Get into it. Ephesians 3, 14 through 21. There'll be a King James version for most of you. For this cause, Paul says, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you according to his riches, the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man. that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye being rooted and grounded in love may be able to comprehend with all the saints, all saints, what is the breadth, the length, the depth, and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, Say that with me. Amen. according to the power that worketh in us. Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen. Amen. I'm gonna speak to you today from the title, The Removal of God's Competition. The Removal of God's Competition. The removal of God's competition. All right, keep your finger there and let's turn into Psalms, into the book of Psalms, Old Testament Psalms. I'm just gonna just pivot from this particular scripture and then springboard hopefully into Ephesians 3. But Psalm 73, verse 25 and 26. Psalm 73, verse 25 and 76. The writer of the psalm says this, Whom have I in heaven but thee? There is none upon earth that I desire besides thee. My flesh and my heart may fail, heartfelt, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Amen. Whom have I in heaven but thee? And there is none upon the earth that I desire besides thee. The word desire here is to take pleasure or delight in. There's none upon the earth. that I take pleasure or delight in, wow, besides you, God. And then he says, however, my flesh and my heart faileth. My heart here speaks of the inner man, the mind, the will, the emotions, the place where I make my decisions. He's saying that there's none that I desire besides thee and also coupled with that is the fact that I know that my flesh, my body, and my heart, my mind, my emotions, the place where I make my decisions from, it fails. I don't know how. to make God my number one priority or focus. I don't know how in and of myself, I don't know how to make sure that God is the focus of my delight. I am weak. My sin gets in the way. And from time to time, I make promises I don't keep. My heart is not dependable. My heart is not consistent. My decision-making process gets off track. Why? Because I have sin in my heart, amen? And even though it is my desire to put God first, I fail. Amen? But then he says, in spite of that contradiction, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion. He says, but God is my rock. He is my stability. He is the consistency that I desire. He is my sure footedness. He is the consistency in my walk, okay? God is my strength. He is the strength of my heart and my portion and my inheritance. What I'm hoping to get out of all of this is God. Huh, forever. One of the reasons why Many Christians lose heart in their walk, in this faith walk, is because we depend on our own strength and not the power of God, which after receiving Jesus Christ is none other than the Holy Spirit himself. We do not rely on the Holy Spirit, who he is and what he can do for us, amen? Amen. And one of the reasons why believers are so disappointed in this life is because we seek after everything else but God for fulfillment. Amen. Here's the truth, saints. Just like in Old Testament times, when he was talking to the Levites and talking to Aaron, the priesthood, he was saying, there is no inheritance for you here. It's not that God is trying to keep good things from us. He just wants his children to have the very best. Amen? He knows that this earthly stuff is at its best temporary and not good enough. Amen? So he says, no, I don't want to give you some trash. I'm going to give you me. Why? Because he just wants, I mean, I'm a dad. I want the best for my children, right? Wouldn't you want the best for your children? Amen. God's not doing anything different here. He's not withholding good things. He's just saying that ain't good enough. But here's the issue, saints. The problem of making God priority number one in the believer's life is not a new problem. This has been an issue for a long time. We've seen it in Genesis. We're now looking at it in the Psalms, amen? And we're getting ready to go into the New Testament in Ephesians three again and see it again. This has been a problem since the beginning since God has created people, amen? God has always desired to save us, not only from sin, not only from hell, but also from the disappointment that stems from chasing after things that will never really satisfy. He wants to rescue us from that. Amen. So, Ephesians 3 again. Here we are again in Ephesians 3, looking at this passage, and I've said it before, I've preached this passage several times before, but I'm just now getting at the heart of what God is saying, and what Paul is praying through the Holy Spirit for the believers. I understood it, and have understood some good things about it. You know, I've been a young preacher for a while, and you get an academic understanding of things, you know, Donald Wright, and that's a good start. to get an academic understanding. I'm gonna look under everything and be like, ooh, this word means this, and this word means that, and I teach it to the people. Young preachers, we do that. But eventually, as God takes you through some things, you say, you know what? I don't need just an academic understanding. I'm going through too much. I need some power here now. Now I require power. But here's the thing, you don't get to that place until God takes you through some things and you begin to understand, wait a minute, this ain't happening. I get the understanding, but how do I apply the word to my life where I'm actually walking in victory? That's the question, amen? So now, because God unslapped me in the head and allowed me to have a few things happen to me, here we go, Ephesians three, one more time. All right, after Paul lists some things that we ought to be grateful for in the beginning of the not so much chapter but the letter to the Ephesians church, amen, starting with chapter one all the way going to the middle of three, amen, he still knows that after we have all these promises that we are supposed to be grateful for that are listed there, he still knows that transformation in the heart of the believer will not take place. Because even after we have an understanding of God's list of promises, we still need supernatural power to stop ignoring God. That's how I want to say that. Yeah, that's it. I get it. But I have this default position because of my sinful nature to ignore God. even with all the stuff he's promising. So the issue is, is that we could ignore God and then, here's the thing, saints, for whatever reason, we not only ignore him, but we refuse to put him in the only place that makes practical sense. The place that makes practical sense for God to be is on the throne of our lives, amen, where He is first and He has the first priority over everything, amen. So Paul, after this great list, he gets on his knees and he begins to pray. And it says here in Ephesians 3, verse 14 through 21. It says, for this cause, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Of who the whole family in heaven and earth is named. I go to God who is over everything and everyone. Because this problem is so huge. it's going to need His intervention to bring us into the very things that God is promising us. Wow. And He says in verse 16, He's praying that He, God the Father, would grant to us according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man. All of the rich promises that are mentioned, as I said, in the first couple of chapters into the middle of the third chapter that are listed there, and you're going to have time to go over it, but take it and read it yourself. Amen? Up to the 14th verse. He's praying that the truth of these riches, the guarantee of these riches, that we are, here's our little part that we get into it, that we are now aware of because we have read our contract, our Bible, we've studied the fine print, We've looked at the contract for ourselves. He's saying, he's praying that all of these riches out of God's wealth of unlimited resources will work along with the word, with the power of the Holy Spirit to strengthen the believer in the inner man. Are you hearing me? Am I okay so far, Rick? Amen. God, give your people the strength or slash encouragement Amen? That the will to keep going, the power to willingly submit to your will, God, and not rebel against what you only know is best for our lives. Strengthen me in my inner man, my decision making, my mental process, whatever it is that I come up with that determines what's important to me. Strengthen me in that area so I can submit to you, God, and not rebel against all the wonderful promises that you want to give me. Amen. You're going to need power to do that. You don't just kind of, you know, take some self-help books and some classes and whatever have you, and, you know, kind of get yourself together and pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Good luck. What you're going to need is a supernatural infusion of the Holy Spirit. That's why he's praying. He's like, I listed the promises. Now you need power. Amen? How aware? Again, I'm being redundant for a reason. In my heart, the seed of my emotions, this place where I make decisions as far as what's important to me. I need help in that area. My inner man, the place where I decide what's important about my life, the place where I determine what I'm going to do with my life, who I'm going to be, who I'm going to be with, how are we going to do all this? He said, you need Jesus's help to overpower what's naturally in you to decide to get from God what is best for you. Come on, Holy Spirit. When Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, he said, not my will, but thy will be done. It's because he had power, even though he is the God-man, fully God, fully man, he had power to override his flesh and his emotions that was saying, you know what, is it gonna take all this? I mean, this is gonna be a bit much to save a bunch of people who don't even like you. who can't even recognize that I came from you. He's saying we're going to need power. He demonstrated that instead of doing his will, he would do the will of the Father. Are you hearing me? Not my will, but thy will. Amen. Jesus was the only one who had power enough to override his flesh. If you think you have the power to do things by yourself in a holy and righteous way without the Holy Spirit, think again. So Paul is praying for it, because he knows we ain't got it like that. Amen? We go from situation to situation. Doing the same thing over and over again. Amen. People come to this planet and miss out on the best that God has for them because humans have no power to submit to even receive it from God. Wow. None of us have that. In order to get the best from God, we've got to have power. Otherwise we'll just go around in circles and then we'll just get older. going missing out on what God has for us. I didn't say we didn't go to church. I didn't say we didn't serve on the usher board. I didn't say we didn't do all kinds of things in church religious business. What I'm saying is that God has got some things for you that will blow your mind. And we miss out on those things simply because we don't recognize that we actually need power to even take them. So Paul prays that we have power in our inner man. Help me, Lord. Our decision-making faculties and abilities to receive from God. And he also prays in verse 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts, that Christ may live comfortably in every room in your heart. of the places in your heart that you have made a priority. The things and the people that we have considered are important. They're like little rooms in our hearts. Things and people are like little rooms. And Jesus desires to be comfortable. That word dwell means to live. And it means to live comfortably. Jesus desires to live comfortably in all of those rooms in our heart. Amen. All the things that we think are important to us. We've made room for these things in our lives. We've made room for these things in our heart. And Jesus is saying, you're not gonna know how to make the right decisions with all these rooms you got unless you let me in that area where I can be comfortable Are you hearing me? Jesus wants to control you and all the rooms. He needs control to be comfortable in every area of your life. He wants to be in control of the money room. He wants to be in control of your future plans. He wants to be in control of your relationships. Amen. We got folks that, you know, if we're totally honest, we get to Jesus and we go, you know what? Wait, wait, Jesus. You don't want to go in there. Why? What's in there? I have people in that room. That's the relationship room. Well, how do you know if those people are in my will? You've made a determination that they're important. Huh? And you want me to go ahead and manage this room with all these folks in here that are not even in my will? Fix all this, Jesus. No, no, no, no, no. Jeffrey and John and Scott, out. You don't even fit into the plan that I have purposed for this person's life. Are you hearing what I'm saying? You don't want to go in there, God. There's people in there. What about your future plans? Huh? We got a room with future plans, you know? Things we want to be, things we want to do, places we want to go, what we want to spend our money on, you know? How we fill up our calendar, what's important to us. The stuff that, you know, how I want to invest, my vacation, my retirement. By this time I will be such and such and I will do such and such. And this is what I will be spending my time on because this is important to me. This is my future plan. And Jesus is saying, excuse me, I need to get up in there, because you didn't ask me about any of that. You want to be and do when I gave you purpose and life and breath. No, Jesus, don't go in there. Why? Because I got plans. Jesus wants to be able to at any moment walk into any room in our heart. and say to not only this room, but to you, you will not override my main purpose for your life, which is, watch this, to give you the greatest joy, here we go again, because it's coming right back around, by you going therefore and making disciples. No, no, Jesus, I got stuff I have to do, but what did I say? Go ye therefore and become an NBA player? No. Go ye therefore and, you know, get married. That's not mainly what I said. Go ye therefore and put all your children in Ivy League schools. Go ye therefore and become the greatest preaching pastor. Build the biggest church. That's not mainly what he said. He said, go ye therefore and make disciples. But all of us in America are trying to get rich. Because by the time we get rich and everything will be, you know, we'll be fine if we get some money up in here, honey. Because that's what I need. Right? Jesus is saying, no, that will not give you the most satisfaction. That's not how you're built. And the way to make sure that we're not devastated Should the Lord take these things or deny us from having these things is to make sure our identity is not tied to these things. Whether he gives it or not. Whether he allows it for a time and takes it away. That can only happen when Jesus is comfortable living in every room. Amen? Every room in your heart because he must become first above all things. He must have no competition. Amen? If you are thinking of getting married and you want your lover to now come and live with you, hallelujah, but you care more about what happens to your couch than what happens to the person that's coming in to live with you, then you're not really ready for that relationship. Are you? I don't know about you, but I had a grandmother that had a couch and then plastic on the couch. And somehow the couch was something I couldn't sit on, even though it had plastic on it. It was a hideous 1970s Afro looking couch with way too many colors. And I couldn't sit on that because you put plastic on top of it. And then you got mad at me when I sat on something that was already protected. So as a child, I feel like, well, gee, this couch must really be something. Is a couch more important than me? You care more about that couch than your honey that's coming to live with you. You ain't ready for no relationship. I had an uncle, God rest his soul, love him to death. His name was Edwin Hawkins. I'm going to say his name. Edwin Hawkins had this living room on in Edna and Hoover Street. And Hoover Street's living room was, I kid you not, it seemed like to us like it was as wide as that whole area back there where you can run from this side of the wall to the other side of the wall. And me and my sister Tristan, we would get excited because when children see wide open spaces, the first thing they do is. They start running. So what happens to me and my sister? We go to running and you know, singing, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, singing a Smurf song all through his living room. And Uncle Edwin is sitting there, he's upset and he's concerned. Why? Because he's got vases from China and stuff from Spain and things you can't find nowhere. I was singing, oh, happy day in that country. And I'll never know when they're coming, when they'll ask me back. Don't you tell my stuff. So what happened to us is we kind of started feeling like, is the stuff more important than your niece and your nephews? Because we can't walk in there. We can't run through there. We can't do nothing in that area. Why? Because that area is off limits. You know? Believers say that Jesus is more important than the things in the rooms in our hearts. But I wonder, if that's how he really feels. Is the Holy Spirit comfortable living in you right now? Or do we just say he's comfortable? Have we decided that there's some things that we have in place that we want to hold on to that's a bigger priority than him? Are there things that are competing for his attention? Are there things that are competing for his authority? Can we let go of those things? You're good and quiet, that's good. If Jesus says, this has got to go, I'm coming for this, whether you like it or not, I'm going to take it from you. Huh? That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith. Totally dependent and relying upon and trusting in Jesus. Watch this, this is what hit me. That ye being rooted and grounded in love. Stop. That Christ will dwell in your hearts by me trusting and depending on him because I am rooted and grounded in his love. Planted in his love. with absolute certainty that his love is never going anywhere. Because you become planted and settled in the love of God. You can trust him. The faith thing works with the love. I have faith that he loves me. Are you hearing me? So Christ gets more comfortable because I am depending on Christ because I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he loves me. Are you getting this? Are you getting this? Okay, so, and you find out that God loves you that much, not because everything is going your way. Perfectly, no. The times that are your lowest, that's when you really, really know that God loves me. It's not when I'm on the mountaintop, it's when I call and nobody answers but Jesus, and I'm looking for all my friends, I don't know where they've been, and all I got is Jesus to lean on, and I find out in that moment that he's the only one that really loves me. Not only that, when you blow it, And you make a huge mistake and you fall, huh? Because you're not perfect and you're struggling with some things and you realize that God loves you not when you make improvements upon yourself, but he loves you before you did anything impressive. Amen. He loved you while you were in your mess. When you were doing your dirt, he loved you. He didn't agree with it. He doesn't give excuses for you to stay in it. But his love doesn't change because of it. Are you hearing what I'm saying? What I'm saying is when I was at my lowest and when I was doing some low things, God loved me anyway. Not because he wants me to go ahead and do it again. Not because he agrees with what I was doing, it just didn't affect his love. I don't know about you, but you're sitting up in this church today not because you did everything right. You're sitting up in this church living holy not because you got it together and then Jesus said, come on in. No, no, he had his eye on you when you was doing your dirt. Before the foundation of the world, he called you and said, you are mine, and I know you're gonna go through this, this, this, that, that, that, him, her, him, her, before you get up and say, okay, God, okay, okay, okay. And guess what? His love was there all the way through. Hallelujah. Don't misunderstand me. That doesn't mean go out there and do something crazy. Okay, don't get killed. What I'm saying to you is that Jesus loves you and has of you. And when you're rooted and grounded and settled in that love, only in that position, verse 18, after you are rooted and grounded in the love, may you from that position, oh, come on Holy Spirit, may the church be able to comprehend with all the saints What is the breadth, the length, and the depth, and the height of his love? And to know, verse 19, to know by experience. I know the width of his love, the breadth of his love. Why? Because I've gone through some things. I've not only been in some low places, I've been the person that was doing the low things and I saw God kind of, you know, just kind of gently pull me along. You know, if it needed to be rough, it needed to be rough. But even in him being rough, he was still being gentle. And he pulled me along and now I understand what is the breadth, the length, the depth, the height of his love. I know it not by scripture memory, I know it by experience. To know the love of Christ with passage knowledge, for what purpose, Paul says, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God. Okay, you ready? The fullness of God. is what God is mostly after. This is the place where you will find your greatest joy, your greatest fulfillment. Okay? This is what God wants for all of his children. He wants you to be full of him. Okay? So let's put it together and then we'll close. When you put the list or the items in this list together, From this prayer, it goes like this. Paul is praying that we would be given power by the Holy Spirit to decide to submit to God to the point to where he controls our deepest desires, which Paul already knows will only come because we have faith and trust in the absolute certainty of God's love. From that place, it will result in the believer doing exactly what God really wants, having the believer function in the fullness of God. I'm going to say that again because that's a lot, but this is not a run-on sentence that Paul has here. This is what God is ultimately up to in every believer to give us our greatest joy by removing the things that compete against him. Listen again, Paul is praying that we would be given power by the Holy Spirit to decide to submit to God to the point to where he controls our deepest desires, which Paul already knows will only come because we trust him by faith that his love is absolutely certain, which will result in the believer functioning in the fullness of God. That's a lot. But that's what's happening, amen? And the fullness of God just happens to be the only place that we are designed to receive the greatest joy and the greatest fulfillment. I got one clap back there and he was scared to clap. Rick said... That's okay, that's okay, because this is something I'm dawning on. This takes a minute. You're going to have to take this message home to really, really kind of dissect it a little bit. The fullness of God, which is what God wants for us, is the only place that the believer is designed to actually receive the kind of joy and fulfillment that we're really searching for. Huh? We are frustrated because we're not functioning in our designed way. Paul is led to pray this prayer because he knows that to comprehend the love of God in that way that is beneficial to us, God must first, here we go, remove all the things and the people that are competing with him. Are you getting it now? Okay? That does not mean that you will not have love. That does not mean that you will not have some things. That doesn't mean that you won't have some dear people in your life. It just means that no matter what God gives you or what he takes from you, you will not lose your focus on him because the love of God will become your first priority. You hear me? We are devastated when things happen because we're so focused on that thing instead of God. That's what happens. Oh, did you hear what happened to Pastor Jamie? Oh, that's just terrible what happened to Sister Sarah or Sister Brown or Brother Jackson. Did you hear what happened? Well, they will be okay eventually, but the impact of that thing, even though it may hurt, even though it may be severe, is greatly diminished if their eyes are on Jesus versus their eyes on the other things. That's it. Now, from the place of being or functioning in the fullness of God. Come on, Jesus. Verse number 20, the one we all love. Now unto him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we can ask or even think according to the power that worketh in us. Right? We know that. Come on, that's my scripture. Okay. Here's the thing, saints. We use this scripture out of context. Okay? We use this scripture so we can feel good about asking God to give us the stuff we want. This prayer is not for all the things that we ask God for that we eventually compete with him. No, it's about being filled with the fullness of God. What does that mean, saints? Now unto him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we could ask or think. In order to ask for something, I have to be thinking about what I'm asking, right? According to the power that work within us, the Holy Spirit is now gonna give me the ability to ask for greater things than I would ever ask for. Are you hearing me? We will never think to ask for the greater things of God without his power to make us function in the fullness of God. If you're full of a bunch of junk and a bunch of temporary stuff, you don't think to ask for God's kinds of things. Uh-oh. Until we are given power from the Holy Spirit to think his thoughts, and to live His thoughts and His ways are much higher than ours, right? Until we are given the power to think His thoughts and desire what He wants us to desire, I will give you the desires of your heart. I will give you, as I said before, what you should be desiring. Until that happens, guess what, saints? We're not even scratching the surface of what God can give us. We're thinking too low. It's exceedingly, abundantly above what I would ask or think, which means I would never come up with this prayer. I would never think to ask for this thing, God. Oh, are you getting it? It's being filled with God, not filled with stuff. Christ will have full range in our lives as we cling to him because he's going to give us the power to focus on what he wants and let go of all this temporary stuff that will never ultimately satisfy. Are you hearing me? Paul is praying because he knows God is going to have to strip some things. He's going to have to strip some people. in order for us to experience His fullness. A full glass of water is a pure glass of water. Once I put other things in it, it's no longer full of water. It's not pure. There's other motives. Amen? Not yet. Verse 21, very quickly. Now unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end, amen. Meaning God will not change his mind about his purposes that he has for your life. The purpose of Christ in you to the point where you live like Christ and want what Christ wanted. Amen. Which is the father's will being done so that the father gets the glory forever and ever world without end. God will never change his agenda. That's hard to hear, but it's the truth. So when you think that your life is falling apart because God has said no to some things, or God has allowed some things that you would have never asked for, or God took some things away from you or some people away from you, don't let the devil trick you into thinking that something's wrong with your life or your relationship with God. It's simply that God loves you too much to let you trust in, lean on, or be satisfied by something that is temporary that will never ever equal up to his goal or his reward that he has for you. He just won't do it. What's going on with my life? Why is everything falling apart? Because I love you too much to let you lean on this stuff. You can't take it with you anyway. Are you hearing what I'm saying? It's not that everything is all, oh, my life is just horrible. No, God is saying, I'm gently saying no, no, no, no. Why? Because you're going to lean on that and you're going to break your neck. It's temporary. It will not hold you. Let me tell you what will hold you. Let me tell you what will hold you. It's just God's love and his mercy. That's all it is. The Holy Spirit, let me be very accurate. The Holy Spirit is praying through Paul and saying here, I've got something better. I've got something better. Something that I know will satisfy you. There is a joy that comes from knowing that we are in the center of the will of God. Huh? That this world will never be able to compete with. That's what the new creation ultimately wants, whether we're mature enough to see it or not. That's really what we want. I see people that die all the time and in their last wishes, they don't want the stuff. They're looking for relationships. It's all about that. And so we have this relationship with Jesus Christ. And that's the thing that we want most, that our father is with us because of what Jesus has done. Amen? That's what we want. We want to know that, Lord, am I doing your will? Well done by good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of the Lord. That's what we really want. You may not be able to see it, but that's what it's really about. We will see God part the Red Sea in the folks' lives that are connected to us. We will see people come out of the grip of Satan when there was no way. God will make a way out of no way for them to get delivered, for them to be set free. He will open up and part the Red Sea. We will recognize that. We will be able to see that. We will participate in that because God's power will be flowing through us so we can actually realize that. Are you hearing what I'm saying, saints? God's power will flow through you so we can participate in the salvation of a soul. And there's no greater joy, whether you understand this or not, than seeing somebody else get saved, because that's why we're still here. It's not about the stuff. It's about doing His will. Jesus had a meeting with a woman at the well. And I'm done. She came there looking for water. She had a water pot. After conversation with Jesus and him revealing to her who he really was, the true Messiah, she left her water pot and she went out with living water. Right? You remember the story. Now here's the part people don't recognize a lot or remember. Right before that, in the context, Jesus was hungry and thirsty before he got there. That's why he asked her for something to drink. Okay, he was hungry and thirsty. So before he had the conversation, because he knew that the disciples couldn't handle him talking to some Samaritan woman, he sent them on to the grocery store. Y'all go on to the Jerusalem grocery store, give me some chicken and come back. Okay, so they go in and getting some food, right? Jesus had the conversation. By the time they come back, they're like, Lord Jesus, you sent us to get some lunch, why you sit here talking to some woman? This is Jesus's reply, John 4, 31 through 36. Meanwhile, the disciples were urging Jesus, Rabbi, eat something. But Jesus replied, I have a kind of food you know nothing about. The disciples said, did someone bring him some food while we were gone? That's what they said. The disciples asked each other. This is Jesus' explanation. Jesus then explained, my nourishment comes from doing the will of God who sent me and from finishing his work. You know the saying, four months between planting and harvest, but I say, wake up and look around. The fields are already ripe for harvest. The harvesters are paid good wages. And the fruit they harvest is people brought into eternal life. And here's a promise, what joy awaits both the planter and the harvester alike. Are you hearing what he's saying, saints? Believers are not getting what God wants because we're missing out because we got all this stuff that competes with his will. We cling to God's competition and God has to gently remove, lovingly remove these things because like any father, he only wants to give us his best. And we out here getting upset because we can't get married and then end up divorced and get a new car and end up getting it smashed and get a new job and then get fired. Huh? Didn't have some kids that we like, Lord, if you don't do something with these kids. And Jesus is saying, your fulfillment, your greatest joy is waiting for you. Go and make disciples. What are you waiting for? You want to be happy? You want to have some joy? Just do what he said. Just do what he said. Jesus said, be followers of me or follow me as I follow Christ. One of the songs that my daddy wrote. Follow me. And this is all in the concept of following Christ. If we know His love and are filled with His love because we are rooted and grounded in that love and are trusting in that love by faith, we can really say, follow me as I follow Christ, because we are leading people to Christ and not religion. But to do that, we're going to have to function in the fullness of God. And the only way to do that is Paul's praying and saying, listen, you can't do this on your own. Jesus prayed drops of blood before he went to the cross. Even he pushed through it. But he was empowered. And we're going to need that same power in order for Christ to deal with the things that compete against him. He's going to have to remove those things. I don't know where you are today. I don't know where you are online. I don't know who's listening. But here's the bottom line. We need to pray. Pray that God will remove these things so we don't miss out. Amen. Are you with me on that? Come on, Rich.