If you have a Bible, we're going to be in the 16th chapter of the Gospel of Luke.
And I had shared last week that that parable of the unjust steward was one of the tougher
parables that Jesus had shared.
And if that's true, then this second story in Luke 16 is probably the most, one of the most powerful stories that he ever tells of, I believe, very certain.
events that happen here with these two men in Luke chapter 16 versus 19 through 31. And it's there
that we're going to read this morning. And so if you have your Bibles, please read along with me.
And it says in verse 19, there was a certain rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen
and fared sumptuously every day. But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus full of sores who was
laid at his gate, desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table.
Moreover, the dogs came and licked his soars. And so it was that the beggar died and was carried
by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being in torments
in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and he saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom.
And then he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me.
and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue,
for I am tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, son, remember that in your lifetime,
you receive your good things and likewise Lazarus evil things. But now he is comforted and you
are tormented. And besides all this, between us and you, there is a great gulf fixed so that those
who want to pass from here to you cannot,
nor can those from there pass to us.
And then he said,
I beg you therefore, Father,
that you would send him to my father's house.
For I have five brothers that he may testify to them,
lest they also come to this place of torment,
and Abraham said to him,
they have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them.
And he said, no, Father Abraham,
but if one goes to them from the dead,
they will repent, but he said to him,
if they do not hear Moses and the prophets,
neither will they be persuaded, though one rise from the dead.
Let's pray.
Father, thank you for this word,
for this pulling back the curtain of the other side.
Lord, what's on the other side of this life?
Lord, that you show us in this parable.
And I pray that we would consider,
Lord, as your word tells us in Ecclesiastes,
the living will take it to heart.
Oh, Lord, may we take this to heart today,
that this could be us very soon,
even like our friend, Lindsey Graham,
who has stood before you even just in these last days.
And so, Father, may we prepare ourselves to stand before our God.
And may our ears hear those sweet words.
Well done, good and faithful servant.
be with us today. Lord, may we consider, may we do a life examination. May we not wait till
it's too late. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Amen. This is quite a story.
Bible commentators, you know, basilate back and forth. And by the way, they are just
commentators. So from Idaho.
taters get it common tater okay well that was a flop okay but many believe that this was not is not a
parable it's not a parable that it's an actual that's an actually event that happened with these two men
and it's interesting that we have been talking last week we talked about the unjust steward and
Jesus seems to be bringing up this subject of money over and over again.
Here we have in this parable a rich man and a poor man.
And I don't think this is a parable though.
I think it's a story and Jesus pulls the curtain back to show us some of the things
from the other side, such as being conscious, having vision, being able to see
communication speaking to someone from the past.
In life after this life, there is comfort and or torment.
There's a memory of our life on earth.
There's a lot of things here that with substance.
You know, right now, the NDE are all the rage, right?
On the internet, people watch John Burke and, golly, it's just like there are a dime a dozen now.
but people that have actually said that they have seen
or had these near-death experiences where they see things
and there's commonality with some of them.
Burke has probably done the most exhaustive research
on those who have had these experiences.
But here in this story, there's two men, one rich, one poor,
both die, one is carried, and one is buried.
Seems to be a difference there.
it is appears that one went down and one went up each are present in eternity with different addresses
but they can look into each other's neighborhoods kind of wild isn't it what we see
the thing that is that causes people just be so afraid of death is we don't know
we don't know what the other side is like
and then God comes along
and calls you and I to this life of faith
here puts your faith in something that you can't see with your eyes
and without it it's impossible to please God
so that would suggest that it's impossible
to experience this place of comfort when you take your last breath
if you don't have faith in the Lord Jesus very specifically.
People have all kinds of ideas, don't they, about what happens when you die?
Some people believe that we become angels.
The Bible does not teach that.
The Bible does not teach that we become angels.
Some people will say, well,
there's marriage in heaven, and I agree, people go,
what? There's one marriage in heaven, right? We're married to Jesus. Right? He's the bridegroom.
We're the bride. That's the way it goes throughout Scripture. Some will say, oh, they're in a better place.
Listen, if they're in this place of torment that we just read about, they are not in a better place.
Okay? And that is just the hard, cold reality of it, folks. And so we just need to be truthful and honest.
And when somebody passes from this life and you don't know, people tell me, well, they're in hell.
How do you know? You're not God, right? He makes the call. And he can be as gracious and merciful as he wants to be.
You and I don't have the privilege of making that call, although they're in hell.
Because that's the final judgment that he reserves for himself.
If I don't know, I put my hope in the mercy and grace of God.
Then that's where I leave that.
When people die, that I don't know where they're at spiritually.
You can assume, but that's all it is.
And you know what happens to those who assume.
E.R. E.
Ah.
So it says here, notice, right off the bat, there was a certain rich man.
And Jesus had just talked about being rich.
and the Pharisees who loved money derided him
because he says those things that people
possess that they glory in are an abomination to the Lord.
Be careful what you glory in.
Jesus said, you know, our lives do not consist
in the abundance of things.
In other words, those things can do nothing for you.
The things that you and I have are firewood at best.
and an idol at worst.
So it says here,
there was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen
and fared sumptuously every day.
The great preacher, William Barclay,
says about the word fared sumptuously
is the word that is used for a gourmet
feeding on exotic and costly dishes. And this man did it every day. He gloried in the fact
of what he could eat that obviously others could not, especially the guy laying outside his
gate, some 15 or 20 yards away. In other words, he treated himself very well.
And I don't know, but it appears the Lord kind of has a problem with that.
that we're called to a life of sacrifice and self-denial.
Not that he has not called us to pamper ourselves.
The rich man noticed he didn't even minister to this beggar, this Lazarus,
but the dogs did.
He was no better than a dog.
In fact, the dog was a little better than him,
because the dog came up and licked the man's wounds.
So many people that I know
are ministered to by dogs.
Some of their best friends are their dogs.
Some of steam their dogs higher than people.
We live in a weird world.
The Bible says that we're more important than animals.
We read that in the,
in the
passage about the sparrows
and that you're more important than the sparrows
or the passage about the sheep
that you're more important than the sheep.
Oh, no, but my dog.
If it was me having to save a life
between my neighbor and my dog,
my dog would win every time.
Now, I got it.
I love dogs.
they're fun
they got a short
lifespan
there's a lot of things in my life they can't fix
but
this rich man had opportunity
to be better than a dog
are you
better than a dog
the Bible doesn't have a lot of good things to say
dogs. But how dare we be a dirty dog to those who are in need when we have it within our means
to minister to them? But there was a certain beggar named Lazarus full of sores and was laid at his
gate, desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table. And the dogs came and
looked his source. All he wanted was just a piece of bread. And it appears that he doesn't even
get that from this man. So in verses 22 and 23, it says, so it was that the beggar died
and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried. And being
in torments in Hades, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom.
this story reminds me of an actual event that I was a sexton
and for those of you don't know what that is I know it sounds like a dirty word but
a sexton is a gravedigger
and for a couple years I worked at a cemetery
and there was this guy in town that was very well known
and he um we did his funeral we buried him
and we went back a couple weeks later after we buried him,
his grave had sunk.
Oh.
Well, this guy was a radio personality in the southern Idaho area
that was a fire-breathing atheist.
And he tried tearing the Christian faith down
with every word he ever spoke on his radio program.
He would have Christians on and young earthers,
and he would just try to destroy them.
So there's a good chance.
Right.
He's like the rich man.
He was buried.
But then he went down deeper.
We had to fix his grave.
And the two and a half years I was there, we fixed it four times.
He just kept going down and down and down to the depths of hell.
I don't know that, but.
But it was striking.
All of us would look at each other and say, oh no,
Coppnick sunk again, right?
And it wasn't like he had a,
because that would happen when you do it,
a county funeral was where you'd turn a cement box upside down
and you just set it over the casket,
as cheap as possible.
But the dirt would wash down with the snow and the rain
and fill the thing up and you would have to fix it.
But this was like a sealed casket, you know.
And so, you know, poor Mr. Cokin, just,
it didn't look good for him for eternity.
But here's these two guys.
They both died.
And it says, and being in Hades, this man,
he went down into this hot place where he's torment.
and he looks up, it says, and he sees Lazarus,
this beggar that he was very familiar with in the presence of Abraham.
Abraham, you guys know who Abraham is, right?
I mean, for a long time, I always thought it was Abraham Lincoln.
But no, it's Abraham.
Father Abraham had many sons, and many sons had...
You guys sound so good.
So let's just praise the Lord, right?
And he's that father of faith.
The faith of Abraham.
It's what defined the nation of Israel.
Was this patriarch.
And notice God gives him a position here
after he's in this place.
Now most people believe that Hades was a two
compartmental place.
There was a comfort side of Hades and there was a torment side of Hades.
That's what some people believe.
And David Guzik says this about these two verses in verses 22 and 3.
He says, we should not think that Lazarus was saved by his poverty any more than we should
think that the rich man was damned by his wealth.
Lazarus most have had a true relationship of faith with the true God and the rich man did not.
Their life's circumstances made that faith easier or more difficult, but it did not create it.
And he looked up and he's going, man, that guy that was misery out by my gate is in the tall cotton.
He's faring sumptuously now.
And here I am.
I'm tormented.
And you notice all this is going on here.
He's conscious.
He recognizes.
He recognizes Abraham.
He recognizes Lazarus.
People say, well, are we going to know each other in heaven?
Well, I hope we're not more stupid in heaven than we are here.
The Bible talks about that, that we will, obviously.
But many believe that Jesus, when he died, went and cleaned out,
carried captivity, captive, if you will, the comfort side of Hades,
a.k.a. the grave, or also called hell.
But he took that comfort side, and it suggested in Ephesians chapter,
4, verses 7 and 9, it says, but to each one of us, grace was given according to the measure of
Christ's gift. Therefore, he says, when he, Jesus, ascended on high, he led captivity captive
and gave gifts to men. Now this, he ascended, what does it mean, but that he also first
descended into the lower parts of the earth? And that's what some people believe. I don't know,
for sure. First Peter,
suggests Jesus addressing the unrighteous dead, many believe, in 1 Peter 3, 18, and 20.
It says, for Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God,
being put to death in the flesh, but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also he went and preached to the
spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient when once the divine longs,
suffering waited in the days of Noah while the ark was being prepared in which a few,
that is eight souls, were saved through water. And so this seems to be suggesting that Jesus
made a proclamation. Preach doesn't necessarily mean that they got a second chance. Some think that.
But no, he made a proclamation. I am the one to come. I am the seed of the woman that was talked
about in Genesis chapter three. Because once man sin,
right, it was a downward spiral
till God had to bring about the flood of Noah
and deal with the wickedness of mankind.
So a place of comfort
and a place of torment.
And so the rich man cries out in verse 24.
Notice his
His condition that he had in the world of selfishness seems to be, he seems to be sealed in that condition.
Are you selfish? Don't answer that question. I'll answer it for you. Of course you are. Are we not all self-centered?
It's just, it's just all about me. I get up in the morning and I try to make this mop of hair I got look presentable.
people go oh you got hair into that cowboy hat
you know or getting the yellow stuff off your teeth in the morning or
taking a whiff and whew this it's a hard maintenance right this but it's all about us
we love self and yet this guy's attitude is the same he's just concerned about himself
in verse 24 and he cried and said,
Father Abraham, have mercy on me
and send Lazarus, right?
Make him serve me.
Please, Father, make him serve me.
It's kind of like when Jesus told Peter, right?
Hey, you know, right now you're doing what you want,
but there's going to come in time where they're going to dress your hind end down
and they're going to put you on a cross, right?
And you're going to die for me.
But what about John?
What about him?
we're such cry babies, you know? And Jesus said, if I want him to stay here until I come again,
that's none of your business. You do what I've called you to do. This guy says, send him that
slender says, he dip his tongue, or excuse me, his finger in water and cool my tongue for I'm
tormented in this flame. He had no compassion for this guy, even on the other side. Wouldn't that be hellish
to be sealed in your self-centered,
you know,
glorious jerk type attitude?
Just sealed right there.
That's what you want.
That's what you got.
That's what you are.
And Abraham, bless his heart, he responds.
And I'm wondering,
I'm wondering how this communication's going.
Are they yelling at each?
Hey, what are you doing over there?
Over there, over there.
Send him.
I'm over here, over here, over here.
Somebody has rightly said, this life,
this life is just a shadow of the actual reality of the other side,
of the life after this life.
I believe there's truth in that.
But he says, Father, but Abraham said,
Son, remember, notice he calls him son.
He calls him son.
and this guy calls him father.
This is a good Jew boy.
He knew better.
He was a son of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
He knew his family history that they were people of faith.
And yet it appears that he had none.
He had no faith.
What's your faith like?
Is it in a process?
we all should be in process of our faith walk.
Hopefully we're on a growing graph, right,
that we're increasing in faith as we go along.
But he calls him son.
Son, remember.
Memory totally intact.
Could you imagine how horrific that would be?
to be in eternity and have your memory,
every single thing you've ever seen, heard, done, said.
It's totally intact.
It's right there.
Perfect recall.
Not this old man shutdown that happens sometimes.
And you're looking right at somebody you know their name and it just won't come.
None of that.
He says, remember.
Could you imagine being in eternity and remembering
every time you heard the name of Jesus,
every time you had an opportunity to say,
yes, Lord, I need you, forgive me of my sin,
and you never did it.
That would be an eternal torment right there.
Remember, memory, totally intact.
And yet the scripture tells us in Revelation
that when we're in heaven,
that the memory of this life is,
wiped clean.
Oh, are there things I wish I could forget?
The memories that come back when I'm sitting here and trying to sing a worship song
and all of a sudden this hideous deed that I did in my teenage years or my early 20s
that would just, it'd make a sailor blush with shame.
And it comes in like a flood.
Oh, Lord.
But one day, one day that will be wiped clean when I'm with the Lord and I honestly can't wait.
It's going to be a glorious thing.
He says, remember in your lifetime, right?
That you had these good things.
God gave you so much.
You had an opportunity to give and you didn't do it.
God gives to us that we might give.
That is the principle in the Christian life.
When you look at 1st Corinthians chapter 12,
when it talks about these gifts that God gives us,
the gifts are not for us.
It's for others.
That we would share our gifts with others.
That people would be encouraged in the faith
and that they would desire to do the same.
And that we would take care of one.
another and this didn't happen he says it this Lazarus was tormented and you were comforted in this life
but now it's just the opposite Lazarus experienced evil things and now he's comforted and you're
tormented.
Tormented means agony, emotional grief.
One commentator says, the scene is not mere parable scenery, it is Christ's sobering
warning of irreversible judgment affirming the justice of God.
God is just.
You and I will get paid what is owed to us.
We got it coming.
We got some wages coming, you and I.
Good or bad.
Heaven or hell.
The wages are coming.
We know what the wages of sin are, right?
The wages of sins are death.
So he should have humbled himself.
And it's interesting, some of these near-death experienced people
when they face and they see the hellish experience of God's judgment
and are allowed to come back,
every one of them has said, this is what I deserve.
This is what I deserve.
This torment.
It's what I deserve.
I know it's what I deserve, right?
The hottest part.
But when we humble ourselves,
the justice of God morphs into the mercy of God.
It's just the wildest thing.
And it's totally on us.
It's our decision.
It's our choice.
I love proper.
verse 22, 4 says,
Humility is the fear of the Lord.
Its wages are riches, honor, and life.
Humble yourself before the Lord.
He'll truly lift you up.
Why is it so hard?
I'm hoping and praying as I'm getting older
that I'll be more humble before the Lord.
Because I was jogging the other day
and I was humbled before the Lord when I popped a hammy.
And, oh, that really hurts.
And now I can't run no more.
And I like to run.
But God has his way of humbling you,
especially as you get older.
You're supposed to get more humble as you get older,
not harder and crustier.
Verse 26,
And then Abraham tells him, he says, listen, besides all this, besides all this that you deserve to be where you're at, and Lazarus is where he's at, besides all those decisions that God has made, he says, there is between us and you is a great gulf fixed so that those who would want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can those from there pass to you.
us. It's like it's a done deal. You can't cross that chasm. And people have literally seen
chasms. Though the rich man could see and speak with Abraham, he wasn't close to him at all.
That's just wild. And that's why I'm wondering, how did they, hey, can you hear me? No, it's like they could
look, see each other, and communication was happening.
Because we know so much more when we get there.
That's what the Apostle Paul taught.
And verse 12 of 1 Corinthians 15, he says,
for now we see through a glass darkly,
but then face to face.
Now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I am known.
Think about that.
You pass out of this body, all the limits of it,
and all knowledge is downloaded into you in a moment.
Woo!
And that you can look at each other possibly
and know what's being communicated.
Because there is no lack of communication right here at all.
It's pretty intense.
It's really real.
hopefully if you haven't thought about it lately this is maybe encouraging you i need to be ready for this
i need my heart ready i need my heart before god ready for this i'm wondering if lindsay graham said
that in the last few days you guys heard about lindsay graham right he died
Lindsay Graham is dead
It's crazy
Mitch McConnell might
already be there
we just don't know if he's there yet
then poor Republicans are shaking in their boots
if they lose those two Senate seats
and Lindsay was only 71
I walked into a room on Friday
And this guy was, he wasn't 70 yet, he's only five years older than me.
He just took his last breath.
Sat with the family for a few minutes.
We knew it was coming.
And he was ready.
And oh, what joy.
Oh, what joy when you know that carcass laying there, you know, it's just a shell.
The nut's gone.
Just a shell.
and he was a nut, right?
A nut for Jesus.
But we're going to know,
we're going to know even as we are known.
Think about how well does God know you?
Does he know you better than yourself?
He does.
He knows you better than you know you.
We're too limited.
But then, face to face, we will know him
even as we will know even as we are known.
this great gulf is fixed between them and their destiny seems to be fixed for all time
you had your chance you had your chance that's why the bible says don't mess around today is the
day of salvation now is the appointed time the accepted time get right with jesus you don't know if
you got tomorrow. You don't know if you got this afternoon. And you know, when you're,
when you're right with the Lord, everything's going to be a cakewalk. No, okay, maybe not. But
death is going to be a cakewalk. It's going to, it's no big deal. The process might be
brutal, but when we take our last breath, right, we win. You had your chance, rich man,
with your good things. He had determined his own destiny by leaving God out of his life,
and now neither his character nor his destiny could be changed.
Verse 27, then he said, I beg you, therefore, father, that you would send him to my father's house.
All of a sudden, he has this compassion for his family to not be with him.
You know, you talk to them people, well, I'm just going to go to hell and be with all my friends.
Notice this guy doesn't even want his family to come to this place.
Right?
At least he says you, verse 27, send them to my father's house,
for I have five brothers that he may testify to them lest they also come to this place of torment.
I don't want my family coming here. I don't want my brothers coming here.
Christians, we wouldn't want our worst enemy to go there because we're called to love our enemies.
Yet in church, I see that some people, the way they treat each other, they want their brothers and sisters to go here.
Shameful.
Shameful stuff.
He begged him, please, let Lazarus go tell him.
To warn him.
And notice Abraham.
sticking true to his character,
hey, they got Moses, right?
They've got Deuteronomy and Exodus.
They got all that.
Let them read Moses and the prophets.
That's who they have.
But he's not letting it go.
It said in verse 30,
and he said, no, Father Abraham,
still calling him Father Abraham.
Abraham. But if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent. What do you think?
You think if you saw that heathen come up out of the casket, you repent right then on the spot?
Either that or faint.
Abraham's words are pretty powerful. When he responds, he says,
No, they ain't got the Word of God.
If they don't have the, if they won't listen to the Word of God, they're not going to listen to someone else.
But he said to them, if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded,
though one rise from the dead.
Do we see that today?
Obviously, we see that.
Jesus rose from the dead.
He conquered death, hell, and the great.
grave. Historically, they can prove it. James Blackstone said it's one of the greatest
provable events in human history, that there's actually more evidence to prove that Jesus
rose from the dead than that George Washington was our first president. William Blackstone
said that. No, they got...
They got Moses and the prophets.
They got the Word of God.
Romans 10, 17, right?
So then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.
It's the Word of God that converts the soul that tells us in the Psalms.
But so many people, they don't want to read the Word of God.
That's too much work.
I was talking to a brother the other day, and he actually leads a Bible study.
He said he just kind of vacillated.
He did pick it up and read it occasionally, but he wasn't consistent.
And it wasn't until he became consistent that things started to just open up for him.
It began to change his life.
A guy by the name of J.D. Greer says,
If you want to be led by the Spirit of God, then devote yourself to the Word of God.
I remember I was 27 years old when I made this commitment.
I said, God, I got to read through your Bible.
I've never read through it.
from Genesis to Revelation.
I'd never read through it.
And I didn't think I could because I would start,
and then I would get to Leviticus and Numbers and Deuter.
Right.
And I just lose steam.
And then I listened to a fellow by the name Chuck Missler.
Who knows who Chuck Missler was?
Right?
Missler was incredible Bible teacher.
But he was just a man because he was really speaking loud during Y2K,
telling what a train wreck it was going to be.
So our dear brother had to eat some crow.
But he said, this is how you read the Word of God.
He says start in Matthew 1, start in Psalm 1, and start in Genesis 1.
Yeah.
Three places, three chapters a day.
You know, good reader can do it in, what, 10, 15, 20 minutes.
There's no big deal.
Start in Genesis 1, Psalm 1, and Matthew 1.
When you get to Malachi, go back to Genesis 1.
When you get through the Psalms, you can add Proverbs and Ecclesiastes as well.
There's books of wisdom there.
When you get to the end of Ecclesiastas, go back to Psalm 1.
When you get to Revelation 22, go back to Matthew chapter 1.
So it's so simple.
It was such a simple, I go, I can even remember that.
And so I started when I was 27.
And I've been doing that, and I'll be 64 this week.
So it changes your life, folks.
The word of God. It gives you hope. It fills you with life.
Jesus said, the words that I speak to you, their spirit and their life.
Ruth Graham wrote this in the inside page of her daughter, Anne Graham Lotz's Bible.
It says, this book is your one sure guide in an unsure world. Read it, study it, love it, live it.
That's good. That's really good. This book is your sure guide in an
sure world. Read it, study it, love it, live it. I found that to be true. Good old Smith's
Wiggleworth. Anybody ever heard Smith Wigglesworth? He said there are four principles we need to
maintain. First, read the Word of God. Second, consuming the Word of God until it consumes you.
Third, believe the word of God.
Fourth, act on the word of God.
That's good counsel right there.
That's what's going to take you to this place of comfort, folks.
Right?
And yet, we don't do it.
The church doesn't do it.
American Christians don't do it.
there's truly a famine in the land like the old testament prophet said but it's the famine of the word of god
because the word of god truly affects how you live your life that old saying the only thing
necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing and especially for men to not read
the word of God.
Because if our men are righteous, there's a good chance more of society will be righteous.
I'm going to close just with a thought about these guys from Warren Weirsby.
It says, we must remind ourselves that the rich man was not condemned because he was rich, nor was Lazarus, saved because,
he was poor. Abraham was very wealthy man, yet he was not in torments in Hades. The rich man
trusted in his riches and did not trust the Lord. The safest road to hell, wrote C.S. Lewis,
is the gradual one. The safest road to hell is the gradual one. The gentle slope,
soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones.
without signposts.
Jesus said, for what shall a profit a man
if he shall gain a whole world and lose his own soul?
Jesus asked the question,
what's your answer?
I pray that you would say, here I am, Lord.
Send me.
Send me to do whatever you want me to do.
That might be helping your neighbor across the street.
That might be going to Bible school.
That might be starting a home study.
That might be going down and helping at the homeless shelter.
I talked to the brother that leads that down there now,
and he went to a men's retreat,
and he was sitting with these two homeless guys having dinner
that somebody had brought up to the retreat.
And he fell in love with the guys.
He goes, I love these people.
and now he's the director of the homeless shelter.
God opened a door.
God called him to minister to the beggar at the gate.
And so it is with you and I.
Shall we pray?
Father, we thank you.
Thank you for your goodness, for your love,
for the peace that passes all understanding from knowing you.
Lord, as we look at these things and we consider our own life
and really our own life on the other side of this life.
Lord, when we step into eternity, the place that will be.
And oh, Lord, I pray that those in this room
would make a decision, maybe even today,
to be in that place of comfort.
Lord, where we can rest and where tears are wiped away
where there's no more death, no more disease, no more
more crying, all those things that will be filled with perfect knowledge, Lord, and we'll know you
and the power of your resurrection, and we'll be with you for all eternity. Lord, whatever it takes,
get us to that place. Some may not be ready, but maybe by this evening they will be. And so I just pray
that they would be quick to cry out and say, oh, Lord, oh, Lord, save me, because I need saved.
Lord, would you be with us?
Would you direct our steps?
Open doors for us.
Show us how we can help that person at our gate.
Lord, that you've put there.
Maybe we see them every day or once a week.
Lord, you love people.
and you call us to love people.
So help us to do that by the power of your Holy Spirit
in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.
Hey, let's all stand.
Hey, the prayer team's going to be over here
behind these bleachers over here if you need prayer.
If you need to stand in from somebody
or you just need somebody
to confirm with you and pray with you.
God bless you.
Look for those who you can minister to this week.
Let's worship.
Thank you.