The Way to God

By Greg Byman
August 27, 2018
St Joe Community Church

Pastor's Notes

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Transcript

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​By Rev. Greg Byman
How Narrow is the Narrow Road
St. Joe Community Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana
Sunday, August 27, 2017, 10:00 am

Note: This is a human transcription.

Yes, he is Lord of all. You may be seated.
Well, we are going to look at a Bible verse in Luke Chapter 13 as the text for today's message. Luke Chapter 13:22-30.
Excessive vs. Essential Theologizing: How important is the narrow/wide gate issue?
I have a lot of circles of people that I am around and I have been working even when we were in Ecuador, there were circles of thought, of pastors and some of the questions they would ask, were good practical questions, and then sometimes it's just a matter of wanting to be, for lack of a better word, theologically nerdy. Okay? And I can go there with them. I'm pretty good at the being nerdy. And then theologically, Well, I'm working on that too, right? Okay?
So, I can, we can, debate all kinds of stuff about God's word but when it comes down to actually practicing our faith, we kind of got to stop, and go, "what's the bottom line of what I'm going to do about what we're talking about?” And you just name a statement that the church has made, and you'll find another church that they've made a similar statement, but they think their similar statement is better than the statement, right? And so, we kind of have this....
And I'm just done having those conversations. We can agree to disagree on certain things, but let's all work together on the main things. And let's find a reason to come together instead of finding ways to stay apart and one way that really helps me to do that is knowing that, you know, when I get thrown into conversations at school events with my kids, or as chaplain at Indiana Tech, or working among....
I mean, I’ve had.... I got into the cab of a police officer, and he just asked me a point-blank question, "what do you think about this group of people? And they weren't my group of people, right? OK so I can now trash them or something, you know, right? I mean, "no!”
He goes, "well, you know, what's the difference between this and that?” And really, it's like an ice breaker question. And it's also a question to jolt you into, you know, they kind of want to put you on the spot. And you've got to find a way to say, well, to get to the main conversation.
The main conversation: How do we find the narrow gate?
And so today I want to talk about the main conversation. The main conversation of how do you get to God? Because there's a lot of people asking a lot of questions and there's a lot of people with a lot of answers. There’s a lot of self-help books. Religious section in most bookstores are full of information and very little truth.
There are a lot of paths that people keep saying is the way to God. And you know, there was a book out called More Than a Carpenter by a guy named Josh McDowell. It's a little book, and it was back in my era of going to school, and now Lee Strobel is kind of the guru for going and talking to somebody about your faith. And The Case for Christ and the case for Christianity, and he has some great research out there that he's done because he was an atheist that became a Christian. Same thing with the guy just mentioned.... He was an atheist and now he's a....
Josh McDowell became a Christian because he was trying to prove that Jesus was not real and the Word of God was fake and he couldn't prove it. He found more evidence, compelling evidence to say that this is the Word of God and that Jesus was a historical figure and he was either a liar a lunatic or he was the Lord. And he decided, in his life, that based on all the evidence and the and even the mathematical odds, that it was in the favor heavily that Jesus was who he said he was. He's the Lord of Lords, the King of Kings, and he's the savior of the world.
And, in particular, he's my Savior, who I came to know at an early age and I'm still learning to know who he is and become like Him in my life, in spite of my flesh, and in spite of my tendencies, in spite of what Celebrate Recover calls hurts, habits and hang ups. By his power and strength, and I'm becoming more like Christ, and I'm thankful that he's compelling me and it's not a manmade, self-made, ritual, rule-based relationship. It’s a relationship of love that he's drawing me into, day by day, and moment by moment sometimes, to become more like him and to be a blessing to my family, and to people around me, for his name's sake.
That's a lifelong journey. And I invite you to join me in that journey this morning, as we think about the main way, the way to God. How do we find the way to God?
I want to read this Bible passage, and we're not always a stand-up-sit-down church all the time, but let's stand one more time if we would. And honor God's word as we read this little story that Luke the physician was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write down. It's been preserved through the ages.
I'm reading by the way from the Holman Christian Standard Bible and I hope that you can follow along if you have a different version, well enough to know where we're going with this.
[Jesus] went through one town and village after another teaching and making his way to Jerusalem. "Lord,” someone asked him, "are there few being saved?” – Luke 13:22, 23
Is church growth merely a numbers game?
Discerning the narrow and wide gates is massively important, not Again, let me just pause there. This is one of those questions that they're just like, they don't get it. “there's only a few that’s going to be saved?”
It’s like on the Monday morning when the pastor called you from another church. He says, “So how many did you have for worship?” Or you go to a convention. “how is it going?” And “how is it going?” means, “How good is your church going?” Right?
And I had one guy said he was feeling really bad, and I mean, the church, it was doing.... He was doing great, but there were horrible things going on his church, and he says, "well how’s it going with you?”
“Great!” And we talk about it and I said, “how's it going with you?” He says, Well, I’d rather keep hearing about how’s it going with you, because it’s not going so well where I am.”
Sometimes we get at these, you know, it's a numbers game. And it's as a game. It's just that. It's a game. These are lives!
“Are only a few people going to get saved?” I don't know what God's going to do today!
Jesus is like “Ugh.” He said to them,
Make every effort to enter through the narrow door because I tell you many will try to enter and won't be able once the homeowner gets up and shuts the door.
Then you will stand outside and knock on the door saying, "Lord, open up for us” and he will answer you, "I don't know you or where you're from.” And then you will say, "We ate and drank in your presence and you taught in our streets.” He will say, "I tell you I don't know you or where you're from. Get away from me all you workers of unrighteousness.”
There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth in that place when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but yourselves thrown out. They will come from east and west from north and south and recline at the table in the kingdom of God. Note this. Some are last who will be first and some are first who will be last.
Let’s pray that God will open our eyes to know what he's saying today as we continue to talk. You may be seated.
Jews were waiting for God at the wrong gate
In this beginning passage it says that Jesus was heading to Jerusalem. He was teaching from village to town, from village to town, but his focus was on dying for our sins, the sins of the world. His focus was on saving the people he was talking to and all those that would come after that, and all those who a trusted in Jesus long before Jesus arrived on the scene back in what we call the Old Testament era of God's working in history.
Jesus was the Messiah, and he was heading to Jerusalem to die even though there were murderous threats. There are all kinds of rumors. There were all kinds of ways in which the religious leaders are doing everything they can to put him to death, or at least squelch his story. Because he was stealing their limelight and what he said was not enjoyable to hear: “You’re whitewashed tombs. You're dead inside. Looking good on the outside.”
I mean, that kind of speaker wouldn't get back to St Joe after a while, probably. You know, I'm going on about how spiritual we are but after a while, we get beat up by somebody who says, “You are nothing but a hypocrite.” And we don’t say, “Yes we are in recovery.”
But we don't always want to believe that. We think we're better than we think we are. We're better than we really are. And Jesus is just.... He has a love for the people enough that he's moving in the direction of the father told him to go.
And even while he's being tripped up or he's being tried to trip up, all these people asking him questions, they don't even get it. They don't realize it. But the kingdom of God was at hand. That he was the Incarnate Word of God. He was God. And he's walking among them and they're asking all these questions. The reality is, “You need to find God! And you need to find him now!”
Choices, choices: how to identify the narrow gate?
I don't know what the price of China Rice is going to look like next week, if something big or bad happens. I don't know all the results of Hurricane Harvey. I don't understand evil and why it tends to manifest itself, even among people that we would say are “innocent bystanders, collateral damage,” in the milieu of all the evil that exists in this world today.
But I do know this: Jesus came to save us from death and hell. He came to rescue us from the pain and misery that we experienced day by day in humanity and he came to take care of our eternal problem of separation from God. And if we don't solve that, it doesn't matter what we solve on earth.
Because eternity is too long for us to be wrong. He responded harshly to the sidebar question. Even as he was making his way to Jerusalem focused on us.
“Make every effort…”
You see, the way of God, Jesus says in this passage, requires a commitment. The way of God requires a commitment. The narrow door. It requires a commitment. He says, "make every effort to enter through the narrow door.”
I inherited, by birthing them into my family, wrestlers. And it’s amazing how, now, I don't even try to find it, but there's all kinds of references to the effort of wrestling in the Bible. This is one of those words straining with all your muscles an effort to compete in such a way that you win something. It's an athletic term. It says you're absolutely giving it your absolute all to find the way of God. It's a commitment. And it's a commitment that requires us to find the narrow door.
Tradition: The wide gate of the Pharisees
Now let me put in context here. Jesus is talking to a bunch of religious leaders who think they have the door to heaven. And Jesus has proclaimed, more than once already, in his ministry, that door, through them, does not exist to God. They don't have a pathway to God. In fact, they are blinded to the truth, and this same pathway that they think is to God, they're going to kill God. They're going to kill the humanity of God on a cross. They're going to take his life out.
They didn't have a door, but they had a big one. They said, "Come this way, this is the way you do it. This is the way it works. They had a system, a system, they had a temple. They had a building that was full of merchants that would help sell you the right kind of offerings to give. They had a whole financial system in which the money changers would take your money and turn it into Hebrew money, because you wouldn't want to have you know that pagan money going into the temple tent, would you? And throw a little bit of tax on top of that and that sounds a good fundraiser for the church. Let's do that.
They had turned church.... They had turned religious faith in God into a religion of profit, and greed and power.
Repentance: The narrow gate of God
And Jesus said, "this is the narrow road.” And, by the way, when it talks about that narrow door, the illusion of this is that repentance is required. I got to repent from going through the door that's natural in my life in the flesh and repent of my sin and turn towards the door that only God can give me through faith in Jesus Christ. I’ve got to repent.
And sometimes I think that we as Christians, we pawn off Christianity as some easy thing. It is not easy. It is a hard life. It is not something that is, so you take in lightly, when we say, "we are going to become a follower of Jesus Christ.”
Persecution of the narrow gate
You know there's a Bible verse that actually says, "everyone who follows Jesus is going to be persecuted”? I'd like to snip that one out. I don't like that. I can't. I won't. Okay? But I'd like to.
But if you're a Christian and you live out your Christian principles, somewhere in your life, somebody is not going to like you, because you're living your faith in Jesus Christ. And they're going to take the popular moment of the day, that they say the Bible says is against, and if you say, "well I believe in the Bible” then you're against that, and they will now blackball you at work. They were ridicule you as a student at school. And they will not give you the popularity that Christianity in many ways has received over the many years that we have been in America. That may happen again but the reality is it might get harder than it is easier to live out your faith in Jesus Christ, and Jesus says, "make every effort. Strain. Be the wrestler in the match in the ring,” and you're going after it with all your gusto to live for Jesus Christ and when you look for that door you're going to find it. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. He wants you to find him. But he doesn't want you to find a substitute for him and think that's enough and that's good enough. It is a narrow road. It's a narrow door. It requires commitment, and eventually that door is going to close.
Both the narrow and wide gates are doors to eternity. Choose well.
I've done a couple of funerals. I did one yesterday for a “one-hour child.” That's just the worst one of all, is to do the funeral for a child. But every time I go to a grave, and we have a group of people, it's a reminder that all of us are destined to be in a box. At least our body is.
That's really good.... “Pastor, can we live it up today? This is a little bit heavy.” I can see it on your faces. You're not really enjoying this.
But we're all destined to go somewhere and be worm food. Well no, if you buy that real nice thing for millions of dollars, worms won’t touch you because they can't get to you.
Don't worry about it. You won't be there. Save your money. Anyway, um .... I'm sorry, I had to have a little levity somewhere.
The reality is we all have a destiny with eternity. And whether we're alive when Jesus comes or we go into eternity before he comes, we all have a destiny with it. At some point or another. Everybody in....
Our mortality rate in the world, as it stands, is 100 percent. So far, they have not found a cure for death. And the only one that came back to life whose tomb is empty is Jesus. I'm going to trust the guy is not in there anymore. And I believe that it's important that everyone trusts him soon, because I don't know when the door will close for any one person in this room or in this city or in this country or in this world. I just don't know.
I’ve been ministering.... And many of you, more than I’ve even gone over to see Norma, and then Norma is one of our senior citizens who's struggling with the last stages of cancer. And I don't know what's going to happen over the next few days, maybe a couple weeks. I don't know, but yesterday didn’t look so good for her. But I’ve said to her when she had a cognizant, I said, "there's no expiration date on your tomb, Norma. Don't listen to what anybody says. You just live the right way every day. And just let God take care of the expiration date.”
Connection Groups help us pursue the narrow gate
And that's how we all live. But the reality is there is a date that's coming for all of us somewhere, somehow, and we've got to be ready for that. And I want my friends to be ready for that. I want the world to be ready for that. I want everybody to find the narrow door. Please. That's why we believe in Connection Groups, because it's one more hook, one more way one more avenue one more open door in our church for people to enter in and think about, consider, pray about, learn, read, talk to other people about Jesus Christ, and they can come to know him as personal Lord and Savior through friendships and those Connection Groups.
And that's why our Sunday morning, we continue to pray that more will come that are being a part of a crowd of people, not just the members of St. Joe Community Church. We are, you know, the church is the one institution of the world that exists for people that are not yet in it. Our mission is to reach people and to tell people the good news about God. And if we do it with cotton candy, or we do it with a service project down the neighborhood, or we do it by just walking up and down the streets and saying “Hi” to people, and as someone wants to talk, we talk to them. However, we do it, whatever way works best for you, we've got to let people know the door is going to close, and if we really believe that, we'll be compelled to go and help people find and follow Christ and go through that door before it's too late.
Churchianity: the false “narrow gate.”
You see, there are some worthless excuses for refusing to go through the narrow door.

• “First of all, I practice lots of religious things.”
• “I act religious.”

• “We ate and drank with you!” Maybe an allusion to “we had the Lord's Supper. Why, I go up every time they have the Lord's Supper. I go up there and take it. That must mean I’m saved. That must mean I'm a Christian.”
• Or, "I know a lot about Jesus. I’ve studied his life.”

These people were saying, "we've been with you when you were teaching. What do you mean we're not going through the narrow door? What do you mean? I know who you are.”
Even the demons believe in Jesus and they shutter because they know that they have no eternal life. They have eternal death and punishment. These are worthless excuses.

• “I've gone to church all my life.”
• “My family is a Christian. That must mean by inheritance, I by genetics, I am a Christian.”

You know, I’ve prayed from before our children were ever born to the day that they were born, and even into their childhood, up into now, ours going to college, and high school, and one a middle school, that they would come to know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior, and that they'd be in love with the Lord Jesus Christ in His Body of Christ, a local church.
Because I’ll see my children who are saved in heaven. That's my eternal family. And I wanted them to know Jesus. Not just know a way of living, the Byman way of living, which I think is a pretty cool way to live. But anyway.
But, Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. He's the way to God. And I don't want them to just practice religion. I want them to know and be in a relationship with Jesus Christ. I don't want them to have a formal knowledge of Jesus. I want them to personally know Jesus.
Churchianity helps cultural and commerce thrive. It does not save.
That's why we don't stress just having a lot of educational head knowledge, although knowing a lot of things about the Bible, that's important. Memorizing the Word of God. Being able to articulate our faith and what we believe. That's those are important things. But divorced from a relationship with the one who gave us the word, who is the word, it's just a social experiment that, by the way, kind of works.
You know, when people start acting more Christian, their finances get better. They spend on things they should spend on their more benevolent. Because we started out with Judeo Christian principles, and whether people believe it or not, they've lived in a system that sort of says, "we ought to be generous.” And America has been one of those generous nations in the world, and we have shown other nations how to be generous. I mean, what other nation like goes bombs a country, destroys them, takes them over, and then gives them all their money to build them back up again?
We've done that. How many times? Eh, agree or disagree. I'm just saying.... But I believe it's because, in some way, at the early stages of our history, Christianity was kind of the standard, whether they all were Christians or not, they knew that was kind of the code of conduct. It works. I'm just praying that when you come to St. Joe, you're just not looking for a code of conduct, you're looking for Christ and you'll find him, because Christ will encode the conduct in your life, and will compel you to live the way that you normally would want to live, and it won't be a bunch of rules, it'll live out in relationship.
It's like when my dad said, "be home on time.”
I said, "What time is that?”
He said, "well, if we struggle with it, I’ll give you a time.” Which meant, the relationship was, "I trust you. We're going to trust each other. But we're going to have some boundaries. But it's about you doing the right thing and learning how to do it, not about following a bunch of rules so as soon as you go off to college, you can do whatever you want to do, and you just squirrel out of that authoritarian-based system and you go crazy.”
Rules without relationships equals rebellion, and you’ve heard that a lot of times. Relationships without rules equals rebellion. You know, I said, "we got to strain at this. We've got to follow Christ. We've got to repent of our sin. If it's just about a relationship, it's not about living out the right way of living, then that's not what Christ came to do. Christ came to save you from a way of living into a new way of life. But if you think it's all about rules and not a relationship, you're going to rebel quickly from that, because who wants to follow a bunch of rules that you don't understand, they don't know the person who made them?”
The Thump is a hazardous tool for gate choosing: Use with care and prayer.
We used to have an usher one time. He would say, "hey there's some kids over there that are messing around. You only go thump him?”
And I really think he meant thump them. In fact, there were times I think he wanted to thump me and I kind of thought he could have.
And I said, "well, do you know their names?”
He says, “I have no idea who those kids are. But they're causing problems, they were causing problems last Sunday, and this Sunday I am going to settle them down.”
I said, “I'm all for reformation. Reforming behavior. I'm all for that, but how about, before you tell them what to do, you are able to tell me who they are. And that you can tell me that you said at least one, or two, or three.... I think I told them five, that’d be almost....
I said, "you need to say three nice things to them before so you say one bad thing to them.”
“But, oh, um, hmm. Okay.”
He never thumped them. It's about the relationship. Thumping a kid from yelling or talking or scrambling under a pew in the middle of church may solve the moment but it doesn't build a relationship.
God's not here just to thump you and say how wrong you are, he's here to say how much he loves you. And when he does thump you, it's in love, and you know it. You can trust the hand that has done this, that might be saying, "don't do that.”
Everyone is invite to the narrow gate
God wants to know you. He wants to intimately work in your life. He sent His Son to die for you. And he's saying, "the door is here.” Will you see it? Will you respond?
You see here, Jesus is telling this crowd—which made them even more angry—that Jesus invites everyone to enter. Everyone. I want to think of the least likely person in your life that would ever put their faith in Jesus Christ, or even darken the door of a church building during a worship service. The least likely person to sit next to you on a Sunday morning. Just think of that person right now.  Jesus invites that person to enter and join him in a relationship and a journey. Just think of that one person that would seem like the most out of place person. God wants that person as much as anybody, more so than even you. For him or her to know him.
The road to the narrow gate does not go through Jerusalem or even St. Joe Community Church
He's inviting everyone to enter. How do we know that? Because he says here that they're coming from the four corners of the world. It says it's coming from the east, the west, the north, the south. They're all coming in from all over the place, and why does this make them mad? Because Israelites thought they had a monopoly on who God was and how to get to him. They thought that everybody came to heaven through Jerusalem. And they thought it's all about our system of religion, that's going to get people into heaven.
And Jesus said, " No, it's people you've never even thought are worthy of the love of God, and all of these Gentiles, these non-Jewish, these pagans, these people that you call “outsiders” to your religion, they're going to come from all, streaming from all nations, and we read it in Revelation.
Every tribe, every tongue, every place, there will be believers in Jesus Christ who will flood into the kingdom of God and they will recline at the table in the joy of the Lord and they'll be there with Abraham, Jacob, Isaac and they're going to be with all the prophets and all the elders and they're going to sit there together never going to enjoy the eternal life that God has in store for all of us and those that were listening to Jesus could not.... They were seething with anger. Mad, angry that Jesus would even think about that somebody, other than a Jew, would be in heaven with God. They were the chosen people. And in today's world we call it, in some churches, the frozen chosen. Because they think they're the only ones with a monopoly on God. And they didn't realize that the monopoly on God exists when people refuse to give him away to other people. And those churches die.
Who.... And then the other part we know. “The last will be first and the first will be last.”
Well, what does that mean? Well, the Jews were the first ones to know about God. Abraham, Isaac. He called them out. And he started a movement in history. And we can use it in different ways but in the most plain sense, we're seeing here, he says, "Look those of you that think you're in line first? Nope—you’re last. And the people you never thought would be in line? They’re in front of you. And they're going to get in. And unless you repent, you're not.”
Jesus was opening the floodgates for people to say that Christianity is this exclusive faith. There is an exclusive claim that Jesus is the Lord, but this claim is open and available for all to consider and to put their trust in.
Put your faith in Jesus this morning. Because the question is.... The final two questions is, "Who is going to respond in time?”
And I can't answer that for everybody. I can't answer that for our city. I can't answer that for you today.
But right now, if you've been hearing this message, and you go, "you know what, this has been a game I’ve been playing with Christianity, and I'm done playing games. I'm ready to be serious about being a follower of Christ. I realize that if I don't make this decision clear and quick, I'm going to miss what God has in store for me, and I'm going to die in my sins and I'm not going to be able to have the benefit of eternal life.”
And if that's you this morning, I would just ask and pray that you would just right now, just say, "Lord Jesus, I'm done playing games. And I'm willing to turn from whatever you ask me to turn from, to live for you. I have no power to do it by myself. I need your strength to do it, but I willingly, with all that I am, I give myself to you completely right now, to do with as you please. I trust Jesus, you're my savior and I pray that you will come into my life and make me a new person.
And if you pray that prayer this morning and you are breathing that prayer now, the Bible says, "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
That's a promise, and I have watched it play out in this room over, and over, and over again. I watched it play out of the movie theater, when we were there. I watched it play out in the school buildings, and I watched it play out in churches, that I’ve lived through and in throughout my life, as God got a hold of people.
Or, as I helped someone in a restaurant on a napkin, talk to them about how to follow Christ, and they call me the next day and say I became a follower of Christ. Or I'm on a school property, there at Indiana Tech helping a student find and follow Christ. I'm telling you, it changes lives. It is the real deal, and you can have the real deal if you'll stop playing games, get serious with God.
But who's going to wait till it's too late? That person will be weeping and gnashing their teeth. They're going to be seething with anger they can't believe it. They missed it. And here's the scariest part about eternity for someone who misses out on following God in time. They're going to know what they missed. They're going to see what they missed, based on this passage. They're going to see it they're going to see the people who are in and they’re going to know that they're not.
Shudder to think of that memory of a moment like right now, or a person in eternity, who knew that God was calling on their heart to make a decision. And they refused it. And it was the last time they had an opportunity or, as sensitive as they are today, to make that decision.
Invitation to the narrow gate
Let’s stand our feet this morning. Our band is going to play one more song for us, and I invite you to enter through the narrow door right now. I invite you to put your faith in Jesus Christ. If not Jesus, who else are you trusting in? If not Jesus, what else is worth your entire life and your soul? What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and yet loses his soul?
I just pray this morning that this altar would be full of people. And I don't do this very often and I know Zeke had an altar call that really brought of movement in this church, and I don't know what God wants to do this morning, but I just felt impressed that this morning, maybe you are burdened for a particular person. You know that they've not in or through the narrow door and I'm not asking you to call them out by name because that's something that you .... That's a stun thing, that that's not right.
But maybe you need to come and bring them to the Lord in a burden of prayer. And that you might just asked and beseech God in a public way, “God, get a hold of this person. Help this person.”
And maybe this morning, you're done gripping a hold of that chair in front of you and it's time for you to step out. I remember the times that I publicly made a decision to follow Christ. I’ve publicly made a decision to surrender my life to Christ, to Christian service and I remember publicly repenting a handful of times in my life where I just said, "I’ve got to get serious and real with God in a fresh way.”
And that first, that that welled up within me, I'm like, “I can't do this. Like everybody is going to see me!”
“Yeah….”
And it was that first step, that was the hardest step for me to take, but after that step, the rest, I didn't know how fast I got down to the front. And it's not about coming to a front. This isn't Jesus. Jesus is right where you are, but something about being public might change the needle in your life, spiritually, to the positive in a way that just sitting where you are or using the card that we ask you to use--that Connection Card--I'm putting in the box, that might not be as effective.
But if that's what you desire to do, and that's what God's telling you to do, then use the card and put it in the box. But we want to invite you, if today is the day, that you need to openly declare, or maybe even baptism.  We're going to baptize next week. Maybe there's something that God is stirring in your heart, to openly declare him in baptism.
I don't know. I just want God to have his will and way, as we sing this last song.
Prayer
Father God, help us to follow you whatever the cost. May we count it. May we openly give that cost and may we openly find you in a fresh way this morning. Fall on this place. Lord, I can't compel people with words. I can't make people. I don't want to talk anybody into something that somebody else can talk them out of later. So, Lord, I pray that there's no hint of manipulation or any way that I'm trying to get people do anything, and I had no target in this room other than to please you, Lord. So, God help us to respond even as only the Holy Spirit is doing. Don't let someone come that doesn't mean it. And let someone who must come, and truly mean it.
In Jesus name, amen.