Our Mission

Amen, amen.

Good morning, church.

It's so good to be with you all this morning.

But as I enter in this morning, I've got to make a confession.

Is it okay if I make a confession this morning?

Is that okay?

Everyone loves confession time.

I never, back in the day, I never wanted to live in Maine.

Don't shoot me, okay?

Okay?

Hear me out.

I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Born and raised there.

Lived there most all of my life.

And I loved where I lived.

I loved the suburbs that I was in.

I loved the skyline as you were driving through.

I loved the sports teams.

No matter how much they have let me down, and I'm praying won't let me down this year.

Okay.

Thanks a lot, Adam.

I love my city regardless.

You know, there is just something about hometown pride, isn't there?

You think about the place that you grew up in, most likely, sometimes you don't, but most likely you have fond memories of the place that you grew up and cherished and loved.

And you know, so when I met this pretty girl in college and she told me that she was from Bangor, Maine,

there were two things that had to happen.

First, I had to learn that it was called Bangor.

And then second, I had to pull up a map because I had no clue where Maine was.

And so when I pulled up that map, I realized I was in trouble.

I was in trouble.

You know, I might not have known where Maine was, but I knew the synonyms for what Maine was.

Do you know what the synonyms are for Maine?

Cold, snow, freezing.

That's it.

At least from a Midwest perspective, that's all you knew.

They don't call it vacation land for nothing.

You vacation here, and then you get out.

That's how it is.

And then I started to hear rumors about how the Maine people were.

Again, there were rumors, this isn't everybody, but the stereotype that Mainers were much like their weather, that they were cold and blunt.

You know, again, remind you, I'm on the border of southern hospitality, right?

So we're nice to everybody even if we, you know, gossip about them behind their backs, right?

I mean, that's how it was in the Midwest.

But here, they'll tell you exactly what they think.

Right?

Amen.

Right?

I mean, the standoffish feel.

This is the rumors that I started to hear about Maine people.

So when I started to get serious with this girl, I had to lay down the law.

I said, sweetie, just want to let you know that if you want to marry me,

We're not moving to Maine, okay?

That's how this is going to work.

And by God's sovereign grace, thank you, Jesus, she said yes somehow.

I don't know why she said yes, but she did.

And I praise God for that every day.

And so, you know, I will never forget one of my first visits here.

It was during the winter, meeting the family.

And I remember on our way, I was going to be on the day that we were going to fly back to Ohio.

It snowed a foot and a half.

And I said to myself, nope, nope.

You know, God, I want to serve you.

God, send me anywhere, but not here.

And then God opened a door to move to Bangor, Maine.

God, are you sure?

Like really?

Okay.

Was I excited?

Let's put it this way.

I was, when we said yes to moving here, I was 51% sure that we made the right move.

Just enough to know that I made the right move.

But here's the thing.

Over time, God started to do something in my heart that 20-year-old Adam never would have imagined would have happened.

Is that once I started to get situated here, started living here, starting to get to meet, not just you all, but to meet the people in our city, my heart grew for this place.

It grew for this place.

It didn't grow for the weather, right?

I think all of us could be okay to not have like six months of winter, right?

I think all of us would appreciate that.

Summer's fantastic, right?

But the winter's, you know, and it's not even like what the town even has to offer.

It really has to do with the people.

Has to do with you.

Has to do with the people that I've encountered with over the years.

You know, in Matthew chapter 9,

Jesus is going around to all these different cities and villages, and you start to see him, you know, teaching about God's word.

He's preaching to them.

He's healing their sick.

But I want you to notice, he's not just expecting them to come to him.

Notice that he is the one that is going to these cities and villages.

He's seeking them out.

And as he's seeking them out, as he's going from city to city, something happens to him.

It's the thing that honestly I really can only say has happened to me as well.

It's the only way I can explain it.

And it's this in Matthew chapter 9 verse 36.

When Jesus saw the crowds, he's in each city, he sees the crowds.

He had compassion for them.

By compassion, just like Pastor Steve talked about, we're not talking about pity, right?

We're talking about this idea of being so deeply moved by people or the people that you see that it wants to lead you to action, to serve them, to care for them.

And I want you to see that Jesus wasn't just doing all these programs.

He wasn't just teaching.

He wasn't preaching.

He saw them.

I'm not just talking about physically seeing them just like I physically see you.

What he's saying is, I see you deep down.

He, out of, compared to all of us, he was the only one that could be able to see not only our exterior, but see our interior.

Right?

To see our hearts.

To see our life experiences from the past.

He knew everything about us.

He saw them.

And as he saw them, I'm one of those people that, maybe you're this way too.

Are you a people watcher?

Anybody a people watcher in the room?

You just go to a restaurant, go somewhere, and you just watch people.

You observe them.

You just see how they're responding, living, acting.

And Jesus saw them deep down.

Truly saw them.

And his heart was weighing heavy on them.

So the question is, what triggered his compassion?

When he saw them and his heart was heavy for them, what led to that compassion?

Later half of verse 36.

When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because these people, these crowds that he was seeing were harassed and helpless like, listen to this, like sheep.

Without a shepherd.

He sees these people, these crowds, and he compares them to sheep.

Cute, right?

Adorable.

But when Jesus makes that comment of saying they're like sheep without a shepherd, is that a compliment?

No.

It's not a compliment.

What do you know about sheep?

You know that sheep...

are defenseless.

I mean, look at them.

You think that these sheep are going to be able to attack back on a wolf or anything like that?

Of course they're not, right?

They're pretty defenseless.

They can't outrun anybody.

I mean, look at their legs.

My goodness, right?

They're not going to outrun danger.

They can't protect themselves.

They're defenseless, but they're also directionless.

Have you ever seen a sheep just kind of roam around, right, wander around?

They get lost all the time, right?

They have no clue where they're going.

They can't get back on their own, and they're dependent.

They're so, they can't survive without someone feeding them and giving them water and leading them to safety.

The sheep constantly need what?

A shepherd.

So Jesus saw these people.

He knows their names.

He knows their stories.

He knows their burdens.

He knows their wounds and their temptations and their afflictions.

And he sees these sheep and they're vulnerable to the enemy.

They're spiritually lost, spiritually wandering, helpless, desperately in need of God's care.

And what he sees with these people is that unlike sheep, they are spiritually wandering, but they're wandering to the wrong things, right?

They're wandering to the wrong places.

They need a shepherd.

They need Jesus.

And as I've been stewing, this passage has been on my heart for about a year.

And as I've been thinking about this story, it just gives me this picture that has gripped my heart for the state of Maine.

Hear me out.

You can look at almost any religious pole.

And the consensus is clear that the state of Maine is one of the least religious states in America.

There is no doubt about that.

I remember moving here from basically the Bible Belt where churches were on every corner.

And it was one of those like Wizard of Oz moments where, you know, you ain't in Kansas anymore, Dorothy.

I mean, it was one of those moments.

The culture was different.

And you can look at some of these statistics and they're telling, right?

To think that only one in four call themselves religious.

Any religion, not even Christianity, any religion in our state.

That two out of three rarely or never set a foot in a church.

Two-thirds of the people in our community have never set their foot in a church.

Can you believe that?

There's nearly a third who claim no faith at all.

No belief in God whatsoever.

Just think about this.

This isn't just statistics.

This is people.

People like you and me.

People that, thousands of people, whether it's your next door neighbor or the people that are in your community, these people surround us.

And they are what?

They are sheep without a shepherd.

They need a shepherd.

I've met people here that have just kind of wandered in through the doors, have no connection to us.

They were maybe in a crisis or something like that.

And I realized as people have come in over the years that one thing is clear, that they have, a lot of them have no clue what the Bible says.

When they hear the name Jesus, they hear it as a curse word, but they don't know who Jesus is or what he really did.

No clue about salvation.

This is, I'm telling you guys, this is story after story after story of people who have walked through these doors.

People are looking for something.

You know, the basic stories of the Bible, Noah, Jonah, David and the Goliath, man, like not on their radar.

Not a clue.

Maybe they've heard the names, but they don't know what the stories are about.

So with that in mind, let me ask you this.

Why do you live here?

Why do you live here?

Seriously, like think about that just for a minute.

Like why do you live here?

Like, let's be honest.

Like, really clear.

You could live in any city, any town, any state, any nation that you really could want to, for the most part, right?

And when you compare Bangor to other cities, yeah, it's fine.

But, man, if you wanted more attractions in the city, I mean, would you really come to Bangor, Maine for that, right?

You know...

I mean, think about it this way.

Cost of living, man, you could go to almost any other state in the planet and you could get a better cost of living.

So, like, with this kind of stuff, like, why do you live here?

You could find better weather in Florida, right?

You can go anywhere else.

Why here?

Why Maine?

Why Bangor?

Why did you choose here?

For some of you, it might be family.

And some of you, it might be a job.

Some of you are coming back for college and you chose, you know, Hassan or you made.

And those are good reasons.

Don't get me wrong.

Those are good reasons.

But I want to challenge you this morning to think about where God has placed you as more than just a place to live.

I want you to see it more than just the, this is where my job's at.

This is, you know, where my family's at.

My prayer is, and maybe my challenge for you, is to see the place that God has placed you as a God-given calling.

We are spatial people.

Unlike God, who is omnipresent, can be in all space, for us, we are localized.

We're in one place at one time.

We can't clone ourselves to go to different places.

We are in one space.

God has placed each and every one of you, at least in this moment in time, for a God-given purpose.

What is that for you?

Why do you live here?

Why am I here?

This has been the pressing question for me over the past few years, and this is where my burden has really aligned with this passage.

I'm here.

Because as I've gone out, as I've seen the crowds, not just in our church, I'm talking about in our city, that there's been placed, at least within me and within our staff, there's been this great burden that's been placed upon us.

Because we see that there are so many people that are spiritually lost, spiritually broken in our state and around the world.

I mean, but especially focusing in on our state.

So I just want to ask you this morning, does it break your heart when you see people in our community that are spiritually lost?

Does it?

I know it's not always like on our mind, right?

But is that like a continual routine that doesn't weigh on you that there are people that you're interacting with and your spheres of life that are chasing fulfillment in all the wrong places, right?

They could be chasing it in good things.

It could be all out into their careers or all out into relationships.

I mean, my goodness, you can go down on State Street and you can recognize that addiction is everywhere in our city.

That is hopelessness, church.

It's hopelessness.

People are chasing for things.

They're looking for guidance.

They're looking for hope.

They're looking for a purpose that is so much deeper than what they have.

They're looking for a love that's deeper than they can ever find it.

Does that break your heart?

When you see people that are around you,

I get it.

You know, you might not feel that way for everyone.

But, you know, Jesus had this kind of supernatural compassion for people that, you know, we, you know, sinful people, we can't fully grasp.

But can I ask you this?

Who in our community, who in our city do you have compassion for?

At least one person.

Please tell me you have at least one person that's in our city that you have genuine compassion and care for.

If you don't,

First off, it might be a self-check on our own hearts.

Maybe we're in the wrong place.

Why are you here?

You know, you might look at our state, our city.

You know, I mean, you hear all the stuff on the news about the state of Maine and Bangor and all that.

And you might think to yourself, man, like this state is far too lost.

Like it's far too gone.

It's down the tubes.

It's down the toilet.

Like there's no way to bring this thing back.

And you know, Jesus could have said the same thing.

He could have said, you know what?

I'm looking at this city.

Man, they are so down the toilet.

Like, this is pointless.

I'm going to avoid this city.

He could have done that.

But notice what Jesus says.

Matthew 9, verse 37.

He says to his disciples that the harvest is plentiful.

The harvest is plentiful.

When he's talking about harvest, he's talking about people.

Harvest equals people.

People who do not know about Jesus.

That is the harvest that he sees.

He sees people that do not know Jesus.

And instead of saying, man, that's too big of a task.

I can't deal with that.

What does he say?

He says the harvest is plentiful.

In other words, Jesus sees opportunity.

He sees opportunity.

He sees the chance to be able to change people's lives, to help see hearts that can be saved, people that can know the living God.

And, you know, for Jesus, this harvest being plentiful, this is a big dream.

This is what Jesus wants to reach.

He wants to reach this massive harvest.

Big dream.

Jesus is a big dreamer.

Awesome, right?

A vision to save the lost, transform lives.

Isn't that all of our dreams?

Shouldn't it be one of our dreams?

As a church, this is my prayer, is that this becomes our dream.

Our vision, really, you could say.

for us as a church to, you know, one day down the road that we can see that the people of Maine become transformed followers of Jesus.

Not just people that come for a Sunday, just want to get the ticket to heaven and run out.

No, transformed, radically changed followers of Jesus who make a gospel impact in Maine and around the world.

You know, Jesus tends to work in the unlikeliest of places.

Don't you think, like out of all 50 states, don't you think that Maine probably wouldn't be on the radar of great revival?

I mean, you would think, okay, it's probably a Midwest state, Bible Belt state, something like that.

You know, I read a poll the other day.

I think it was a few years ago that it was done.

But the poll asked the question, how is the spiritual state of different states and different regions?

And it talks about like the spiritual hunger for people to want to know more about God.

About every region on the United States map is on the decline.

You want to know the one region that's on the up and up?

The Northeast.

The Northeast.

the Northeast, people are hungering and thirsting for righteousness.

They're seeking for something.

They're longing for something.

And so I just want you to dream with me just for a minute what that could look like.

I'm not even talking about filling up the seats.

I'm not talking about numbers.

That's good.

But I'm talking about people

one at a time, that are radically changed.

That are like in no man's land all the way to they are making impact for the kingdom of God.

That is a massive dream.

Do you have that dream with me?

Will you join me in this vision and dream together to be able to see it?

You might be thinking to yourself, you know, Adam, that's a great dream, but man, how in the world are you going to do that, right?

Listen, the task is huge, overwhelming.

Harvest is plentiful.

There are thousands of people in our city.

Thousands of people that don't know about Jesus.

And like, there's only a few of us.

And if we know rightly, we know that that's hard work to be able to do that kind of life change with people.

Notice what Jesus says, and he gets it.

He says, listen, the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, right?

He knows there's a Christian labor shortage.

He knows that we're in the minority.

He knows that leading people to true transformation, true life change, takes time and energy and effort and real investment into people.

That takes a lot of time, a lot of hours, sometimes heartache.

It's a lot of work.

So the question, the really big question is this.

How do we guide broken, so many broken guided Mainers who don't know what they're looking for and they need Jesus.

How do you lead them through a process that gets them all the way to they are now going to find those people that they were once and bringing them alongside them?

How do you take this massive gap over here and fill the gap to get over here?

That's the main question, isn't it?

You know what I love about Jesus?

He always leads the way.

Chapter 10, verse 1, says this.

Jesus called to him 12 men, 12 disciples, and he gave them authority over unclean spirits to cast them out to heal every disease and every affliction.

This is what he goes out to do.

Can I tell you something?

Jesus, this is gonna sound harsh, Jesus doesn't need you.

You hear me?

Jesus doesn't need me.

He could have done all the work by himself.

He could have done all the inviting.

He could have done all the ministry, all the work, all the healing, all that stuff.

He could have done it all by himself, but he didn't.

How gracious it is that he invites us along on the journey.

That he gives us true calling and purpose for our lives.

He invites us to join us with him.

He calls 12 men, 12 disciples to go alongside him to do all this work.

And I want you to look at these men for a moment.

Verses 2 to 4.

For those of you that have a Christian background, when you look at these men, would you have said, yes, they are the Christian all-stars.

Those are the people that I would have picked.

Would you have chosen these 12?

What's the answer?

No.

No.

In fact, when you look into their stories and dig into them, you start to realize that, man, there's a lot of baggage from their past.

There's a lot of people on this list that even after they were called...

All of them let Jesus down in one portion or another.

So much so that even one of them completely betrayed him so much so that it led Jesus to his own death.

And knowing all of that, Jesus invites us in anyway.

He invites you in anyway.

You know, maybe today you're here and you might be on the spiritual sidelines.

Like, you're just out, not really getting involved.

And maybe today you think that your past disqualifies you.

Like, Adam, you don't really know what I've done.

God, you don't know the things that I've done wrong.

Listen, take a lesson from these men who didn't feel qualified whatsoever.

God doesn't call the equipped.

He equips the called.

He equips you along the journey.

If you're waiting to be perfect before you can ever do anything for Jesus, you will never do anything for Jesus.

You hear me?

Nothing.

Jesus isn't waiting for you to be perfect.

He's just waiting for you to be faithful and available and teachable and to walk alongside him in the journey.

That's all he asks.

That's all he asks.

The question is, will you come along this journey?

And this leads to really the heartbeat of the Crosspoint Church mission, at least for us.

What we've been wrestling with and why we think this is our ultimate task.

If we want to bring people from all the way broken people all the way to transformed followers of Jesus, listen, it's going to take more than just a pastoral staff to do.

It's a whole man team.

And so this is our goal, our mission.

Our mission is this, it's to mobilize the people of Maine, the people that are here, to become transformed followers of Jesus.

I want to break this down for you.

When I say mobilize, I'm talking about this idea of preparing and organizing a group of people to action, using your skill sets and your gifts and your passions to be able to utilize those where God has really placed a burden upon your heart

to go out, not in, out.

to the community, to serve them, to mobilize you all, to get into the game.

That's our goal is to mobilize people, to mobilize people specifically the people of Maine here.

Listen, if you try and reach everybody, you reach nobody.

You ever hear that saying?

You try and do everything, you do nothing because you're so spread thin that you can't make an impact whatsoever.

And what we want to do is narrow in our focus.

You know, for Jesus, he changed the world through 12 men.

He focused small.

Jesus usually changes the world in small ways, doesn't he?

He started that way.

And, you know, likewise, if we hope to reach our community, and hopefully, you know, the goal would be to reach our world.

It starts small.

And so, you know, our focus is clear that we want to focus on a specific people.

We are in a specific location, so we're going to focus on those people, the people of Maine right here.

That's our focus.

Lastly, our goal, again, is not for people to just hear about salvation, get saved, and then duck out and do nothing about it.

It is people that are radically transformed followers of Jesus and

Anybody can say that they're a Christian, right?

But to have them transformed is a different category.

It's a different way of living.

And so I want to elaborate on this for you to be able to describe what do I mean when I say transform follower of Jesus?

Like what do you transform followers of Jesus even do?

And so I want to share basically our five pillars, our five values, our five things as a church we're going to be focusing on to help people get from broken manors to going out and multiplying.

And these are the five.

These are the five.

The first is to seek.

People are seeking and longing for something.

We, we're going to go into this more next week.

A lot of times churches, they can be more inward focused, focused on ourselves more than outward focused.

I've heard someone say before, if you want your church to thrive and survive, you need to be a tent more focused outwardly than inwardly.

Because if you just stay inward, it'll be a slow death.

We want to seek people where they're at and bring them along and help them encounter Jesus along the way.

A lot of churches tend to forget the second one of surrender.

That Jesus calls each and every one of us to lay down all that we have, all of our identity, all of what we have hoped in the past, all the things on a daily basis to surrender them to Jesus.

seek, surrender.

Ultimately, we want to help people grow through the Bible.

We are going to teach through the Bible every single week because we believe this word is living and active and changes lives.

And it's this word that changes lives, that ultimately gives us this compassion, this heart to go out showing and sharing the love of Jesus.

And ultimately, I think for many of us, we want to leave a legacy, don't we?

When we die, we want to have a purpose that we say, at the end of my life, what I did in the past was worth it.

And we say that the greatest thing that we can share as Christians, the greatest legacy that we can have is to take pride

where we were at as broken people and lead those same broken people and lead them along the way.

We are one sheep going to another sheep where to find their shepherd.

That is our five values.

Seek, surrender, grow, go, multiply.

Over the next four weeks, I'm going to elaborate on each of these five.

We're going to go through stories where Jesus shares and really lives out these principles that I want to share with you.

So you will not want to miss any of the rest of the series.

I ask you to stick around for a few weeks.

But I think for many of us, I think that the question is, what do I do right now?

How do I start this now?

I think for us, we've been, my prayer is that

We look at this list, if you notice, it's kind of like stepping stones from one to the next.

You first are somebody who's seeking after God, ultimately leads to your surrender, and then when you surrender, you want to grow more in the knowledge of Jesus and then go into the multiply.

It's like stepping stones one to the next.

It's this progression.

And so I want to ask you this morning this specific question.

Where would you say in each category, where would you say that you land in one of these categories?

Are you somebody that's, you know, maybe you're not even really sure about Jesus right now.

You've heard about him, but man, I really don't know who he is.

Maybe you're seeking to learn more about him this morning.

Maybe you're learning about him, but man, I don't know if I'm ready to surrender.

Maybe you're there.

Maybe you've, you know, asked Jesus to be your Lord and Savior, but man, I have not grown a single ounce since I've started my Christian walk.

There might be some of you that have been consuming, consuming, consuming, but not taking what you're learning into action and going to other people.

And maybe there's some of you today that, man, I haven't really left a legacy or leaving a legacy behind me to be able to share my faith, my hope with other people.

Where do you land on the spectrum this morning?

If you were to say, I am under one of these categories, where are you at?

Where are you at?

My prayer for you and for everyone who walks through the Crosspoint doors is that really we become what we're calling our series over the next few weeks.

This idea of being scattered to scent.

Taking the sheep that are out in the world and bringing them into the fold and leading them out to bring other sheep to hear about the true shepherd.

That's the vision.

That's the mission.

That is my hope for our church.

And you know, it doesn't happen overnight.

I understand that.

It takes a lot of time and focus and intentionality.

And you know, there's going to be things that we probably say, you know, there's a lot of great ministry opportunities you can do.

You got to narrow in and focus in though if you want to make an impact.

Some things we might have to say no to.

You know, everything that we do needs to be intentional.

That's the word I want to use.

And so, you know, over the next few weeks, we're going to elaborate on, okay, as a church, what is our strategy in doing each of these five things?

And, you know, if you want to, you can take a picture of this and soak it in, whatever you want.

But we'll reflect on those in the following weeks.

But I want to ask the question, what do we do now?

If we see that there is so many sheep without a shepherd leading them into the fold and going into making, you know, mobilized followers of Jesus, leading them to transform followers of Jesus, how do we do, like, where do we even start?

And I'm so glad you asked that question because it's exactly how Jesus started is how we're going to start.

Skip back to chapter 9, verse 38.

And you see that Jesus says to his disciples, listen, the harvest is plentiful.

There's a lot of work to do.

I understand the laborers are few.

Therefore, what?

Pray earnestly.

Pray earnestly.

Say this with me.

Pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.

Don't you see that Jesus is all powerful?

He could have just gone in and done it, come up with plans and strategies and goals.

He could have just done it, and yet he goes to his Father in heaven.

He relies on him.

Listen, we can come up with any programs on the planet here at the church.

We could come up with any ministry that we ever wanted to do.

But listen, God is going to produce the fruit.

God's the only one that's going to be able to do the work.

We can plant seeds, but man, and this has been the tough thing for me, is I'm one of those people, and I'm sure you are too, that I want to, like as soon as I have a passion for something, I'm going to make a plan and just get on it and go and just do it.

And sometimes I leave God behind.

Listen, we need to bring God throughout every single aspect of this process.

This is what we want.

This is what we need.

And so starting tomorrow, I mentioned this last week, but I want to invite you to join me in this three-week prayer challenge that we're doing.

Starting tomorrow for three weeks, praying.

Praying to God that God might help us in these five values of helping to seek after people, leading people to surrender, to help them grow and go and multiply.

and to become transformed followers of Jesus.

That is the prayer.

And so at the end of the service, we're going to have some ushers that are in the back of the doors.

And so they are going to have cards for you.

They are these three-week prayer cards, and they look like this.

And you'll see it on the flip side of this prayer card.

You'll see that it has the whole calendar.

right?

It's actually, if you look at this one, the font's pretty small.

This is like an eye check for you if you need glasses or not.

But regardless, this is a goal for us to be able to pray together.

Church, God will work most powerfully and mightily when we pray to him.

And so these are just simple prayer prompts that go off of these five values of seeking and surrendering and going and growing and multiplying.

And I just want us to pray through these things.

You know, maybe you want to use this prayer challenge and you want to just pray, you know, for specific things that are going on in your life.

If that's you, great.

But I ask you to just join along with me in praying, again, these simple prayers.

That God might change, not just our church, but that God would bring laborers here.

That we could pray for the scattered here, in Maine, in Bangor, in our city, in your city, and pray that lives are changed here.

Pray that your life is changed over the next three weeks.

That's what I want to use this three-week prayer challenge for.

Will you join me?

Will you join me in this invitation to pray together for God, for his kingdom, and how he's going to work.

And you know what?

For some of you, you know, we have a Wednesday morning prayer time.

It's at 9 a.m.

I just want to invite you.

It's in Wambaland, which is the room right next to the cafe.

If you have time, we'd love for you to join and pray with us together.

But as we close our service this morning, I want to close our service in a final word of prayer.

And so I'm going to invite our prayer team to come forward.

I'm going to ask if we can put the lights down for a little bit.

Just play some music in the background.

You're here today and, you know, maybe you just need prayer.

Maybe you're struggling, wrestling with something.

Maybe you are just exhausted, busy.

You just need prayer.

If that's you today, we have some of our prayer team that's up here that would love to pray for you during this time.

You know, there might be some of you that, as I was speaking today, you're in one of those categories, and you want to get to the next step.

I'm seeking, I want to surrender.

You know, I've surrendered, but I want to start growing.

Maybe you're growing a bunch, but you want to go out and use your gifts and talents and passions to serve our God.

Maybe you feel tempted, or not tempted, you feel...

Feel just God's impression for you to impact people and invest in their lives through multiplying.

That's you today.

I just want to spend this time in reflective prayer.

Again, we have some guys here up in the front.

We have Megan here to the side.

we just want to spend some time in prayer.

If you just want to pray in your seat, that's fine.

If you want to talk to a pastor or a women's director, Megan, we'd love for you to pray with them.

If you want to kneel at the front and just say, God, I want to surrender something to you today, now is the time.

So we're just going to spend a few minutes just praying to our God, and then I'll close out our service in a few minutes.

Father, as we close out our service this morning, God, I know that for many of us, you have brought us from different walks of life, different places, different cities.

But God, you have today brought us here.

You've brought us here for this moment.

And so God, I want to pray for each and every one of us that is here, that is online.

God, would you help us to do what you've called us to do?

God, there is a whole city out there, a whole metro area that has thousands upon thousands of sheep that do not know their shepherd.

God, I first and foremost ask that you help.

I pray that breaks our heart.

God, I pray as we encounter people at work, as we encounter family and friends, as we encounter neighbors or people that we just see, God, would you give us eyes to be able to see those people just as you saw them?

And God, would it fill us with great compassion?

Father, I pray for our church.

I pray for the people that are here

God, would you help us become transformed followers of Jesus day after day to seek and to surrender and to grow and to go and to multiply?

Would you help us do that?

God, we need your help.

God, would you lead us in that way?

Father, I pray, I pray for those that feel unqualified, that feel that they could never be

be part of a mission like this, would you remind them of the disciples who were incredibly unqualified and yet they made an incredible impact through the work of Jesus?

God, would you help them see that can be the case in their life too?

And God, as we go, would you give us eyes to see people for who they are?

God, would you give us hearts that care for the sheep

And God, would you give boldness as we go out to share about the shepherd.

God, we love you and we thank you.

Bless our church as they go out today.

It's in Jesus' name that we pray.

Amen.