YouTube Content
Open on YouTubePastor Paul Condrell leads a Sunday service featuring worship, testimonies from the worship leader and a congregant named Dwight about discerning God's will, and a sermon on Jesus's three wilderness temptations. The pastor emphasizes memorizing Scripture, testing spirits, and relying on God's timing rather than forcing outcomes.
Good morning, everyone. It's such a pleasure that we come to worship our our God. But why we come here to worship our God? So in Jesus' name, let's start today's worship. And I like to tell you a story that I encounter. And that story drew me near to God. On Christmas Day, last Christmas Day, we headed out to Arizona. A place called Sedona. It's a small city but with lots of visitors. This is a 6-day vacation to celebrate our 50th anniversary. The main scenery is the red rocks deposited in the bottom of sea 5 million years ago, and it is beautiful and draw many, many tourists beyond my expectation. The most amazing things happened in our last day in Sedona. The night at 9 o'clock PM, of course, we drove a short distance from hotel to the wilderness to watch the night sky. Away from all the lights, pollution as in the US East Coast. Well, I can never find the milky sky from our home. But there at Sedona, I saw the Milky Way calling to me. So vividly. Each constellation brings my memory back 54 years ago, 54, that's 1970, when I came to the United States. That time in the countryside near the city of Taipei, The air is so clean and free of light pollution. Every summer night, we would lay skywards on a long bench to count all the constellations. In the clear sky and with the help of moonless night and a software called SkyGate, which is not available when I was young. We traced 7 of the 8 planets. The night, Jupiter is so bright and the Mars is very, very red. Of course, we cannot see Mercury because it's so close to the Sun. With long exposure, My son took a picture of the sky and the mountains. The stars are so bright and the mountains so fiery red. I just could not believe my eyes. At the last moment there, We saw a bright light with brightness equivalent of several outstanding stars flew past the sky. I was told it's ISS, the International Space Station. Oh, what a night! The sky banquet that Almighty God has set long time ago for all His people to enjoy. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank You. For your beautiful creation that we can all enjoy every single day. We praise you and worship you because you are the only one worth our worship and praise. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
There is love.
There is love that came for us, humble to a sinner's cross. You broke my shame and sinfulness. You rose again victorious. Faithfulness none can deny. Through the storm and through the fire, there is truth that sets me free. Jesus Christ who lives in me. You are stronger, you are stronger. My sin is broken, you have saved me. It is written, Christ is risen. Jesus, you are Lord of all. No beginning. No beginning. And no end. You're my hope and my defense. You came to seek and save the lost. You paid it all upon the cross. You are stronger. You are stronger. Sin is broken. You have saved me. It is Christ is risen. Jesus, you are Lord of all. So let your name be lifted higher, be lifted higher, be lifted higher. You are stronger, you are stronger. Sin is broken, you have saved me. It is written, Christ is risen. Jesus, you are Lord of all. You are stronger, you are stronger. Sin is broken, you have saved me. It is written, Christ is risen. Jesus, you are Lord of all. Come, quiet my soul. Remember Redemption's Hill, where your blood was spilled for my ransom. Everything I once held dear, I count it all as loss. Lead me to the cross where your love poured out. Bring me to my knees, Lord, I lay me down. Rid me of myself, I belong to you. Oh, lead me, lead me to the cross. too dear. I count it all as lost. Lead me to the cross where your love poured out. Bring me to my knees, Lord, I lay me down. Rid me of myself, I belong to you. Oh, lead me, lead me to the cross. It cost to see my sin upon that cross. Lead me to the cross where your love poured out. Bring me to my knees, Lord, I lay me down. Rid me of myself, I belong to you. Oh, lead me. Lead me, lead me to the cross where your love poured out. Bring me to my knees, Lord, I lay me down. Rid me of myself, I belong to you. Oh, lead me, lead me to the cross. Sing one piece. When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. Though Satan should buffet me, That though trials shall come, that this blessed assurance can true. That Christ hath begun in my helpless estate and hath shed his own blood for my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought! My sin, not in part but in whole, He is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. And Lord, haste the day when the faith shall be sight, when clouds be rolled back as a scroll. The trump shall resound and the Lord shall be saved. Even so, it is well with my soul. We sing, it is well, it is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. We sing, it is well, it is well It is well, it is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. One more time. It is well, it is well, it is well with my soul. Let's bow our heads in prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, with everything that's going on in the world right now, with the fires in LA and anything else that's going on in our lives, Lord, I pray that this song, that these lyrics would be forever on our hearts, forever on our lips, singing that we know that it is well. We know it is as well. And it truly is well with our souls because the sacrifice that was made for us, because of the assurance we have in Christ, because he's ascended to the heavens and is forever, forever pleading our case before the Father. Lord, thank you that we have this assurance. No matter what storms may come, no matter what temptations may seek to lead us astray, Lord, help us to forever rest in you and to forever turn our eyes towards your sacrifice, towards your glory, and towards your kindness. Lord, we thank you for all this. We pray that you would be with us this morning and remind us of that truth. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Amen.
Good morning. It wasn't too long ago I was given the opportunity to share one of my testimonies, and Minister Paul asked me to do this again recently, but I wanted to kind of continue on. So last time I talked about how I was seeking truth, and seeking truth is what led me finally to accept Jesus. But there's more to that, of course. Our Christian walks aren't just a simple We become disciples and that's it. So as I was starting to figure out what it meant to be a disciple of God, you know, I ran into the trouble that a lot of people run into is, well, what's God's will? You know, what's God telling me to do in my life? What am I being asked to do? What is it that I'm expected to do? And these things are a struggle because as everyone knows, God just doesn't speak to us. We just don't hear from him day to day. We look through all the stories in the Bible, we hear about all the times that God makes appearances, speaks in dreams, or even talks to people, gives revelations, but that doesn't always come to us. So it's a challenge. It's actually extremely hard to know what God's will is and to walk as a disciple of Jesus. But I want to talk to you a little bit about something that happened to me and something that gave me at least least a clue as to what it means to be in God's will. So when I was younger in high school, I had a friend, and this friend, uh, was a very energetic person, um, always someone who he called Speedy. He would, uh, go from class to class in a matter of seconds. It was kind of funny. He could walk faster than anyone in the school, and it actually proved in, uh, You know, one of the gym classes where he could do— he could walk a mile faster than most people could run it. Um, after high school, uh, he went into the Navy and, um, after about one year, not even one year, um, he ran into a breakdown. So, sorry, it still troubles me a little bit. Um, But he became disabled and he went into the Navy mental hospital at Perry Point. And being one of his friends, I had the opportunity to go visit him. And that hospital is challenging to go to, as if you've ever been to any kind of mental facility, it's very difficult. Seeing people who are sick, seeing people who struggle. And he went through that and he got better. He was released. But visiting that place really made an impression on me. It made me realize that not everyone goes through life as a normal person. But one of the things I learned actually much later on as he explained, is that no one else visited him other than family. I was the only friend to actually go to the hospital to see him. And that kind of struck me, that I was doing something that I didn't really want to do. It was difficult, it was hard, and as you can hear from my voice, it certainly kept an impact on my life. And I did it anyway. It was later on that I realized that was something God called me to do. That was part of God's will. So, as I kind of thought about that and I thought about, you know, where my life was going, I realized that God's will isn't giving us actually just a voice or a dream or a revelation. It's Him giving us a calling and Him telling us, "I've already given you all what you need to know. You just need to listen. You just need to obey." There are things that I would read in the Bible that I would understand that they were very difficult. I'm not always applying them in my life, particularly as I look just to my day-to-day living. You know, when I see what I speak and what I act out to people, these are not the ways that Jesus has given us an example. And so the biggest things that I have as a takeaway is, one, be with God. Be in His presence and pray. Know that He's with you. Two, be present. The past is done. You can't change it. The future is yet to be. You shouldn't worry over it. It's what people are around you today and now, the needs they have that you should be paying attention to. And be in His word. He's already given us so much. There's so much in the Bible we have yet to actually obey. I have yet to actually understand and and read all of it and really go through it. But that is really where we should be focusing. As it's said by the Lord, "This is my beloved Son. With him I am well pleased. Hear him." In some of the translations, it actually says, "Listen to him," which is a very much more active thing to do. So we have His word, and that's what we should be doing. That's what I need to remember to do.
Thank you.
Now let us read today's scriptures. First is Matthew. Matthew chapter 3 from verse 16 to 17. After his baptism, Jesus came up out of the water. The heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling upon him. And the voice from heaven said, "This is my dear loved Son, who brings me great joy." Second part of the scripture is from Matthew 4:1-11. Luke 4:1-4. Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted there by the devil. For 40 days and 40 nights he fasted and became very hungry. During that time the devil came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread." But Jesus told him, "No, the Scriptures say, 'People do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" May God bless his own words.
Well, good morning. Today's message will be a little on the short side, I hope, but also very impactful because this is a topic that has to be close to all of our hearts as we see Jesus confronting the devil. And we might wonder right off the bat, you know, what did the devil look like? Because if you Google image search on the devil, you'll see this recurring theme of the red guy with horns and a pitchfork or something. But Jesus is having an actual conversation. So this, whatever it was, is something that perhaps looked like a person, and he's having a normal conversation, and presumably we're just getting little snippets of it. But I wanted to set the context with that first scripture because this is just days after this great high. You know, we talk about highs and lows all the time. This huge high where God's voice spoke from the heavens saying, "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." And immediately he goes, ends up in the wilderness, and he's facing the devil who's saying, "If you're the Son of 'If you are the Son of God.' So when— I don't know how many— just now Dwight was saying we don't usually hear God's voice audibly. I don't suppose we hear the devil's voice audibly either. But where do we encounter the influence of the devil or of evil? We might encounter it all over the place. And so I hope that we'll learn also to recognize God's God's leading and His will, also recognize the opposite. Sometimes we will have influences that will be saying to do the wrong thing. So we're going to get into it here. So when He said, "Command these stones to be made bread," let me just go back here. The devil said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread." Now, if you remember the story, Jesus had been without food. Food for 40 days and 40 nights. So he was hungry, and it says he was hungry. But when the devil said, "Tell these stones to become loaves of bread," that would have solved Jesus' problem, right? And also it would prove that he really was the Son of God because he presumably had this power. Do we see him doing that later? We see him spread— feeding 5,000 or 4,000 with just a few loaves of bread. So he is able But he says, "No." He says, "The Scriptures say people do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes out of the mouth of God." Now, how did he come up with this particular scripture? Because Jesus, of course, has presumably memorized the entire Old Testament. And this one is very apropos, of course, to this temptation to make stones into bread. But it occurred to me that he probably had this story in mind too, and he's remembering, thinking back to how Esau had, for one pot of food, had sold his birthright. And that may have strengthened Jesus in that moment to say, "No, I'm not going to do like Esau. I'm not going to eat," even though he's hungry. There's other ways to get food, right? He can come out of the wilderness and go to 7-Eleven. So he doesn't have to make stones into bread. And so from— we want to have people in the Bible that we imitate, that we do like they do, but also people we do the opposite. In this case, we don't want to do what Esau has done. And so what I want us to draw from this encounter in this first temptation is how Jesus uses "it is written." And I appreciate Jonathan has chose that one song, that "it is written." Did you do that on purpose? It is written becomes like this rallying cry where it's like it gives us strength. It gives us wisdom, but also gives us power to encounter or to overcome a temptation or when we get the wrong thought in our mind. So that's, of course, we have to have the scripture in our mind in the first place in order to be able to quote it or to fight the temptations, and that's why we spend spend a lifetime not only learning the scripture but also meditating on it so that it will be fresh in our mind when we have any kind of encounter. So it could be an actual verse or it could even be like that story, like about Esau. Now there is a problem, and I'm sure maybe you have already thought back to the encounter of Adam and Eve with the serpent. Which is like the Old Testament version of what Jesus is going through now. So Jesus fought back the temptation with, "It is written." But Eve did the exact same thing. But what she did is something very interesting. So God had said in chapter 2 of Genesis, "You may freely eat of the fruit of every tree in the garden, except, of course, the tree of knowledge of good and evil. If you eat its fruit, you are sure—" to die. That was the whole Bible in the garden. Just one— or is that two sentences? One and a half sentences. That was the whole Bible. That's all that she had to learn. But then when the serpent says, hey, what did God say? She says, it is written, we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden. Only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden we are not allowed to eat. God said— and she's quoting here You must not eat it or even touch it. If you do, you will die. And I can remember, I think I was like 16 or 17 in a youth group, and the pastor was showing the difference between what God had said and what Eve had said, maybe just hours later. It was all on the 6th day or maybe the 7th. It was amazing. I just couldn't believe that she could make a goof like that. But where do you suppose that came from? How could she just make that up? Now, if you, if you remember the story, when God gave the command, it was to Adam only. That was before Eve was formed out of the rib. And so presumably God didn't appear again to Eve and repeat the same thing, but it was Adam that explained to Eve what are the rules. And so Adam added a little bit of extra gloss. So Eve, you're not supposed to eat this tree. You know what would be better? Don't even touch it. That way you're sure not to eat it, right, if you don't touch it. So he improved on the word. Anyway, the point we want to draw from this today is if we're going to be quoting, we want to do it accurately. We need to think through or to read and to get a clear idea of what God really is saying and not do what Eve did. And there's plenty of examples in the Bible. And let's say this is the case of sexual temptation, which in the world today is certainly very prevalent and is bombarding us from all around. So how are we going to deal with that temptation? So we are just going to give this as a freebie here, I guess, for the men, but maybe not only for the men. We can remember the story of Joseph. Joseph and how he was put in this position, but he refused. And he said, "How could I do such a wicked thing? It would be a great sin against God." So he wasn't thinking, you know, "Oh, nobody will know." That's maybe what she's saying. But he's saying, "God's going to know!" Right? So he said, "I won't do it." And he refused. And so that's the kind of thing that we can keep in our mind to strengthen and And of course, if you have trouble with this, go to Proverbs 5, the whole chapter. We're not going to read the whole thing, but it basically tells, you know, "You're getting yourself into trouble. You're playing with fire. For the lips of an immoral woman are sweet as honey, but in the end, she is bitter as poison and leads straight to the grave." So if you knew what it was going to cost you, you wouldn't do it. So these are the sort of things that we keep in mind and imitate Joseph. And don't imitate Esau. So the conclusion for this first temptation is learn the Scripture and hold on to the stories. Because these stories, you know, I heard the saying once that our whole brain is made— our brains are designed to hold God's Word. And so if we do that, it will really work for us. Now the second temptation, it says, the devil took him to the holy city Jerusalem, to the highest point of the temple, and said, 'If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say he will order his angels to protect you, and they will hold you up with their hands so you won't even hurt your foot on a stone.' So he's saying, 'Jesus, show off a little bit. Jump off the pinnacle.' Presumably there's going to be people there. This is the most crowded place in all of the whole country of Israel, is around the temple. So if he jumps off, everybody will see, 'Oh, wow, look at that. 'Jesus is a real miracle worker. The David Copperfield of our time has come,' and they'll all make a big deal out of Him. But He says no. He says— but even before we get to His response, there's something very interesting here is that the devil himself is quoting the Scripture. Did you notice that? So the devil says, 'Oh, you're going to quote Scripture, are you?' Well, he does the same thing. He says, "I will— there's this verse that says you can jump off and the angels will protect you. So don't worry, you'll be fine." So we learn from this that yes, even the devil can quote Scripture. And it says, 1 John, the book of 1 John says we need to test the spirits. He's talking about in the context that we have to be questioning, we have to have critical thinking. It's right there in the Scripture to test what we're hearing even if it is from the Scripture. Because people can, as you know very well, take Scripture wildly out of context. So then Jesus does respond in a similar way. "It is written." The Scriptures also say, "You must not test the Lord your God." So in other words, he's using this Scripture to counterbalance the one that the devil had said. In other words, if you— the Scripture that the devil's quoting is, if you accidentally fall down, the angel will protect you. But if you do it on purpose, that's different, right? And so Jesus said we can't just tempt God by doing things on purpose that we know are foolish or the wrong thing to do. So the difference is the heart or the motivation, and Jesus sees through that misuse of Scripture that the devil had done. So therefore, the lesson from the second temptation we can draw is that we need to let Scripture interpret Scripture. So we can't— if you just take one thing all by itself like the devil had, out of context, it's not going to work for us. And we're gonna have— I think all of us develop a kind of— I call it spiritual common sense. So when we have— and there's a verse that talks about this in Hebrews. It says, "Babies who need milk do not know how to do what is right, but solid food is for those who are mature, who through training have the skill to recognize the difference between right and wrong. So it takes training, it takes learning and experience in order to understand how the scriptures will apply in all of our lives. And we also see this over and over in Proverbs. I'm just quoting this one spot where the writer, presumably Solomon, is saying, "My child, listen to what I say. Tune your ears to wisdom. Cry out for insight." Search for them as you would for silver. Then you will understand what it means to fear the Lord, and you will gain knowledge of God. And we see all through Proverbs, don't we, the fool and the wise man, the wise man and the fool. The wise do this, the fools do that. Well, let me ask you, when you become a Christian, do you become wise? Not right away. So we can't just like go down the aisle and say the sinner's prayer or whatever, make a decision, and now we're wise. No, it's only the beginning. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. So that's why we still need to work at it. So finally, we're here now on the third temptation, and this one's a little bit hard to get your mind around. The devil took him to a peak of a very high mountain, showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, saying, I will give it all to you if you will kneel down and worship me. And you can't imagine how Jesus could even consider worshiping the devil. It doesn't really make sense. But imagine— I've thought about this, and I try to imagine— like suppose the Roman Emperor were to come to Jesus and say, look, let's make a treaty. We'll share, and we'll have peace, and you won't have to be crucified, and you won't have to— and we'll give you all these territories, and all you have to do is "Put our little Roman emblem on, you know, at the bottom of all of your official declarations or something." We can kind of look at this in a modern way, at the compromise that you would be making. And you can see it almost makes sense. He's saying, "Well, let's make peace. Let's not kill each other. Let's not— why don't we just become allies?" And of course, Jesus sees through that and he says, He knows that he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, but when he will be King of Kings, he knows he's— this is his destiny to have all the kingdoms, but he's not going to get it by getting Satan to give it to him for free. He's going to go through God's way of giving it to him. He knows it's going to be tough work, but he's going to do it that way. And the lesson we draw from this is is the ends don't justify the means. That even the proper end where Jesus is in possession of authority and ruling the whole world as he should, as he's destined to do, doesn't mean it's okay for him to just take it or to take it through the devil's way of getting there. It kind of reminds me of this song by Frank Sinatra called "My Way." Have you all heard that song? I did it my way. I saw some article said that that was the most requested song at funerals in America. When at my funeral, said, "I did it my way." They didn't do that at Jimmy Carter's funeral, though, did they? All right, so the ends don't justify the means. And so Jesus says, "Get out of here, Satan! For the Scriptures say, 'It is written, you must worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.'" And so he's going to follow through on God's way. This reaction reminds me too of how Jesus confronted Peter that time when Peter said, "Oh, you're not going to have to die. We'll figure out a way." And He said, "Satan, get behind me." It reminds me of the time when Jesus is at the wedding in Cana and they ran out of wine. And His mom said, "Go help them out with that. Why don't you make some wine for them out of the water?" But she's hinting that he should do something about it. And Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come." So he's willing to wait. And so that gives us this lesson we get from this third temptation is that we need to wait. And we need to allow things to come our way instead of just grabbing and taking them for ourselves. And we see this also in this famous passage in Philippians where it praises Jesus, saying, "He existed in the form of God, but he did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped or seized. Instead, he humbled himself, he waited, and God elevated him through resurrection and made him Lord of Lords." The Lord of Lords, Lord of all Lords, it reminds me of like boss of all bosses, president of all presidents. We don't have lords in our— we don't get that word because we're not feudalists, right? But in the old days, the lord was somebody. He's the guy that ran the whole manor and he had all the slaves and he controlled all the— he controlled a lot. So Lord of Lords really meant something. But for us, it should be like president or presidents or Supreme Court justice or Supreme Court justices. So then we also have to resist. So this is the way that we resist. "Humble ourselves before God, resist the devil, he will flee from you." And that's where we end up with Jesus when he's finally, after these three temptations, he quotes the scripture three times and it says, "The devil went away." And so he was victorious. Angels came and took care of him and that's where we want to be. But I'm just going back to this verse. It sounds hard. And it's actually impossible for us to resist the devil, but we have— we're equipped. So we have the scriptures, the only way that we're going to be able to do it and put it in our mind. And I was reminded as I was preparing about this message about my son when he was, I don't know, about 7 months, he started eating solid food, or 8 months. He was breastfed until that moment, and I would feed him whatever baby food We would feed him, and guess what he did? Spit it right back out. So you say, "Oh, he doesn't like it." So you try something else. Spit that one too. Well, then I try again. He spit it out again. But I found, guess what? If you keep trying 3 or 4 times, he gives in. I was so surprised that if you just, you know, keep going 3 or 4 more times, and he eventually, he ate it. It was such a surprise. So I think if we just resist, eventually he's going to go away. I had a mentor and I was asking him about this question. He said it's like flies at a picnic. And the flies are going to come and sit on your food. You don't want them to sit on your food, so you wave them away. And sure enough, they're going to come back. But you just have to wave them away again. It doesn't take that much work. But if you don't even wave them, they're going to cover all your food and eat it. So you have to take a little bit of effort and let God's word do most of the work. So that's the end of this record. And it's summarized in Paul in 1 Corinthians says, "Good news, the temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. God will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand or endure. He will show you a way out." out so that you can endure. And so the way out, when we are in that situation, we have two choices. We can do it Adam and Eve's way. What's Adam and Eve's way? Hide, right? Just hide. How good does that work? It works for a while. If you're married, you know what I mean. My wife is like super observant. Observant. I would love to tell you the story of how observant she is, but we wouldn't have time. She is— she would— you couldn't get away with anything. Like she walks into a room and she says, "Who moved? Who moved that? Who did this? Who did that?" So fortunately, I can't get away with hiding, but that's our choice. But the other choice is what we see in the story of the prodigal son. When he goes on this— he's disowning his father, taking the money, and he goes and he wastes it. And finally, he's there serving pigs because it's the only job he can get. And it says, "He came to his senses." The son realized that he had been very foolish. That's that moment of repentance. And we use this word, Christian circles, we call it repent. But in other circles, we might just say, "Wake up! Stop hiding. You're caught. You got caught." No, my wife might not have caught me, but guess what? God caught me. I caught myself. So I woke up. I woke up and came to my senses and decided, "You know what? I'm going to go back. Go back to the Father where things are good. They're a lot better than they are here." And it exceeded, vastly exceeded his expectations, didn't it, when he got back? I want to leave you with one, a new word for you to learn, and that is sign language. Does anybody know American Sign Language? A little bit of sign language? No. There's a sign for the word dumb, like stupid, as in dumb. And you take your fist and you knock your head with it, just like this. Like this. And if you like go on YouTube, it says the sign for dumb is just like this. But when I learned it, I was listening to— well, having dinner with a deaf person and there's someone translating back and forth. And when a deaf person says dumb, she did it like this. They're so expressive as they're doing the sign. You can't just do this. You have to do— so I'm teaching you that. So that you can use it the next time you get into this situation where you know you've gone a little bit down the wrong track. I want you to just do that and, you know, wake yourself up, okay? And that way you'll be well on your way to recovery. All right, let's, let's have a word of prayer and then get our song, okay? Father, we are thankful for how powerful your word is. As it says, the sword of the Spirit and all of the weaponry and the protection that we could possibly ask for. We're thankful for all of the examples and the stories of the heroes and anti-heroes that have gone before us to imitate or to not imitate, like in Esau's case. But now it's up to us. I'm thankful for this community where we can encourage each other, be examples to each other but also to lean on each other when we have to. So thank you for this message, Father, for the rest of the Gospel of Matthew, and for the communion that we'll take in a few moments. Just thank you for being with us. In Jesus' name, amen. Can you all please rise for the reflection song?
Awee, we call the cup poured out in sacrifice to trade this sin essence for your new covenant. Hallelujah! I live my life in remembrance. Hallelujah, your promise I won't forget. I walk. I'll walk salvation's road with fear and trembling, your way born as my own, as Christ is formed in me. Hallelujah! And I'll live my life in remembrance Hallelujah, your promise I won't forget. If ever I should lose my way, if ever I deny your grace, remind me of the price you paid. Hallelujah! I live in remembrance. If not for you, if not for you. You've been, you've been so, so good to me. You've been so, so good to me. Oh, to think where I would be if not for you, if not for you. One more time. You've been, you've been so, so good to me. You've been so, so good to me. And all to think where I would be if not for you, if not for you. As far as heights reach from the depths, as far as east is from the west, so far your grace has carried me. And until I see you face to face, until at last I've won my race, remind me you're not finished yet. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. I live in remembrance. You may be seated.
We're going to distribute the communion elements now, this cup and wafer. I have one. Psalm 134, just a very short psalm, says, Come, praise the Lord, all his servants, all who serve in the temple at night. Raise your hands in prayer in the temple and praise the Lord. May the Lord who made heaven and earth bless you from Zion. Wish we had some trumpets, but we don't have trumpets today. We have a trumpeter though, don't we? Is Brendan the only trumpeter in the crowd? Next communion, you bring in your trumpet. Now, you know, there is usually a time for introspection when we do communion. So we're going to do that in a moment. But if you've read the book of Daniel, he prays on behalf of the whole nation this prayer of confession, repentance. So I want to pray in the words of Daniel from chapter 9, verse 5, starting, "Lord God, You are great, and we honor You. You are faithful to Your covenant and show constant love to those who love You and do what You command." but we have sinned. We've been evil and we've done wrong. We've rejected what you commanded us to do. We've turned away from what you showed us was right. Yet you are merciful and forgiving, although we have rebelled against you. We did not listen to you, O Lord our God, when you told us to live according to the laws which you gave us through your servants the prophets. O God, hear my prayer and pleading. Restore us so that everyone will know that you are God. We are praying to you because you are merciful, not because we have done right. Lord, hear us. Lord, forgive us. Almighty God, who forgives all who truly repent, have mercy upon you, pardon and deliver you from all your sins, confirm and strengthen you in all goodness, and keep you in life eternal, through Jesus Christ our Lord. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, he took a piece of bread and gave thanks to God and broke broke it and said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in memory of me. Take and eat.' In the same way, after the supper, he took the cup He said, this cup is God's new covenant sealed with my blood. Whenever you drink it, do so in memory of me. Take and drink. In this way we have proclaimed the death, the Lord's death, until he comes. And we say thank you, Lord, for your sacrifice and for your resurrection and for eternal life. Now I want the communion service to remind us now that we have been forgiven and we've eaten the true food, true drink, and true bread. We are like being commissioned to go out until our next communion, which will be the first week in February. We've eaten the bread of life, we've drunk true drink, and we're ready. So let's read this prayer together, shall we? Our Father in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. So last— a couple months ago, a few months ago, Paul Nettler, when he did the corporate proper prayer, he asked us to take out our phones and take a picture of these 8 things that we can have then for this month that we can pray about. So I wanted you to know, Michael Badalour is going to be in a Philadelphia hospital on the 17th, this Friday, with a procedure on his heart. So it's not dangerous, but it's always a little bit risky. So Michael, our prayers are with you as you do that. And, uh, we hope to see you back here next Sunday. He just has to stay overnight. So let's be praying for Michael. Wendy Badalora, as you know, has been recovering for a long time from a serious concussion she had. It's been 3 years, and she just had a bit of a setback this week with a different kind of symptom that she hadn't had before. She had some migraine type of headaches, and she's happily gotten some new treatment now, but I— we really need to pray for Wendy. Sandra Wu also had a concussion, although not so long ago, about 4 months ago, and she's back at work part-time, but we do need to pray that she's able to sustain that workload. She said she's got about 80%— she's about 80% able to fulfill her, her job during those 4 days a week. So let's pray for Sandra. And Mariah, as you know, has a new baby about 3 months old. So let's— if you ever had a 3-month-old at home, you know how much, how disruptive that is. So let's be also praying for Mariah. And many of you don't know, but Pei-Ju, who's a Montessori school teacher, has hired Annie, our own Annie, to work in her classroom together. And so that just started the last week. Hi, Annie! Where's— is Pei-Ju around? There she is. Is in the back. So that's like a really— it's a really big, big deal for Annie. It's a new job. She's always wanted to work with children, and Paige has been given more and more kids to take care of but no helpers in the classroom. So she's got a new assistant teacher to help with that workload. So we pray that you are able to get along and that Paige can teach Annie quickly. We also want to pray for our newest youth deacon We had Situ for so many years, we just thought he was like permanent youth deacon, but that's not true. So Don is new in the role. Thank you, Don, for stepping up. And so we're going to pray with you. Also, as most of you know, David Jao, who's been minister for over a year here, has now been ordained as pastor. So let's pray for David as he's stepping into a little bit more responsibility. Responsibility than before. And finally, as you know, the January 20th will be the inauguration of a new president and a new whole bunch of a new administration. A new people will be hired to take roles in every part of the government. So let's be praying for that transition as well. So if you got a picture now, that's going to be all done. So that is it for corporate prayer. Oh no, let me just pray one quickly then. I'm so— not just let you pray for it. Father, we're thankful for these 8 things that we've mentioned. We want to pray finally again for Michael and for this procedure and trust you for the doctors and everything going smoothly. He'll even be able to drive himself home the next day. We pray for Wendy and the new protocol and treatment that will help her to battle and overcome whatever new symptoms she's faced. And pray for Sandra being able to step up to the, this workload that's increasing slowly without any setbacks. We pray for Mariah and that we can all meet the baby soon. Pray for Pei Ju and Annie as they're getting to work together in this classroom setting, that they can be, uh, work together well and that the, the kids will be happy. Pray for Deacon Don in his new role, that he'll fill in those shoes. In a, in a good way. Likewise, we pray for Pastor David Zhao and his managing the Mandarin ministry with greater responsibility. And finally, Father, for the new administration, we know there's so much going on. We just ask you to be with this process and look over and bless our country. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.
Thank you, Paul, for those prayers and for remembering the very ones of us, including myself. You can ask me details later if you'd like. As far as announcements, we do have the— if you go back one, if you do want to look up the website where the bulletin is, you can get details there. But next slide, if there's anybody here visiting with us for the first time, we we have a gift for you, and so if you'll raise your hand, we'll get that to you. If not, we can go on to the announcements, and there's a lot there. I guess it's kind of hard to read from the back. I'd just like to highlight a few things, and MomCo will be meeting on the 21st at 6:00 PM with food. And then also I wanted to mention that we're unable to— our molecular biologist on hand is unable to clone Paul Condrell, and he can't be two, two places at one time. And so for the SMT, they're meeting today, but the adult English ministry team meeting will be rescheduled to the 26th, uh, in the lounge at 12:15. So that was a change for— normally we would have had the meeting today. Youth winter retreat is coming up. If you need any details, talk to Paul Condrell or to Don. And the last thing I'd like I would like to mention is just that the prayer circle will be this coming Wednesday, 7 to 8 PM in the lounge or by Zoom. You can keep your eyes peeled for the Zoom information and join us then. So that's it for the announcements. If you would please rise with me, I think the next slide will be the doxology.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him, all creatures here below. Praise him above the earthy crust. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
Our benediction today comes from Romans 11, and I was just thinking about and struck by how both Paul in his message and Dwight in his testimony was just talking about how we have God's Word and how wonderful it is. Romans 11:33 says, oh, the depths of riches both of wisdom and knowledge knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and unfathomable his ways! For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. Go in peace.
