Sit Down and Eat — Jim Cymbala

Isn't this a Bible amazing? How many love your Bible? Just say amen. And I hope you try to read it every day, right? By the grace of God. But you know what I found? You can read it and read it, and then the Holy Spirit will make you begin to see things, and you'll go, oh, how many have ever had that?

You thought you knew a verse, and then you read a verse, and the light went on. Lift your hand if that's ever happened to you. Well, I mean, lights have been going on for me. Lights, an understanding of the Bible in a new way, oh my goodness, it's just been, I've been delighting in the Word of God.

And I wanna read to you a story which highlights something that we think we know, but we don't know, and the depth of it, I don't think we'll ever understand until we see Christ face to face. The story is found in the Old Testament.

You must remember now, ladies and gentlemen, whenever you read the Old Testament, people have been coming to me with questions about, are we supposed to obey that command that Moses gave to the people of Israel?

And what about all that slaughter going on in the book of Joshua, and so on and so forth? So you must remember that no command, nor a promise in the Old Testament made to Israel is applicable to us unless it's found repeated in the New Testament, you got that?

No command, like every three years, the Jews had to forgive everybody any debt they owed. Well, a lot of people who go by the Old Testament and say you gotta worship on Saturday, and you can't eat pork, and you can't eat certain kinds of fish, they forget that command.

Because if you're gonna obey some of them, you gotta obey all of them. How many say amen? You can't pick and choose. So every three years, you're supposed to forgive everyone their debt. Well, nobody does that, and nobody does a lot of things, and we don't consider women unclean to come and worship after they have a baby for a certain amount of time.

We live in a different dispensation. So we have to learn to rightly divide the word of God. So no command or promise is applicable. A sister came to me recently, her boss was giving her trouble, and she said, you know, I'm so aggravated with my boss, I'm gonna pray one of those imprecatory prayers that David prays in the Psalms.

Lord, bust their head, break their teeth, smash them. Is that in the Bible? I said, is that in the Bible? Are we supposed to pray like that? No, no, no. Jesus said, Father, forgive them, they don't know what they're doing.

And when they were stoning Stephen, instead of saying, oh Lord, they're gonna kill me, but break their head and chop them in little pieces, no, he said, Lord, don't lay this to their charge. So remember that, otherwise you're gonna get confused by the prosperity teachers and all these other people that are slinging hash left and right, picking and choosing and not rightly dividing the word of God.

But here's one that's so good. I love this, I love this. I can't wait to tell you the wonderful things about God that come from this story. King David is now king, and in 2 Samuel chapter nine, we read this.

David asked, is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan's sake? That was his friend's sake. Now there was a servant of Saul's household named Ziba, and they called him to appear before David, and the king said to him, are you Ziba?

Your servant, he replied. The king asked, is there no one left of the house of Saul to whom I can show God's kindness? Ziba answered the king, there's still a son of Jonathan. He's crippled in both feet.

Where is he, the king asked. Ziba answered, he's at the house of Macabre, son of Amiel in Lodabar. So King David had him brought from Lodabar, from the house of Macabre, son of Amiel, and when Mephibosheth, son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor, and David said, Mephibosheth, your servant, he replied.

Don't be afraid, David said to him, for I will surely show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan. I will restore to you all the land that belonged to your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table.

Mephibosheth bowed down and said, what is your servant that you should notice a dead dog like me? Then the king summoned Ziba, Saul's servant, and said to him, I have given your master's grandson everything that belonged to Saul and his family.

I'm restoring it all. You and your sons, because he's crippled, you and your sons and your servants are to farm the land for him and bring in the crops so that your master's grandson may be provided for, and Mephibosheth, grandson of your master, will always eat at my table.

Now Ziba had 15 sons and 20 servants. Then Ziba said to the king, your servant will do whatever my lord, the king, commands his servant to do. So Mephibosheth ate at David's table like one of the king's sons.

That's a good story. Oh, it says a lot more than you think. David, you remember, is the second king of Israel. The first king was King Saul, and King Saul's was the people's choice, but David was the lord's choice.

And even though David was very kind to Saul, and even though David showed great courage on behalf of the armies of Israel as a young man, Saul got jealous of David because he knew that God was with him.

Isn't jealousy an ugly thing? David never did one thing wrong against Saul, but when people are blessed by God, and maybe you're losing out with God, when people have more blessing than maybe God has given you for whatever reason, it's so easy not to root for them.

What is easy to do is to be jealous of them. Jealousy and envy, let's ask God to take it out of our hearts today because it leads to madness. Saul ended up spiritually nuts. He ended up crazy, consulting a witch at the end of his life.

David is forced to go on the run, and you know the story, right? That's how we got a lot of our Psalms. David is hiding in rocks and caves, and that's where Pam has to introduce those songs and explain that song when she sings that song about the cleft of the rock because that comes from the Psalms where David was hiding, and that God would hide him from who?

From Saul, who was trying to kill him. Well, God brings judgment on Saul and his household, and now David is king, and David gets established, and they conquer a place called Jebus, which becomes renamed Jerusalem, and God is with David, and David's kingdom is established, and from shepherd boy to king, it's done.

And then one day, David is just walking, and he says, isn't there somebody left from Saul's household that I can show kindness to? After all that God has done for me, I gotta show kindness to someone.

God's been so kind to me. God has taken me from the sheepfolds. God helped me slay Goliath. God has been with me when I killed the bear and the lion. God has been with me when I was playing the harp and Saul tried to kill me with a javelin, and God has watched over me.

I was hiding in the rocks in the desert. I was one step from death, and he could've killed me, but God delivered me every time. Oh, when I think of the goodness of God and all that he's done for me, my soul cries out, hallelujah!

When people are conscious of God's kindness to them, they are kind to other people. In fact, they're driven to kindness. David is like driven. He's possessed by a spirit of kindness, because if you're not rejoicing at what God has done for you, if you don't think back of all the valleys he's brought you through, all the mountains he's taken you over, God hasn't seen you through a few things in your life, if you focus on that, you're so overwhelmed with the goodness of God, you just gotta be kind to other people.

You wanna just give somebody something, just hand something to somebody. Never cheap, never judgmental. How could you be judgmental when you're thinking about all God has done for you? Why are you and I here today?

Because we've been good, or because God is good? Because God is good. Unkind people are living, unkind Christians are living with no consciousness of what God has done for them. How, when you think of the goodness of Jesus and all that he's done for us, some of us would be dead.

You would be dead. Forget sleepless nights, insomnia. Some of you would be dead, some of us would be dead. God preserved us. God kept us. Some would be in jail. Who knows where we'd be? Come on, do you agree with me?

Lift your hand if you agree with me. And when you think of all that God has done for us, how could you be unkind to another person? And I wanna charge all of you. As I walk around this neighborhood a lot more now, there's so much unkindness.

People are mean. And people go to church are mean too. Not just folks in the street. People go to church can be mean. They praise God, and with the same mouth, they talk nasty to other people. I was waiting to see the doctor for my knee, and I was in this waiting room, and there were a bunch of people just looking at each other on Newkirk Avenue near Coney Island Avenue, and this woman came in.

I don't know what her problem was, but she was, the wires weren't connected or something. And she walked in and so verbally abused the young lady who was at the desk for the doctors and setting up appointments.

There were multi-offices back there. Lady was just nasty, loud, up in her grill, so loud through the whole office that we were all just looking at each other like, where did this woman come from? Just shouting, nasty, talking derogatory.

She thought she was standing for her rights. She didn't like the answer she was getting from the woman, so she was just acting nasty. But you know what? When you act nasty, you're never justified. Brothers and sisters, if we're gonna be anything, let's be kind.

What a terrible advertisement for Jesus if Christians are unkind. And you know what? Kind to everyone. You know, the other day, we found out someone who acts very sweet to me and the other pastors, we found out that they're talking just nasty to other members of the church because they put on one face with us, but then another face with other people.

They're respecters of persons. We should never respect persons. We should be kind to everyone. How many wanna be kind to everyone? Lift up both your hands. Come on, lift them up both. God, help us just to be kind.

If you're not gonna be kind, then don't tell anyone you're a Christian. Shh, just keep it down. Because what a terrible thing. So David is possessed by this spirit of kindness. Oh, I wanna be possessed by that.

I just wanna be kind. I wanna help people. I just wanna give something away to someone. Someone say, no, you can't do that. You gotta think of yourself. No, when you do that, God thinks about you and takes care of you.

It's when you're cheap and tight and selfish that you lose out, you lose the blessing of God. David says, isn't there somebody that I can bless? And that, of course, is a picture of David's greater son, whose name is Jesus.

Jesus was born from the line of David, and Jesus was called the son of David. And this is a picture, what David is doing, of God. Why is David like that? Why is he so kind? What is kindness a fruit of?

Well, it's a fruit of love. Forgiving people, being kind to people, is a result of love. And that's the way God is. See what it says back there? God is love. God is so much love. His essence is so love that we can't understand it.

What kindness can I show somebody today, David says. Did you know what God, right now, his presence is right now here in this auditorium? And you're 16 years old, and you're sitting back over there, or you're here in the front row.

Did you know all that God is trying to do today is just, he's asking, the spirit is searching through the whole building, who can I be kind to today? Not because of you, you have nothing to do with it.

It's because of him. Mephibosheth had nothing. He was crippled, and he came from the family of David's arch enemy. It had nothing to do with Mephibosheth, don't you get it? This is what we don't understand about God.

When you love, you always want to help and show kindness. You just got to find people who will receive it. The battle is, today, who will believe and receive? God, Jesus didn't come into the world to judge the world.

He came to give his life so that the world could be saved. And right now, God is in this room saying, who can I show kindness to today? Is there anyone? That's what he wants to do, because love always wants to do that.

You put me with my grandson, Luke. You put me with my granddaughter, Claire. You put me with my grandson, Levi. I am going to do nothing but go out and show kindness. And anything they struggle with, whether it's insomnia or school or rejection by a friend, I am going to take their part and try to help them.

Why? You don't have to teach me that. I love them. When you love, you want to help and show kindness and give to. And I'm an evil man. Imagine how God wants to help you, sir, and you, ma 'am. God wants to help everybody here.

Oh, but I'm not what I ought to be. It has nothing to do with it. It wouldn't matter if Levi was good or bad or my grandson Luke was doing well or not well in school. My love isn't affected by how they're doing something.

The blessing that I want to impart is based on my love. And there's not one in 10 of us, there's not 10 of us that see God that way. We see God as judge. We see God as rule giver. We see God as holy.

We see God as all those things, and they're all true. But you got to remember, his essence is love. And love is always searching to find a way to bless. He wants to bless you men on the retreat. He wants to bless the choir every time they gather.

He wants to bless and help you every single day. I don't care if it's tying your shoelace. He wants to help you. Wouldn't you want to help a grandson who was struggling to tie his shoelace? Would something be too small for me?

Say you're all quiet because you're not even thinking about God this way. We've grown up in different churches and different cultures and different backgrounds. We got some weird pictures of God in our minds.

The only picture of God that we can accept, the Bible says, is Jesus. He is the image of the invisible God. Who did Jesus ever hurt? Who did he ever not reach out to, except people that didn't want to know about him?

He was always looking to help people. A woman caught in adultery, he didn't go, man, I don't believe. No, just no, nobody's here to accuse you. Go and sin no more. Now, remember this. Why wouldn't he want to help everybody in the building?

He loves you. If he gave his son to die for us, he doesn't want to help you today? You're not going to say amen? All right, it's going to be that way, all right. Just because God is love, don't mistake that love that it doesn't correct.

All correction, everything God does, is done in love because God is love. God never does anything out of love, out of the spirit of love. Is a doctor mean when the doctor says, Kenesha, I just picked up there's a bacteria in your blood or there's something going on, a virus, we got to work on it.

I thought you loved me. I do love you, that's why I'm telling you this. See, we get this crazy picture of God that if he loves me, he's never going to correct me. No, whom the Lord loves, he chastens.

The sign of his love is if you're living wrong today, he's going to manifest his love to you by saying, don't go that way. Don't go that way. Does a mother not love her child when she sees him running with the wrong people?

And say, don't go that way, don't hang out with those people. Mom, I thought you, you're immature when you think that way. Mom, I thought you loved me. Why are you trying to take away my fun? No, I see something you don't see.

So if any of you are living wrong, you're living in sin, you're sleeping around, you're hung up on pornography, you're involved in all kinds of nastiness, it's going to hurt you, it's going to bite you.

So out of love, God is not going to make a treaty with that. He's not going to say, go girl, you're okay guy. No, no, he'll fight you because he loves you. Come on, can we put our hands together on that?

So when David says, who can I show kindness to? Isn't there somebody I can find who will receive this spirit of kindness? That's the way Jesus is today. What do you need from him? He wants to give it to you.

What do you need? Do you need to become a Christian? He wants to do that. You're not sleeping at night like we prayed. You don't have to convince him anything, you don't have to come and say, oh God, I know I've been bad, but please change your mind.

You can't change love's mind. He loves you. But remember, it's a kind of love that is, it's straight love, it's real talk love. He's not going to gloss over your prejudice and that bitterness in you and that unforgiveness in you.

No, he's going to talk to you about it because he loves you. He wants to clean out all the junk so that the blessing can flow and you can see things you can't even imagine happen. Now what's strange about this, David says, isn't there anybody from Saul's house that I can show God's kindness to?

God's been so good to me. Can I show kindness? And brothers and sisters, whenever you get an urge to show kindness or give something to someone, always obey it. I mean, pray about it, make sure it's the spirit guiding you but there's so few people that just show kindness.

But when they heard David say that, all his assistants went, time out. If you want to show kindness to somebody in the street, you go show kindness to someone in the street. Why do you say to Saul's house, Saul was the guy trying to kill you?

Now back in that day, if you became king and you replaced someone who was your enemy, you didn't only kill the king, the previous king, you wiped out his whole family because all those people were potential heirs or potential problems, potential insurrectionists.

David never touched Saul. He could have killed him twice but he didn't. And one time when he just cut off a piece of Saul's robe to show Saul that his intentions were good, he got convicted that he even cut off a piece of Saul's robe when Saul went into a cave to relieve himself and David happened to be in that cave with his men.

David said, what have I done? And his men were saying, what have you done? Stick a spear through this guy, he's trying to kill you. No, David says, no, no, God's gonna take care of things for me, I'm not touching anybody.

He's still the king, he's anointed by God to sit on the throne, I will not do it. How many would rather have God do it than us mess it up, right, and get involved? When they heard Saul's family, they were like, David, what are you made of, where do you come from?

But see, that's in the Bible so that we would know that God loves to pick and show kindness to people who are his enemies. He reaches out or else we wouldn't be here. Didn't some of us curse and use his name in vain?

Didn't some of us break, of all the 10 commandments, we broke them all like in a week? And what did he do? Did he send judgment and lightning and thunder or did he reach out for us in love? We're here today because God shows kindness to sinners, people who oppose him.

Who's the greatest apostle that we know of in the New Testament? The one who was persecuting the church. Why would God do that? To show us that anybody can be kind to family. If you're kind to your family, animals are kind to their family.

Well, of course be kind to your family. But Jesus said, bless those that curse you. When you're kind to people who are nasty and ugly to you, now we're starting to act like God. Anybody, someone said, oh, I'm loyal to my family.

Well, of course be loyal to your family. But that doesn't prove anything. Sinners do that. Jesus taught that. Sinners take care of their families. Bearers take care of their cubs. But they're still bearers.

But oh, when you start blessing people who are obnoxious. I saw someone being obnoxious to me the other day and I just determined to be kind to them. It was in a diner and they were really obnoxious. Just talking and I just, it was a battle.

But if you wanna do it, how many know God will give you the grace to do it? Just to be kind. You can disarm people. Soft answer turns away what? Wrath, it does. So David is a picture of Jesus Christ in reaching out to those, showing kindness to those who aren't worthy.

So they bring Mephibosheth to David because he learns that Mephibosheth is alive. And some of you know the story. On one of the nights when Mephibosheth's father Jonathan and his grandfather Saul got killed and the Philistines were attacking, he was just a little guy and a nurse took him and they're running, trying to escape the Philistines and they dropped him.

And he fell, it seems, among rocks and he busted up both his legs and doctors then forget about it. So he was crippled and he walked crippled for the rest of his life. He was all just stumbling around.

So they call from Mephibosheth, they send a messenger and they say, David wants to see you. And he goes, that's the end of my life. King David, as in the one my grandfather tried to kill, wants to see me.

I didn't even know he knew I was alive. I'm hiding out in Lodabar. That word means like Nowheresville. And he's hiding out and now he's been discovered. So when he comes to David, he falls at David's feet and he bows down in honor to the king.

But do you notice what David says to him? Don't be afraid. I'm not here to kill you. I'm here to bless you. That's the way we are with God. I don't know about you, how you grew up, but the picture I got of God, I never thought you could just approach him boldly and come just the way you are.

I thought he was gonna pound me. I know someone in the building here today, they were living so wrong a life that they thought that if they ever came to church, someone invited them, they thought if they come, the ceiling will fall down on me.

That's how bad I'm living. Isn't that the way a lot of us have a picture of God? And David says, no, don't be afraid. I'm not here to hurt you. I'm here to help you, to bless you. God's amazing. His assistants are saying, kill the guy.

It's from Saul's family. He could get a following and they'll say, put Mephibosheth on the throne. Kill him like every other king does. He goes, no, no kill, bless. I gotta show kindness to this guy. My goodness, thank God for his heart.

How many are happy God is full of grace? Put your hands together. Come on, let's really just thank him for all the time he's shown mercy to us. He says, Mephibosheth, I wanna do two things for you and this is why I closed, because I wanna represent Jesus Christ to you.

I wanna tell you two things Jesus wants to do for you today. He says, Mephibosheth, I'm gonna restore everything you've lost. That's what Jesus wants to do. You know the peace you used to have? You lost it or maybe you lost your soul.

Maybe you're not even a Christian. You have no direction. You have no meaning in life. Jesus came to restore what the enemy has stolen. And if you've known the Lord and you've drifted away from him, he wants to restore the calling that's on your life, the purpose, so you wake up in the morning and you have energy and excitement because you know God's doing a work in my life rather than that hungover, depressed, nothing feeling of every day is just a lot of nothing.

Jesus said, no, I'm gonna give you joy, unspeakable and full of glory. I'm gonna restore peace to you. Everything the enemy has stolen and you've lost, I wanna restore it to you. Now, I don't know what he wants to restore in your life, but for some, it's the years that the locusts have eaten.

You've lost years out of your life. And the way you're living now, come on, own up, be real. Some of us, if we were honest, you gotta look at your life. Is this the way God wants me to live? Is this life?

You go to work, come home, hopefully get a vacation, save, for what? No purpose, no meaning, no joy, no spiritual connection with God. Jesus said, I've come that you might have life and have it more abundantly.

I'm gonna restore what the enemy has eaten and taken. And these guys that are next to David, they're saying, what kind of crazy king do we have? Here's the enemy and he's restoring stuff. But that's what God's heart is like.

He just wants to restore and bless. And finally, David says, and here's what, Mephibosheth, for the rest of your life, you're gonna eat at my table, just like one of my own family. Other people see you as an enemy, but I'm gonna have you limp and crippled and all.

You'll sit at my table. Now, this is so unusual because the kings were known in those days to have the beautiful people sitting at their table, the rich and the famous. You know, I heard about a preacher who's on TV somewhere, and when he walks around, the cameras are on the first couple rows of the church as he's talking the first couple rows.

Like, sometimes I walk off there. And I learned later from someone who worked there that they screen the people who sit in the front, and they only let people who are really together sit in the front.

If you're a little ragged, if you're a little poor, no, you go in the back. We don't want you on camera. Oh, I'm so glad God is not like that preacher. Come on, can we say amen to that? Come on, really, let's thank God.

You're gonna sit at my table, and you know, everybody who was into themselves and into image, they must have looked down and been nervous, came late to probably every meal. It's hard when you're crippled.

But then again, someone dropped them. And a lot of us are crippled today in some way because someone dropped us. We went through something that we didn't ask for. But the Lord says, sit at my table. Now, what does that mean, sit at David's table?

I'm just thinking, wait a minute, he prepares a table for me in the presence of my? What does that mean spiritually to us? What Jesus is saying to all of us today, he loves us so much. I see this so differently now.

I see it so deeper now. When people reject what I'm saying, it's gonna be bad in your life because you're tossing him aside, but he weeps. No wonder he wept over Jerusalem. Jerusalem, how many times I would you had you sit at my table, but you didn't want me.

And now, what you sow, you're gonna reap. But it's on you because I would have gathered you like a hen gathers her chicks. Brothers and sisters, what more love can Christ show? He died on the cross for us.

How much more does he wanna help us on a daily basis? But he says, come and sit at the table. Now, if Mephibosheth said, no, I don't wanna sit at your table. I wanna go back to Lodah Bar and eat there.

Well, then it's on you, and then you miss everything. But if you just sit at my table, I'll provide the food that you need, and you'll have the identity that you need, that you're identified with the king.

You're sitting at my table. You don't have to be a nobody. You can be a somebody. I sit at the king's table. He provides the richest food, the food that I need. And the Lord says to us today, sit at my table.

Let me feed you in my word. Let me pour my spirit into your life. Let me give you refreshing so you get rid of that depression. And instead of running out of gas and being depressed, I'm gonna feed you my word.

It's gonna come alive. That's the real food that we need. You go to a restaurant, eat a good meal, you forget about it within 24 hours, but oh, how many know when the Lord feeds you, you have food for your soul.

Can we say amen to that? He feeds us, and he gives us that privilege of sitting at his table. Oh, brothers and sisters, what do you need from God today? Jesus is saying to all of us, what kindness can I show?

Who can I show some kindness to? Anybody up in the balcony, do you need something from God? Jesus is wanting you to have it more than you wanna have it. But he came unto his own, his own received him not.

He reaches out his hands, and some people's hands are so full of junk from the world that they can't empty it and throw it down so they can hold his hands. Let's bow our heads and pray today. Before we sing that song, we're gonna celebrate his goodness.

Is there anybody here who's not ready to die today? That's stark. If you were to die today and you face eternity, you might have eternity without Jesus. Oh, I want God to show his love to you today and give you the gift of salvation.

Nothing for you to earn, just for you to believe and receive. Is there anybody here who comes to the church and you're here today and you've drifted away from where you know you need to be? Do you need to be with God sitting at his table?

You're not at his table. You're eating at every other kind of place. And what kind of food are you eating? Junk food, junk in, junk out. You're feeding on every video, on every movie, on every sports thing, on every newspaper, every magazine.

And what is it producing in your life? Tell me the great peace you have. Tell me the great joy you have. Jesus has something better for you. That's the way his love is. Always talks straight to us, just like a parent would.

Oh, Jesus, I pray today that your love would not be rejected but that your love would be accepted today in all of our lives. I pray that I, Lord, would receive every hour, every day, the kindness that you want to show me.

I don't have to convince you to love me. You loved me before I was born. You knew me and you loved me. Oh, Lord, take away Satan's lies and all the deception that he uses. Let this be a momentous day in people's lives.

If you're here today and would like me to just pray for you as we sing this song, we're just gonna pray over you that you will receive and have restored to you what the enemy has stolen. That you will come and sit at his table and identify with the king now like you never have.

And don't be afraid. And don't believe that lie. No, if I serve Jesus and really give up my life, I'm gonna miss out on so much fun. That is a lie. The only peace and joy you'll ever know is just serving Jesus, responding to his love.

Anybody here just stand that I could pray for? Or just, yeah, stand up and come forward. Come from the balcony. Say, pastor, that was for me. I need some things restored in my life. I see his love for me now in new light.

Just come out, thank you, sir. You could be a Christian for 20 years but the light just went on. I'm not receiving his kindness and his love like I need to. Just come and stand here. Come on, this could be the turning point in your life.

I don't care if there's two of you or 200 of you. This is what the gospel is, the good news. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever would believe in him would not perish but have everlasting life.

Does anyone want the gift of eternal life here? You don't have it. Come up. It's a gift. Jesus is handing out gifts. Will you receive it? Just get those hands that are full of so many other things. Empty them and just come open, empty.

Every eye closed. Is there anyone? We're gonna draw a line now. We're gonna draw a line. You either wanna sit at his table and you trust him or you wanna sit at someone else's table but choose today whom you're gonna serve.

Today's the day. I've told you how much he loves you and I told you what he wants to do, show kindness to you. You have to respond. Don't be afraid. Respond to Jesus and say, yes, Jesus, take away my sin.

Take my life. Make me what you want me to be and he will help you. He will bless you. He'll be the best friend you ever had. This will be the best day of your life. Can I just fight for one person who maybe is sitting in their seat and you're torn between two opinions?

Get up and say, no, I'm gonna serve Jesus. I'm gonna trust in his love and his kindness. Or if you've drifted away, do not drift any further. Come today, run. Come to the table. You'll be the happiest person in the world.

Is there anyone else I could pray for? Thank you. Lord Jesus, I thank you for my friends who have come forward. When we think of your love and your kindness, why have we lived apart from your love? What madness, what blindness.

How sin entices us. How could we be any place else but at the table of the king? Crippled in all, we bring you our crippled frame and our mess ups and our sins and our mistakes and our rebellions, and we plead with you today.

Please, we turn away from it. Forgive my friends, Lord. Forgive the men and women that are in front of me. Please forgive them, Lord. They're repenting now. They're asking you, they're telling you they're sorry.

Some have drifted away. For what? I've drifted away. For what, Lord? There's nothing out there but you. So we turn away from our sin. We turn away from our drifting. And we ask you to forgive us and show mercy on all these men and women that are in the front.