Politics, Faith, and Christian Unity

hello everyone i'm pastor ryan i'm the i lead the youth ministry here at journey and today we're going to be woo yeah some of you know that's good first service they're like our kids aren't ready for you yet um today we're continuing our series called the elephant in the room and the elephant in the room is a phrase that represents kind of these uncomfortable problematic diverse topics or subjects that people really would rather avoid than to talk about now the christian church has been guilty of doing exactly that not talking about issues and topics that are relevant to our lives because it's uncomfortable because we're afraid that maybe if we say the wrong thing people will leave and uh and so we've just chosen not to and and yet some churches have chosen to talk about this but when they did they decided that they would

just talk about what they were against but that's not what we want to do here at journey here at journey we want to make sure people know what we're for more than what we're against so what is journey for well we have a mission here and that mission will be up on the screen that says this to lead people on a journey of transformation in jesus because at journey it's all about jesus so jesus had something to say about how we were to live our lives and how we were to treat others we see this in john 13 34 and 35. jesus says a new commandment i give to you that you love one another just as i have loved you you also are to love one another by this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another

as christians we are commanded to love we are commanded because it is how all people will identify who the followers of jesus are paul tells us in romans 12 1-2 says this i appeal to you therefore brothers by the mercies of god to present your bodies as a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to god which is your spiritual worship do not conform to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of god what is good and acceptable and perfect see following jesus is not a part-time sunday morning once a week thing we do it's an all day everything we have before the lord

the and we do this in the way we think and how we love i mean how many issues would be eradicated just by committing to obedience in these two areas of our lives having a renewed mind in christ and loving people the way jesus does now this is not a new concept from the beginning god has been trying to make himself the most important part of our lives we see that in the old testament in the shema deuteronomy 6 4 it says shema israel elohim which is hebrew 4 hear o israel the lord our god the lord is one and this was something they would recite daily as a prayer to god to remind themselves that it wasn't god and something else but it was god alone

he was all that they needed you see we've done something we've we've elevated other things to the place of god and this has been a struggle since the beginning where we try to fill that space with something we think we need over god in his word and as believers and jesus in the bible has to be the thing that shapes our world views our identities our beliefs god and his word has to be the lens in which we view everything now this doesn't happen quickly world views develop over time like i think about this when i was a kid on the 4th of july i would wake up to the house blaring to lee greenwood's proud to be an american i mean my family took it serious my sister would do performances in the front yard with the neighbor girls i mean my parents would open up the house

to the neighborhood we'd have hot dogs and drinks and our pool and it just it was a place for community and fun and at night we would light off legal fireworks and we would we would just celebrate and my parents had an influence on how i thought and then my school and then the people around me and so i was shaping a world view of how i see everything but then when i was 16 i accepted jesus i encountered god and my life changed then all of a sudden i began filling my mind with this and it began to shape how i see things differently it gave me a different perspective to the world and and so i understand that yes these things are identities our world views they take time but we have to make sure that we are elevating god to the proper place and

all those things which brings us today's topic today we're talking about politics now i did notice as soon as i said that some of the eyes this morning were moving to the elephant in the room i just want to stop and say this elephant has nothing to do with politics okay this elephant is just part of our series all right now that we've cleared that up we'll be looking at what the bible has to say about politics and our response is believers because today it's not about choosing a political side it's not about trying to convince anyone that your party is better than the other and as good as politics can be and as helpful as they can be the truth is politics are divisive

we see it every day in our news we hear it on the radio 24 7 about how each side is the worst thing to happen to this world since the dmv so it's pretty bad sorry for anyone who works at the dmv we love you no but the political temperature man it's it's rising right it's boiling we're afraid we're angry we're polarized and we're reminded daily how evil the other side is and and i can feel it man every day it just feels like the political tension is higher and higher than ever before and even as i'm on like social media it's going through i'm seeing more and more posts that are about how we can no longer find common ground that we have to just accept that they

are the enemy unfortunately it comes all too natural for us to actually hate our enemies and the church christians were not immune to this i mean how many times have you thought something like this about someone who disagreed with you politically you had these kind of thoughts saying like how can they support that or how can they believe this don't they know xyz i know i'm guilty of it of having this this feeling about an issue that is to me is so clearly right or so clearly wrong and thinking to myself how could this person not just see things like i do and so it's a struggle so for some of us today might be challenging

because whether we think of ourselves as political or not we all have beliefs and a lot of these beliefs have become political issues so it's no wonder why politics has this unique way of causing a physiological response in us because if it was just about a difference of opinion then we could disagree with the understanding that you just have a different perspective on it than i do but because politics have become so intertwined with our beliefs and our identities when someone attacks or argues against our political abuse we take it personally now i believe that some of us we've elevated politics to a place in our lives where it becomes the defining filter for everything else even how we define ourselves as christians i mean how many times have we heard this conservative christian liberal christian

progressive christian republican christian democrat christian we've placed a political emphasis in a space that only belongs to jesus we shouldn't be filling the blank christians we should just be christians you see there's a struggle and we can see it and identify it but what does the bible have to say about it well it has a lot to say because the people in the bible they've been dealing with political systems for centuries and when we look back at the old testament the israelites knew all about these political systems and powers as god's chosen people the israelites found themselves subjected to other nations throughout their existence from egypt to assyria to babylon to

persia to greece to rome and on but despite their circumstances israel had hope because god had promised them a messiah someone who would come and liberate and that's what messiah means liberator savior so god had promised israel that he would send someone who would save them and liberate them and we find this in one of the those promises written in the the prophet of isaiah from the prophet isaiah says this in isaiah 9 6-7 for to us a child is born to us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulders and his name shall be called wonderful counselor mighty god everlasting father prince of peace of the increase of his government and of

peace there will be no end on the throne of david and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore the zeal of the lord of hosts will do this now they would read that and be inspired like oh lord we long for the day that this would happen but some israelites they interpreted passages like this as a messiah who would come and conquer the enemies of god and overthrow the nations who were pressing god's people to liberate them and free them to bring in peace and justice forever so their idea of the messiah was a political one god's people had created an expectation of the promised messiah and what that messiah would do when he arrived

so after hundreds of years of subjugation from foreign nations finally jesus shows up on the scene claiming to be the christ now christ is greek for messiah which was a title of jesus not his last name so sometimes people hear christ like oh yeah jesus christ i know that guy no title when jesus began his ministry the jewish people were still under roman occupation but he demonstrated authority greater than even the prophets of the old testament so many people began to think maybe this is the messiah we've been waiting for but then jesus starts doing and saying things that went against their expectation of who the messiah was supposed to be and many of the religious leaders on

that day began rejecting jesus and conspired against him you see jesus didn't match up with their expectation so they chose to reject the one who they had hoped and prayed for for centuries you see the kingdom that jesus introduced to them was not the kingdom they were expecting they thought their kingdom would come in a physical form that one day they would come and the destruction of their enemies would happen and their political opponents bring freedom for their people and when we think about this that's a transcendent principle that people have continued to adopt throughout time which is this the belief that if their political system or party has complete control there will be peace and prosperity for all the power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely

you see jesus had a different kingdom in mind a kingdom not of this world but of god a perfect kingdom free from sin death corruptions lies deceit free from pride and the desire for power and rule a kingdom of heaven that would be a restoration of god's intended design for creation so what jesus does is he reorients the political expectation of the kingdom and reshaped it so the early church can respond differently to governments and political systems and we see this happen towards the end of jesus ministry because by this time the religious leaders they didn't like what jesus was doing they didn't like the message he was bringing or who he was bringing it

to because all of a sudden this kingdom that was supposed to be for their people was now for all people and there was some tension with that so they would come up with plans to try to trap jesus and trick jesus and in matthew 22 they came up with a plan to trap jesus with politics so matthew 22 15 to 22 says this then the pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him jesus in his words and so they sent their disciples to him along with the herodians now the herodians uh were a sect of judaism so this was a group of people that were faithful to herod the great in his dynasty herod was one of the kings of the jewish people at the time but clearly submitted to rome and worked with rome to to just be corrupt

but these herodians also like some of the pharisees were opposed to jesus so here they are they sent their disciples for him along with these herodians saying teacher we know that you are true and teach the way of god truthfully and you and you do not care about anyone's opinion for you are not suede by appearance now i i read this and the youth pastor in me just thinks mean girls you know like that backhanded compliment like wow you are so bold and courageous to wear that you know it's like ouch like here they come like oh we know you don't care what other people say jesus you're not swayed by appearances you don't talk to jesus that way so anyway they they they give jesus the question right here's here it is tell us then what you think is it lawful to pay

taxes to caesar or not and in their mind they're probably like got him but jesus aware of their malice said why put me to the test you hypocrites show me the coin for the tax and they brought him a denarius and jesus said to them whose likeness and inscription is this they said caesar's then he said to them therefore render to caesar the things that are caesar's and to god the things that are god's when they heard it they marveled and they they left him and went away so let's understand some historical context here that's going to give us a richer perspective of what's happening here in this text you see when rome took over direct control in 86 they imposed a poll tax which is just a

head tax for every adult so all of a sudden they're conquered and now every adult has to pay attacks to rome well they didn't like that and so groups rose up and they revolted against rome now this is something that would happen again and again so this opposition to the taxes and to the roman rule in the early 1st century continued for decades and centuries so when jesus is having this conversation there would have still been a great tension between the roman government and the jewish people surrounding this issue so here's the trap that they set for jesus now jesus will either oppose the tax now if he does that if he opposes the tax then they get to run to the roman government and say hey that galilean he's another galilean trying to lead a rebel a revolt against rome but

what if he denies the tax or no what if he supports the tax he says then what he'll do if he supports it is create tension with the jewish followers who resented rome so they're thinking win-win support it and we got you deny it and we got you but they don't see jesus first calls them out for their hypocrisy and we'll see why in a second and ask for daenerys which they produce now this is significant because most jewish people refused to use these idolatrous coins because it had the image of caesar on it with this inscription that read dv filius which is latin for divine son or son of god so these coins were a contravention to the first two commandments of the mosaic law yet they had one and were able to give it to jesus

hypocrites another thing jesus does here is he introduces a new approach to their ideology you see for these leaders they thought the only way we can support god is by opposing rome but jesus does something different he says there's another way render to caesar the things that are caesar's but what caesar's what belongs to the roman government well to name a few the roman government were known for providing roads trade routes ways so people could actually experience some prosperity they also offered security from foreign invaders and from being taken over so there were some things that the roman government did do so within this perspective then taxes are not just this arbitrary imposition of their subjection but

rather become a repayment for services provided by the imperial government what jesus does is offer a perspective that allows for peace instead of hostility a way that would have benefited them decades later the second and more important part of this is to remember to give god what is god's now this was something that these men had clearly lost focus on they were so concerned with their cause they were so concerned with overthrowing rome with getting out under from under the oppression of rome that that's all that mattered and they forgot where their primary focus was supposed to be you see jesus takes this political discussion and he

brings it back to the call as believers he brings it back to our relationship with god now politics it just has a way of distracting us from our primary calling in this life to love god which leads to a renewed mind and a love for others i mean think about how many awkward thanksgiving dinners we've had with people we love because all of a sudden uncle joe's like hey this is how it is and he's like oh i disagree and all of a sudden it's all gone we can get distracted and forget again what's supposed to be the emphasis now paul shows us

in romans 13 and emphasizes this relationship between us and the government he says this in verse 1 of chapter 13 let every person be subject to the governing authorities for there is no authority except from god and those that exist have been instituted by god therefore whoever resists these authorities resists what god has appointed and those who resist will encourage judgment for rulers are not a terror to good conduct but to bad would you have no fear of the one who is in authority then do what is good and you will receive his approval for he is god's servant for your good but if you do wrong be afraid for he does not bear the sword in vain for he is a servant of god an avenger who carries out god's wrath on the wrong doer therefore one must be in subjection not

only to avoid god's wrath but also for the sake of conscience for because of this you also pay taxes for the authorities or ministers of god attending to this very thing pay to all what is owed to them taxes to whom taxes are owed revenue to whom revenue is owed respect to whom respect is owed in honor to whom honor is owed now we read that out of context and we think what ryan i could name a few examples throughout history where this shouldn't have applied and i think it can kind of hit a nerve with us this kind of feeling like oh no we we have to submit fully to to governments because god has ordained them and and people throughout history have abused that text but just imagine what it was like to the audience paul wrote to because paul

wrote this letter to the church of rome in 57 a.d the emperor at that time was emperor nero so he was caesar now not only was he caesar nero appointed procurators who would go on to be some of the worst and most violent leaders towards judea jews and christians so how could paul write this you see when we read these words i think it's easy for us to focus on the call to submit to government leaders and laws but what paul is saying here is that hey when you see these structures and systems you got to remember there's actually someone greater who's in charge there's actually someone who's in a higher level of authority than even these and that ultimate authority that we submit to is god because caesar's procurators governors

politicians they're all temporary they come and they go but god is eternal and his authority has no end as christians and we need discernment to know something or or when someone or something is trying to put us in opposition to god you see like the christians would later experience under the the emperor domitian he would later try to force christians to worship him and we saw in revelation that they were praised for not doing it so we need discernment and all discernment is is is the idea of good judgment as christians we would say it's like using your knowledge and wisdom to make a good decision but we have something with us as believers to help us discern and that's the holy spirit

now it's hard to explain that right like what does it mean to have the holy spirit help you discern things like is it a voice like okay now turn right and you'll miss all the traffic on newport no like i needed you spirit it's not always like that and sure it can be but for me personally it's been a little bit different my experience with with discernment came in a more subtle way back in 2012 my wife and i uh were going to a wedding and in colorado now why that's important and you need some background here is um because on that day of the wedding was a premiere of a movie i wanted to see now i

love movies friends like i grew up kind of a latchkey kid and so man i got to watch whatever i wanted and and pastor keith message last week was very convicting so just know i'm wrestling with that but i loved and i love movies i i love seeing them i love being going to midnight premieres because i get to be the first one and no one can spoil it for me um and so that's that's me that's who i am and so we go to this wedding and i find out it's the same night that this movie i want to see called the dark knight rises comes out and i had seen the others previously in theater and i saw a dark knight at the midnight showing and so i'm like oh like why is this wedding so i'm like looking up i'm like okay the wedding's gonna end roughly around like eight or so we get back to the hotel i'm like pulling up maps and i'm trying to find in so i'm like okay let

me just find the theater because they were sold out all over the place where we're at so i finally found a theater i was about 20 minutes away a century 16 and i'm like oh they got tickets all right so i've looked up directions i've got it all set i'm gonna go and then all of a sudden i'm back at the hotel room i'm ready to do this and i hear this it's kind of it's not like an audible voice but this feeling of saying don't go and i was like well that's weird like why did that thought pop into my head like clearly i'm gonna go and and then i got this even stronger feeling of ryan don't go and i remember wrestling like this doesn't happen to me like it's just a movie this is insignificant why am i feeling this need not to go

but i obeyed and i was like no you're kind of grumpy about it and i was just like i guess i won't go i see you another time and my wife was like yeah it's probably wise and i was like okay so anyway we go to bed wake up the next morning and once you knew on on the news that morning there had been a shooting at that theater i got chills in that moment i knew well that feeling was the holy spirit now i don't know if i would have been in that theater but god didn't want me anywhere near that scene that night you see discernment has is us being able to to listen to the spirit when it's working in our lives

and the more we devote ourselves to this to to putting god elevating god to that place in our lives the more we'll clearly we'll be able to hear when he's speaking let's continue on and hear what peter had to say so first peter 2 chapter 2 verses 13 and 17 say this be subject for the lord's sake to every human institution whether it be to the emperor's supreme or to governors is sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good for this is the will of god that by doing good you should not put to silence the ignorance of foolish people live as people who are free not using your freedom as a cover-up for for evil but living as servants of god honor everyone love the brotherhood fear

god honor the emperor now most likely when peter wrote this the tension between the jewish people and the roman empire was at an all-time high i mean it was so high that actually a few years later the jewish people would revolt against rome completely and then they would come in and destroy the temple for the last time you see our call as followers of jesus is not to give in to the tension of the political atmosphere through revolts or violence rather peter reminds his audience in us today that we have a freedom in christ that no government can take away we have a freedom that allows us to honor everyone even the authorities that are over us and to love each other no matter what our circumstances

what peter paul and jesus are not saying is do nothing i mean they're reminding us as christians to remember who we are and where our focus is supposed to be you see when we live like jesus commanded us to with renewed minds in christ with love for each other and for others then we can have the greatest impact because everyone else when everyone else is ready to fight each other because of their political division we're ready to love now unfortunately today like back then we've allowed our concerns for our rights to become more important than what's righteous i want to say that again we've we've allowed our concerns for our rights to become more important than what's righteous

and christ desired something of his disciples and of us and it wasn't that they would be wealthy or have security or or feel great no it was it was something else we see it when jesus was in the garden the night before he's about to be betrayed and arrested and crucified his last moments and he's praying to the father and this is what he prays john 17 verse 11 i am no longer in the world but they are in the world and i am coming to you holy father keep them in your name which you have given me that they may be one even as we are one that they may be one jesus's prayer for the disciples was that they would be unified that they wouldn't be divided by future politics by disagreements about what hymns they

sing about what color the curtains were where the cross was in the same none of that like none of these ecclesial things that that we wrestle with like i don't like to worship there that's too loud it's too quiet you know they don't do enough of this or have enough of this man jesus wanted them to be unified and in his last night he prays for the disciples to continue in the unity that he had with the father but his prayer wasn't just for the disciples it was for us today now what a fun concept i mean how many of us have realized that jesus actually prayed for us like he prayed a prayer for us and it was recorded in the bible and here it is john 17 20-21 i do not ask for these only but also for

those who will believe in me through their word that's us the believers today that they may all be one just as you father are in me and i in you that they also may be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me i don't know about you i am so grateful that jesus prayed that we today would be the most intelligent most powerful most wealthy most secure people in the world sorry no that's not what jesus prayed jesus prayed that we believers today would be unified so that the world would know jesus our unity is one of the greatest testimonies of who god is to this world

so it's no surprise then that the enemy will use whatever tool possible to create as much division within the christian church as possible and one of those tools is politics so we need to stop letting our political differences divide us and begin to be the church jesus prayed us to be amen [Applause] and i get it it sounds so simple but it's not romans 12 9-10 say this let love be genuine abhor what is evil hold fast to what is good love one another with brotherly affection and outdo one another in showing honor sounds easy enough until we try to honor someone we don't like really i mean i'm a middle child so i

understand this completely like i know what it's like to have to honor someone on both sides that you dislike it's not as easy as we we think it would come to us but it's always going to be hard as long as we continue to try to live lives our way because genuine love happens best when it comes from the overflow of god's love in you there's no way we can succeed in being the men and women god has created us to be without god so let's start talking to god there's this thing we call prayer which is just that talking to god and prayer is powerful i mean prayer changes lives prayer brings forth healing and revival in

nations i mean prayer is the foundation of what god goes and does before us and our god hears our prayers and yet for us for a lot of us we look at it as a chore have i prayed today have i checked that off my list we've taken something sacred and personal something that connects us to the holy creator a god above all things and we turned it into this activity and we've forgotten that it's something we're called to do because of the power that's within it first timothy 2 1-2 says this first all then i urge you that supplications prayers intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all people for kings and all who are in high positions that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life godly and dignified in every way

do you want to see your heart change for those around you start praying for them it's hard to consider someone your enemy when you're lifting them up daily in prayer you know it's it's funny this this passage reminded me of when i was in college and i took this intro to christianity course and i sat in back and i was next to a very big samoan football player and me and him just kind of sat back and one day the professor put out a challenge for the class he said hey if you're bold i want you to pray this prayer jesus let me see people like you do and i thought okay that sounds good whatever didn't really resonate didn't take it serious and and so i left i come back to class the next week and my football samoan friend raises his

hand says professor i got to say something he goes what's up he goes this last week i took your challenge to pray that prayer to see people as as you do and so i was in the cafeteria eating my lunch minding my business and i look across the cafeteria and there's this young small girl just sitting at the table by herself crying and he said all of a sudden i felt this call that i had to go over and sit with her and he was like what's going on this is not me but he's like okay i'm gonna listen so he goes over and he sits down she's kind of looks up kind of terrified here's this big man she's never seen before and and he just begins asking like what's going on and and so she begins to just share like man i'm missing my family things are hard this is not what i expected i just want to go home i don't want to be here and she's crying and then he goes the crazy because then i start crying because she's crying and i'm crying and

i never cry he was like and then he's like we i just got to be there for him pray for her and walk out and he said i don't think that would have happened without me praying the prayer for me to see people as jesus does it's hard to hate the politician you disagree with politically when you pray for them every single day and i'm not just saying praying for them to do what you want them to do i'm talking about interceding for them on behalf of the lord lifting up their very souls before the lord see when this becomes our normal practice then we will see unity in jesus

that he was praying for us about but this will be difficult to do if we continue to elevate our political beliefs to the place of authority in our lives that was only ever intended for god our worldviews and beliefs our identities will continue to be shaped by whatever we put in that place 2 1 to 4 says this so if there's any encouragement in christ any comfort from love any participation in the spirit any affection and sympathy complete my joy by being of the same mind having the same love being in full accord and of one mind do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility count others more significant than yourselves

let each of you look not only to his own interests but also to the interests of others jesus may we see people as you see them may we treat people as you treated them because when we are unified for the things of christ the devil shudders in fear because when we act like the church it's a foreshadow of the kingdom that he's cast out of so church we have an opportunity to not worry about the things that are in front of us but to long for the day when political agendas and parties and all that stuff is gone and here's the encouragement right now we can be a reflection of that church of that future kingdom of heaven even in the midst of everything that's happening

and i get it there's some crazy things going on things that affect us politically things that affect our schools and our jobs and our loved ones and it can feel like everything we believe is going to be lost [Music] but it's not [Music] psalm 22 28 says this for kingship belongs to the lord and he rules over the nations we're not going to leave here today and have everything be the way we want it to be and that's okay as long as we can leave here as one body united in jesus empowered by the spirit to live out the gospel because it's that remember it's that

unity that's gonna show the world who jesus is our unity is not for us our unity is for him and he's worth it [Music] so a couple things before we close today first is this at the end of the service we're going to hand out these many american flags now the purpose of these flags is to be a reminder for us as followers of jesus to pray not just for our country and how we think it should be but to pray for all the leaders and authority especially the ones we disagree with so i want you to take it home and don't put it in a junk drawer don't put in the garage put it somewhere you're not gonna see it put it somewhere or you're going to see it at least for a while

and every time you do just take a moment and pray pray for those leaders pray for our country because prayer is powerful and i think we spend more time complaining about the things that are happening than praying about them [Music] now finally there's this some of you maybe you came in here today and you had an expectation of jesus that doesn't align with the scripture and so maybe you're like man i don't like this idea of jesus because it seems too american or to this or that our expectation just not aligned but i want to tell you

jesus man he offers us a freedom greater than any other freedom we can get which is the freedom from our sins and he offers you a hope that you won't find in anything else friends you see jesus gave his life so that we could be restored with god so if you came here today and you don't know who jesus is i want to tell you have an opportunity to and this is not something you can earn it's not something you can buy it's not something you can achieve through good works it's only something you can receive and i know some of you might be thinking i'm not good enough right if you knew my life you would not you wouldn't know that i'm not worthy but here's the best part jesus does know your life and he says you are because he's willing to give you his

righteousness so if you're here today and you're like man something's stirring i i feel like i need to make this decision you should because that's the holy spirit and he's calling you into this family he's saying all you have to do is accept it paul says this in romans he says when you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that christ is lord then you're saved [Music] that is good news so in just a moment i'm going to ask that that everyone just close their eyes and then i'm gonna pray a prayer and if you're here today and you don't know jesus you've never accepted jesus as your lord and savior your messiah your christ i want to give you an opportunity to do that so let's close our eyes holy father

[Music] lord thank you for loving us so much that you sent your son to this earth to live a perfect life to die on the cross and to raise again for us to be the sacrifice lord i just thank you that this is not something we have to earn or be good enough for but you look at us with love and grace and call us to be worthy through your son so right now lord i just pray for the person in here who doesn't know you that they would say yes lord i accept your free gift so right now with every head bowed and every eye closed i want to invite you if that's you today if you want to accept jesus and have him become the lord of your

life just put up your hand because we want to celebrate with you we want to rejoice with you i see that hand amen [Music] and this is not something to pressure you into i'm just sharing this because i'm passionate about it it changed my life forever so if that's you today man just put your hand up and know that man you are in the kingdom [Music] well amen well church you can open your eyes thank you for being here thanks for for going through a series that's going to challenge us convict us and today as you go out to to remember our freedoms that we have as americans may we remember the freedom we have in christ that is the freedom from our sins and that is the greatest freedom we could ever have so let's stand to our feet