Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - Stay Positive, Part 2: The Cure for Complaining

Episode Date: May 17, 2020

REOPENINGSome Life.Church locations have resumed services. To ensure safety at our locations, our weekend services have been redesigned to create a sanitary, touchless environment that allows for physical distancing. To see if your location is open and to save your seat at an upcoming service, please visit https://www.life.church/updatesI’M GRATEFULGratitude turns what we have into enough. This four-day Bible Plan will help you discover a more grateful perspective. Start reading part two of the six-part Stay Positive series: https://www.go2.lc/staypositiveSUPPORT COVID-19 RESPONSE AND DIGITAL MISSIONSYou can designate a gift to Life.Church to go to coronavirus relief or to Digital Missions like the Church Online Platform! Your gift above the tithe helps meet immediate needs in your community and around the world and helps other churches to spread the Good News of Christ to people everywhere: https://www.life.church/givingABOUT STAY POSITIVEThere’s no limit on hope. You can discover a whole lot to smile about if you know where to look. And we can help you find it! Don’t let life get you down. Stay joyful. Stay hopeful. And Stay Positive! For more about this series, visit https://www.life.church/staypositiveSTAY CONNECTEDStay updated with the latest news from Life.Church at https://www.life.church/stayconnected. You can also visit https://www.life.church/updates for the latest, or download the Life.Church app (https://www.life.church/app) and enable push notifications.NEXT STEPSHave you made a decision to follow Jesus? You may be wondering what’s next on your journey. We want to help! Let us guide you to your next steps in your walk with Christ: https://www.life.church/nextABOUT LIFE.CHURCHWherever you are in life, you have a purpose. Life.Church wants to help you find your next step. Our hope is that your journey will include joining us at a Life.Church location throughout the United States or globally online at https://www.live.life.church. Find locations, videos, and more info about us at https://www.life.church or download the Life.Church app at https://www.life.church/app. FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIAFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/life.churchInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/life.churchTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/lifechurchCONNECT WITH PASTOR CRAIGYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIIdiIO-Y20hRW9niR0CA8AFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/craiggroeschelInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/craiggroeschelTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/craiggroeschel Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Man, welcome out to all of you today. At those of you who are at our physical locations that actually can meet, welcome out. Great to have you with us. For those of you who are with us at Church Online from all across the globe, it's always great to have you. And then those of you who are maybe on an archive message on our YouTube or some other platform, great to have you with us as well. My name is Sam Roberts, and I'm one of the directional leadership team members here at Life Church.

And I have been with Pastor Craig serving alongside him now. This is my 22nd year serving alongside Pastor Craig. Yep. So what that means is that we've served together through a lot of things that the world has dished out, things like recession, war, actual wars, terrorist attacks, and now a pandemic. And I will say this, it's awesome to fall into the leadership of Pastor Craig in a normal circumstance. But as you've seen over the last month, month and a half, and we as a. staff have felt very personally, what we found and what I've seen over the last 22 years with

Pastor Craig is that the bigger the challenge, the better he leads. And I love the fact that we collectively have a pastor and a leader that leads so well in the face of adversity. So I honor and very grateful for him and his leadership of our church. In like manner, I'm also grateful for my wife, Jamie, who is actually the inspiration for my message today. And if I'm being truthful, she actually is probably responsible for a little over 60% at least of the content you're going to hear today. So I am the mouthpiece delivering her wisdom straight into your life today as she delivers wisdom into my life quite often.

So I'm very, very grateful for her. We are in week two of this series called Stay Positive. And, man, isn't the series very, very timely for the time that we're in right now? Because in so many times negativity can just try to rule our lives, we need to be able to stay positive. And today, we're going to talk about gratitude. Man, gratitude is something we really, really, really need to have.

Now, I don't know about you, but during a time when you're in a stay-at-home order or you're under quarantine and you're with those people that you're close with me, your family or some time, you just start to learn a whole lot of stuff about the people you're quarantined with. You know what I mean? In fact, I've learned quite a bit as well, and I'll just kind of share something with you. I have five children, but during quarantine, I actually learned that I, I actually have a kid. I didn't even know I had.

A sixth kid. And now, to be fair, I've never seen this kid. But I do know his name. His name is nobody. And he does a lot of crap around my house. Let me give you an example, for instance, because nobody drank the last of the milk and then put the carton back in the fridge.

And nobody peed on the toilet seat. And nobody left the food on this plate that they got left on the countertop. And nobody threw the trash on the floor when the trash came is right there. I'll tell you, if I find this nobody character, I am going to be, he's going to be in some time out, you know what I mean? Hold on. You mean you got you a nobody too? Maybe everybody has a little nobody in their life somewhere, right? It's kind of like having an elf on the shelf for like all

year long. You never know what you're going to get. You just walk around the corner and tell them what nobody's done. But I'll tell you what, it's sure enough to get a complaining on about it, right? We can complain about all sorts of things in our life. And if you're, I'll tell you, I'll It's crazy. My Gen Z kids, they got a whole term in Gen Z for people to complain. Kind of are those people, you know, those people. They're calling Karens. Now, I'm sorry if your name is Karen, and an entire generation is now labeled you as this.

I didn't do it. Blame Gen Z for this, okay? But here's the thing. And in case you don't have a Gen Z translator living in home, let me just try to explain what a Karen is via a story. My daughter works at Starbucks, and recently she had somebody come through, drive-thru, and say, yes, I need a hot, cold brew. My daughter's like, well, actually, we don't serve hot cold brew,

but we do have cold, cold brew, or I could get you maybe a hot coffee or some espresso shots? No, I've ordered this at many Starbucks. Do your job right. Okay, I'll be right back. Let me check with my shift manager. Goes to the shift manager. Do we serve hot, cold brew by chance?

No, we don't serve that. What do I do? just give her a black coffee. Okay, great. Come on up to the front. We have that order ready for you. Comes up to the front. My daughter hands her a black pike place, grande.

Sip. And she says, C, hot, cold brew. Get it right next time. And drives off as if my daughter is the idiot. This is where Gen Z would be like, hope you enjoy that hot cold brew, Karen. That's how it works with Jin Zers, right?

People complain. They complain about hot cold brew, but right, we complain about all sorts of things. Not just like hot, cold, but we complain about the weather. It's too hot, too cold, it's too rainy, hadn't rained enough, we need more rain. People complain about the pandemic. Why are people wearing so many masks? Why are they putting all these orders in place? This is crazy.

They complain the other way. It's like people should be wearing masks. Why are people just out and about? What are they doing? This is crazy. People complain about being at home too long over the last six weeks or so. In the time in quarantine, it's safe for an own. then those same people who complained about that,

we're complaining about being at work two months ago. You can't win for losing. I submit to you, we got a new pandemic in town, and it is the pandemic of complaining. And we, as the people of God, need to flatten the curve on the pandemic of complaining. The good news that I have for you today

is that there's a cure to the pandemic of complaining. complaining, and it is called gratitude. It is called gratitude. Now, we see this illustrated in scripture in Proverbs chapter 15, where the Bible says in verse 13, a glad heart makes a cheerful face. But by sorrow of heart, the spirit is crushed. Glad heart makes a cheerful face. Doesn't that sound good? Having a cheerful heart makes a cheerful, glad heart makes a cheerful face. Doesn't that sound good, right? Listen, you don't need Botox, you don't need that anti-aging cream. If you want to improve the curb appeal of your face, put a smile on it, right? And that smile comes from a heart that is full of gratitude, and it creates a glad heart,

a place that we can smile. Now, lest you think that this is just some biblical precept that I'm tossing out to you today, I actually, during the course of research the last couple weeks on gratitude, I found an article in a psychology magazine that talked about these psychological benefits of gratitude in our lives. Check this out. According to the article, it has five different things they've positively identified that will bring impact to your life. Number one, gratitude eliminates toxic emotions. Gratitude reduces pain, improves sleep quality, gratitude aids in stress regulation,

and gratitude reduces anxiety and depression. Does this sound like a miracle drug? Well, it is. And guess what? There's nobody going to be reading side effects at the end of the commercial and auctioneers pace, okay? It has truly got no ill side effects. Gratitude.

Do you need a little bit today? You're feeling a little critical, feeling a little bit of anxiety, a little bit of pressure, a little bit of complaining coming out. There's a cure for that. It's called gratitude. Maybe you could type in the chat. What do you need to exhibit gratitude for in your life? You see, I like to say it this way,

is that gratitude is the gateway to peace. Gratitude is the gateway to peace. I encourage you today. Step through it. Step into it. And watch as God transforms your inside and your heart because you can't have gratitude in your heart and then you start having all this complaining coming across your lips, right?

Gratitude becomes the gateway to peace. Now, I don't just stand up here and throw this out of some little cute phrase that you can try to memorize or whatever. I've seen it personally in my life. How is that expressed? Well, I mentioned to you at the start of the message that Jamie is the inspiration for much of this, right? And so we've been married 23 years, and I actually have a picture. My wife, Jamie, and I'm sure she's happy that I'm showing you a picture, right? and that's so great, we're there in Oregon there.

It's so fantastic. Now, we've been married 23 years, and what I'm about to tell you, I'll tell you with her full permission because she talked to me about if it's helped me in such a way, maybe it might just encourage and even save some of you.

So during the course of 23 years, there's been seasons where she's really battled with anxiety, some severe anxiety, which leads toward depression, and really, if you've ever had a loved one who's struggled with her, that, you know the internal dialogue can be very damaging to a person, right? And during one of these seasons, recently, she felt like God really just impressed upon her to be like, listen, have gratitude,

write it down, write it down. And she's like, maybe you feel this way. Write it down. Be grateful for what? I don't have a lot. So she began a journal called her gratitude journal. And she began to write down things that she had gratitude for. And understand this. Hey, when you start this, when you start this process, it may look like, I'm grateful for the birds singing right now and the sunshine on my face. Man, it's hard to find stuff, but you just keep going. And all of a sudden things get deeper. Recently, I checked one of her gratitude journals. She's up to over 1,300 things that she can look back on and find gratitude in. And in her words, her words, were that gratitude, was the way out of the pit of despair.

And maybe today you find yourself in a bit of a pit, some anxiety, negativity, complaining, bitterness, anxious. Gratitude then becomes the gateway to peace for you. Gratitude becomes the gateway to peace. And in fact, not too long ago, we actually had a friend of ours find out that they were diagnosed with a rare cancer, and they've given her about five or six months to live.

And as you could imagine, when someone's dealing with that in their head, I mean, it's just all the thoughts of loss come in, loss of the days that you thought you had, the time with your kids you thought you had, and your spouse, and it can become quite a pit of despair and discouragement and depression

when you receive news like that. And Jamie reached out to me and was like, man, this has really impacted me. So she actually went down and got a journal and talked to her about, hey, I know this is totally different circumstances, but this maybe help me, maybe it'll encourage you. And it was funny recently, she was telling Jamie how, even though the times are unbelievably difficult

in the face of this sickness of her cancer diagnosis, that even though when she was sitting there in the hospital with chemo dripping into her vein, And she's like, they couldn't touch my heart because my heart began to fill up with gratitude, finding silver linings. And even in the middle of a situation that every single one of us would say we would want nothing. We would not wish that upon anyone. Horrid.

But even in those situations, she said that you can begin to find a gateway, gratitude being the gateway to peace. We're going to look at a scripture today in Philippians chapter four that I'm going to tell you, you didn't end up at one of our locations on accident. You didn't click on a video on accident or attend it. Let me explain. God wants you to hear a truth from His word that will be transformative to your life. And it comes from Philippians chapter four versus four through eight. And I want to want you to understand something before we get into the scripture. And that is that Paul is actually writing this book from prison, right? So a situation where he's locked up and he can't go anywhere, he can't get out, he certainly has a very unsure future, doesn't know what tomorrow

brings for him, is this starting to feel a little bit close to home for any of you right now? Yes, it's in that situation that he pens these words where he writes in verse four, rejoice in the Lord always again I will say rejoice now I think it's important you ever whenever you're with a friend or maybe when you were little and your parent they repeat something two times to you it's like this is important you need to listen up to this okay he says rejoice and we'll say it again rejoice always rejoice well that Greek word for rejoice is the word Carrillo it means to be glad which would make sense. But there's a more beautiful truth a little deeper.

The root word for Carrillo comes directly from the word caris, caris, meaning grace. Having God's unmarried favor, in other words, getting something you don't deserve. You see a beautiful little word picture here where his circumstances didn't dictate him rejoicing. It was a deeper truth. And understanding that he's experienced something, that causes true rejoicing. Rejoice, he says. Again, I'm going to tell you, rejoice.

And let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand, Paul's saying, he's not gone. In the middle of me being in prison, in the middle of quarantine or in a pandemic, he's not gone. The Lord is close. Therefore, he says,

do not be anxious about anything. Now, that's a tough one. Don't be anxious about anything. Well, that word anxious from the Greek, actually it means, yes, to be concerned or worried, but even more beautifully, I love this word picture, how the Greek, it's meaning is to be pulled apart in many directions, right? You feel a little pulled apart recently. Can't worry, just begin to pull us apart, and you start worrying about your job, and you start worrying about your health and the finances and all this stuff,

and you begin to feel pulled apart. that is where anxiety. Anxiousness comes in. Paul's saying, don't be pulled apart. Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything. And this is a concept that Paul talks about many times in scripture. In fact, in Romans 8, he talks about, hey, listen, God can take all things and work them together for the good of those who are called according to his purpose.

This is the same principle. God's using everything. He says, listen, don't be anxious about anything, but in everything. by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be known to God. The word thanksgiving right there, I want to call you, because this is so beautiful of a picture of words. It is the word Eucharista, okay? And I'm going to have them put it up on screen there. One of the crazy things, yes, it means thankful. But in the middle of the word, what do we see? We see the word caris again. It's that idea of God.

God's unmerited favor, His grace. Isn't it beautiful? That Paul's saying, you can rejoice, rejoice always, do it again with what? Thanksgiving. These things, these emotions, these attitudes stem from a place much deeper than circumstance. It's from a heart of gratitude, understanding that which you've been saved from. Because you see, the truth of the matter is, what Paul's saying is, hey, listen, I'm in prison here. I get it. I'm locked up. But you know what? My circumstance doesn't dictate my ability to rejoice and to be thankful.

And for us today, I would submit to you that it's not just about being out of quarantine, being out of your fear or worry. It's about something much deeper being set free, transformed from the bonds of sin that hold us back, receiving something we didn't deserve. God's grace, his care us. And in that, we find the ability to rejoice. We find the ability to be thankful. That's what Paul's telling us.

And then check this out. In verse six, right, we finish. But then listen to verse seven, okay? Just listen. Let me speak verse seven over you. Listen to this and tell me if this doesn't just sound like the best thing ever. Verse seven. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your mind.

in Christ Jesus. The peace of God. Doesn't that sound good? Oh, it sounds so good, right? The idea of peace. Well, here's the thing. That word for peace in the Greek, it's actually the opposite for being anxious.

Remember, I told you what? It's like anxiety is like being pulled apart in many different directions, right? But this word is different. A rene. It means the exact opposite. It means to be made whole. to be complete.

So what you find is that the peace of God, a gift of God's peace comes from being made whole, right? Let me try to illustrate it to you like this, okay? So in our lives, we have things that we're doing here. We got some stuff here in our lives. We've got our little tray in our life, and we have things that happen, and we begin to put them on, right?

And that's not too bad. One little worry, one little problem, not too bad. But then things start happening. And, you know, it just gets a little bit more difficult and problematic. And there are many of you right now, you're getting anxious about these balls rolling around on a tray much more than I am at the moment. Trust me, I'm a little concerned about it myself. But this is like a great illustration and a picture of what our life looks like, right? It's all rolling around everywhere.

How worried am I about walking across this stage at any level of speed right now? I'm a little concerned. and it's kind of how where we are in our lives, you see, because the worries of the world pull us apart in many directions, and now I'm fearful to move. You found yourself fearful to move recently? Being pulled apart in many different directions, but you guess what?

This is not just about being. Listen, Paul says, don't be anxious about anything. Don't be pulled apart in many directions, but we find ourselves held up here, and we start to try to walk, but then we're like, oh gosh, I can't go anywhere, right? And we start to go, and now I'm getting a little concerned, and we start moving, and we start going,

and then what happens? Oh, we trip, we trip, and then, oh, no. That right there, that's what I didn't want to happen. That's what I, see? That's why I should have just stayed over here. Paul's like, hold on a second. Hold on. Don't be anxious.

Don't be pulled apart by many things. There's something better. It's called the peace. And like, it's like to be made whole, right? See it? How worried am I about dropping this going across stage? Now, hopefully not too worried. I did play sports in college.

Hopefully I've got the dexterity to get across the stage without dropping this one ball, right? Be made whole, peace. Feel the difference? What happens when I walk? I'm not worried about walking. I can walk. I feel good.

Being made whole. The peace of God, right? What happens when I walk alone? What happens if I trip? Oh, it's okay. I'm good. Why? Peace.

It's guarding my heart. In my mind, in Christ Jesus, I made whole. But guess what? You can't get this. Verse 7, without doing verse 6. Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything. With prayer and petition, supplication. Make your request known to God.

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding because his thoughts, oh, there's so much higher than ours. His ways, so much higher. It'll guard your heart and your mind in Christ, Jesus. The peace of God. Now, I can also illustrate it like this. It's a great Christian cheesy bumper sticker out there. I don't know if you've ever seen this one.

I'll throw it up on screen as we look at it here. No Jesus, no peace. No Jesus, no peace. You see that? You see what they did there? You get that one? I'll wait just a little bit longer for some of you. You were distracted by your kid there at church online.

It's okay, hold up, go back. Yeah, no Jesus, no peace. Cheesy? Yeah, it's pretty cheesy. True? Absolutely. Why? Because Jesus is the prince of peace.

Noah's peace. How do I get his peace? Well, it goes back to gratitude, actually. Because gratitude, remember I told you, it's the gateway to peace. Where's gratitude come from? Hmm. An understanding of something that you received that you didn't deserve. God's grace, his carous, unmerited favor.

And when you understand that and you operate from a place of gratitude, as Jesus said, out of the overflow of your heart, your heart full of gratitude, your mouth speaks thankfulness. and it begins to squelch the negativity. It helps you to stay positive. Gratitude. It is the gateway to peace. There's a final verse that Paul pens here in the book of flipping.

It's in chapter 4, verse 8 there, as he's coming to a close. He says, finally, brothers. Now, finally would kind of mean that we're getting close to the end. And so for some of you, you got a good reason to be grateful right now because we're about done. Okay? Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable. If there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about such things.

Why? Because what we think about begins to transform. our heart. And then out of the overflow of our heart, the mouth begins to speak. Let me illustrate it to you the best way I know how. Now, this illustration, I saw Pastor Craig do this probably like 16 years ago. And this has stayed with me all those years. And I pray and hope it stays with you as well. So this glass here, let's say it represents our lives. Okay? scripture says it'll guard your heart and your mind so this represents like your heart now when it says heart it's not talking about your the organ that pumps blood inside your chest it's talking about

something much bigger it's about your thoughts your dreams your endeavors your desires it's your totality of living this is you things are pretty good right maybe this is like 2019 for you was things pretty good maybe it was January Q1 sales were rocking this is back when you your kids were still in school, right? This is you happy. Oh, but then something happened. Um, worry. A pandemic hit. And you began to get a little concerned. Uh, you began to worry about your finances, your 401k, which quite honestly looks about like a 201K at the moment. Worry about your job. You know, that one email that your boss sent out last week, it had that one line in and you kind of read that line, that one sentence, and you're like, ah, what does he or she mean by that?

Maybe I'm going to lose my job. Maybe it's your kids' health or your aging parents, or maybe you have a relative who's immunocompromised, and there's true concern about what's going to happen to them? I mean, what about the economy? I mean, you can't just, like, print money, right? I mean, that doesn't make any sense. What's going to happen in Q3, Q4 to my business? What about what if the virus comes back?

What if it comes back stronger than it did before and things get to happen? What if we get under control, but then it comes back? So many worries. What about murder hornets? Right? And this is what happens to us, right? It was all good. No, I don't feel so great.

I feel pulled apart, anxious. I complain a lot. Depression, anxiety. fear, worry. Jesus said there's a better way. Paul writes, hey, listen, don't be anxious about anything. But in everything, present your request to God and the peace of God which transcends all understanding

will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. You see, there's a cure for this pandemic of complaining. And the cure is a nice picture of gratitude in your life. What does it look like? Well, kind of like this. Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely. Now understand, some of you, you're going to hear this and you're going to be like, this is a great idea. And you're going to start, you're going to open a note in your phone, you're going to start putting down things, you're going to get a gratitude journal, you're going to have all kind of things, you're going to start, and it's going to go great.

And by Wednesday, you stop and you're going to look like this. You see, it's a grind, everybody. It's a grind. You got to keep going. You got to stay in there. You got to take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ because whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,

whatever is commendable. If there's any excellence, if there's anything worthy of praise, then think about such things Paul says don't be anxious about anything but in everything prayer supplication present your request to God and then the peace of God which transcends all understanding it'll guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus and that which the enemy has tried to hold you captive to in your thoughts the fear and the worry will be replaced with the peace of God, when you allow gratitude to overflow in your heart, to be thankful in all circumstances. And what you'll find is that perhaps even in the middle of a time where

there's a lot of negativity and a lot of things, quite honestly, to be worried about and find negative, maybe you'll find that there is a cure, a little miracle drug called gratitude. And when you put it into place, perhaps it'll help you to learn how to stay positive. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word, the transformation that you have through your scripture and your truth. I pray today that as we take this in, God, that we're not just motivated in the moment, but a deep understanding and motivation to put into practice what you've taught us through your word today. As you're praying today, man, if there's those of you who say, you know what?

I hear you. And, man, I want to exhibit that. I want to find myself being grateful in all circumstances and allowing gratitude to begin to flow out as thankfulness across my lips. And no matter what I face, to be grateful and to find gratitude. If that's you, just lift up your hands. I'd be honored to pray for you. If you're at church online, just let us know there.

Yeah, many of his father today. I pray that in the face of a lot of opportunity to find worry and strife and complaining, I pray that you would allow gratitude to overflow in our hearts for what you've done for us first and in what you're going to do through us and what you're going to do in this moment, then we trust you that you will work all things for the good of those who are called according to this purpose. And I pray for those of us today who are saying, yes, help me to have more gratitude, that you would give us eyes to see, even in moments that look negative, that there's something to be grateful for in it.

Still praying today, there's those of you who say, you know, I don't know that I find that peace you talk about that surpasses all understanding. I don't have that, but man, it really sounds good. I don't know that I feel all that grateful to God. Well, maybe it's because many times folks feel that way because they don't understand a very, very fundamental truth. And let me just tell you, it's so beautiful, that idea of grace, unmerited favor,

meaning we're getting something we don't deserve. What do we deserve? Well, the Bible is very clear that all of us have sinned. That includes you and that includes me. We've all sinned and fallen short of the standards of God, far short. Oh, but there's good news in that. Some great news. Are you ready to be grateful? Well, here's the truth. The truth is that even though while we were still sinners, while we still hadn't done anything, you see, it's not what we do. It's who's done it for us. And that is Jesus. God said

Jesus, his only son who was sinless to be a sacrifice for us so that we could be made news, that we could be forgiven so that we could experience his peace that surpasses all understanding. And there are those of you today who that is the truth that God wants you to hear. That there's nothing you can do to earn his peace. He gives his peace to you freely through his grace, that you didn't deserve, that I don't deserve through his sacrifice of his son, Jesus. And the Bible says all you have to do is believe in your heart and confess with your out that Jesus is Lord and you shall be saved. You shall be forgiven. You shall be made whole. You shall find

peace. There are those of you today at all of our locations. And for those of you across church online, who that is why God has you today listening to this message, if that's you today. And God has brought you here to hear this message online or at a location. And you say, yes, Jesus, I need your forgiveness. I want your peace in my life. Just lift up your hand. now and say yes Jesus come in take over yes right over here to my right right over here to my left welcome in the god's family may his peace reign in your heart those of you at church online you just let us know that you're making that decision today and as people across the world are coming to know Jesus let's lift our voices together just repeat this prayer after me dear Jesus thank you for dying in my

place so I could experience forgiveness so that I could have your peace. Jesus, come into my heart, make me new, help me to live my life, grateful for your sacrifice in my life. In Jesus' name, I pray. And everybody said, amen. Could you give it up for God and the work he's doing?