what team am I describing? Avengers. Avengers. The Avengers. The Avengers. How many people don't know who the Avengers are at all? Okay. How many people do know who the Avengers are? Okay. All right. Um, I just saw the Avengers. Avengers. It was great. And when I see movies, sometimes God gets to my emotions. Does that ever happen with any of you? The telling of a story, you know, some of you like to read still.

I, I'm not a great reader, but, uh, I see this. I see the story through the movie and there's these moments where my heart gets like inflamed. My mind gets fascinated. My will gets charged up. That's God actually spoke to me through the movie slumdog millionaire millionaire about orphans. If you guys have ever seen that for like an hour, I'm like, Whoa, God.

And it, God speaks through scripture primarily. I'm just saying he sometimes speaks to us through movies and there's this moment at the end. They were all decentralized. Like they were mad at the whole because he smashed up the whole city. And, you know, there's all this different discord. There this moment they're on a plane. They're not talking.

They're sad. And then by the end of the movie, they're all together. All these different colors, green, the, the red, white, and blue flag, the, the red, the, the, the, the black widow. And it's slow mo's is all these negative, like army robotic evil people are trying to take over the world. And they're all together. And they're fighting the enemy and, and everything slows down.

And you just see this beauty. Man, I want to cry about adventures. No, I'm just kidding. That was triggering other stuff. But there's something so beautiful and exciting about people that are very different on a team that are unified to fight an enemy. Don't you think there's something beautiful about that unity? Oh, let me start this clock so I don't go too long.

And you think of other pictures of unified teams that bring beauty. Just think. I think of when I was in track, actually, in high school. And there's like the relay. And there's four people. And they're running. They're running. They got the baton. You say, go. And they're running. Then you get it. You ever seen that in the Olympics? And they have to be unified to win.

And if they're not unified, they don't win. I think of other pictures in nature. You ever seen, it's probably not in San Diego, but big flocks of blackbirds that swarm together in the sky. You ever seen that before? It's just like, wow, that is so beautiful. Or all the ducks. You know, I grew up duck hunting and got the lead duck. Got like that and they're going.

What are some other pictures of unity that are beautiful? Dan, what's a picture of unity that's beautiful? You could think of. Friday Night Co-ed group at the church. Good answer. What about the San Francisco Giants? Batman and Robin. A mother's love for their children. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. Dolphins. If you ever, dolphins in the ocean all over.

Beautiful. Beautiful. We love unity. We love unity because God is unity. We love unity because we're called to unity. But there's also an opposite of that, an ugly aspect of anti-unity. And think of what that feels like and what that looks like when something that's supposed to be unified is not unified. I just went home back to, I tell people Santa Cruz, but I'm actually from Sonora.

7,000 person town near Yosemite. Can I walk up and down? Does it work? I'm just one. I didn't know if it works. Okay. I won't, but I just ask him just in case. So I went to Sonora. I was like there two weeks ago and I was sad the whole time. And I get sad sometimes. I need to apply the gospel and be happy, joyful. But I was like analyzing why I was sad.

And one of the reasons I'm sad is because I was suspended so many times in high school and brought so much shame on my family because of my things that I did that were not right. I didn't honor my father and my mother. I need to be saved. Thank you, God, for saving me. So we're driving past a small mountain town. I saw like this Denny's. And we're together and they didn't even know what I'm thinking.

I'm like, oh. And I remember I got suspended from high school. It's a small town. Brought shame upon my grandpa, upon my grandma. It was in the paper. I was a baseball player and I missed the game. And the paper dude actually wrote it. My dad had to call him up. Why would you write that about my son? So I find myself like with my family. We can't even talk.

We're in Denny's and they're just looking at me and I'm looking down. Shame. A family that's supposed to be together but it's not one. Doesn't that feel yucky? Doesn't those feelings of non-unity just like, ugh. Yeah? Or another thing that I just don't like is when there's two couple, a couple in a restaurant or a coffee shop. They went on a date night and they can't even talk to one another.

And there's couples here. Don't look at them right now. You can ask them after that's ever happened to them. And I always said I never want to be that person. And I remember being on a date like 10 years ago or something. And I was that person. Like we were trying to work out something and we just couldn't have unity. And it was like, oh, it hurts so bad.

Anyway, unity is beautiful. Non-unity isn't. Beautiful unity is God and God-like. And God wants us to be one so the world will know we're his disciples. Again, Jesus prays. We're listening to Jesus' prayer. Listen to these words. I don't ask for these only. And he's talking about the disciples that are right in front of him that he had called. This is for us.

But also for those who will believe me through their word that they may be all one. Everybody hold up the one. Please. All right. Already we're ununified because not everybody did it. But that's cool. I get it. They may all be one just as you, Father, are in me. And I knew that they may also be in us so that the world may believe that you sent me.

What does true unity look like? I think the greatest example of true unity is the mission of God between the Father and the Son. It's the greatest example. What are your personal missions, though? I exist for blank. I spend my time to do this. I think about this to attain this. They're not all bad missions. But what are those? And think of the time, the energy, the verbiage, the prayers, the networking.

It might be to have a four-pack again for the beach in the summer. I don't know. Maybe to own a house in La Jolla. Maybe to get that mortgage down. These are not bad in themselves, but we all have these personal missions. What is the mission when you're at work trying to get something done? Work alone. Work in coffee shops. I was like, God, I really would love to, like, have somebody to work with in a coffee shop.

I run into Kai. This guy named Kai right here. Awesome man. He's on the phone talking to China, trying to get these parts made so that he can deliver. And it's going to work. This isn't private, right? No, I didn't think so. I'm playing, I think. So he's trying to get through. He's like a networker, entrepreneur, and has all these moving pieces and trying to get some product made in China, shipped to the United States.

And it's not working that well because they're not unified. It's not your fault. But it's just hard to unify people when you're at work, isn't it? I work in Nicaragua and help out in Mexico, too. And I have to email, you know, and use Google Translate. And I said to this orphanage, well, we're coming to bring you food and we want to eat with you.

And I cc'd some people. And these people, they're fluent in Spanish, emailed back laughing at me. And the way it got translated is we want to come eat you. And then I did it again the next month. I don't understand, you know. You know, just even our communication. I let this other orphanage we have in Tecate let this girl use my van. And there was like $50 that I had stashed away.

You know, if you lose your wallet, you store some money somewhere in your car. Does anybody else do that? And it was slipping out. And she texted me. She's all, hey, your money's in the trunk. I don't have a trunk. It's in the glove box. And just her language conception, she didn't know the word glove box. And I tried to tell her it's glove box. She's like, okay.

But just the way we communicate can be difficult to have unity. But is God like us when working on mission? I'd say no. Because his mission is not just about himself, it's about others. And if it is about himself, it's perfect because he's perfect and he deserves all the glory and the worship. His mission is not like us because he's perfectly unified.

He never grows tired. The Father plans and sends the Son. The Son steps into the world and accomplishes salvation. The Father and the Son send the Spirit to apply salvation subjectively to our hearts. So that we know the hour that we exist for. Jesus had an hour. The hour of mission that was on his brain. It's laced all throughout the Gospel of John.

And we hear about it in John 17 when he prays for it. His mother comes up to him in, like, I think it's John chapter 2. They run out of wine. And he says, she says to him, please, more wine. And he says, woman, my hour has not yet come. We don't really know what the hour is yet. But his hour had not yet come. Angry mobs try to arrest him and take him.

But they couldn't because his hour had not yet come. Sad emotions in his hour. Jesus was heavy in spirit. Looks at the cross in the future. And he says, now my soul is troubled. But what shall I say, Father? Save me from this hour. But no, for this very purpose, I have come for this hour. He's washing the feet of the disciples like a servant during Passover.

And he said he knew his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the very end. And then for looking, praying to God, looking in the future, praying in front of his disciples, he says, he lifts up his eyes and says, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your son, that your son may glorify you.

And the hour was his work of salvation in him dying on the cross. And really, I spent a lot of time just thinking and thinking and writing and rewriting. And it's very simple but profound. God, the Father's mission, the Son's mission was to seek and save the lost and for the Son to die on the cross for you because of his love and bring you to be one back with him.

To bring you back into that oneness that you never, you kind of felt, you're like, life, I'm just like incomplete. I'm kind of like empty, you know? And then you see Jesus finally in a whole new way and you believe and the Spirit comes into you and all of a sudden you have a spirit of sonship and you realize you're one with the person, the God that created you.

It's pretty good. God is good. Really, I was just overwhelmed. Just thank you for this opportunity. I was just like overwhelmed by God's goodness during this whole thing, whole experience. The Son not only does the work the Father sent him to do, but he does it with a great attitude. Sonora Summers. Where I grew up, it would be in the summer like 105.

105. There's no fog. 108 sometimes. My dad was a contractor. And I probably had the worst attitude in the world. I still struggle with having a bad attitude sometimes. Thank you, Jesus. So, Joe, get up, 6 in the morning, make my coffee. We drive silently to the work. And I would always have to dig the ditches, pack the boards, pick up the nails, do all this type of stuff, do the framing.

My father was asking me to do something. My father had provided everything for me, and yet I had the worst attitude when he's asked me to do work. Any of you ever struggle with that? Not realizing how good somebody's been to you. Maybe your father was bad. Your mother did something good to you. Your friends did something good to you. And then they ask you to do something.

You're like, grumble, grumble, grumble. That's not how Jesus was. His attitude was perfect. What we're doing is we're studying the unity of God as we're tapping into the essence of God, the perfections of God, the Father and the Son, and just looking at him, and then hopefully reinterpreting how we should feel and think and act as people who are called to be one.

Jesus says, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and accomplish his work. How opposite is that of me and my father, or you and your boss, or your wife and your husband when they ask you to do something for you? My father is working until now, and I am working. For the works that the Father has given me to accomplish, they are the very works I'm doing.

God, the Father, and the Son are unified in their work of salvation, in their work of mission, and it's beautiful. That's true unity. True unity is also being given to the Son. Last night, I got back from Mexico and was kind of stressing out about this sermon. And I need to get the endorphins going, need to get in nature. And you guys ever heard of surfing?

You guys heard of surfing before? So there's like an ocean over there. So I got in the waves. Yeah, it rained. I may get some disease because I didn't wait seven, two hours. And there was barely anybody out. There's two guys out. Got some waves, sun setting, and I was tired. And I just, where the waves kind of come in and meet the sand, you know, they're a lot smaller and they kind of crash, crash.

They just sat Indian style. Let the waves, little waves, crash over me. Another wave, another wave, another wave. Not the big ones, just real small when you're on the sand. And I thought, you know what? God is a giver. These waves are never going to end, ever, when they hit the sand. They could be this big. They could be that big. How much more like God?

He infinitely, internally is a giver. His generosity never runs out. Just like the waves that keep on coming. And I think that... Oh, I won't get into my father issues. Yeah. So, no, this is what I was going to say. It's not me. I think we get tired of asking people for things because we know how exhausting it is to keep on giving to people. We have limited capacity to give.

But God doesn't. Right? That's just a... He's infinite. He's eternal. God is love. God is... Because he's love, he gives and he gives and he gives. So, if you get tired of keep on giving to people, as long as it's not full-on codependency, you're actually being like God. You're being like Jesus. It's beautiful. So, God is a giver. He gives us to the Son, it says.

And a lot of us love gifts. I was thinking if we can participate... I'm going to say on the count of three, I'm going to have you say something. What is the best gift you've ever been given? The best one. The best. Oh, hold on. I was on the count of three. We'll all say it at the same time. One, two, three. All right. There is tongue speaking in this church.

I remember I got a Kawasaki 80 when I was a teenager. It was used, but it was awesome. And I grew up in the mountains. And I just love that motorcycle. And it just changed my life. I was able just to have all this fun, stay out of trouble. And, you know, women like these diamond rings, I think. And guys like cool, shiny trucks or cars or whatever they like.

Surfboards, yeah. I only have one surfboard. I only have one. But do you realize you've been given as a gift to the son from the father? And you're far more beautiful and special than any material gift? You know, I look. Certain things in nature captivate us more than others. Mine are waves, butterflies, and I don't know what else. A bunch of other stuff.

And I look at these butterflies. Or it would be flowers. I just didn't want to say it because I'm a guy. Just don't give me any. But I think they're beautiful. I see why girls like them. Women like them. But you think, like, you look at the flower. You look at the butterflies. And you think how beautiful they are. And then you think of yourself. And you're like, I'm not that beautiful.

You ever think that? Your negative self voices. But that is not true. You are a gift given by the father to the son. And the son steps in the world to purchase you by his blood and then give you back to the father. And then someday when we either die and go be with him or he comes back, all the nations. There's all these different nation representatives here, which is cool.

We're going to all be one, praising his name in the new heavens and new earth with a new glorified body. Don't lose faith. Don't forget. We are gifts given to God. And then we're going to give him the gift of praise in the future. And we give him the gift of praise right now. True unity is giving towards another. True unity is Jesus making known the father.

Introductions are really important. Trying to get a certain business deal. Hey, can you introduce me to so-and-so? Sometimes the introductions don't go as you would want them to go, right? I was in Tecate again. And we're trying to meet these government officials and to get blessing to bring food in. And this girl that grew up in Tecate, she's like, okay, be real cool.

I like doing impersonations. So is that okay? Don't be finished. So be real cool. You know, talk to them. I'm like, I don't speak Spanish. And they don't speak English. So it'll be okay. So she's best friends with these people. We're eating lunch. I'm like, I can't connect. They're talking so fast. It's all Spanish. And I'm feeling totally on the outside.

It's Latino, Latina time. It's going on two hours. And I'm just sitting there. And I'm like, this is really hard. And then she goes, hey, what do you think? She's making the introduction. She brought us together. But I cannot communicate. And then she steps aside. She's like, hey, are you going to start? Like, you need to step it up. You need to step it up.

You need to be in your game. I'm like, why don't you speak Spanish? Like, you speak slower. And it ended up working out. It ended up working out. But sometimes the introductions don't even work out the way we'd like them to. And, you know, because we naturally are born into the Word, we're born in the image of God. But we naturally don't have a saving knowledge of God.

And we need Jesus to introduce us to the Father. He says, chapter 17, verse 26, I made known to them your name, and I continue to make it known. That love with which you've loved me may be in them, and I in them. But how did Jesus make the Father known? It says, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And then that Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

We beheld his glory. Jesus is a communicator. There's the Greek of the logos, and what does that mean? But Jesus is a communicator. I remember when I first, my first concept of God, and this isn't bashing any type of church, but my concept of God is he's far away. His voice is silent. He's angry and kind of bored, but I'm going to go to heaven somehow.

And then Jesus, I need to feel guilty because he's hanging on a cross in weakness. There's no resurrection emphasis. So that's the concept I got of God. And then also because I was raised by coaches since the age five up until college. It's all performance and anger. I throw that in there too. So we need Jesus to let us know who God the Father is.

And that is not how God the Father is. He's not far away. He's not angry. He's not a God of guilt, even if you feel it. And that's why it says, if you've seen me, Jesus says, you've seen the Father. Philip says, show us the Father. He says, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. Father, how are you seeing Jesus? If there's 30 parts of perception to, let's say you have saving faith.

You believe. You're saved. But there's like, let's say 30 parts that make up the puzzle of faith. Maybe you've got like 15 of them. Like, yeah, he's patient. He's kind. He's this and that. But the other parts, you just don't. Like, he wants me to work harder and harder. He doesn't want me to have fun. He doesn't. I mean, we have this stuff that we need to have our mind renewed.

We need to take away some of our worldly thinking so that we apprehend Jesus the right way. Jesus says, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. He says he is the way in John 14. He is the vine. I am the building. You are the stones. I am the head of the body. You're the body. He's given all these images of one. When you put faith in him, you're one with God the Father, and you're one with God the Son.

And I'm your sheep. I'm the shepherd. What are some other images and imagery that he speaks through the Gospels of oneness and community? What is that? The vine and the branches. Thank you. Anybody else? A mother hen. Yes, you're right. Yeah, I wasn't thinking of chickens. That's good. That's very true. Anybody else? Other images of beautiful unity. Somebody over here.

We're not going on until somebody over here says something. Shepherd flock. Shepherd sheep. Shepherd flock. Thank you. That's beautiful. True unity. God is about true unity. True unity is working on mission together, giving to another, introducing others, and glorifying one another above self. Glorifying one another above self. Verbal glorification of another.

Any of you like rap music? Anybody like rap music? I like rap music. I do. I do. But what I don't like is how often they talk about themselves. I got more money. I got more girls. I got this and that. Isn't that true? Am I lying? I'm not putting down all rap music, but they talk a lot about themselves. They're glorifying themselves. Do we glorify ourselves through whatever, our words, our possessions?

Or do we let another glorify us? What are you about on Facebook? What are you about on online dating sites? Not me. There's other people here. Okay. I was supposed to get a lot. Have you ever self... I'm sweating now. Great. Have you ever self-promoted yourself and then not produced what you said you could do? Had a girlfriend back when I was a long time ago in college.

First love of my life at the time and went to LA to meet her family. And there's this big softball game. And I literally played baseball since 5 to 20, but I had stopped a year and a half before, but I hadn't touched a baseball. I'm all, yeah. Yeah, I played ball. College ball. Look, okay. You're third base. Third base. Ball gets hit to me. I literally throw it five feet over the first baseman twice.

And everybody's looking at me. I struck out at slow pitch softball. I praised myself and then I didn't deliver. Not good. Not good. You know, and we love words. We love when other people talk about us. I have some roommates and I woke up and heard my name. I'm like, I'm going to go back to sleep. But then I heard my name. Like, what are they saying?

They said some funny things. Fine. Laugh. It's good. It wasn't negative. But when we hear some people talking about us, don't, we can't not listen. We want to know what they're saying. Because we love verbal praise. We love those words. And God loves words too. God's love language, one of them is words. But yet sometimes we deny Jesus with our words.

Peter, the apostle who Jesus had gathered, says, I'll go with you wherever you go. I'll do whatever you do. I'll never deny you. And then after this prayer in that chapter, there's a slave girl. Hey, aren't you one of his followers? No. He's warm himself by the fire. Aren't you with Jesus? No. Then he's with another servant. No. And then the rooster crows.

Oh, that's just Peter. But I know a lot of us, well, just talk about me. I deny him sometimes with my words. Again, back in Sonora for this golf tournament, I was with four buddies on a golf cart. We played high school football together and baseball in a group since age five with them. I hadn't seen them for like 15 whatever years. And they knew what I was about.

They knew I was a Christian. They knew I had been a pastor a long time ago. But they never asked me about Jesus. And I kept on wanting them to. In the past, I used to overtly talk to people about Jesus. And now I've went like, I'm just going to wait until they ask me. And guess what? If you keep on waiting until people ask you about Jesus, I don't think they're going to ask that often.

That's my two cents. You need to be a little more proactive. Even though I'm not even being that proactive lately. But I just kind of felt like. And then when they kind of said, there was this one moment where they asked something. And I was afraid. I was afraid. I said something. But my words and my heart didn't match. And my love language towards the Father and the Son didn't match the way the Son is to the Father.

Jesus had his Father on the brain. Every time asked about his Father, he's probably smiling and serious at the same time. I love him. And I'm serious about him. You need to think about him rightly. He is good. 66 times in the Gospel of John. My Father. My Father. My Father. He never shrinks back ever. To talk about his Father. True unity is glorifying another with visual praise.

True unity is also glorifying another visually. Again, we have all those social media sites. Facebook. Instagram. Snapchat. Vimeo. YouTube. YouTube. I love that there's photos up with Unifor orphans on Facebook. And there's also stuff I don't like. I'm like, what's that fuzzy line of like, yeah, this is awesome. Yet, yeah, look at me. Or look at whatever.

And there's something beautiful about it. Like these people that take all the photos of their food. There's something beautiful about this food. And there's something also odd about it. I don't know. And then babies. Like babies and kids are so cool. But, man, do we need to see everything. Every moment of every baby moment. But really, what this is happening to is, I love my baby.

And there's something beautiful about that. Because you're trying to give visual glory to my baby. Which is actually going, wow, God gave me this baby. And it's awesome. And the Father glorifies the Son by the visual, the cross. For all the world to see. He would be lifted up. And everyone would see. Unity happens through visual glory. Through verbal glory.

And then unity, this is like the last point. True unity is wanting to be with another. John 17, 24. Father, I desire they also whom you've given me may be with me where I am. I desire they be with me to be where I am. Who do you just love to be with? There's some people you love to be with and you just can't be with them. They're just geography or they got married or they're dead, you know.

On the count of three, I want us to say a name or two of a person you just love to be with. One, two, three. Okay. I didn't hear my name, but that's fine. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you. What does it feel like to be with your best friend? What does it feel like to be with your best friend? I didn't ask for participation, but I like that.

Thank you. Because we have that connection, I know. Comfortable, safe, easy. That's nice, isn't it? It's just easy. What? Totally open. Anybody back there? Want to say anything? What? Fun? Yeah, fun. Calm. If you said that too. It's like being home. All right. It's good. Praise God. We have a lot of best friends. That's good. We want to be with them. Unity is wanting to be with them.

We feel unified. Unified. Now think of the feeling of what it's to be like when you're with somebody that you can't connect with, that you're almost an enemy with. It's like you're stuck in that elevator ride, you know, and it gets stuck and you can't wait to get down on the ground floor to leave, to vamonos. You don't have to say any names. We're not going to say any names.

But it's completely opposite. And sometimes this non-unified feeling is because of, you just can't connect and you try to. Some is because they're just like a mean person or they, you annoy them, you know? It's just not unified. And it's a bummer. It's like two magnets trying to be pushed together, but they can't. And I thought about this. Do you think that God thinks about you like that?

Do you think he just tolerates being with you? Amen. But some people have these voices like, yeah, he's going to let me into heaven. But does he really delight in me? Does he really want to be with me? But it says, Jesus says his desire is for you. His desire is for you. And he wants to be with you. He wants to be with you so much that before the foundation of the world, you were chosen in him.

You think of what a beautiful world it is. Think of the most beautiful things in the world. I was watching the planet earth last night. Mind-blowing. You should see it. God's orchestrating this whole world like polar bears and penguins, you know? Anyway, you got to see it. That's not working. Okay. But it's just a beautiful, amazing world. Snow leopards.

And no, I just totally lost my train of thought. It's all right. Here, let me just, I'll just shake the tambourine and see if, okay. That's going to center me. So God wants us to be one with him. God makes us one with him. That's it. He created a beautiful world. And it says, we were chosen in him before the foundation of the world. Therefore, I would think that we're almost, in a sense, more valuable than the world to him.

More precious than everything beautiful in the world that you see. That's amazing. Mind-blowing. Heart expanding. And we need to model that to one another. You need to forgive the sins of your husband. You know, we're knuckleheads. We're cavemen, you know, in a sense. And, you know, when, anyway, and vice versa. And the Father, if they didn't love you perfectly, like, they had stuff happen to them too.

We need to let that go. We're called to forgive. If Jesus could die on the cross and forgive us of all our sins, why can't we forgive those who sin against us? If he reconciled us to be with the Father, to be one, why can't we strive to be one with one another? That's the beginning of his prayer. That you will be one so the world will know. Half the time, we're so murmuring against each other, we're not great on mission.

I know it's hard. I know it's hard. But it's not an excuse. It was hard for Jesus to die on the cross to make us one. But Jesus makes us one. The Spirit comes into us. We believe. We're born again. We're born from on high. We're a new creation, regenerated. We have the helper. He guides us in all truth. He convicts us of sin, righteousness, and judgment.

That we couldn't just do that on our own. It's a gift. And then, we find ourselves in church. There's so many churches all over the world. One church, though diverse. One God. One faith. One baptism. One communion. One book. One people. God is about oneness. And he's made us one. And it's a beautiful thing. And then, he calls us to be one. And some of us are failing more than others at being one.

I'm not perfect at all. And know when we fail. Trying to be one. We're not saved because of our oneness. Our actions of oneness. We're saved because of his actions. He is the savior. He's the perfect one. And we look to him. We fail. There's that bitterness. There's that anger. There's that gossip that we keep on doing. We confess it. We try to repent. We try to reconcile.

And it still is hard. And we thank God that we're not saved by our unrighteous deeds that can't attain unity. Sometimes, no matter how hard we try. And we look to that one. I believe. Jesus' gospel. The gospel of John was written so that you believe. I believe I'm a sinner. That I need a savior. And then he can change me to a saint and a son. And that's the good news.

Father, son, spirit, you're awesome. It's amazing how you use the foolishness of preaching to edify your saints. We just ask that any whatever poor communication is gone. And the spirit deposits something in the hearts of everybody here. We thank you. You're a one God. You love each other. And we've been tapped into that oneness forever. And you've given us the spirit forever.

And now we have the hard mission or the glorious mission of while we're on mission to try to be one with one another so the world will know. Help us. Empower us to do such things. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. All right. Let's thank Joe for bringing the word of God to us today. Amen. It is good when the brothers and sisters dwell together in unity. It is like precious oil being poured out on your head, running down on the beard, running down on Aaron's beard, down the collar and on his robe.

It is as the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion. For there the Lord bestows his blessing, even life forevermore. You know what this scripture says? In unity, God commands a blessing. Let's fight for unity as a church. Let's fight for unity in our marriages. Let's fight for unity with our children. Let's fight for unity in our friendships. Fight, fight, fight with the power of God.

For the weapons of our warfare are not those of the world, but those of heaven that are powerful for the breaking down of strongholds. And if you have a stronghold of disunity, attack it with prayer. Attack it with this verse. Attack it with the word of God. So let's stand right now. Our team is going to lead us in a final song. And begin to just pour yourself out to God.