Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - Dangerous Prayers, Part 2: Break Me

Episode Date: January 23, 2016

Believe your big risks will be rewarded. Believe what you ask for is possible. If you’re ready to see a spark in your life, pray boldly. Pray daringly. Pray with fire. And remember God's listening to your Dangerous Prayers. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

God, I know you give grace to the humble. So I ask you, God, to do a deep work in my heart. And break me. Break me of my pride. Break me in my selfishness. Break me of anything that keeps me from knowing you. As hard as it is to ask God, do whatever it takes to break me. Well, it is great to have you at all of our life churches, at all of our network churches.

those of you in every country and territory in the world and the other side of screens at Church Online, we are in part two of a three-part message series called Dangerous Prayers. If you were with us last week, I actually said at the beginning of the message that I believe for many of you, one of the three prayers that we're praying

will have a significant impact. In fact, last week I explained that for some of you, one of these messages might become what I call an anchor message. In fact, as I look back over my relationship with God over all the years, there are three or four messages that I actually heard and experienced when someone else was preaching that really had such a deep spiritual impact on my life that I was significantly different after being in the presence of God hearing his word. I call those anchor messages. I can remember the moment. I can remember the time. I can remember the message I was transformed in those messages.

Last week we talked about, search me God, search my heart. And I already had some of you say, well, there it was. That was an anchor message for me. Next week's message, I really believe of all three will be an anchor message for more people than any other message. We're going to ask God to send us. Here I am, God. Anywhere, any time. I'm available to you.

Send me. It is my favorite now of the three next week. Today, though, is going to be the most difficult. If there is one that is by far the most dangerous of all three, it is the prayer we're going to talk about this week. And I want to warn you and just tell you up front, some of you will not like this prayer. Many of you will refuse to pray it. I'm simply not going to pray this prayer. I'll tell you up front, it's not a common prayer.

It doesn't feel good. This prayer is not consistent with the God will always make your life. better version of Christianity. Okay? This prayer, though, it does have the potential to open your heart up to the work of God in such a way that it can forever change your life. And the prayer that I'm going to ask you to consider praying is the prayer, break me.

Break me, God. Break me. I received a text this week from a close friend, someone that I have known for years in the church, a very committed Jesus follower. And this friend said, we talked about it in our life group and we all agree. We all want to be closer to God. We all want the junk out of our lives. We all want to be conformed to the image of Christ.

But we really don't feel safe praying the prayer, break me. We don't really want to pray that. Okay? I understand that. It is a very dangerous prayer to say, God, break me. My first experience with this whole idea of brokenness, it actually was about 21 years ago. Amy and I were leading up to the events that would allow us to start Life Church. And I was sitting with a mentor, Gary Walter, who had helped a lot of people start churches.

I was learning from and taking notes. He was kind of helping me to understand. I was 27 at the time, didn't know much. He was coaching me, and we were about to start Life Church. I sat across from the table, maybe our third meeting or so, and we had a very first meeting or so, and we had a very solemn moment at the end right after he prayed for me. And it was the end of the meeting.

I never will forget. He leans in. He looks at me and he says, I have only one promise for you and one promise. I guarantee this is going to happen. Now, I was naive enough to think, and this is the honest truth.

I thought Gary is going to say, God is going to use you in a massive way. God is going to exceed your expectations. It's going to be amazing. I mean, I was stupid enough to think that was his promise. I never will forget. Gary looked at me and said, my promise is this, God will break you.

I was like, crap. Really a holy moment, and you're telling me that. Well, praise the Lord, thank you, Jesus. That's just what I wanted to hear. God will break you. We started the church. We hit road bump after road bump after road bump. Some heart-wrenching things happened.

People we loved got hurt, we got hurt. I had to let good friends go on the staff. that weren't cutting it. We got removed from a building, didn't have a place to go. Couldn't barely pay the bill's massive financial tension. Every time something happened, I would call Gary and say, here's what's going on. I mean, I'm literally aching on the inside. I said, Gary, am I broken yet?

Am I broken yet? Am I broken yet? Am I broken yet? He said, listen, listen. Finally after the third or fourth call, I said, when you're broken, you will not have to call me and ask me if you're broken. When you're broken, you will know you're broken. you are broken. Dangerous prayer. God, break me. I at the time could not imagine the blessings and the intimacy

with God on the other side of the pain that I would one day experience. I want to ask you to consider praying a very dangerous prayer. Not all of you will. You don't have to. This isn't like you have to pray this. But to consider giving God permission to do a deep work in your life, God, break me. So to study this today, what we're going to do is we're going to look at two different stories in the Bible. What's really cool is they're both side by side. They're in the very same chapter.

In the book of Mark, there's one story, immediately followed by another story. The first story deals with a prostitute. And I actually had to write a 15-page paper in seminary on this one little story, so I know way too much about it. But one of the things I remember is really trying to get into the mind of what it would have been like for this woman because nobody in the first century wanted to be a prostitute. It wasn't like, hey, hopefully by the time I'm 21, I'll be in the top 10% of prostitutes in the community. Nobody wanted to do this.

In fact, if you were a prostitutes, it's only because life dealt you cards that you felt had no other way to play except for this desperate plea because they were hated, despised, they were. full of shame. Who knows what would have led this woman to this? Maybe she was a single mom and had no other way of paying for the bills. Maybe she had been abused by men, knew nothing else. Whatever it was, she was hated by every woman and used by many men. Full of shame.

And one day she met a man that treated her differently. Maybe for the first time from a male, she was shown honor, she was shown respect, he treated her with dignity, and he loved her appropriately. and it so transformed this woman that she wanted to worship him in the most sacrificial way that she could imagine. And her extravagant act of worship

completely confused everyone else in this story. Mark chapter 14, verse 3, says this. And it's interesting to me, while Jesus was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of Simon the Lepper, a woman, and this is the sinful woman that we know from Luke's gospel, this is the sinful woman comes in with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume.

Now, first thing I wanted to know, whose home was Jesus in? He was in the home of Simon the leper. Okay? Everyone else would run from lepers. Jesus would befriend them and heal them. That's pretty cool. So you got a rabbi, Jesus. This sounds like a joke, okay?

A rabbi, a leper, and a prostitute walked into a bar. Right? Okay, so you've got a rabbi, a leopard, a prostitute in this house, along with some other disciples. She comes in with very expensive perfume. Now, before I go on, I want to explain the perfume to you. This perfume was so valuable we find out later in the Gospels that it was valued at like a year's worth of wages. So just imagine what you make in a year, okay? And imagine it being that valuable.

Now, why was it so valuable? It's valuable because it was incredibly rare, really difficult to come by. And so ordinary women did not wear perfume because they could not afford it. Who wore perfume? Basically, it was like the calling card, okay? You invested your money into the perfume, so when you're walking by and some guy goes, oh, I see, okay, you're sending me a message that you're available, okay? So this was very, very expensive, with a year's worth of wages, and it was essentially

the source of her income to draw business. So she's got this incredibly expensive perfume. And then the next part of the verse says this. She did what with the jar? Let's all say it aloud. She did what? She broke the jar. Everybody said it again.

What did she do? She broke the jar and then what did she do? She poured the perfume on Jesus's head. She broke and poured. She broke and poured. Say it with me. What did she do? She broke and she poured.

Now, some people, as we read on in the story, freaked out. Don't do that. Stop! You can imagine in slow motion, them diving over there. It's so valuable. Now, I've heard preachers kind of make fun of that say, you know, these lack of faith people, you know, they're, you know, stop, these worldly people. Listen to me. If I'd have been there, I would be saying the same exact thing.

Woman, don't do that. I would have done that. I said, it's too valuable. Give them a drop. Give him two. Sell the rest. We'll split it up. We'll feed the poor.

I mean, that's exactly what I would have been doing. And this act of worship was more extravagant than you can imagine. Essentially, she was saying, I'm giving you my whole life. I'm giving you the most valuable possession I have. This represents my past and this represents my future. In other words, I'm leaving my life. past life behind. I'm giving my future source of income and my life savings away. Jesus, you have loved me so that I will break open the most valuable possession that I have.

What represents my livelihood, I will break it and I will pour it. All of it, poured out in one selfless, extravagant moment of worship, broken and poured. broken, and poured. That's the first story. The second story is right after the first story in the same book of the Bible. And in this story, Jesus is having his last meal. He's gathered together with his closest friends.

He knows what is coming, that he's going to give his life on the cross, and this is how Mark tells the story. Same chapter, verse 22. As they were eating, Jesus took some bread and blessed it. Then what did he do? Say it aloud, all of our churches. Then what did he do?

Then he broke it into pieces and gave it to his disciples saying, take it, for this is my body. And he took a cup of wine and he gave thanks to God for it. And he gave it to them and they all drank from it. And he said to them, this is my blood, which confirms the covenant between God and his people. He said, it is what? Everybody, you all in Albany?

Say it aloud. He said what? He said, it is poured out as a sacrifice for many. It's broken and it's poured. Broken and poured. My body is broken for you. My blood will be poured out. My jar is broken.

broken in an act of worship, and I pour it all out because I'm giving you everything I am and everything that I have. Broken and poured. Luke reports on this same story. Luke was at the table. Mark was there. Luke was there. The rest of the disciples were there. And Luke wrote about it, and he told the story in almost the same way, but he added and picked up on something that Mark didn't point out in Mark's writing. This is what Luke said about it in Luke 2219. He said basically the same thing. Jesus took bread, gave thanks and did what? There it is again.

And he broke it. Gave it to them saying, this is my body given for you. And then what did he say? He said, do this in remembrance of me. Do this in remembrance of me. Do this in remembrance of me. Well, what is this? Okay?

Most of us would agree that as followers of Jesus, we gather together and we take the Lord's supper. We take bread and we take wine or we take juice and we do this in remembrance of Him. We celebrate the death and the resurrection of Jesus by doing this. Do this in remembrance of me. All scholars agree that the this

refers to celebrating communion or the Lord's Supper. Some scholars argue that the do this means more than just that. I tend to agree. Jesus says, do this, what does it mean? Well, certainly it means to celebrate and remember what he did, but perhaps that it could also mean as he was broken and as he was poured out, we should do that as well as the ritual.

Not just the ritual, but live as he lived. God calls us to live as Jesus lived and to love as Jesus loved. We were to die to ourselves daily so that we can live for His glory. So when the gospel says to do this, what if perhaps Jesus was saying, don't just do an act to remember, but may you also be broken and poured out in such a way. Even as Paul said, I'm poured out like a drink offering, giving everything that I have for God's glory, broken and poured. God will break you. So we started the church. First year went by, it was really tough. Second year, I had to let some staff go. The church had gotten to several

hundred people, and it was essentially only us. We had Brian Bruss was part-time. We had a bookkeeper part-time and we were we were hurting the church had outgrown our capacity to handle it. I had a good friend and I've told a version of this story before, but I've never told it the way I'm going to tell it today. Before starting life church, we were at First United Methodist Church. Nick was my pastor and then he had a right-hand person. And I've told this story before and I've never said his name and I don't know why. I think it's because somehow I just wanted to protect him.

And today I want to honor him and say his name. For the first time publicly, and it happened 18 years ago, what I'm going to tell you about, his name was Jay. And Jay and his wife were our best friends. You've all had someone like that. I hope that when you do something together, they're the couple that we wanted to do stuff with. And Jay made a mistake, a significant mistake when he was at First Methodist. And so he had to go to another city to bring some healing.

Well, we started Life Church, and Jay and his wife said, we'd like to come. and help you build the church. And we said, we would love for you too. And he said, can I be on staff? And I said, well, I'd love for you two one day. But I want to see you in my context for a year to see how you're healing after what had happened. And so that seemed reasonable and fair.

So I don't know what it was. Six or nine months went by and things were going well. And then I found out about something that wasn't quite right. And so I confronted Jay about that. And when I did, I was young. He was relatively young. He didn't like the way I confronted him. I didn't like his response, and we went, boom!

And we got into a big argument. And he left, and a week went by, and we hadn't spoken. And another week went by, and we hadn't spoken. And I was teaching at a church called Council Road Baptist Church on a Tuesday night Bible study for young adults. And I remember the name of the message. I was teaching a message called Loving Those You Don't Like. And in the middle of the message, I'm teaching, and I was like, I just was kind of hit. I just stopped and said, I just told everybody, because that's kind of what I do sometimes,

or better or worse, you know. And I just said, I just recognized that there's someone very dear to me, and we haven't spoken over something. And so when I get home tonight, I'm going to call him. This was before cell phones and such. And so, Amy and I drove home, and I was like, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do this. I got home.

And we had answer machines back then. If you don't know what that is, just Google it, you know. And so I pressed the answer machine. And it was Jay's wife crying, and she said, I just found him, and he had taken his own life. Okay. That was a Tuesday, and his family moved in with us. I think it was a Friday that I did the funeral. And I knew something that I would, I just more than what I would have shared at the funeral.

And I carried the weight and the guilt of what if I had done something different. That Sunday, I stood up before the little crowd of people, because that's all that was at that point. It was just a little crowd of people. And I just, I broke down and I cried like crazy. And just cried like crazy. Because when you're broken, you don't care what anybody thinks. And I just let it, let it all come out and said, I was overwhelmed before this. I can't continue. I need your support. I'm doing what I can do, and I can't do this. And we're all broken right now. We're all grieving because everyone knew him. And I just said, something needs to change. I need you. And a little group of people, they all came up. I didn't even preach,

couldn't finish the sermon, and the whole little group of people prayed. And on that day, the crowd became a church. We became a church. Something was different. We were broken together. I've said this before. We impress people with our strengths, but we connect through our weaknesses. I'll say it this way, this time. We may impress people with our strengths, but we connect most deeply through our brokenness. Isn't that true? We impress people with our strengths like, oh, man, that's amazing. You're cool. That's amazing. I like you. All that kind of stuff. I can't believe you did that. But sometimes when somebody's so good at things, you actually don't even like them, right? To be honest, I hate her. Why? She's so perfect, walks around, never has

problem. Then you find out she has a problem like, oh, I like her. She sucks too. She's insecure too. I like her, right? We impress people with our strengths, but we connect through our brokenness. Dr. Henry Cloud is a friend of mine. We teach leadership together sometimes. He's a brilliant author. He's a consultant, leadership genius, and a psychologist. And he writes amazing books I listened to one recently, and he said, I'm really convinced that God made the tear ducks in the eyes for a reason. And then it was kind of funny. It is funny. When we think about it, tears could have come out anywhere, right?

It's kind of funny, the eyes. Like, think about it. You know, the nose makes total sense. I mean, the nose runs anyway. Like, you know, that makes sense. I mean, you could get creative and, you know, it could be like, I think you're crying. You know, I'm not crying. I don't know.

It could, there's, forgive me for that, but it just felt right at the moment. Okay, it could have, I mean, it's kind of funny when you think it comes down the eyes. And so he says, I can't prove this, but I just think that perhaps God designed the tears to come out of your eyes because you were designed by God to have someone looking you in the eye when you're hurting and feeling their love. I like that. I mean, maybe, just maybe, God in his infinite wisdom. allowed us to cry because someone else should be connecting with us eye to eye when we are breaking. Speaking of tears, I have a really cool workout partner.

22 years, we've been slinging weights together, slinging weights together, walking in the gym, making it happen, throwing it down. 22, that's pretty cool to have a friendship that long, getting jacked together. 22 years, Paco, that's what I call him, and I have never cried together. Best friends, but gym friends, not cry friends. The best kind, almost. Paco got something they called, I guess it's tenitis, extreme form a couple months ago. If you have it, you know it.

It's a severe ringing in the year that doesn't go away, doesn't stop, never stops, never stops. Some people say you have it, and then there's extreme cases, and he has the extreme case. The doctor says there is no cure for it. There is nothing you can do. Some say it's the highest suicide rate because it never goes away. You can't sleep. You can't think. It just yells at you and yells at you and yells at you and yells at you and yells at you.

And so I'll check on him every day. 72 hours, and he hasn't slept. You know, not at all. And it's agonizing. So about two weeks ago, we're in a gym, and we're doing what we do. And Paco, John, is his real name. John started crying. And next thing you know, I'm crying, and we're in the gym.

And he said, this is the worst thing. And I knew, I mean, I feel it because I'm trying to hold them up as best I can. He can't do anything, but I'm trying to be there for him. And he's like, it's the worst thing ever, and he's crying. He said, and I have never been closer to God in my whole life. Kind of interesting to me is John just started serving at his campus and just started a life group all since this happened. I've never been closer to God.

He's crying. He said, I've never been closer to my wife in my whole life, and he's crying. He says, people could do anything to me right now, and it wouldn't hurt me because I just have so much love in my heart. I just have so much love on my heart, and he's crying, and I'm crying. Next day, we're trying to lift weights again, and we're both crying. And the next day, if I start getting flabby, it's all because John's a cry, baby. I'm working out at home today, because I've got to stay in shape.

John calls. He's crying, and I'm crying. And he's never been closer to God, and we've been through everything with each other for 22 years. We've never been closer as friends. Because you impress people with strings, but you connect through brokenness. So back when Gary said, God will break you, I would have had the same exact response

that almost everybody here is going to have. I don't want to pray that. Because at the time, I couldn't have known what I know now. Everything God has shown me on the other side of that broken moment. And just to make you feel better, being broken is not only just one moment, but it's an ongoing breaking as God breaks you of your own sinfulness and continues to teach you to depend on him. I had no idea at the time, but I'll say it and believe it and stand by it with all of my heart today that life's greatest breakings

often lead to God's greatest blessings. I want to say it again, and you don't need to clap, I just want it to just sink in. That life's greatest breaking, often lead to God's greatest blessings. And when Gary told me God would break me, I didn't realize the significance of that. And what I'm going to say now is my own theory. And when I look at the people in the Bible, this proves to be true.

Peter, who said, Jesus, I'll never deny you. Denied it three times. On the third time, Jesus is looking at Peter as Peter is denying him. And Peter broke. Peter also, after forgiven by Jesus after the rest of him, after the resurrection was chosen by God to be the gift speaker on the day of Pentecost. That was a pretty big gig. 3,000 people born into the family of God.

Those whom God uses the greatest are often those who've been broken the deepest. Because God never ever waste a hurt. He never ever waste a hurt. So there are some of you right now, you don't want to be broken, you don't want to be broken, you're never going to pray this. That's okay. I mean, it's not, it's not, you don't have to pray this to be a follower of Jesus. There's some of you, though, you could preach this sermon better than me right now because you're in the middle of it. There's a group of you, and either right now or at some point you're going to get to the place where you are breaking and everything's crumbling around you, and you may be tempted to fight to keep it together.

What I would say to you is just go ahead and fall on the rock and break. Just break. Just break like I broke and say, I need God and I need his people and I need more of his people and I need you and I want to be there for you and I need His Holy Spirit and I don't care what anybody thinks. I just need you, God. When you get to that moment and you will, life kind of guarantees it. You can either run to God or unfortunately some people run from God.

my greatest advice for you is just break wide open, fully depend on God, and let him do a healing work for you. And understand this, this is not advanced Christianity. Honestly, it's Christianity 101. This isn't for like monks and missionaries and women who only wear skirts and wear their hair and buns, okay?

It's not. Okay, this is like, I'm coming to Jesus. Break my body. Break my sin. break me of me that I could serve you, Jesus with all of my life. I surrender it completely to you. The gospel is an invitation to come and die. Die to yourself so that Jesus can live through you.

You see, when the sinful woman broke open the jar, she poured it all, symbolizing, I'm giving you my whole life, broken and poured. when Jesus's body was broken, it was broken for you and it was broken for me. And his blood was poured out that our sins might be forgiven. And Jesus said, do this in remembrance of me. I can't prove it, but I believe it. That this doesn't just refer to a ritual, that this refers to let our lives be broken

and poured out that we can serve Jesus with all of our hearts. Our mission at this church is to lead people to become fully devoted followers of Christ. I believe with all my heart that represents the heart of God. The reality is many of us are what I would call not fully devoted followers of Jesus, but partially devoted followers of Jesus. We do it when it's convenient for us. If you find yourself at any point being partially devoted to Jesus, let me encourage you to consider praying a very dangerous prayer.

God break me so I could be fully dependent on you. Whatever it takes, God. I want to know you intimately and serve you faithfully. Because I trust you, God, do whatever it takes. Break me that I could know you. All of our churches, let's take a moment and pray. Father, we ask that in the next few moments you would do a significant work in the hearts of many people. And I thank you, God, that there are going to be some. This is an anchor message.

That even right now, your Holy Spirit is doing a deep work in their hearts, and we choose to trust you. All of our churches, nobody looking around. Let me just say it this way. I'm not afraid to push you, and I will push you, as I hope you'll push me. At this point today, though, I'm going to give you a little breathing room. I'm going to give you a little bit of room to breathe. At all of our churches, there are those of you, you're like crazy all in. You trust God enough. to pray an incredibly dangerous prayer. God break me, whatever it takes, break me. If that's you, more power to you.

Go full on, all in. But I don't want today 90% of you to walk away and just say, well, that one wasn't for me. That's unacceptable for me. I always want a higher percentage of that, hearing from God and applying it to their lives. So what I'll do is I'll give you an introductory version to that prayer.

And it goes like this. Pick something in your life. Last week, if you were here, you were praying. Search my heart, oh God. show me if there's any offensive way in me. Whatever God showed you, that it's offensive to him that's displeasing, that shouldn't be there, just make that your broken prayer. Break me of that, God, whatever it is.

Break me of my pride. Break me of my anger. Break me of my self-sufficiency. Break me of my lust. Break me of my impatience, whatever it is. Let's just start there. And when God breaks you of that, what you're going to see is on the other side of brokennesses are the blessings of God.

Life's greatest breakings often lead to God's greatest blessings. So have the courage to start wherever you want to start and say, God, break me of this because I trust you are a good God. And if I need breaking, then there is a blessing I have not yet experienced. So, God, I trust you with this. At whatever level you want to start, if it's a start, if you want to go all in and have no qualification, break me wide open, God, I trust you, whatever it is.

If you will pray this week, as we prayed, search me, God, last week. If you'll pray every single day, some prayer this week, let's pray some dangerous prayers because we have an amazing God that we can always trust. If you will pick your own version, maybe even tell your life group, this is what I'm praying, this is what I'm praying. I'm believing and trusting God. Would you have the courage to pray your version of that dangerous prayer? If so, would you lift up your hands right now?

All of our churches, lift up your hands. Lift up your hands. All of our churches. Father, thank you for people that we, really want to trust you. And God, I know this is a difficult one, but I pray that we see answers to these prayers. I pray, God, that we see specific answers in these small specific things we ask. Break us of this, whatever it is, God.

Ultimately, God, I hope we'll recognize that we without Christ are already broken. And whenever life starts coming apart and we experience difficulties, God, I pray that we would all have the faith and the courage just to break wide open and say, God, I totally and completely need you, and I need your people, but we need each other. So God, break us. Break us to the point where we know you and we have nothing else to hold on but you.

And then we'll recognize that all along, you are all that we really needed in the first place. So God, do a work, do a work in our church, for those who have the courage to pray this dangerous prayer. I pray that on the other side of the breakings, they will see indescribable blessings because that's the kind of God that you are. We trust you, God.

We trust you. As you keep praying today at all our churches, nobody looking around. This is so amazing to me. Jesus sat around with his best friends, and he lifted up bread, and he said, this is my body broken for you. And with only a matter of hours,

that's exactly what was going to happen. Jesus' body was broken. He held up a cup, and in it was wine. He said, this is my blood, spilled out for you, poured out for you for the forgiveness of your sins. And Jesus shed his blood that we could live. Here's the amazing thing, and I hope you'll recognize this. Without Christ, you're broken already.

You are broken already. I am broken without Christ. We are broken people. Look at your life. You make sinful decisions. Why? Because we're broken people. And listen, we can't heal ourselves.

We can never get better on our own. That's why Jesus is the great physician. He is the son of God. He was born without sin. He was perfect in every way. He went to the cross. His body was broken. He shed his blood.

He died and rose again. Why? So whosoever, and that includes you, who calls on his name, would be saved, forgiven, and transformed. And honestly, that is why many of you are here. You already recognize you are broken and you need his healing and you need his forgiveness.

So today you call on him. And when you do, he will forgive every sin that you've ever committed and you will be brand new. That's why you're here today and you know it. All of our churches, you say, yes, I need his grace. Yes, I need his forgiveness. I surrender my life to Jesus.

That's your prayer. Lift your hands high right now and say, yes, I give my life completely to him. Right over here. God bless you over here as well. Back over here in this back section, way back over here in the back. Praise God for you. Both of you right over here. Awesome.

Others of you say, yes, Jesus. Take my life. Church online. You click right below me. and as we have a party here today celebrating the goodness of God, would you all pray aloud? Pray Heavenly Father, I surrender everything, broken and poured out. Take all of my life.

Forgive all of my sins. I surrender to you. Jesus, be my Lord. Be my Savior. Fill me with your spirit so I could follow you always. My life is not my own. Today I give it to you. Thank you for new life.

Now you have mine. In Jesus' name, I pray. Life Church, go crazy. Worship God. Welcome those born into his family.