Now, if you would open your Bibles to 1 Thessalonians chapter 3. This has been good for us to study in 1 Thessalonians, and we will continue this study on through 2 Thessalonians as well. to give us some insight into what was the early church talking about, what were they understanding about the gospel, about what was coming next, what their lives were to be, and many other issues of that time. This book was written probably one of the very earliest of the New Testament that was actually put down in writing, probably sometime in the 50s AD, which would be like 20 years after Christ's death, burial, and resurrection. And so it's early, early in church history. So this gives us some insight into what they were thinking, how the Lord was working, and today especially we see Paul's deep love for the Thessalonians, his deep love for Christ's church, And I've titled this today, The Joy of Intercessory Prayer. And you'll see that in this passage, of Paul's joy as he prays for them. And so, let's look at this passage once more in 1 Thessalonians 3, verses 9-13. Before we begin, let's ask our Lord's blessing on His Word. Father, it is always with trepidation that I come to preach Your Word and preach the Gospel. I ask You, Lord, to help me make it clear today. May I handle Your Word rightly, Lord? Lord, would You open hearts and minds today to receive what is preached? Father, I want to include those many folks around the world who listen many times every single week. Lord, bless them and keep them as well, and may they grow in grace and knowledge of You. In Jesus' name, Amen. If you would look now at 1 Thessalonians chapter 3, we read this passage in its entirety earlier. We have been seeing, Paul, last week we were looking at the great joy he had in the gospel and its effects on them. And this week we see, he says, for what thanks can we render to God for you in return for all the joy with which we rejoice before our God on your behalf? It is that idea of joy before God in thanksgiving for what he's doing in others, for what he's doing in that church. If you don't take anything else away from this passage today, I hope you leave with a deeper love for the church, for God's holy people for his elect and it's not only generically for the church around the world but especially for your local church that you would have a deep love for them as Paul exhibits over and over It's interesting. You see him in book after book in his writings. We won't look at all of them today, but there are some passages that we will see of his love, his concern for these people. And you hear me talking about places where I've gone and preached and the deep love that I have for people that I've met in Mexico and in Peru and elsewhere. I'm finding I have a much larger family than I used to think." And so you see him and he says, what thanks can we render to God for you in return for all the joy with which we rejoice before our God on your account. Every time he remembered him, it brought up joy in his heart. Do you feel that way about your church? About the folks that you know there? Or is it... Oh man, I've got to go to church and you know who is going to be there again today. And if you've ever been in a church like that, it can be devastating to have that kind of... I remember as a young man, I loved to pick on my old home church because, well, they're such a great bad example. I remember how my father, who was on the deacon board at that church, dreaded business meetings. Just dreaded them. And we would go and there were always just this small group that were only there, they should have been at a hockey game instead. They were there to fight. They were there to just stir up trouble. It's awful. But that's not Paul's attitude toward the Thessalonians. He remembers them with joy. I'd like you to compare that with another passage in Philippians. If you just turn back a few pages to the book of Philippians. Philippians, we'll look at a couple passages here. Chapter 1. Look at Paul's attitude toward the Philippians. Now remember, Philippi was in the same region as Thessalonica, less than 100 miles apart. Paul had been in Philippi, and as you know, he was terribly mistreated there, thrown into the dungeon, and all kinds of things happened. They left there and went on and eventually ended up in Thessalonica. But here in Philippi, look at what Paul says about them there. Starting with verse 1, Paul and Timothy, bondservants of Christ Jesus, to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. Isn't that, what a wonderful statement. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. Always offering prayer with joy in my every prayer for you all. When we think about prayer and what goes on in churches and prayer for one another, Yes, it's not inappropriate for us. Like today, we were praying for Harry and the situation with his eyes. And that's not wrong for us to do. But sadly, much of the prayer of churches, if you've ever been in prayer meetings, the vast majority of what we pray about is for either health or personal safety. By and large, that's what we pray about. And like I say, it's not wrong, but look at how Paul was praying for them. He gives thanks for, in all my remembrance of you, if you don't have like a prayer list or like one of our church directories, it's a great way to pray. Just go down through the directory and pray for this person, and pray for that person, and thank God for them, and thank God for what's going on in their lives, and you'd be amazed how God will work in your heart in that way. Paul goes on to say, He says, always offering prayer with joy in my every prayer for you all. You see the same thing here in Philippians that we saw in Thessalonians, that he's praying with joy as he thinks about them. And then he says, in view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now. That idea of participation, it's that word koinonia. It's the word for communion, that oneness in the gospel. He viewed those people in Philippi as equal workers alongside of Him. They were all on the same team, if you will. That's how Paul viewed these folks. Look at what else he says, for I am confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus. This is wonderful, this is that wonderful Doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints that we talk about. A lot of churches talk about, you know, eternal security of the believer, or once saved, always saved. Well, yes, that's true, but it's true in the light of the perseverance of the saints. And what that means is that those who truly know Christ, God continues to do that work in them. I am reading a wonderful book by John Owen. And if you have access to John Owen's book on spiritual mindedness, it has just been, I mean, he beats me up every morning as I read more of that. He whoops on me good. This morning I was reading about the dangers of lukewarmness in Christians. And how do I know that I am truly saved? And one of those is that when I become begin to become lukewarm, it bothers me and it drives me back to my first love like you see in Revelation of him calling the church back to their first love. But a person who perhaps has had some sort of religious experience in the past and since has drifted back into worldly living and it doesn't bother them That is a very frightening and dangerous place to be. If God is at work in a person's life, His work does continue. Yes, are there ups and downs? Are there fallings? And yes, all of those. But the person who truly knows Christ continues to come back and continues in repentance. And He says, I'm confident of this saying that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus. And of course, the question has to be then regarding salvation, was it a work of man or was it a work of God? If God is doing the work, it will continue. If it was a work of man, it will not. Do you ever wonder why maybe you've known people in the past who were involved in churches, and maybe you saw them get involved in some kind of very religious experience, and they professed to know Christ, and maybe they were baptized, and now you can't find them. And they have no interest in the things of God. What was wrong? Well, many, many times. The reason is it was a work of men. They were emotionally worked up in a service or whatever, and yet it was not a work that God did. But Paul says, If God does the work, He will perfect it. That is, He will keep on doing that work. It will continue until the day of Christ Jesus. It's interesting that Paul's focus is always on the end in view. That day when Christ returns. When Christ returns and comes for His own. You know, I talked some in weeks past about some of the wrong-headed ideas people have about prophecy and end times, to where it becomes just this... oh, I don't know how to describe it, just conjecture, and, oh, I think it's this, or I think it's that, or I think so-and-so is the Antichrist, and I think this person might be the false prophet, and trying to figure out some sort of timetable of end times events. I read a really good statement in a book about such things several years ago. And this fellow said, regardless of their point of view, whether they hold to this kind of idea about end times or that, he said, every single person that writes about those things, it ends in their generation. And when you think about it, it's true. All of these books and all these things, it's always, well, this is going to happen. I remember when I was a young guy in church, we'd have these so-called prophecy conferences, and I remember this fellow saying with great clarity that because of this or that, the Lord would absolutely return before 1980. Well, 1980 came and went some time ago, actually, longer ago than we want to admit, some of us, right? And, you know, we joke about those things, but who was wrong? Was God wrong, or was that fellow wrong in his assumptions? No, we are looking for the day of Christ Jesus. Paul was, and so are we. Our desire is that Christ return. We look forward to His return. We plead for His return. I would love it if He would return before I get done today. But we live as though, yes, he could return at any moment, but we also live wisely. We don't, remember a few years ago, there was this Cook, Harold Camping, that he had, you know, they had the billboards and everything, you know, and he had it all figured out that the Lord was coming back, what was it, I don't know, October something or other or whatever. when the Lord Himself says, it's not for you to know the times and the seasons that the Lord has placed under His own authority. Our job is to go and proclaim the gospel until He comes. What do we say when we celebrate the Lord's table together? Until He comes. That's our job. And Paul's view was, I hope He comes today. And our whole desire is that He would perfect in you that work until the day of Christ Jesus. I'll never forget a teacher I had in college that someone in class one day asked him about end times things, and the Lord's return, and all of that, and I'll never forget his answer. He said, I don't know when the Lord's coming back. He said, the real question is for you. He said, today you will leave my classroom and you'll walk out there across the street to go to the other part of the campus. And he said, if you get hit by a truck between here and there, it won't matter for you when the Lord returns, because he came for you right then. He said, are you ready to meet the Lord today? What a great response. And here's the best part of that. That was in a secular university in Texas that that man said that. There are times when you have the opportunity to speak the truth into the darkness, and that man had the boldness to preach the gospel in that sense to that group of people that day. And I look back at that as one of those moments as a young man that God began to work in my heart and life. I was not a believer at the time, but I couldn't forget what he said. So Paul was talking about that. He said, it's only right for me to feel this way about you all because I have you in my heart. I love that verse. Philippians 1, 7. It's only right for me to feel this way about you because I have you in my heart. And the interesting thing is that Greek is a strange language. That particular sentence can just as easily be translated, you have me in your heart. I have you in mine, and you have me in yours. It is that love and concern of family. And he says, I have you in my heart. And look at where he talks about participation in the gospel. Look at what he says. He says, since both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers of grace with me. That's why I share with you what goes on with Sermon Audio and the trip to Mexico. Yes, I know I'm physically going there, but you guys are going too. You're all participants in that ministry. Isn't that great? That God includes all of His own. And as you pray for me, and I pray for you, and we pray for those folks there, we're co-soldiers in that same battle. Look with me at another passage in Philippians just to encourage you a little more in this love for one another. Philippians 4, almost at the end of the book of Philippians, Paul talks to them again of his great love for them. And in this way, he says in Philippians 4 verse 10, he says, But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity. Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means. I also know how to live in prosperity. And in any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me." No, that's not your key verse for going to the gym. You'll see these guys with that emblazoned on their t-shirt, you know, the guys that have muscles that I don't even own, you know. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. That's not what that verse is about. It is about living in prosperity and adversity. It is about serving the Lord no matter what the circumstances. That's what he's talking about here. And he is so rejoicing regarding them. Why does he say, I rejoice that at last you've revived your concern for me? He's sitting in prison at this point. Did you know that the only church that we read of supporting Paul financially was the Philippian church? Did you know that? He was sent out from Antioch, but you never see anything about him. And he received his monthly stipend from Antioch. The only place that you read about someone sending funds to care for him was the Philippian church. And here, it's a church that's being persecuted. Isn't that amazing? And he goes on to talk about how much that meant to him. And he says in verse 15, you yourselves also know Philippians, and at the first preaching in the gospel, after I departed from Macedonia, no church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving but you alone. Even in Thessalonica, you sent a gift more than once for my needs. Isn't that amazing that God provided for Paul in that way? And you find out in Acts when he's there in Corinth and working as a tent maker, that's where you see another gift arrives from them by means of Timothy, and that's how Paul was able to devote all of his time, it says, to the preaching of the gospel. Amazing. So a lot of Paul's thanksgiving for them was for their love that had been exhibited to him. I'd like you to look now in 1 Thessalonians again. Not only does he rejoice before God on your account, notice in verse 10 what he says, Keep praying most earnestly that we may see your face and may complete what is lacking in your faith. I've called this that joy of communion, that joy of co-participation in the gospel, that joy of seeing people that you really truly love. It's amazing. I wish I could take more of you with me on some of these trips because it's great fun to go. It really is. And great fun to go to new places and preach the gospel. It's even more fun to go back. and see brother so-and-so, and sister this and that, and all of these dear saints in the Lord, that you get to rejoice together as you see God at work. And in His prayer, this is what's going on night and day. Keep praying most earnestly that we may see your face. Paul had been run out of town there, he's now sitting at this point, he's in Corinth, clear at the other end of the Greek peninsula, and he's longing to see these folks. If you had served in the Corinthian church, you'd probably be longing to be somewhere else. They had issues at that church and problems. The whole time he was there and afterward, praise God for that, we wouldn't have 1st and 2nd Corinthians without that. But Paul is encouraged by them and he prays for them night and day. As you get older, most folks struggle with not being able to sleep like we once did. When we wake up, I have found what helps me the most is prayer. To focus on praying. Praying for everybody you can think of in the church. And praying for various things like that. Pretty soon, you're not thinking about how to plan the rest of your life. I don't know about you, but that's what my brain wants to do. Let's plan the rest of your life. No, I want to go to sleep. No, you have to plan it right now. You know how that goes. Or you'll find out, you younger people. Or maybe you're kept awake by the past. Does your past come back to haunt you at night? Sometimes that's the case. Go in prayer to the Lord and pray for others. Not just, oh Lord, help me to quit thinking about this. That's a guarantee that you'll start thinking about that. Well start praying for others. Start thanking the Lord for this person and that person and the effect they had on your life and my goodness pretty soon your troubles don't seem so bad and and then you wake up. It's wonderful. So you see Paul night and day, praying earnestly that we may see your face, and look at what he says, and may complete what is lacking in your faith. His desire was to build them up, not just to be happy in being in their presence, but that he would build them up. I want you to look at, this is an interesting passage in Romans chapter 1. You see this same theme over and over and over in Paul's writings. Now when he writes to Romans, he has never actually been to Rome yet. Although he knows many of the people, you find out in chapter 16, there's already a whole list of people that he knows there. But in Romans chapter 1, look at what he says of his desire to see them in Rome. In Romans 1.8. He says, first, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world. It's Rome. The whole world came to Rome, and Rome went everywhere. There were roads from Rome that went everywhere, and what a great place for the gospel to be preached, and it's disseminated. Why do we go and preach in a place like Mexico City? Well, it's just a tiny little place. There's only 29 million people there. Whatever happens there goes elsewhere. throughout the whole world. For God, whom I serve in my spirit in the preaching of the gospel of His Son, is my witness as to how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers making requests, if perhaps now at last, by the will of God, I may succeed in coming to you." He was constantly looking for opportunities for ministry. He was looking for ways to disseminate the Gospel, to encourage the church in the Gospel. And you understand with me that when I talk about preaching the Gospel, we are constantly rehearsing the Gospel here. Why do we do that? Well, it is good for us to be constantly reminded of how God saves lost men. How did God save me? And we think about those things and we talk about them, but we must constantly be pointing to Christ and His work. And Paul's desire is to go and preach there in Rome. I have shared with you that my desire, I have asked the Lord for this. I don't know if he'll say yes or not, but he seems to be in some ways. I have asked the Lord to let me preach the gospel in every Latin American country before I die. Wouldn't that be fun? I would love to preach the gospel in Chile and Uruguay and Dominican Republic and all of Latin America. That's my heart's desire. Now whether the Lord allows that or not, in Paul's case, he got to go to Rome because he was a prisoner and taken there by force. We don't know. He says, always in my prayers, perhaps now at last by the will of God, I may succeed in coming to you. And look at what he wanted for them. For I long to see you in order that I may impart some spiritual gift to you that you may be established. People, I've heard people take this. See, he was going there so they could speak in tongues. Read the next verse. That is, that I may be encouraged together with you while among you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine. What kind of spiritual gift is he talking about? That wonderful gift of built-up faith, as we encourage one another. That was his desire. Paul's desire was that for the Romans. He says, and I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that often I have planned to come to you and have been prevented thus far in order that I might obtain some fruit among you also, even as among the rest of the Gentiles. I'm under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and the foolish. Thus, for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome." And realize he is writing to a church, and he's longing to preach the gospel to a church. That's what I mean about constantly rehearsing it. This is Paul's heart. Is this your heart for the church of God? This is why I constantly come back to this. If this is the way Paul thought and what he was desiring for the people in Thessalonica and the people in Rome and the people in Philippi was all the same thing. That God's love would be shed abroad by means of his church. This is why the local church is so, so very important. The witness of Christ to the world around takes place through local churches. Why do people have bad ideas about God? Well, you can lay it sometimes at the door of so-called churches. Paul's desire is to see the Roman Church built up in the Gospel. Let's look once more now at 1 Thessalonians 3. As we walk through this passage, Paul then actually records one of his prayers. That in itself is a great way to study prayer. Just spend time reading Paul's letters and note all of his prayers. And what was he praying for? It'll change your prayer life. Look at what He says. He says, Now may our God and Father Himself and Jesus our Lord direct our way to you, and may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another and for all men, just as we also do for you. It is that we've seen the joy of thanksgiving, the joy of communion, and now we are looking at the joy of fruit. The joy of the fruit of the gospel, of that church living and bearing fruit as God has ordained. The joy of fruit among them. We just looked at Romans 1, but let's also now turn to John chapter 15. Remember what I was talking about, that perseverance of the saints, of a genuine work of God, there's going to be some evidence of it. And if a person who has given profession of faith in Christ and yet is not walking with Christ, has no interest in His Word, is living like the world and behaving like the world, there's genuine reason to question, what sort of faith was that? And in John 15, we have this beautiful picture of the vine. Jesus says in John 15, I am the true vine, verse 1. My Father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, He takes away, and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it, that it may bear more fruit. And so there are times, if you ever read the wheat and the tares, yeah, there's times when things appear to be genuine, But one of the ways of determining is, is that branch bearing fruit? And if it is bearing fruit, what sort of fruit is it bearing? And in this case, the one that doesn't bear fruit, it says he takes away. And then it says every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it that it may bear more fruit. If you want to have a fruit tree here in the Grand Valley, they have to be pruned every year. If you don't, they'll look very pretty. They'll have lots of lovely blossoms and not much fruit. In order to produce fruit, they have to be pruned and it has to be done by someone who knows what they're doing. It's not just to make it look pretty, but a person who knows, they know which branches to prune and which ones to not, and the tree will bear more fruit. And you and I, in our lives, we go along through life, and things that we're just rejoicing in, and it looks like there's lots of blossoms, and the Lord comes along and snip, snip, snip, And we cry and say, oh Lord, why did you take that away? And why did you do that? And He is making you bear fruit. Something to understand is that those who love Christ best most often have come to that love in the crucible of suffering. That's how it happens. And yet we have false teachers saying, you must never suffer. If you suffer, that's not of God, that's of the devil, and you know all that nonsense. The whole healthy, wealthy, and wise prosperity gospel is so false. No, God will prune you. He will discipline you. He prunes it, that it may bear more fruit." How did Paul bear more fruit? Well, the Lord beat him up, seems like, every day. You know, I don't know. We're not told what Paul personally was like, how other people perceived him. But what we see the Lord do, is he puts him through the ringer and the Lord says ahead of time that he will, I will show him how much he must suffer for my name. Wow. So the Lord Jesus goes on, he says, you are already clean. Because of the word that I've spoken to you, abide in me and I in you. The branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. This is important. If you're gonna bear fruit, you must be connected to the vine. When we talk about the gospel and we talk about true and saving faith, It's not that you had some wonderful experience in the past. Are you abiding in Christ today? How is your love for Him today? How is your love for the local church? How is your love for the Word of God? Abiding. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing." Nothing. Everything that we have spiritually must come from Christ. This is very important. There's a lot of teaching, a lot of folks have grown up in churches where they were taught that you do your bit and God does His. God's made 99 steps to you, you've got to make the 100th one. No, we must rely on Him for the 100th as well. It is all His work. Apart from Him, you can do nothing. This is so important. It's nice to know. It's very freeing to realize, I don't have any control in this. I can't fix this. To be able to just let go and say, it's God's work. It's especially true for the pastor or the person who is out proclaiming the gospel. I don't have to be the best salesman. I was taught in, well, the Bible school, I refuse to mention their name, that I had to be a better salesman than the next guy. And that's how I could have success. as a soul winner. That I had to be the best salesman. Well, I'm a terrible salesman. That's not what God is interested in. He calls men to faithfulness. What a relief to find out that salvation is the work of God and God alone. He uses means, yes, the means of the gospel, but it's his work. I remember hearing Conrad in Bayway years ago speaking about the power of preaching and great presentations of the gospel and that kind of thing, and he said that he teaches the young men that come to him regarding preaching. that yes, we should preach with passion, we should preach with conviction, but it is still the work of God. And he said, the illustration that he uses is that he tells these young men that you think you're a good preacher, you think you have a lot of power in preaching, you need to go today, go out to the cemetery. and preach to the people in the cemetery. Preach to the gravestones there. And if anybody comes out of there alive, it's a flat-out miracle. And that is what we do when we preach the gospel to the people around us. Because like those folks in the cemetery who are physically dead, the people you present the gospel to are spiritually dead. And if any of them are going to be saved, it's going to take a flat-out miracle of God to do it. What joy it is when once in a while God gives us a glimpse of that. We've seen that here. Folks called to life. Right in the service we've seen it happen. I'll never forget it. But it certainly isn't from the skill of the preacher, but rather the power of God that can do that. Look with me now at back at 1 Thessalonians chapter 3 once more. There's just so much here, I could just kind of go on all day about it. Not only have we seen the joy of thanksgiving and the joy of communion, the joy of bearing fruit, What is our greatest joy? Look at verse 13, "...so that He may establish your hearts, unblameable in holiness..." By the way, God is not so much interested in your happiness as He is in your holiness. God's goal for you, and all the pruning that goes on, and all of the affliction that He sends into your life, has one goal in mind, that you would be holy and blameless before Him. That's His goal, that's what He's doing. He would establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before our God and Father, when? At the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints. Do you understand that those who die in Christ will be resurrected someday? Some will still be living when Christ returns. Of course, all of us are hoping for that, aren't we? But regardless of physically living or physically dead, Christ is coming. You want to understand my eschatology? I have two points. Christ is coming. And He has not yet come. Those two things I'm certain of. How all of that fits together is a little fuzzy for me. What I do know is that when he comes, it will be personal, it'll be visible, it'll be loud, and it'll be the end. And the real question, just like that teacher in school all those years ago, when Christ returns, Are you ready to meet him today? None of us have a guarantee of tomorrow. None of us do. You know me, I do a lot of funerals. I bury people all the time. Got another one coming this week. Sometimes they're really old and sometimes they're really young. And it happens every single day. I asked A fellow at the mortuary one time, is there any pattern? Do you find that more people die one part of the month or another, or one, you know, phase of the moon, or all of that kind of thing? He says, nope. People die every day. Every day. So for you, where do you stand today? Are you prepared? If Christ returns for all of His own today, or if He returns just for you, are you prepared to meet Him? Are you living in holiness? Do you know that His blood has washed away your sin? Are you trusting in His righteousness and His righteousness alone? that he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. That's going to be quite a thing. Do you understand that someday All of that you and I see will evaporate like an illusion, like a dream in the morning. You dream at night? Almost all my dreams, they're really stupid, and I forget almost all of it the moment I wake. You might think back and go, oh yeah, it was just really weird, I was here and there. Don't look for wisdom there. You'll have a really strange life. Someday, all that you see that you consider to be the most real and the most touchable will disappear in a moment and you will stand before the reality that is God. Do you understand that? That there is a spiritual world that is far more real than this one. And someday, He's going to invade this world in that way. The Word says that the sky will be rolled back like a scroll. He'll tear open the sky. And in all of His glory, He'll return. In the old days, when God would send revival to the churches, Almost always, it came about from several things. One was that there was a renewed desire for prayer. There was a renewed desire for God's Word, and there was a renewed fear of His judgment. Those are the things that you see at the beginning of genuine revival. Oh, that God would send that upon our country once more. Let's pray. Father God, we love you and we rejoice in you. And Lord, we rejoice in the love of your saints. Father, how I plead with you for this group and their love for one another, that it would grow and blossom and bear fruit. Oh, Father God, as we look forward to the return of our Savior and we know, Lord, that it is much sooner that it was blessed. Oh, may it be today. In Jesus' name.