Compassion Sunday

Cornerstone Church

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We won't fear the battle, we won't fear the night We will walk with vows, with you by our side

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You will go before us, you will lead the way We will lift the refuge, only you can save Sing with joy now, our

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God is for us The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress

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Raise your voice now, no other's greater You can stand against us if our

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God is for us Even when

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I stumble, even when I fall Even when I turn back, still your love is sure

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You will not abandon, you will not forsake You will cheer me onward with never -ending grace

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Sing with joy now, our God is for us The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress

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Raise your voice now, no other's greater You can stand against us if our

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God is for us Neither height nor depth can separate us

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Hell and death will not defeat us He who gave his

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Son to free us Holds me in his love

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Neither height nor depth can separate us

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Hell and death will not defeat us He who gave his

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Son to free us Holds me in his love

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Sing with joy now, our God is for us The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress

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Raise your voice now, no other's greater You can stand against us if our

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God is for us Sing with joy now, our God is for us

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The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress Raise your voice now, no other's greater

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You can stand against us if our God is for us

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On Tuesday, there is a women's Bible study So women, if you're free on Tuesdays in the day 9 .30

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until 11, Jill Deegan will be teaching the women's Bible study every other

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Tuesday beginning this Tuesday, June 8 Number three, the men are not to be outdone

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On Monday nights, we have a men's Bible study studying manly things

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On June 21st is when we begin on that So it will be 7pm on Monday nights

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Drew Deegan teaching that And you guys may not know You know that Phil is a musician, right?

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You see this is Phil back here on the bass guitar What you do not know about Phil is he is also an artist

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He makes pottery Guys, look at this These pieces were all made by our own

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Phil And the reason I'm bringing this up is because next Saturday our church plant,

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The Rock is having a block party And Phil has made four pieces You have more than that, Phil? How many do you have?

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70 pieces of pottery will be for sale at the block party in Rancocos Woods And all of the proceeds are being donated to The Rock, the church plant

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So we would love for you to go out to Rancocos Woods Enjoy the day, there's games for kids And there's some pottery for sale

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Good news, church Remember a couple weeks ago we had a baby born Little Walter Well, there is another baby that was born

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A little girl named Audrey Bob and Katie Dipold have a little baby named

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Audrey I don't know anything other than it's a girl So praise the

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Lord, a baby has joined the church Guys, thank you for anybody, men and women who showed up for the work party yesterday

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I was at a smorgasbord in Lancaster just eating all the food

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I could possibly eat while you guys were here working, so thank you We were there, by the way, because we went to see the show

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Esther, anybody seen Esther at Sight and Sound? Absolutely incredible It will bring the book of Esther to life in a way you just can't even imagine

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So if you get an opportunity to go to Sight and Sound I would recommend that highly Praise God for what they're doing there

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But thank you guys for the work that you put in yesterday Next Sunday we are recognizing graduates, so if you are graduating from elementary school or middle school or high school nursing school, whatever it may be we want to recognize you next

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Sunday, so let us know this week so we can make preparations We just want to honor you and pray for you next

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Sunday Both services, you can come to either There is a men's breakfast tomorrow morning at 6am

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So guys, you gotta be soldiers if you're gonna do this Get up at the crack of dawn, come study

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God's Word, we will have some food So 6am for the men Next Sunday Baptism at the lake in Marlton I think we have like 8 or 9

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It seems like they're all young men this time From maybe 13 years old to 20 something

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But it's 8 or 9 young men who are getting baptized in the lake, thank you

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Eric for preparing them for that by the way So please come if you like from 12 o 'clock till 5 o 'clock we have the lake

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We're gonna be canoeing, fishing having a blast on the beach So everybody please come hang out for any part of that time that you can

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Marlton Lake next Sunday And the baptism itself will be 1 o 'clock

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And last but not least If you guys look out the window there Is anybody taking advantage of it yet this week?

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No? It's too hot this week But we have an overflow area If you want to be outdoors or if you come late and you can't find a seat, you're going outdoors

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But we have It's just the same service going on there With the screen and a speaker

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So you'll be able to hear what's going on But if you want to worship God in the great outdoors Still be part of the family That's the overflow area as we're anticipating

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The church is growing like crazy And we don't want it to stop We want God to keep bringing people So when all the rest of these seats fill in People have to be out there

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That's our plan So praise God for what he's doing here at Cornerstone And we're thankful that you all are here

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Let's keep worshiping the Lord Thank you I should pray before I just got on a roll there

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We've got to dedicate this to the Lord So Father God, you have overheard everything that we've said And we want to say to you,

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God, that you are the one who deserves all the glory and all the praise for the incredible things that are happening here at this church

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The Lord has done great things for us and we are filled with joy We praise you, Lord God Thank you for what you're doing

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We pray now, Lord, that you would take what's about to happen this Sunday morning in this space and that you would receive glory from it

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We dedicate it to you and ask that you would come and take over That you would speak through Edgar Speak through myself

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Speak through Rick We ask that you would use mere jars of clay to show that the all -surpassing power comes from you and not from us

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Receive glory to your name Be lifted up in this worship service In Jesus' name, amen

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Let's stand and worship You may have had an easy week an easy month

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Some of us have struggles and things that we're dealing with But this morning we're going to focus our minds back on praising the

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Lord Let's sing together, to God be the glory To God be the glory

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Great things he has done So loved he the world that he gave us

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His Son who lived his life and atoned for sin and opened the life that all may go in Praise the

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Lord Praise the Lord Let the earth hear his voice

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Praise the Lord Praise the Lord Let the people rejoice

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Oh God to the Father to Jesus the

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Son and give him the glory Great things he has done

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The purchase of blood to every believer

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The promise of God who truly believes and receives

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Praise the Lord Praise the Lord Let the earth hear his voice

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Praise the Lord To Jesus the

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Son and give him the glory Great things he has done

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Great things he has taught us Great things that God that great power

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Rejoice through Jesus the Son and give him the glory

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Great things will be our wonder our transform

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When Jesus we see Praise the Lord Praise the

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Lord Let the earth hear his voice Praise the Lord Praise the

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Lord Let the people rejoice. We'll go to the

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Father, to Jesus, the Son, and give him the glory, great things he has done.

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Let's sing that chorus again, just our voices. Praise the Lord. Praise the

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Lord. Let the earth hear his voice. Praise the Lord.

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Praise the Lord. Let the people rejoice. Oh, come to the

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Father, through Jesus, the Son, and give him the glory, great things he hath done.

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It's to you, our Heavenly Father, that we offer our sacrifice of praise and sing together.

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The Son cannot compare. The Son cannot compare to the glory of your love.

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There is no shadow in your presence. No mortal man would dare to stand before your throne, before the

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Holy One of Heaven. It's only by your blood, and it's only through your mercy,

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Lord, I come. I bring an offering of worship to my

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King. No one on earth deserves the praises that I sing.

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Jesus, may you receive the honor that you're due.

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Oh, Lord, I bring an offering to you. Let's sing that first verse again.

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The Son cannot compare. I hope this is your prayer.

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The Son cannot compare to the glory of your love.

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There is no shadow in your presence. No mortal man would dare to stand before your throne, before the

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Holy One of Heaven. It's only by your blood, and it's only through your mercy,

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Lord, I come. I bring an offering of worship to my

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King. No one on earth deserves the praises that I sing.

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Jesus, may you receive the honor that you're due.

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Oh, Lord, I bring an offering to you.

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I bring an offering to you. You may be seated.

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Well, the only reason that we are able to bring an offering of praise to bring our very lives to God is because God Himself has made an offering that atones for our sin.

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We have a great high priest whose name is Jesus. He came to this earth, dwelt among us, tabernacling here among us.

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He lived a perfect life that we should have lived but didn't. We all fall short of God's glory.

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But Jesus lived a perfect life, and then He gave

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His life for our sins. He laid down on the cross as a substitute for our sins.

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They nailed Him to a cross. They lifted Him up, and He died the death that we deserve.

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But on the third day, He rose from the dead, and He ascended to the right hand of the

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Father where He ever lives to make intercession for us. By the shedding of His blood,

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He has opened a new and living way. We were separated from God, and that was pictured by the curtain in the temple.

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No one could go in behind the curtain except for the great high priest, and that just once a year. But Jesus, in the breaking of His body,

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He tore the temple's curtain in two from top to bottom to show that it was

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God who opened the new and living way. Now, if you're not quite familiar with some of these things, it might be difficult to follow, but understand this.

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Jesus is the one who died for our sins. He is the great high priest, and before He left,

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He gave us a way to remember Him, to draw near to Him until He comes back for us.

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And that is to take of the bread and the cup on the Lord's table.

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So, if there's someone in the back there that could grab... Thank you, Stan, I appreciate that. If you guys didn't get one of these, this is our communion cup.

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We're just going to use this one more time, by the way, then we'll be back to our old method. This has both the juice and a little cracker on the top, and this is how we take communion.

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Guys, communion, the Lord's table, is for believers. It's for those who have been born again, who trust in Jesus Christ, and we're not to take the cup unworthily.

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What that means is not that you have to earn the right to take the cup, but rather you must come with a humble and contrite spirit, confessing sins and taking seriously what the

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Lord did for us. You have to examine your heart. So, if you haven't gotten one of these, the ushers are going to pass that out.

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But what we're going to do before we take it is I'm going to give you guys just a minute to pray. Remember, Jesus is the great high priest.

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Where is he right now? At the right hand of the Father. And when you speak to him, he is interceding for you at the

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Father's right hand. You confess your sins, and he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

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So, brothers and sisters, just bow your heads, take a moment, and confess sin to God.

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Know that he is a forgiving God. He hears our prayer, and he listens to the confession, and he washes us in that precious blood.

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So let's ask for forgiveness. You know the sins of your own heart, so confess those things to God.

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So, Father, we are here before you not by any merit of our own.

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We have no righteousness to bring to this table. We have no good works that could appease you.

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We have but one plea, and that is the righteousness of Jesus Christ. On the basis of the shed blood and the broken body of Jesus Christ, we come to you.

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We ask that you would forgive us of our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.

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Thank you for this table that we can come to, to remember your body and your blood.

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In Jesus' name, amen. So at this time, if you would take just the top piece off and take hold of the bread.

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All right. We'll take this together. For I received from the Lord what

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I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said,

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This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.

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Now if you would take from the cup. In the same way also, he took the cup.

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After supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

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Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. Let's pray.

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So, Father, thank you so much. Thank you so much, God, that you gave your one and only son.

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As we take this cup and bread, Lord, we remember and we give thanks.

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We remember Calvary. We remember the cross.

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We remember that gift that was given to unworthy sinners like us. And we thank you,

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God, that you so loved the world that you gave your one and only son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.

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In Jesus' name, amen. All right. Brothers and sisters, we have a special treat this

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Sunday morning. The Bible talks about how when missionaries are sent, we are to receive them.

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In 3 John, we're told how diatrophies wouldn't do that, and so he was condemned. But we are going to do that this morning with grateful hearts.

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We have a visiting—I'm going to call him a missionary because, in a sense, he is. We have

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Edgar Benitez, who was born in the Dominican Republic and now lives in Texas, and we are going to invite

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Edgar to come and join me. We are going to have a conversation. Come on up, guys. Give a hand clap. Good morning, and thank you for the warm welcoming.

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Yes, and I'm not going to give you your background story because that's going to be part of what's about to happen right now. So, Edgar, here's your first question.

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You can have a seat. Tell me about your life before Compassion International.

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Yes, so I was born to a teenage single mother in a rural area of the

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Dominican Republic. And my mother, when I was about a toddler or three years old, some of the vague memories

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I have, she decided to move to the city, Santa Domingo, the capital of the

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Dominican Republic, to pursue a better life for the both of us. And some of the memories that I still have is that we just showed up to the city unexpectedly.

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Nobody invited us. Nobody was expecting us. We just showed up and started knocking on doors to see where we could stay.

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And graciously, some people opened their doors. We were bouncing from place to place, just crashing at distant relatives, acquaintances, or anybody we would just meet, sometimes for as long as several weeks or just as short as overnight.

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That went on for about a year. And finally, my mother was able to find a small place for the both of us.

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But it was in one of the poorest and most dangerous crime -filled neighborhoods of Santa Domingo.

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That was where the poorest of the poor lived. It was a neighborhood sandwiched between a very polluted river and the city dump.

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And while my mother and I were happy that finally we were just not bouncing from place to place, we had our own small place we could call home, that brought up a whole new set of struggles and challenges, primarily for my mother, as now she had to endure the stress of making rent every month.

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And she was consumed by not knowing where our next meal was going to come from, besides the constant threats that we received from the landlord of being evicted because my mother was still unemployed, and occasionally she did some domestic work that earned her some money.

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So that went on for about a year. And fast forward, I am five, and I am now ready to be enrolled in elementary school.

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And my mother reaches out to my father for financial assistance.

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I didn't see my father too often. He was not involved in my life much.

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And when he offers a few coins at that time, my mother said,

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Well, that won't be enough. We have to cover registration fees. We have to cover tuition, school uniforms, books, supplies, backpacks, and all of that.

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And he said, Well, give me that. If it's going to take more than a notepad and a pencil, school is not for him.

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Let him grow up to be literate. He won't be the first one, nor he will be the last one.

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That tremendously infuriated my mother. And she told him,

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No, he will go to school. I don't know how, but we will find a way of enrolling him in school. We went home, and that night

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I saw her weeping. I just got close to her, and I asked her, What are we going to do? And she said,

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God will help us. And I think that was the first time that I heard the expression God.

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We were not a very religious family. My mother did not speak about God too often, but I heard the word

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God at that time. So soon after that, my mother investigated and found out that there was a church not too far away from our neighborhood that operated a private

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Christian school, and they partnered with this international ministry called

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Compassion. We quickly went over there. We completed an application. They interviewed my mother.

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They took a photo of me to create a profile, and the director of the center said,

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Well, we'll prioritize him and see how often we can find a sponsor through Compassion.

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Just pray for him. And as she's giving the application to the secretary, I heard she say,

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A child raising another child, referring to my mother and I because my mother was about 20 at that time or 19, and she looked like a teenager, basically.

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So we went home, and a few weeks later, we received news from the center that a

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God -fearing man from Florida, his name was David Rayner, he came across my

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Compassion profile, and I don't know if there's a photo of me that can be shown, and he decided, so that was my

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Compassion profile photo. He decided to sponsor me, and that changed.

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That started my journey of being released from poverty and started my walk with Christ. Wow.

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Okay, so you're growing up in the DR. You're in dire straits, and somehow you come across the

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Compassion program in Santo Domingo. Let me ask you this. Once you got sponsored, what difference did that actually make in your life?

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You will come up short in guessing the many ways that the Compassion sponsorship changed my life, and I could take an extensive amount of time to list them all, but I like to highlight four.

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And to put it into perspective, let me just share this. The prospects of me even completing elementary school were only a fraction compared to the probabilities of me being forced into child labor and joining a life of crime.

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But here are the four main ways that the Compassion sponsorship changed my life.

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Number one, it prevented me from being forced into child labor, so it disrupted the path of going into child labor.

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That was a big deal in the Dominican Republic, and many underdeveloped countries at that time, and still nowadays it is.

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Young boys are forced into child labor to help very often their single mothers, and the

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Compassion sponsorship disrupted that. Number two, and let me just add something to that.

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So the source of employment for your children in my neighborhood was the city dump, right?

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That was our backyard. That's where many children went, and adults as well, to dig up scrap metal and to resell it, or other valuables that could be resold, and even food that restaurants will throw over there.

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Many of those children, sadly, didn't make it back home at the end of the day because they were run over by a bulldozer, or they were attacked by other adults that did not want competition, or when they found a good piece of metal, it was taken away from them for other adults, or going to the streets to shine shoes or perform any kind of other labor.

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In some cases, even just robbing tourists or stealing, etc.

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Number two, it provided me with a good quality of education while keeping me healthy and nourished with all the necessary books and supplies that I needed to successfully graduate from high school, and it set the path for me to become the first one in my family to ever attend and graduate from college.

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Number three, having an education opened doors for me to work for multinational corporations in the

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Dominican Republic and eventually to relocate to the U .S. and work for Fortune 500 companies that not only enabled me to provide a better life for myself and my family, my wife and children, but also to substantially improve the living conditions of many of my relatives in the

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Dominican Republic, primarily my mother and my grandmother, aunts and cousins and many others, and also to be generous in giving in many areas of need for other people and institutions.

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And the final one, the number four, and the most important one, the other three are meaningless without this one.

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It brought the gospel to me. It brought the gospel. It trained me to be a disciple of Christ, and through it

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I have been given the gift of salvation. But not only me, my entire family, both of my parents, my mother, my father amended the relationship with my mother and myself, accepted

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Christ, and is now dedicated to plant churches in the Dominican Republic and runs a ministry to help incarcerated fathers to connect with their sons and many other things.

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So without compassion, I have very little chances over one to first one to overcome extreme poverty and to receive the gospel in the way that I do.

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Wow. Do you have a picture of your family? Thank you.

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Indeed, we do. I don't know if they can show it there. There is. That's one of our photos.

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I think that there's another photo where there's my five children, a small family.

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I have a small family. Yeah, very small. There they are. There they are. So that's my wife and our five children.

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That's actually at the Compassion Headquarters in Colorado Springs. So our small family of five, we're just getting started with that.

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I mean, we have to fill the church, and that's a great way to make disciples.

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So, yes, that's my lovely family. Praise the Lord. Okay, well, you mentioned earlier, and I'm just kind of in my mind just picturing what a sponsor experience is here and what that actually means for a kid.

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In 2000, I was at an event like this. It was actually a concert, and I saw a compassion table.

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And I just glanced down, and I see this little kid from Indonesia whose name is Jeffrey. And I said, oh,

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Lord, why did you make me see that name? Because my name is Jeffrey. So I felt like, all right, I've got to do this.

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I grabbed it, and I started sponsoring a kid back in 2000. And now he's aged out of the program.

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It's been 12 years I sponsored him and with my wife as well. So it was a wonderful thing, but you don't know unless you've lived it what it means from the other side.

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So now you've shared that with us, what it was like for you. So why don't we flip the script. Tell us about your sponsor.

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Tell us about who sponsored you and his story. Yes, absolutely. So just to give you an idea, my sponsor,

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Mr. David Rayner, he had the greatest positive influence in my early and teenage years through letters.

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He wrote me letters often, and I think we just displayed one of them. And I treasure those letters.

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I still have them with me. I often read them again. I have memorized some of them.

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He started with encouraging me always to trust and to depend on God. He often quoted

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Bible verses for me. He told me that God had a major, big plan for me and just a great destiny.

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If I just surrendered to him and trusted him. He quoted verses, just Jeremiah 29, 11.

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I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. There are plans for good and not for disaster to give you a future and hope.

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And he was the first one ever to tell me, I love you. I never heard the expression.

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I've heard it but not addressed to me directly. He was the first one to ever tell me, I love you.

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And I'm sure my mother didn't say it to me, not because she loved me. I am convinced that she loved me tremendously, but it was just not the culture of telling children from parents,

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I love you. The way for them to demonstrate love and affection was through provision, by making sacrifices or we did not get enough to eat the both of us tonight, so you will be the one to eat, whereas I won't have dinner tonight.

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That was kind of the way that she loved. And Mr. Raynor had this profound impact in me that I could actually dream about being someone escaping from poverty if I just surrender myself to God, allow

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Him to fulfill His plan in me by just trusting and obeying. And I started dreaming about it.

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I started thinking that maybe I am not destined to be in this neighborhood where generations after generations continue to live there.

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These neighborhoods don't get smaller. They get bigger. You find five generations there.

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People don't move out of there. They continue to live there. And I started thinking that maybe it is possible for me to become a doctor or an engineer or something else, and He will pray for me often about it that God will fulfill

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His plan in me. So I went on to graduate from the program.

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We did not connect after that. We lost contact. I relocated to the

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U .S., and I started looking for him for a long time, and I didn't find him because there were many people with his name.

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And just as I was about to give up, and I kind of realized that I may not find him.

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It's been more than 15 years, and I can't find him. I decided to honor him.

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My wife was pregnant at the time with our youngest son, and we both talked about it and decided we're going to name him after David, my sponsor, so I can remember him,

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I can honor him, and every time I call my child, I can say, well, your name is

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David because this story. But I didn't quit trying to find him, just not as intensively as I was, and God put it all together.

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So in August of 2018, we reconnected.

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I finally found him. I persisted, and I went to meet him. That was one of the happiest days of my life because I was able, it had been a dream for me just to give him a big hug first and then look at him straight in the eyes and say,

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Mr. Raynor, thank you for allowing God to use you as a tool to release me from poverty and primarily to bring the gospel to me.

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My life would be completely different had you not answered that calling from God. And since then, we've done life together.

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We text daily. We pray together. We do Bible studies together.

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We hang out together. Just a few weeks ago, we were together, hanging out in Georgia and in South Carolina, serving compassion, the two of us together.

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We have a vacation planned together in August of this year in Tyler, Texas, and we're inseparable.

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Many plans to do many things, but primarily continue serving compassion because we both know in our testimonies that this truly works.

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Wow. Okay, so tell me about your life now. Not in my wildest dream

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I could have ever even imagined the life that I have today. God has blessed me abundantly in every aspect of my life, beginning with giving me a wonderful family.

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You saw the photo. I have a beautiful wife, God -fearing, dedicated to our family, and five great children.

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We dedicate all the time and energy that we can to train them to be disciples of Christ, to learn about God, to obey

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God, and to serve God. In our free time, we both serve compassion, which is our second ministry after our family, doing events like this one.

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We often go all together, including my mother, who lives in Texas now, close to us.

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We all serve compassion in events like this one and volunteering. We sponsor three children, and today our family is growing as we are adding one more from your list to four.

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So Andy will receive the blessing of having a fair chance in life of being released from poverty, being a disciple, and receiving the gospel.

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Wow. Praise the Lord. That's the fourth child? That's the fourth child. Praise the

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Lord. So you're not just telling us to do it.

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You're setting an example. I am setting an example. Praise the Lord. Yes, amen. Professionally, God has blessed me abundantly.

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I work for a major financial institution where I am vice president of business controls, and I co -lead multi -million dollar technology projects.

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By the way, I want to publicly thank one of my teammates, who is a mentor to me, that came over to join this event and participates.

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Mark, Mark, thank you so much. He works with me. Yes, and not in a million years

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I would have imagined the wonderful life that God has prepared for me. Wow.

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Do you play baseball? I did play baseball, but I settled for softball.

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Oh, okay. Okay, I'm going to throw a curveball at you. That's why I asked that question. You ready for this? All right, we've been in a conversation here at Cornerstone with the culture, and the issue that I want to raise to you is the question of social justice.

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Now, here's what I'm going to ask you. You know, whenever you have issues of poverty, there will be people who come in and push a victim narrative and teach that the reason that there is poverty in the world is that there's an oppressive class that's making the poor poor.

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And then they'll push that narrative on all areas of differentiation between people, whether it's the color of their skin or gender or sexuality or any number of things.

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They push all of these things under the banner of social justice.

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Here's my question for you. What's different about Compassion International from that narrative of social justice?

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Okay. I only speak

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Spanish. He says he only speaks Spanish all of a sudden. I cannot get out of this question, so please don't cancel me.

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I ask you. So here's what I will say about that.

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In the Compassion program, what we were taught was that we were not victims.

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We were precious children of God, that God had designed plans for all of us.

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If we just obeyed him and surrendered, he would fulfill his plans. We were destined to inherit the kingdom of heaven along with our

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Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We were prepared to use our gifts and our talents and to earn a living from ourselves rather than depend on anybody or any institution.

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We were not taught that the government was the answer to our needs or any institution. We were taught that the answer to all of our needs came from God and not from anybody else and that we needed to use the gifts and talents that God has given us to earn our lives and to provide for our families.

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Wow. Amen. Amen. So you didn't believe a victim narrative. You believed that by the power of the gospel, the same

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God that raised Jesus from the dead, now working in you, and you working, you are able to do whatever he calls you to do.

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So that's quite the opposite of the victim mentality. It is rather hard work.

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And the education that you received was something that you educated yourself by taking advantage of the opportunities given you.

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The empowerment that was taught to us in the compassion program with the plans, the gospel, the instruction from the

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Lord was a liberation from the poverty. Jesus came to us and poverty left.

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Not just the physical poverty, but the mental poverty, the spiritual poverty, the empowerment that we received that we could accomplish just about anything that we wanted if we prayed to God.

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We allowed God to do that. It was possible. And now it was in the hands of a government or it was not.

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We were not limited because we were part of a specific social class or we came from humble origin.

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Amen. And brothers and sisters, just so you know, we've spoken on Zoom. So I knew how he would answer that, if not the exact words.

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It wasn't just like a shot in the dark. We became fast friends over Zoom, and I thank the

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Lord for what God has done in your life. Here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to give you a final just wide open talk about whatever you want.

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But before I do that, let me share just another aspect of God's providence in all of this.

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We in 2020, early 2020, had a new member class here where there were some people in it from the

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Dominican Republic. And meanwhile, I was contacted by Rick or he contacted me one way or the other from Compassion International.

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And he was on his way to the D .R. So we began to talk about a mission trip to the

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Dominican Republic. Long story short, what we've done is all of the child packets where you're able to sponsor a child that we have in the foyer today are from the

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Dominican Republic. And we are planning a mission trip to the D .R. for whoever is able to go.

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If you know the Lord and you're able to preach the gospel and to serve and help, we're going to bring a mission team down to the

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Dominican Republic. And we will meet many of the kids that this church will be sponsoring individually.

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So even if you don't go on the mission trip, we can come back and report to you. Yeah, we met whoever it was that you sponsor.

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And this is what he's like, and this is what he loves to do, and this is what he needs. And here's how you can pray. So we're going to have an actual connection with the people in the

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D .R. So praise God. I'm going to ask Rick to share a little bit more about that when you come up in just a moment. So just awesome things happening.

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And then just the fact that you're from the Dominican Republic, that wasn't even planned either. It was just all

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God, and Rick was on his way. So just what God is doing just blows my mind. So final word of exhortation to the church.

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Yes, thank you once again. A compassion sponsorship is truly a blessing that multiplies exponentially, not just in the life of the child that is sponsored and their future generations, but also in the life of the sponsor himself or herself.

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I heard many stories where nonbelievers actually became to Christianity just because of their sponsor child prayed for them, and they ultimately received and accepted the gospel.

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So today I stand in front of you as a testimony that a compassion sponsorship truly works.

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It did for me exactly what it intended to do and even more. It released me from poverty, and it brought the gospel to myself and my family.

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So I remember in the gospels you'll find the passage of when the

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Jesus are coming to Christ and the disciples stop them. And he says, let the children come to me.

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Do not stop them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to those that look like them. Today these children are being stopped from coming to Christ not because of disciples, but because of extreme poverty, and not just physical poverty, not material poverty, but just mental poverty, psychological poverty.

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The lack of encouragement, the lack of love, the lack of being told that they can succeed in life, being hopeless and thinking that their surroundings, their circumstances define who they are and who they will be.

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And what I ask you is that you do just what I will do today, lead by example.

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As I am sponsoring Andy, we will be giving Andy a fair chance of succeeding in life through the compassion sponsorship program and receiving the gospel.

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I ask you to be faithful and obedient to the calling of Matthew 10a that says, give us freely as you have received.

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My prayer is that after you have seen what happens in the life when a child gets sponsored through compassion,

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God touches your heart and you decide to fulfill the great commission, sponsor a child and create another wonderful story.

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Thank you for giving me this opportunity. Amen. Thank you brother. This is

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Rick Schlup and he works for Compassion International and we're going to call you up here just to share logistically what this looks like and also fill in some of those details about your mission trip.

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We have time so you can tell what that mission trip was like and how that all went down. Well, great.

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It is an incredible privilege to be here. And I serve volunteers with compassion and churches in the

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Northeast region. So I live in Ohio. There's a lot of regional staff with compassion all over the place.

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And I was a volunteer for eight years before I came on staff. So I was a school teacher. You never know what

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God's going to do. And I'm the most unlikeliest of people to be standing up here but he's in the business of transformation.

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And so all glory to him. Incredible privilege to be here and Jeff, thanks so much. So first I just want to share a little bit about the trip to the

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DR. And I remember exactly, Jeff and I were in back and forth communication. I really don't remember exactly how it started.

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I know we had a common Barry Limb kind of introduced us. But anyway, so I was standing at the kitchen stove and he called and it was 6 o 'clock on a weekday.

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And I just remember, huh, I wonder who this is. So I answered it and it was Jeff. And he just talked about maybe getting a

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Compassion alum to come and speak and share their story. And then he said, I have a heart, just kind of have, because I asked him, where's your heart?

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You know, what's the heart of Cornerstone? Is there anywhere in the world? And he said, you know, I have a heart for the

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Dominican Republic. And I said, can't make this up. I'm going there in two days. And this was

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February 2020. So I was on this trip and it was a small church in northern

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Ohio that I was taking. I was leading a trip there. And they were there to meet their kids that they sponsor and also to visit the church, frontline church partner that carries out the work of Compassion that they really had a deep relationship with.

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So that's kind of how all that happened. I mean, God is in the midst of this entire thing. And then Edgar being from the

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Dominican Republic and being the one here, it just all fit perfectly. And this was supposed to happen last year.

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And then COVID wiped things out. So now it's now. And it's God's timing again.

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So incredible opportunity. So the thing is about the trip, there is, you know, some delays with COVID and getting everything up to speed to start doing trips again.

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So it's at least a couple years out. So just to make sure you're aware of that. But it's incredibly impactful.

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And like Jeff said, you know, you can visit the kids and you can visit the kids of maybe people that don't go on the trip.

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But also you can take gifts on their behalf, represent the sponsor, and actually meet the kids.

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And maybe even if we're at that particular child development center in that neighborhood, you can potentially even visit the homes of some of the kids as well, which is incredible to meet the family and the actual neighborhood where they live.

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So a few logistics. We started with 31 child packets specifically for this church.

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These are the only child packets that exist for these kids in the world. They are here today.

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We're down to 14. There's 14 left. So and they're out on the table.

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They are all from the Dominican Republic. They all need a sponsor. So these kids are registered in Compassion's program, but they do not have a sponsor.

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If there's older kids there, they might have had a sponsor before, but for whatever reason, the sponsor had to stop sponsoring them.

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And so those kids need a sponsor desperately. So a couple different ways you can do this.

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There is a form in the back of the child packet, and there's volunteers out there that will help you take care of all this.

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Fill out the form. There's options on how you want to pay. Thirty -eight dollars a month, a little over a dollar a day is what it costs.

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The relationship is crucial. So writing those letters and developing that relationship is key.

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So you can choose a child, and you can fill out the packet here. I also have what's called

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Sponsor Now iPad. So we can actually process everything here. So if you're somebody that says, I don't want to write down my credit card number or my debit card number, we can process it here, and it's immediate.

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It'll go right into our system. You take the child packet home. Compassion will send you an email about your sponsorship probably before you leave the doors.

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That part of it's automated. And then you'll get a welcome packet within a couple weeks with a lot more information about gift -giving and writing your child.

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If you say, I really have a heart for someplace else, I can do searches on the iPad and bring a child up from anywhere you want where Compassion works.

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And including, you know, if you have age specifications, maybe a specific birthday that really resonates with you.

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Maybe there's an important anniversary date. Maybe there's a name you want to try. I can do those searches.

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So see me if you need me to do anything with the iPad. I'll be on this side as you leave, the right side, hanging out there.

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The table's on the left when you go out through the foyer. So anything that I'm missing,

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I'm good. It's been a blessing to be here. Thank you so much. We're going to close in prayer. Praise the

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Lord. There is a Bible verse I'm going to leave you with. It is Galatians 2 .10. The context there was the meeting of Peter, James, and John with the missionaries

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Titus and Paul and Barnabas. When they got together after 14 years, they hadn't met yet.

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And when they got together in Jerusalem, it was time for them to depart. And they realized they were preaching the same gospel.

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Everything checked out. But Galatians 2 .10 says they only asked one thing, that you remember the poor.

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Remember the poor. And so what happened from there is Paul went forth collecting gifts for the poor.

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He went to Corinth. Remember 2 Corinthians 8 and 9 were about this gift. 1 Corinthians 16 was about this.

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So the apostles were together in agreement that we ought to remember the poor. So I would encourage you that you're obeying the word of God, Galatians 2 .10,

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when you remember the poor. So let's close in a word of prayer and give all the glory and praise to God for what he has done and the wonderful testimony we heard today.

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So Father God, we thank you so much for what we heard this morning.

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It blows our minds, Lord, the number of connections that we see that it's just obvious that you are at work.

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And we want to thank you for what you've done in Edgar and now through Edgar. We thank you that you have broken that cycle of poverty and Christlessness.

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And you have raised up a man of God who himself is training his children. And this cycle now will continue forth for your glory.

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We thank you for Edgar. We pray blessing upon him and his family. We pray that you would use him everywhere he goes to raise up others to the ministry, to spur others on to love and good deeds.

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We pray the same thing over Rick, that you would bless him as he goes, that you would use him to raise up sponsors to help children around the world.

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Use these men, Lord. We thank you for their dedication. Let them be an example to us, Lord God, that we would be spurred on.

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Father, we pray even now for the mission trip a few years out. Lord, that we would get to go and preach the gospel, first of all, and also encourage and build up the body of Christ there in the

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Dominican Republic. God, we pray for our church, Lord, that we would have big open hearts and a willingness and a desire, eagerness to do what you've called us to do.

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Thank you, Lord, for all that you're doing. And we give you the praise and the glory in Jesus name.

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Amen. Thank you. All right, let's stand, guys. We're going to close in a song and a benediction.

01:00:30

The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. Raise your voice now.

01:00:37

No love is greater. Who can stand against us if our God is for us?

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And I stumble even when

01:00:55

I fall. Even when I turn back, still your love is sure.

01:01:01

You will not abandon. You will not forsake. You will cheer me on with your never -ending grace.

01:01:13

Sing joy now. Our God is for us. The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress.

01:01:21

Raise your voice now. No love is greater. Who can stand against us if our

01:01:28

God is for us? Neither height nor depth can separate us.

01:01:43

Hell and death will not defeat us. He who gave his son to free us holds me in his love.

01:01:57

Neither height nor depth can separate us.

01:02:03

Hell and death will not defeat us. He who gave his son to free us holds me in his love.

01:02:18

Sing with joy now. Our God is for us. The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress.

01:02:27

Raise your voice now. No love is greater. Who can stand against us if our

01:02:33

God is for us? Sing for joy now. Our God is for us.

01:02:40

The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. Raise your voice now.

01:02:47

No love is greater. Who can stand against us if our God is for us?

01:03:04

We had 31 packets of Kids in Need in the DR. First service took care of 17.

01:03:12

That means we've got 14 to go to completely sponsor all of them, which would be miraculous. Praise God that it's going so well.

01:03:19

Let's do that. If it's God's will, then you do that. Let's close with this benediction.

01:03:25

Galatians 2 .10, Only they asked us to remember the poor the very thing