Hard Hearts

Welcome to God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in Morning Sun, Iowa. Check us out online at www.sharonrpc.org. We pray that this message will be a blessing to you and that the Lord will use it to transform your faith and your life. Quite a sobering psalm. Quite a somber tune.

I'd like to ask you this morning, two different families, one family, a Christian husband and wife who discipled and raised and trained their children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, the child goes off to college, leaves and renounces the faith.

Why didn't God save them? Another family that a Christian husband and wife pray for the wife's unbelieving father for 40 years, and when he's 86 years old, professes faith in Jesus Christ, and has three years to learn to be a disciple of the Messiah. Why does God save some and not others? Why does God seem to reach down from heaven and take out the heart of stone out of some people and others He passes over?

That's the question we look at this morning as we turn in our Bibles to Mark chapter 6. As we turn in our Bibles to Mark chapter 6, we'll see on display here both faith and disbelief. We'll see people who turn to Jesus Christ, love Him and obey Him, and others who have no place in their heart for the Kingdom of Heaven. And it's a stark reality that will also give us comfort. As we look to the Holy Spirit and we know that the wind blows where it wishes. And it gives us great comfort that it is God who saves. So will you turn your Bibles with me now to Mark chapter 6. Mark chapter 6 and we'll begin at verse 1 and we'll read through verse 29. Then he went out from there and came into his own country and his disciples followed him. And when the Sabbath had come, he began to preach in the synagogue.

And many hearing him were astonished, saying, Where did this man get these things? And what wisdom is this which is given to him, that such mighty works are performed by his hands? Is this not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James, Joseph, Judas, and Simon? Are not his sisters here with us? So they were offended at him. But Jesus said to them, a prophet is not without honor except in his own country, among his own relatives, and in his own house.

Now he could do no mighty works there except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief. Then he went about the villages in a circuit teaching. And he called the twelve to himself and began to send them out two by two, and gave them power over unclean spirits.

He commanded them to take nothing for the journey except a staff, no bag, no bread, no copper in their belly belts, but to wear sandals and not to put on two tunics. Also he said to them, in whatever place you enter a house, stay there till you depart from that place. And whoever will not receive you nor hear you, when you depart from there, shake off the dust under your feet as a testimony against them. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city.'

So they went out and preached that people should repent. And they cast out many demons and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them. Now King Herod heard of him For his name had become well known, and he said, John the Baptist is risen from the dead, and therefore these powers are at work in him. Others said, it is Elijah. And others said, it is the prophet, or like one of the prophets. But when Herod heard, he said, this is John, whom I beheaded, he has been raised from the dead.

For Herod himself had sent and laid hold of John and bound him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife. For he had married her because John had said to Herod, it is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. Therefore Herod held it against him and wanted to kill him, but she could not. For Herod feared John, knowing that he was a just and holy man and he protected him. And when he heard him, he did many things, and heard him gladly. Then an opportune day came when Herod on his birthday gave a feast for the nobles, the high officers, and the chief men of Galilee. And when Herodias' daughter herself came in and danced and pleased Herod and those who sat with him, the king said to the girl, ask me whatever you want and I will give it to you.

He also swore to her, whatever you ask me, I will give it to you up to half my kingdom. So she went out and said to her mother, what shall I ask? And she said, the head of John the Baptist. Immediately she came in with haste to the king and asked, saying, I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter. And the king was exceedingly sorry.

Yet because of the oaths and because of those who sat with him, he did not want to refuse her. Immediately the king sent an executioner and commanded his head to be brought. and he went and beheaded him in prison, brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl. And the girl gave it to her mother. When his disciples heard of it, they came and took away his corpse and laid it in a tomb."

Prayer for Illumination

Let's pray. Father, we pray that your Holy Spirit would attend to the reading of your word. It's a hard passage we have for us today. Father, we pray that you would give us reverent, sober minds. That we would have hearts to believe. Father, we pray that your work would be done even this hour. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Sermon

Well, Jesus has been traveling in the first six verses. Jesus has been traveling and he decides to go to his hometown. He decides to go up to Nazareth. He decides to go to the place where he had lived for well over 20 years. A place where when his parents had brought him up out of Egypt, they had brought him to Nazareth, far out of the reach of King Herod down in Jerusalem. And they go there and Jesus begins to preach.

And what we would anticipate is a hometown welcome. Right? You expect a band to play, the hero has come, this is wonderful. Well, that's not exactly what we find. They do allow him to come into the synagogue and he begins to teach. He opens up the book for them. He begins to tell them about it, about what the Lord says, but instead of welcoming it, familiarity breeds contempt. It's not unlike Jesus to come into the synagogue, but now Jesus isn't coming as the carpenter's boy. He's coming as the teacher, and not everyone likes it. He's coming with authority, and people are wondering, We know he interned with his daddy in the shop. We know that he's a contractor. He didn't study with the rabbis. He didn't go to the best schools. Where does he get this wisdom? Where does he get the authority to teach? Don't we know his mother? Isn't she here with us?

We know his brothers. Right, here's James, Joseph, Judas, and Simon. They're all here, and his sisters are even with us. By the way, Mary was not a perpetual virgin. Jesus has a family. You have to do some real serious intellectual hula hoops to get through that. Jesus has a family, and this for them is a hard thing. Because Jesus is just one of the other brothers in their mind. So they're offended at him. And Jesus recognizes their lack of faith. He says, you know, if a prophet was to go to any other town, he would receive honor. But when he comes home, oh, you're just Mary's boy. Put you in the corner, and you keep your place, Jesus. And he's amazed by it.

And he doesn't do a mighty work in that area, and rightly so, because they don't have faith. I love how the New Testament minimizes Jesus' work there. Notice verse 5. Now, He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid hands on a few sick people and healed them. If He did that in our congregation, we'd go, oh man, this is amazing! But even with that, people don't have faith. He's too familiar to them. And it brings contempt upon them.

And I want to tell you, brothers and sisters, this is not much different than what you might experience in your own life. As you try to tell your children about Jesus Christ, as you try to open the Bible with them, as you try to instruct your grandchildren and great-grandchildren about God's Word, you might just be, well, yeah, that's just what mom believes. Yeah, grandpa reads the Bible and he believes that stuff, but I don't know. And they might just put you in the familiar pocket. corner.

For some of you, as you tell your children about Jesus, they might not just think that you're too familiar, but they might have heard so much about Jesus Christ that it's possible that they're too familiar with a Jesus of stories rather than the Jesus who is the king of the universe today. As you tell your parents about the scriptures, Some of you, you were brought to faith and you were raised in believing homes. And so as you tell your parents about Jesus Christ, you might be contemptible to your parents. Why would they want to listen to you? You're just their kid. As you talk to your co-workers about what God has done in your life, they might remember your life. They might be too familiar with you. But here's the beautiful thing.

You're not called to bring about their salvation. We are not called to bring about the fruits of conversion. What we are responsible for is to follow Jesus Christ. To obey His commands, to love Him. And so brothers and sisters, I want to call you this morning to have faith in the teachings of Jesus Christ, the King. A love for Jesus and a belief in what He has taught you and is guiding you through His Word. For a compassion of souls and for a love of others.

And as we continue to go out and tell our co-workers, our neighbors, our loved ones, our families, our friends about Jesus Christ, we can keep in mind what Jesus himself said in John chapter 3 verse 8. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit. The Spirit goes where He wishes.

So the people in Nazareth were too familiar with Jesus. And they held him in contempt. And you might think, as Jesus is leaving this place of disbelief in verses 1 through 6, that he would say, you know what guys, we've suffered a great failure. Let's go into the mountains, let's go to a deserted place, and let's go and pray. But notice what Jesus does in the next verse. Verses 7 through 13, what does Jesus do? And he called the twelve to himself and began to send them out two by twos.

In the face of the failure of Nazareth, Jesus doesn't retreat thinking that God hasn't done his work. But in the face of that, what looks like failure in Nazareth, Jesus uses it as the backdrop for commissioning the apostles to start going out. They had been promised in chapter 1 that they would become fishers of men, and this is the first time in the book of Mark that we actually see them leaving Jesus at all.

Right? They had been sitting at the feet of Jesus, they had been walking with Jesus, they had been learning about Jesus, they had been learning from Jesus, and now they are sent to go tell others about the kingdom of God. You might think Coming off Nazareth, would this bother them in their own hearts and consciences? What if one of their friends saw them? What if one of their old business associates heard them? What if they had gone and people saw them doing what Jesus tells them to? Notice what Jesus mandates for them. In verse 8, you would think Jesus sends them out with a full, you know, Boy Scout backpack ready for anything to come.

But instead, Jesus says, no bread, no money, only a walking staff. By the way, you're not allowed to bring extra clothes, only one tunic, and you got some sandals, that's good, you're allowed to bring those. And that's it. Why? He's sending them out defenseless and with an absolute need to trust in God that if what's going to happen is going to be a success, it could only be of God's doing.

But again, I mean, if you're used to walking around with a belt on, and that belt is almost like a knapsack, you know? And it's got your money in it, and you're used to walking around, and you have defensive rods, and you're able to walk around with a certain amount of confidence that you have food in your bag, and you know where you're supposed to stay.

And now Jesus is saying, no, no, I want you to walk around like a beggar. I want you to go from place to place, and wherever you go, and they show you hospitality, if they open the doors, stay there. Don't go looking for a better place. Stay wherever it's open to you. But He's going to warn them. Not everyone's going to welcome you. As the disciples are being sent out, two by two, they're being sent out, and Jesus is telling them, He's letting them know, when you walk into towns, there are people who are going to shut the door in your face.

They don't want to hear you. They don't want to give you a place to stay. They don't want to give you bread to eat. They don't want to give you water. They don't want to give you anything. They want you to leave. Hospitality in the ancient Near East was one of the most important things that could possibly be given to people. And here they're not even given a bowl of water to wash their feet. And Jesus says, you know what? It's going to happen. It's going to happen. And when they turn away from you, when they don't want to listen to you, walk to the edge of the town, shake the dust off the bottom of your feet and go away.

This is what the rabbis would do when they walked into a pagan land. And they were about to walk back into Israel, they would literally shake the unclean dust off their feet so as not to defile. This was these two witnesses testifying in heaven against this town. their disbelief. But how much the disciples have heard this after seeing their own rabbi rejected. It could have overwhelmed their souls with the possible failure for them for their own journey. He's given them authority over the unclean spirits and they're to preach a message of repentance.

Everyone loves that message, don't they? I mean, you were super comfortable reading Jeremiah 7, weren't you? As we read through Jeremiah 7, you're like, oh man, he's giving us the good stuff today. All the honey, this is wonderful. No, this is not a popular message. But it's a message from God Almighty. But Jesus has just told them, there are gonna be people who don't believe. And that's the same as it is for today. Our question is not whether people will listen to the message or not.

Our question is, will we be faithful with the commission that Jesus has given us? He's promised us all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Him. He's promised us that He is with us always, even until the end of the age. Will we go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them all which He commanded us? Maybe for some of you, as we were praying this morning, you heard about the need for a lead to go to Scotland, and maybe your heart was pricked.

I don't know. Maybe for some of you, you could go to South Sudan, Cyprus, or maybe even more local to Pittsburgh. Maybe you don't have a passport. That's okay. You can just hop on a car, go down 80 for a while, and you'll get there. Maybe you sensed a need to tell someone you know about the gospel. Maybe it's your mom, your dad, your child. Your brother or your sister.

Yeah, you haven't opened your mouth. Why? Have you ever experienced that before? Have you ever been with somebody that you know you ought to tell this person the gospel? And it's like your bones are screaming within you, but your mouth is, it's like there's concrete on your tongue. Why do we get so scared?

Do we not speak about Jesus because we're afraid of rejection? Do we not speak of Jesus because we're afraid of the consequences? Do we not speak of Jesus because we're worried about hurting someone's feelings? Maybe we don't speak about Jesus because in all reality, sometimes you just write people off. Like there's no way that person would ever listen to me. Maybe you're worried about your reputation. Or maybe you're worried about your own sins, ashamed of your own wrongdoings.

Brothers and sisters, the commission of Jesus that he would give at the end of this book to go and preach the gospel to all creation would be even better than the gospel or the commission that he gave them right here. So we ought to pray for courage to go where our master tells us to go. We need to pray for courage to speak to our friends and family members. We need to pray for humility. We need to pray for love. Yet we understand that we can do all this, but we need to understand that at the end of the day, the wind blows where it wishes. The spirit regenerates whom he chooses. Will we go He uses his people as the means of spreading the gospel. How will they believe in whom they have not heard? How will they believe? How will they hear without a preacher? And how will they preach unless they are sent? Is the Lord sending you, even in your context, informally to preach? to those whom you love to declare the good news of Jesus Christ. We tell others of Christ and let God be in charge of the outcome.

Our message is repentant and it's not popular. It wasn't popular in the first century. You know, just go read the book of Acts and see how it works out. Go remember the scars on Paul's back as he was chased out of town, as he was whipped, as he was even stoned. It's not going to be popular today. Christians are called abusive, backward bigots, callous, delirious, or examples of stupidity. And it was the same in Herod's day also. That's the next part. I want to look with you at this kind of two people in this next story of disbelief exemplified. Disbelief exemplified, verses 14 through 29. Verses 14 through 29, we find a very dark and ugly passage.

Jesus's ministry continued to gain steam. More people heard more and more about what he was doing. Now we need to be careful here because when it says, now King Herod heard of him, who is this king? This is not King Herod the Great who tried to kill all the children in Bethlehem to wipe Jesus off the face of the earth. It's not the same. This is his son, Herod Antipas.

And we have a real problem as we read through this because Herod's family loved the name Herod. So much so that even the daughters were named Herodias. And so, in Chalk and Talk, I'm actually going to show you a little video that goes through the family line and all the drama, but I'm warning you, it's like an ancient Near Eastern soap opera. And these people are all connected and it's like a horrible soap opera with incest mixed in.

It's gross. So it's not Herod the Great, it's Herod Antipas and he's the ruler, he's not actually a king, he's just a ruler of the area of Galilee and the area of Perea. So up by the Sea of Galilee and down on the eastern side of the Red Sea. Or sorry, of the Dead Sea. But there's something you need to understand about the Herods. Though they might be rulers of Israel, they're not rulers of Israel because of their piety. The Herods are not rulers of Israel because they are examples of biblical morality.

It's because they knew how to get in politically well with the Romans. They knew how to seize power and how to manipulate things to go in their ways. And they did this through brutality and political prowess. And the family, you read the ancient historian Josephus, and the family is just marked with crazy immorality. It's scandal after scandal.

Herod Antipas, where this comes in is Herod Antipas had fallen in love. He was already married. He was actually married to the princess of Arabia. But one day he goes and he goes to his brother Philip's area and there he falls in love with his sister-in-law. Philip, his half-brother's wife. Now here's where things get really weird and gross. The woman he falls in love with, not only is she his sister-in-law, but she's also his niece.

It's gross. But he falls in love with her, he divorces his wife, the princess of Arabia, actually causes a war so he can stay with this woman. And this, everybody in Israel knows, this is wrong. This is horrible, right? You've married your niece who's also the wife of your living brother, half-brother. Where do you get off doing this? This is adultery and everyone knew it. But there's this mix of immorality and incest going on. There's one voice. There's one voice that cries out from the wilderness.

There's one voice of moral courage who's willing to stand up and go into the king's palace and face-to-face John tells him, it is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. We're going to talk more about the Herod's and Chalk and Talk, but these are people known for literally lopping off the heads, killing even their own children when they were worried about their political power being taken away from them. But John has the moral courage to do it. He takes Herod to task for violating God's law.

And this really irked Herodias. This really irks the queen. She is not happy about this at all. Herodias is even more hungry for power than even her husband was, and she's waiting. The text gives us this feel that somehow she's waiting for this opportune time, this moment when she could finally get rid of this guy who's a pain in her side.

John had caused enough trouble for Herod that he had had him arrested, but You can't really, I mean, let's face it, you can't really have a guy running around saying that your marriage is illegitimate when you're supposed to be a ruler in Israel. That kind of causes political problems.

So he arrests him, but the problem is he knows, what does Herod know? He knows that John is a righteous and holy man. And here's where things get odd. Herod's actually, he's kind of curious about John. Who's this dude in camels fur? And the Bible tells us here that he would actually bring John to him, and he would actually hear him preach. He would hear these things from him, almost like a sense of amusement and entertainment. It's kind of like he was turning on the podcast and listening to John's sermons, listening to coffee and devotion, still not having a lick of concern about changing his ways.

Herod had a passive disbelief. And I fear many churches are filled with this type of listeners. I fear that churches, many churches in America are filled with people who are intrigued and may be interested in the Bible or things about Jesus, but have no love for God or fear over sin.

Herodias, on the other hand, she's looking for an opportunity to kill John. And the scene is set, this ugly scene. It's Herod's birthday, there's a drunken party, and Josephus tells us, the ancient historian, that this is a desert fortress down by the Dead Sea, up on a mountain, and there in the palace, archaeology has shown us that there's two different banquet halls, one for the women, one for the men, and around the corner, down the steps, is a prison. And as the drunken party's going on, Herodias sends her daughter, Salome. She goes there and she dances in a way that no man in this church should ever see. And she goes there and she pleases her stepdad. There's sexual connotations in the windows underneath the bottom of this. And Herod makes her this drunken, prideful, stupid promise.

He acts like he's the king of Persia, or like he's Ashurarius during the reign of Esther. And he says, up to half my kingdom I'll give to you. And what does Salome do? She runs to her mom in the next banquet hall, and she says, what should I ask for?

Disbelief on display. Get that man's head. And the daughter does it. She's only 12 years old, somewhere around there at this time, and she runs back and she tells her stepfather that she wants John the Baptist's head and she makes sure she adds the detail on a silver platter.

Herod's caught in a rock and a hard place, right? He's made this stupid promise. He's made this He's made this contract with her, he can't break. Why? Because the military officials are there, the chief men are there, everybody's watching him. Is he really going to give up his authority? Is he going to play himself to be a fool? Is he not going to keep his word?

And so he leans over to his executioner, to his right-hand man on his bodyguard, and he says, go do it. And this is the tragic end to the story of John. He murders the prophet of God. But Herod's conscience, that's where we're going historically through the story, but now we're at the point of when this is going on. Herod's conscience can't get away from him.

Now King Herod heard of him, verse 14, for his name had become well known, and he said, so this is after Jesus' name has become well known, now Herod's like, wrestling in his heart and his soul and he's talking to people, who is this dude? Who is this guy healing people, going around, who's teaching these things? And some people think that Jesus is Elijah, the messianic forerunner who was promised in Malachi 4-5. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And some people think that this is Elijah come. Other people think that he is the prophet.

The prophet that God had promised Moses in Deuteronomy 18.15. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. You shall him, you shall hear. And other people think he's just like Jeremiah, or Isaiah, or Ezekiel, one of the prophets of old.

But in Herod's mind, he's worse than this. He's dealing with John all over again. A superstitious belief that somehow Jesus is the resurrected John the Baptist. I don't know, maybe like a ghost from Christmas past or something. Herod's haunted by what he's done and he can't shake it.

And even the non-Christian Jews of his own time, right, what Herod did or non-Christians, right? Josephus writes that even the Jewish people who weren't Christians, when Herod died, they said, it's because he killed John the Baptist. John preached repentance, and it cost him his life. The disciples knew it. And they had seen even Jesus rejected. So where would they find comfort as they still went out and preached. Where would Simon and Andrew, James and John, how would they comfort their souls?

Again, John three, verse eight, the wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but you cannot tell where it comes and where it goes, who is everyone who is born of the spirit. If you tell people about Jesus Christ, It may be costly. We pray week in and week out for evangelistic opportunities, but I'm warning you, I don't want to sugarcoat it for you. If you tell others the true gospel of Jesus Christ, there might be repercussions. You might lose face. You might lose reputation. You might lose friends. You might even lose privileged positions.

But to serve the God of the Bible means we also serve the God and His own ethics. We preach repentance. We preach coming to Jesus Christ alone for salvation for the remission of your sins. We don't have a right to take the message and twist it and make it whatever we want. This is why Jesus, when he commanded us to go and make disciples, that we might instruct them in everything he has commanded us.

This is not easy. So what happens? You need to decide this in your heart right now. I'm warning you because these things will happen in your life if they are not already happening in your life. And you must resolve in your heart, Christian, whether you will hold to the gospel of Jesus Christ no matter the cost. And so these next examples I'm going to give to you, I'm warning you, can happen in your own life.

How will you respond? What happens when one of your children embraces a sinful lifestyle? What will you do? What will you do when you see your co-worker stealing from the company you work for? What will you do when you're invited to a homosexual wedding of someone you love? What will you do when your friend is trying to justify their adulterous relationship with another person's spouse? What will you do when you hear things that your parents are saying, but you know that they're not true?

What will you do when you see sin in the leadership, even of the church? How will you respond? Will you be like those disciples of Jesus Christ who were sent out two by two with authority? And also with a message of repentance, will you be like John with moral courage to stand for the Lord's kingdom, though it might cost you all you have.

We must pray for courage. This is not something we can do apart from the Holy Spirit. We need to pray that God will allow us to enter into these conversations and we need to recognize that God's sovereign over whom he chooses It's the Lord who hardens whom He hardens and loves whom He loves. I know that's experientially, existentially, emotionally difficult for some of us.

Because there are people I love, I love dearly. Family members and friends that I know are walking the path paved to hell. And I love them. And I know you have family members like that and loved ones like that too. The question is, will we be faithful to the one who has loved us with a perfect love?

I need you to be encouraged also, both by the testimony of Scripture and by the history of the world, that evangelism does work. That God does bring sinners to himself, and sometimes in odd ways. Ways we don't understand. Yet as we read through the book of Acts, and as we read church history and we see the gospel spreading through the different nations, we observe that missionaries did have a success, even though many of them we read were abject failures, according to this world's standards. What's our measure of success? Let's bring this home a little bit.

Was the RP church an abject failure in starting a mission church in China in the late 1800s, only to get kicked out by the communists in the mid-1950s? Were we a failure? Was the church a failure of this congregation who spent a massive amount of resources starting a mission church to the Indians in Oklahoma that eventually closed? Was this congregation? That pastor, the missionary's failures.

It's bringing in a modern day. Should I quit? And we labored for a long time with the Gratia Church. Preaching week in and week out. Preaching the gospel, seeing non-Christians come. And yet there's no church meeting in Burlington, no RP church there anymore. Have we failed?

No. Because the Spirit blows where He wishes. We take comfort in God's sovereignty that our job is to go and take the gospel and the Lord brings the fruit. The Lord is the one who saves. The Lord is the one who brings his kingdom. You cannot do the work of evangelizing and going out and sharing the good news of others with your hope being that somehow I'll be able to do this. No, it is receiving and resting upon Jesus Christ as being reborn, which would only happen by the work of the Holy Spirit.

The more Christ is precious to you, though, the more you'll want to share him. The more Jesus is the pearl of great price to you, the more important it will be for you to say, come, come and see the one, meet the one who's told me everything I've ever done. How could Jesus commission 12 disciples to go out and preach after having just been rejected in his own hometown? Because Jesus believed what he taught.

The spirit blows where it wishes. And so have faith, Christian. Have hope in Jesus Christ. If you love Him, you know that His work is effectual even in your own heart and in your own life. And so yes, He can use us as instruments in His hand to bring about someone else's salvation. But if He doesn't, that wasn't our job. He brings about the final product. The question for us is, are we faithful to the commission he's given?

Closing Prayer

So brothers and sisters, I pray that you are encouraged in your evangelism. I pray that you soak in the love of Jesus Christ. And I pray that you would share that good news and that love of Jesus Christ with your family members, with your children, with your grandchildren, with your friends, with your coworkers. And may the kingdom of Satan be destroyed. And may the kingdom of glory advance. Let's pray.

Father, we thank you so much for the work of your Holy Spirit. We thank you, Father, that you have chosen your people, that you have redeemed them by the blood of Jesus, and that you have given us your Spirit. But Father, if we walk out of here, and this was just a rah-rah sermon, without us actually having a burden to go and tell others about Christ, we failed. So Father, we pray that you would so unite us to Jesus Christ, that we would abound in good works, that we would tell others of our great King and Savior. Father, would you do this work in our hearts and in our lives, we pray in Jesus' name.

Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith in your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue, Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.