Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - The Vow, Part 4: The Vow of Purity

Episode Date: July 2, 2017

Wedding vows are more than a declaration of love—they hold the keys to a strong, lasting marriage. Whether you hope to get married someday or you’ve already tied the knot, discover what The Vow can mean for the future. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thanks for joining us here at Life Church, where we are one church meeting in multiple locations and reaching around the world thanks to what God is doing at Church Online. If you ever have any questions or you want to learn more about us as a church, you can always check us out online simply by going to Life.Church. We'd love for you to stay connected throughout your week and everywhere you go with a Life Church app. It's free and available wherever you download your apps from. You know, today we wrap up our message series that's helping us lay the foundation for a God honoring marriage.

And today, we're talking about purity. But it goes beyond sexual purity. It's purity that helps us build a lifelong relationship built on trust. And today our senior pastor Craig Rochelle will help us see how to do that in part four of the vow. Hey, welcome today to all of our life churches, our open network churches. You guys are the best. We love partnering with you. Our online family all over the world at church online, thank you so much for being a part of our family.

We love you and we pray for you. if you're just now joining us, we're actually in part four of a four-part message series. It's called The Vow. And I'll tell you just up front, what we're doing is we're trying to give people that are not married but hope to be married the tools today that would give them the ability to build a foundation that would propel them toward a marriage in the future that would be strong and God honoring. And then we're talking directly into marriages that may be in really good shape or may need a lot of help. and we're really praying that God would do a work to strengthen our relationships into relationships that would honor God and impact generations to come.

We've been looking at different vows. Today we're actually going to look at what I call the vow of purity. I want to start out with a question and get you guys to participate. A few questions. How many of you are married? Raise your hands. Raise your hand all of our churches. How many of you are not married but hope maybe to be married one day?

Raise them up, leave them up, leave them up, leave them up. look around, look around. Let's look around, just look around, and just look around. You never know. Okay, of all of you, you are married or you hope to be married one day, how many of you plan on committing adultery one day? Raise them up. I command, I want to get a little something, something on the side, plan on committing adultery one day, plan on committing adultery? I'm interesting, I'm surprised. Let's just take it down a little bit. Let's just take it down. How many plan on becoming addicted to porn? Addicted to porn? Dicted to porn? Come on. I mean, the statistics would say that most of you are anyway.

I mean, you plan on it? That's what they say. A lot of people are. Is that too harsh, but that's what the study. Let's just take it down. Let's just say an emotional affair. You're not going to actually act on it, but you're going to give your heart to somebody.

How many plan on have an emotional affair? Really interesting. Really interesting. Nobody raise their hand. Because nobody plans to significantly wound their marriage with sin, but people do it every single day, right? It's really quiet in here.

I can keep preaching until it gets so quiet. It sounds like a funeral, okay? Nobody plans, nobody plans to hurt their relationship with sin, but it happens every single day. For those of you that are not yet married, sometimes on the front side of marriage, it feels like, hey, it doesn't really matter once I meet the one later on,

And then we'll be a little more serious. You know, once I meet the two, we'll get things together. What I hope you'll understand is that it all matters. If you're not married or if you are married, recognize that it's very difficult to build a life of righteousness on a foundation of sin. It's incredibly difficult to build a marriage of righteousness on a foundation of sin. The way we live today impacts all areas. of our lives, especially our marriage relationship.

The vow of purity comes from Genesis chapter 2, verses 24 and 25. The text says this, this is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt what? They were both naked and they felt no shame. They were both naked and they felt no shame. shame. The word shame comes from the root Hebrew word bush, and it means to be ashamed or it means to feel

completely worthless. They were naked and they didn't have any sense of, oh, this is funny, this is giggle, this is inappropriate, this is wrong. There wasn't any sense of anything being dirty about it. But what happens is when sin enters the world so does shame. We feel unworthy, we feel unlovable, we feel dirty, we feel embolving. We feel embassable. We feel embedded. We feel embarrassed. We feel like we need to hide whenever shame enters the world. They were naked and they didn't feel any shame. It was totally innocent. A little bit like Amy, you may remember years ago when we were having a life group and one of our sons, our youngest son, with like maybe 18 months old. He came streaking through the life group. And we're in like prayer time and he's just

naked a jaybird. He just came around and goes, I'm naked. And then he went back the other way. I'm naked. and we just laughed, you know, because it was innocent. I mean, he was this big and he was just naked and didn't care, you know. And it was totally innocent and there was no shame. What happened, if you know the story, Adam and Eve were naked and they felt no shame. And a serpent came along and tempted them to sin. And Eve gave in and Adam wasn't there doing anything about it. And the next thing you know, sin entered the world and suddenly what did they feel?

They felt shame. They felt self-conscious. In fact, here's how the story goes. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked, so they sewed fig leaves together, and they made coverings for themselves. That's when Adam said, somebody's got to wear the plants in this family. Just joking. Sorry. Bad preacher joke. I'm just sorry. It's like somebody's got to wear the plants in this family.

So anyway, come on. Hey, if you don't laugh, it could get worse, because I got more. I got more where that one came from, okay? They made coverage for themselves. But the Lord God called to the man. God says, where are you? Adam answered. I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked. So what did he do?

So he hid. Isn't this what happens today? You look at your little kid who's got chocolate all over his face. Did you eat chocolate? No. You look at your little 18-month-old who's, you know, got his diaper on and just, are you going to do you doing a dukey you know he backs into a corner the whole you know and this this is what happens to grownups are you are you in a place where you need help no are you

are you are you being tempted by something no is there anything that you need to tell me no we end up hiding because we feel such a profound sense of shame here's what happens We do something wrong, and we feel shame. What does shame do? Shame is Satan's tool of connecting the act to the identity. This is what Satan does. He connects the act to the identity. You did something bad, Satan says, so therefore you are bad.

And so internally, in our marriages, we often think, I can't let you know what I did because then I'm bad. I can't let you know where I struggle because you won't. love me. I can't let you know what I'm going through because then we wouldn't have the trust that we need to have. And so instead of bringing intimacy of truth, we live in secrecy so often in marriage. If you're taking notes, write this down. Secrecy is the enemy of intimacy. Secrecy is the enemy of intimacy. Let's look at our vow for this week. Week number one, their first vow is this. I I promise God will be my first priority and my spouse will be my second.

Vow number two. I promise I will always pursue my two. Last week, vow number three. I promise our marriage will be about we and not me. Our fourth vow, the vow of purity, is this. I promise to confide in you and not hide from you. All of our churches, let's say that together. I promise to confide in you and not hide.

from you because secrecy is the enemy of intimacy. In fact, Ephesians 5-8 really speaks to darkness and light in our lives. Paul says this, for you are once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. You are once darkness. For those of you that are Jesus followers, before you are a Jesus follower, you are in darkness. You are separated from God by your sin and you are in darkness. The problem is sometimes as Jesus followers, even though spiritually we may be forgiven, practically sometimes we step back into ongoing sin. Let me say it again. Spiritually, we've been made new.

God doesn't hold our sin against us because of the grace of Jesus, but then practically we step back into darkness. spiritually or positionally, we're right with Jesus, but practically we're still sinning. It's a little bit like if you ever go into a movie theater, you walk from a light lobby into a dark movie theater. You're shocked by the darkness, right? You're shocked until after a few minutes, what happens?

Your eyes adjust to the darkness. Then suddenly it doesn't seem so dark. Until what? You walk out the exit into the sunlight, and then, whoa, you're blinded by the light. If I could gently say there are some of you that are Christians who have stepped back into darkness and you don't even realize you're really in darkness right now because your eyes have adjusted to the darkness. You're living in a place that you don't even realize you've drifted from the light that God wants you to have.

And sometimes in your marriage when things aren't working, you don't even realize why? because your eyes have simply adjusted to the darkness. Let's start this text over again. Ephesians 5 verse 8, Paul said, for you are once darkness, but now you're light in the Lord. Now watch what he says. Live as children of light.

For the fruit of light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth. That's what you want for your marriage. That's what you want for every area of your life. And find out what pleases the Lord. Then Paul says, have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, rather expose them. Don't hide them, expose them, have nothing to do with them. Why? Because you will never find healing in the dark.

Shame grows in the dark. Healing happens in the light. Have nothing to do with the deeds of darkness. Expose them. In fact, Paul says that God's standard is incredible. incredibly high when it comes to purity in our lives. He says this in Ephesians 5.3, but among you, there must not even be a what?

Somebody help me. There must not even be a hint of sexual immorality or any kind of impurity. There shouldn't even be a hint. Nothing that resembles it. Nothing at all. No, nor any kind of impurity. What is impurity?

Essentially, it's poison. What do you do? around poison. You stay away from it. You stay away from anything that is impure or displeasing to God because it corrupts, it poisons, and it harms those who consume it. And that's one of the big problems why our eyes adjust to the darkness because we don't realize that we're walking in the darkness because we think the line of sin is in the wrong place. When we talk about purity, we're thinking, well, in my marriage, I'm not supposed to commit adultery. Here's the adultery line.

We don't realize that the sin line actually starts way back here. Long before you ever cross the adultery line, you cross all sorts of other sin lines on your way to just crossing one more. We need to recognize that Jesus said something very clear about the sin line with adultery. He said in Matthew 527, you've heard it spit it was said, you shall not commit adultery. But I tell you, anyone who looks lustfully

at a woman has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Jesus is saying the line of sin is not way over here with adultery. The line of sin

is the first time you're at the gym and you go, oh, it's when you look lustfully. The line for so many of us is in the wrong

place. We've crossed the line into darkness. We're hurting. Our marriages are struggling. We have no idea that our eyes have adjusted to the darkness. What I'm going to tell you right now is hard for me to tell you. It's embarrassing. You may say it's not that big a deal. It's a big deal to me. Years ago, I was in bed watching TV. Amy was in the bathroom doing whatever women do in the bathroom. She's curling something, painting, something. something, fluffing something, something, something. I don't know what you're doing. And I was watching TV. And I was flipping through the channels, golf channel, click, preaching channel, click, weather channel, click, home channel, click.

Girls in bikinis, click. Next channel, click. And I didn't think much of it until five minutes later or so, Amy came to into the bedroom, sat down next to me in bed and just kind of looked over and she said, well, was it worth it? I was like, was what worth it? She's just, you know, the bikinis. And I didn't have anywhere to hide, anywhere to go, but to look at her and say, I am more sorry than I can ever express to you. Wasn't worth it. It was wrong. I don't know what got. I've got no defense whatsoever, but to say that I grieve that I hurt you, and I'm even embarrassed saying that in front of her today. Now, a lot of you would say, well, that's not that big a deal. I mean, you didn't do that much. I mean, oh, that's not that big deal. It actually is a big deal when you

recognize where the sin line is. When you recognize where the sin line is, it's all a really big deal. And you can't build a marriage of righteousness on a foundation of sin. When you realize where the sin line is, what you want to do is you want to stay away. from it. This is what Solomon said. He was very clear about this. So Solomon said about the sin line, this in Proverse 5-8, he says, keep a path far from her, the adulterous woman. Keep a path far from her. Don't even go near the door of her house. In other words, if there's sin in this area, it's like, I'm not, I'm not sinning, I'm not sinning, I'm not sinning, I'm not sinning. No, what it is, is like, there's poison, there's poison, there's poison, there's poison, I'm staying away from this.

this is what we do. Jesus was severe when he taught on this. He says, if your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out. He said, if your right arm causes you to sin, cut the thing off. That's why one time I went to a men's life room and it was full of one-arm psychopsis. I don't think Jesus was being that direct, but his metaphors pretty serious. If there's something that gets in the way of your righteousness, rid yourself from it.

Stay away from it. Don't flirt with it. Don't get close to it. It's poisonous. It's impurity. It's not cute. It's not okay. It's wrong.

It's dangerous. And you stay away from it. That's why in our relationship, I don't have secrets. I'm not perfect, but we don't have secrets. It's all the way down to, I mean, it's like, crazy. I mean, in every area of my life, my computer is monitored every classroom. that I make. Every device that I have, every single password, there's probably five different

people, including all the assistants in my office, aiming my kids. They got passwords to everything, every social media. My phone is actually not fully functioning. There's a lot of things blocked on it, not because I'm going to probably look at it, but if I ever am tempted to, why in the world would I resist a temptation in the future that I have the power to eliminate today? My car, everywhere it goes, my assistants see where it goes. One person on staff sees every dollar from my personal account. There are no secrets. I don't travel alone.

I'm never alone with anybody. I'm not going to put myself in any type of situation. I'm not even getting close to any kind of line because I want to honor God and because I'm married to my best friend, my covenant partner, the mother of my six children, and I want to honor her with everything in me. How do we live this out and live purely in our own lives and in our marriage in a very impure world?

How do we do it? This is a question that somebody asked in the Old Testament, and David actually said this in Psalm 119 versus 9. He asked a question, how can a young person stay on the path of purity? This is a question that's been asked for years. How does anybody stay on the path of purity? He says, it's by living according to your word. It's by living according to your word.

He said, God, I seek you with all my heart. Don't let me stray away from your commands. I love this. He said, I've hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. How do we live according to God's standard? How do we live a life of purity? We live according to God's word. How can we live according to God's word?

We have to know His Word. We have to be people and students of His Word. His Word isn't something we just hear when we're at church. His Word is living bread that we feed on every single day. It spiritually nourishes us. It strengthens us. It guides our past. It directs our steps.

His Word is living. It's actually. It's sharper than any double-edged sword. His word transforms our hearts. It conforms our mind to the image of Christ. It washes impurity away from us. It leads us to know the power of the Holy Spirit that leads us out of darkness into God's life.

We live according to His Word. Then, as we seek God, our hearts conform to Him. And that story I told you about years ago, years ago, while there was a season when I might have been more drawn to that, that which used to draw me now repulses me. Why? Because it's not something, oh, I have to stay pure. I have to stay pure. I'd like to look at that, but I'd have to stay away from that. Now I want to. There's, there is nothing on the other line of sin that's going to draw me because I've tasted the goodness and blessings of righteousness.

I know what it's like to have the blessings of that which God ordains, why would I settle for some imitation, satanic-filled darkness? It's all less than God's best. When you press into God, when you know him, suddenly that which used to lure you starts to repulse you.

Why? Because you're being conformed into the image of Christ. is purity, it's purity, it's purity. Secrecy is the enemy of intimacy. And that's why in our marriage we are not going to have any secrets. We'll pray for each other, and we're going to press on and on and on again toward purity. This is a massively important subject.

And in each of the four weeks, we took some questions around this subject, presented them to Amy so you could hear from her, and I wanted to give her a chance to share with you her thoughts on this subject? So purity is so important to me. It as a believer is what we're called to be, pure and holy, the bride of Christ. Garbage in, garbage out is a rule to think about. And that's one of the simple ways that I can protect my marriage. I don't read trash. I don't, I try not to watch trash. And I want, it's not just in media and things like that. But I, I,

Also, I want to guard our relationship by not having a long conversation alone with a man or be alone with a man. It's not family. Those things are just simple safeguards that protect my marriage and just keep our relationship strong. It is so important that we don't keep secrets from one another. And honestly, Craig and I don't. We just never have. We tell each other everything.

and we don't keep separate accounts or passwords. We have access to everything that is ours. It's just all shared information, things that happen throughout our day. We tell each other. It's not like he has to know everything that I had for lunch. But we want to let each other know what's going on in our lives. We're certainly going to tell each other anything that might have been compromising immediately just sharing things because it just makes us stronger.

and makes us closer. Because Craig and I don't keep secrets, our marriage is so full of peace. We have trust that just transcends understanding. It's peace that trans our understanding. There isn't fear in our relationship. There's total trust. And when you have trust that anything and everything good happens there, that all the intimacy comes, the friendship comes,

everything good in a relationship has to come out of trust. And that's where we are. And it's just from being honest and communicating and not having secrets. It's fantastic. And I just want to say, Amy, that I love when you say it's fantastic. And the fact that we do have trust is something I don't take for granted. It's a gift. And I honor you for your purpose.

you for your purity. I honor you for your faithfulness. I honor you for putting up with all that I bring and always don't bring. And I thank you that because we don't keep secrets and put Jesus first, that we're growing closer in intimacy. Twenty-six years into it, it gets better every single day. So I'll tell you something that years ago a pastor said to me, it's got to hurt the heart of God every time that any steps into sin. I think it's even sadder when someone who is a representative of God does it because it tends to hurt even more people. And I had a pastor years ago tell me, run through this exercise and lock it in your mind. Imagine if you do, step across those lines and end up in a compromising situation. I want you to think ahead and visualize what that will

mean and what that will cost you. And we sat down there and I spelled it all out. And this is not the full list of what it would be, but this is part of it. The first thing that I said was something along the lines of, I would break the heart of God and I would drag the name of Christ through the mud. For me, at this point, it would not just be a local news story. It would be a national news story that, you know, this pastor did this. One day I would meet God face to face.

And I would have to give an account for what I did outside. the parameters of his good and loving truth. I would lose my reputation, something that I've worked very hard to build. I would lose my ministry and should lose it if I stepped outside of those boundaries. I would have to sit down with my children, my six kids who look up to me as a man of God and as an example of what they would like to become in some ways one day. And I would have to apologize to them and tell them, I'm sorry your daddy was not who he said he was. And then I'd have to face Amy, and I'd have to look at the woman who gave me six kids, and I would, by my own selfish decision, inflict untold hurt upon the woman who has sacrificed

more than you can ever imagine to stand with me and to do what God has called us to do. In a few moments of selfishness, I could ruin my life. in a few moments of selfishness. Secrecy is the enemy of intimacy. There are those of you right now that are walking down this line. You're not a pastor. You might not lose as much as I would lose.

The good news is that even though adultery is grounds for forgiveness, adultery is also grounds. Even though adultery is grounds for divorce, adultery is also grounds for forgiveness. It's the good news. The good news is we serve a God of grace. And if you are stepping in,

into any form of darkness right now, what I want to do is I want to encourage you to do what's right and to bring what is in the dark and bring it to light. There's a verse that's, I think, is one of the most powerful verses on the subject, Proverbs 2813, that says this, whoever conceals their sins doesn't prosper. Whoever hides it doesn't prosper. You keep it in the dark, you don't heal in the dark. Whoever conceals their sin doesn't prosper. But the one that confesses and renouncees and renounces their sins, finds mercy. What do we do? We confess our sins to God and we confess our sins to people. We confess our sins to God for forgiveness. We confess our sins to people for healing. We confess our sins to God for forgiveness. If we confess our sins to God, he is faithful and just

to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We confess our sins to people. Confess your sins to one another and pray for each other that you may be healed. We confess our sins to God for forgiveness. We confess our sins to people for healing. There are some of you, you may not even be married, but it's time to come to someone that you love and say, I need help. I'm in trouble.

I've stepped into darkness. I've stepped across the line. Some of you in your marriage, it's time to stop hiding. You do not heal in the dark. Secrets are the enemy of intimacy. And it's time to say, I am in a place where I need help. Those of you who may be on the receiving end of a confession, I know it's going to hurt,

and there may be something in you that wants to throw or yell or say, how dare you, and I know it's going to hurt, but if your spouse has the courage enough to say, I need help, I pray that God gives you the ability to receive a confession with grace, to realize that the truth will set you free, and maybe for the first time in a long time,

the truth is actually coming out. You cannot have what God wants, when you have lies. You can't have what God wants when there's truth. Sometimes you have to press through the pain of dealing with truth to get to the healing on the other side of truth. If you receive it, I pray you can receive it with confession because God wants so much more for marriages than what we're seeing today.

What do we know? He is our one and we serve our two. God will always be my first priority and my spouse will always be my second. Christ is pursuing us, and we continue to pursue our spouse. We will work for the one that we already have, I promise to always pursue you. We didn't enter into some kind of a contract. This is a holy covenant before a holy God. Our marriage will be about we and not about me.

It's my honor to lay down my life, to serve my bride with everything in me. And I promise to confide in you, not to hide from you, Because whoever conceals his sin doesn't prosper. But whoever confesses and renounces it finds mercy and finds healing. And so if you want what few people have, you have to do what few people do. Many people today don't have what you want in marriage. God has a different and a better path. And that's how we live, different and set apart.

to glorify him and all that we do. And my prayer is that as you live according to his principles, you'll be overwhelmed with his goodness. And your marriage would be a testimony to the goodness of Jesus. And people would want what you have, a living relationship with a living God, sharing it together, serving him with the one that you love and glorifying him in all that you do.

So, Father, we pray today that by the power of your Holy Spirit, you would do a work in us. God, for those not yet married, I pray that you would help them even make decisions today. That would be a blessing as they go forward. For the marriage is represented here, we pray God, for your perfect work to be done. All of our churches, whether you're single, whether you're married, no matter who you are, if you say, yes, I am a Jesus follower, and I want help honoring God with a life of purity.

I recognize their temptations all around. But by the power of God, I want to step out of darkness into his glorious light, living in a way that would please him empowered by the spirit, all of our churches. You say, yes, I want to honor God with purity. Lift up your hands right now. It's going up all over the place today. Father, I thank you, and I pray that this would be a holy moment for all of us, that we would recognize we don't have the power to do this on our own. We need Christ in us. God, I know there are many significant addictions represented in our churches today. I pray, God, that you would give us the grace to confess to the right people. God, as we confess to you, we know that you forgive us immediately.

Give us the grace to confess to the right people, God, that we could find healing. God, I thank you for our life groups. For those not yet in a life group, I pray that you would help them to find that safe community where they could let the guard down and let the truth in. Father, I pray for marriages where I know there will be very serious conversations. May you be very present. May they be great. grace and tenderness, God. I pray that you would give couples the courage to work to the pain to experience the blessing on the other side. God, we thank you that when truth comes out, the truth will set us free. And I thank you, God, that as we confess and renounce our sins,

we will find mercy, healing, help, and hope. As you keep praying today at all of our different churches, there are those of you that you've been carrying around the weight of your sin for a long time. This was me as a young guy in college just thinking to myself, after all I've done, how could God love me? After all I've done, could he ever accept me? I thought maybe I can be good enough. Try harder. Work, be better. Try to be religious.

No matter how hard I tried, I always fell short. And the reason is because I'm not designed to be perfect on my own. I can't be perfect. I'm a sinner. And I'm in need of a savior. I had to get to the point and recognize, I've sinned against a holy God. and I don't have the ability to work my way to God. The beauty is that God worked his way to me

through the person of his son, Jesus. God became flesh in Jesus, lived without sin, the perfect life, died on a cross and rose again from the dead. Why did he do this? Because the perfect sacrifice, he showed this for the forgiveness of our sins so that anyone who calls on the name of Jesus

would be saved, sins forgiven. And at all of our churches, there are those of you, you may be trapped in sin. You've got the weight of the sin of your past. When you call on God, he is faithful and just, scripture says, to forgive you of all of your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. When you confess and renounce your sin, in other words, you're turning away from it. I'm not living in this anymore. I'm pursuing Jesus.

When you call on him, he separates your sin from you as far as the east is from the west. You become a brand new person. That's why many of you are here today and you know it. All of our churches, those who say, yes, I am a sinner and I need a Savior. Jesus, I give my life to you, save me, I surrender to you. That's your prayer. Lift your hands high right now. All of our churches and say, yes, Jesus, I follow you.

As we've got hands going up in all of our different churches, those of you at church online, you click right below me, and we're all going to pray aloud together. Nobody prays alone pray. Heavenly Father. Today I turn from my sin and I turn toward you. Jesus forgive me. Save me. Make me new.

I believe you died for me and you rose again so I could live for you. Fill me with your spirit so I could follow you, serve you, and live for you. Thank you for new life. My life is not my own. Today I give it to you. In Jesus name, I pray. Life Church, would you worship big, worship loud, welcome those born into God's family today. Here at Life Church, we are honored to play even a small part in all that God is doing in and through your life.

And we would love to continue with you on that journey. You know, one thing that we know and one thing we found out is living a God-honoring marriage is difficult to do on our own. We're better together. And not just in our marriage relationship, but when we surround ourselves with other Christ's followers to help build us up. And a lot of times it happens in a life group. One of the most amazing life groups I've come across in a long time comes to us from Albany, New York. Not only they come together to build each other up, but they come together to make a difference in their community. You know, you think of Albany and you think about it as being the capital of New York. You think of this big, elaborate

city. It's a large city with a small vibe. The people are fantastic in the way that it's like a melting pot and you can see so many people from different backgrounds and different cultures. It's just a big young professional environment, I'd say. It's a very ambitious place. There is a lot going on. With our society today and how it's so focused on so many objects that people try to put in their life to fill spaces. But I think the biggest need is for real relationships, right where we're having real conversations and not just shallow, how's the weather, you know, how's your day going? Once you build those relationships, they get to see Christ through your actions, your deeds, your words.

Some of the great things that we can do as individuals to bring that message to people is to be a reflection of God. By us receiving his love, his mercy, of grace, it should just kind of flow right out of us. And I hope that to realize it's Jesus and me and just how he flows out to my character. Just love people. It doesn't matter what kind of background they come from or who they are. We're not just going to church once a week. We want to build a relationship where the people that we're interacting with trust us to have the hardest conversations.

With Life Church popping up and the Word of God to reach people, that's what they need. It's Jesus, it's His Word. It's not about a building. It's not about a city. It's about a community. It's about having relationships with our neighbors and living life together. We have hope in this world and we can get through things because of Christ.

I hope that when people think about me, they see that there is something different about me. And the thing that's different is Jesus. You know, here at Life Church, it's our mission to lead people to become fully devoted followers of Christ. That statement drives everything we do here as a church, all because we believe whoever finds God finds life.