Out Of Weakness Were Made Strong — Carter Conlon

The Sermon’s Call to Depend on the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians 2, please, a message that's entitled, Out of Weakness, We're Made Strong. Out of weakness, we're made strong. Father, I thank you, God, with all of my heart for your presence in this church.

I thank you for leading us, Holy Spirit. God forbid that we should ever become a people of the flesh governed by the good ideas of men's minds. I thank you, Lord, that you have led us to be a praying church, a praying leadership, seeking the direction that you would have for us and giving us the courage to follow you.

Father, thank you, Lord, that you will keep this testimony alive and even beyond that, bring us into something of your life that many of us have only touched the surface of it. You have something very, very deep for this last day's generation.

Give me the grace to speak this, the physical strength to speak it, the mind to speak it. Lord, override the frailty of this physical vessel and be my strength. God, touch every heart and give us open hearts, Lord, as you knock on the door of our heart.

Give us open hearts, Lord, to hear your word. Don't let us become stubborn as a people. Father, I pray that we would always be a people who can be moved forward in grace. We can be led by you. Lord, we would not steal ourselves in a position or place and say, this is as far as I go and no farther.

Help us, oh God, help us, Lord. Help me today. And I thank you in Jesus' name. First Corinthians chapter two, I'm going to read the whole chapter with you. If you follow along, I'm reading from the new King James version of the Bible.

Paul’s Ministry in Weakness Rather Than Human Eloquence

And I, brethren, this is the Apostle Paul. When I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom, declaring to you the testimony of God. Now, Paul is saying, I came to you as a testimony of who God is, what God does, how he manifests his glory in an earthen vessel.

But I did not come to you with anything that points to any of my own ability. I came to you showing you there's a divine ability, Paul was saying, inside of my life, which is the portion of everyone who belongs to Christ.

For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. Now, Paul was saying, there is something given to us of Christ, something that was one. You remember the scripture says when he was raised from the dead, he took captivity captive and he gave gifts unto men.

Now, I don't want to know anything, Paul says, apart from the strength and the giftings of God inside my life. That's what he's saying. I don't want anything else. I don't want any of my human strength coming forward.

I don't want any of my own reasoning. I want the power of God to rest upon me. That's why Paul said elsewhere, all of my accomplishments and all of my achievements in life, I count them, but rubbish that I may win Christ.

I don't want any of that stuff in my life anymore. I want to be empowered by the spirit. I want to be led by the spirit. My message is about Christ. It's about what he won, about who he is, where we are seated in him at the right hand of God, about God's holy spirit coming in and dwelling in these earthen vessels.

And by every word of God, we live not by what we think in our own mind, but by the word of God, we live. Paul says in verse three, I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. Now, it may not have looked like that on the outside to some people.

Paul is describing what was going on in the inside. I was aware, in other words, of my own weakness. There was a trembling inside my heart and my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom.

You remember in the last days, it says there'll be a people of God even will be heaping together teachers, having itching ears, clever speakers, the Bible tells us who are not speaking on God's behalf.

They simply have, they're articulate. They have an ability to make people laugh. They have an ability to take common issues of life and they can tell stories and tales and even somehow try to interweave it within the things of scripture, but it's all human wisdom.

It's not led of the spirit. Paul said, my speech and my preacher were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and the power. In other words, I was empowered to speak what I spoke and there was something in your heart that bore witness to it.

The trembling that I feel, you begin to feel. You knew that God is using this human vessel, Paul, to speak to me, an awareness of the spirit of God, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

The Hidden Wisdom of God and the Mind of Christ

However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age who are coming to nothing. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the ages for our glory.

In other words, there was a plan in the heart of God, even before the creation of the world, to redeem a people unto himself and to indwell these people as his physical temple on the earth. This is a wisdom that is hidden from the people of this world who do not know God the way we do, which none of the rulers of this age knew.

For had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. If they had known what they were unleashing into this world, those who live in darkness, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

If they would have understood that the death of Christ was ushering us by faith back into a relationship with the living God, where we would be brought out of weakness and into strength. We would be brought into this power of an endless life, being lived out inside of our life, they would not have crucified Christ.

But as it is written, verse nine, I has not seen nor ear heard, that's the natural eye, nor the natural ear, nor entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for those who love him.

Do you believe this? Do you believe that God has something bigger for you than what you see for yourself? Do you believe that your life is more if it's fully surrendered to God? If it's empowered by the Holy Spirit, if you believe the word of God, do you believe that your life is destined to be more than what you think it is?

But God has revealed them to us through his spirit. Remember Jesus Christ said, when the spirit of truth is calm, he will guide you into all truth. He will take what is mine. In other words, you'll take my victory that I won for you.

You'll take the giftings of God and he will show it to you. He will show you things to come. Those whispers of God, don't you love them? If you don't know them, you got to get to know them. Those whispers of God, when you read, you're reading the word of God and suddenly that whisper of the Holy Spirit comes into your heart, this is for you.

This is something I'm going to do in your life. But God has revealed them to us through his spirit. For the spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of man, which is in him?

Even so, no one knows the things of God except the spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.

These things we also speak not in words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. The natural man does not receive the things of the spirit of God, they are foolishness to him, nor can he know them because they're spiritually discerned.

But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord that we may instruct him, but we have the mind of Christ. You know, in the book of Hebrews chapter 11, it gives us, I call it the hall of faith.

Made Strong Out of Weakness: The Witness of Hebrews 11

Those who were enabled by God to do things that ordinary people simply can't do. In chapter 11, verse 34, in the latter part of that verse, it talks about people in particular who were made strong out of weakness.

They became valiant in battle, that means they were given extraordinary courage. Even though they might've been fearful when they came to God, suddenly they were given a new spirit, a new heart, a new mind.

And they became other than what they had been before they had an intimate relationship with God. And they turned to flight the armies of the aliens. Instead of being in a defensive position all their life, they went on the offense with God and they began to push back darkness.

And God was able to use their lives in spite of their beginnings of weakness. God was able to use their lives to do exploits and to prove one more time to this world that it's not by might nor by power, it's by my spirit, says the Lord.

The beauty of this whole thing, it was not in their strength, but in their weakness that the strength of God was discovered in their weakness. Now this is foolishness. Verse 14 says, to the natural man, foolishness to the person who doesn't understand the ways of God's spirit, foolishness to the person who's believes that they're strong enough somehow to walk with God in their own strength.

Foolishness to those who believe that we can be governed by our own minds, we can be led by our own instincts and somehow survive by our own strength. The ways of the spirit are hidden from that kind of a person, even in the body of Christ.

It's when we finally discover how weak we really are without God. If you feel weak here this morning, you are closer to God than the man beside you that feels strong. I'll tell you right now, you are a candidate for the strength of God.

Moses, Joshua, and David: Learning Dependence Through Failure

Moses, for example, from his early days, he knew what his calling was. He had that whisper of God in his heart that he was called to deliver his own people from captivity. And yet at 40 years of age, at the peak of his strength, the peak of his ability to speak as Stephen said in the book of Acts, the peak of his influence in the secular government at that time, he set out in his own strength to bring about the deliverance that he felt rightly so God had called him to bring to his people.

But he failed to understand that God is not looking for the strength of man. God's not looking for the wisdom of man or the plans of man. He's looking for a people who are able to be led and empowered by his Holy Spirit.

And so instead of delivering millions of people from bondage, he buries one Egyptian in the sand and flees into the wilderness for 40 years. Joshua had a wonderful, wonderful victory going into the promised land, listening to the voice of God surrounding the city called Jericho and watching what God alone was able to do.

But it didn't take long for him to shift from this dependence on God to leaning on his own reasoning. And he was soon approached by a group of people called the Gibeonites who disguised themselves as friends when in fact they were actually enemies.

And he took their testimony and didn't seek God and ended up in the long run, having to defend something that he was called to defeat. You see, when we walk in our own reasoning, we can end up actually defending an enemy, something that was in our life, something that we were called to bring into subjection to the Lordship of Christ.

We can actually end up defending our practice. Even if our practice is contrary to scripture or bringing weakness into our life, we can say, well, God knows, God understands, God is merciful to my struggle.

And just like with King David, a young man who knew great victories in the beginning, could stand against a lion and a bear and a giant. He could sing songs that drove the devil from King Saul. Yet at a certain point, the natural man, you see, we do have these two natures, folks.

You've got, as a believer, you've got the spiritual man or woman, and you've got that natural person living inside of you as well. It's your old nature that wants to always rise up and take over and lead you.

And David started trusting his own instincts instead of God. And he came to a wrong conclusion. And he said, I shall one day perish at the hand of Saul. So there's nothing better for me than to flee into the land of my enemies.

Can you believe that? Among the Philistines of all things, and trying to preserve himself and trying to secure his own future, only to find himself one day on the wrong side of the battle. You ever think it might've got into his mind, what in the world am I, how did I get here?

One day he stood with the armies of Israel with a sling in his hand. On the other side of that valley was the Philistines and Goliath. And when he started, when he left off leaning on the Holy Spirit and started leaning on his own reason that he ended up on the other side of that valley with the Philistines facing down the armies of Israel being led by Saul at that time, only God could have delivered him from that place.

And we can end up if we're not careful on the wrong side of the battle ourselves. I love the fact that the Christian life, the beauty of the Christian life is that in our weakness, a power beyond our deepest hope suddenly becomes known to us in our weakness.

Folks, look, listen to me, especially those that are younger. I've been at this a long time now. I've been over 40 years a Christian now, and I've learned this. It's not in our strength. The kingdom of God moves forward.

It's in our weakness. And that makes it the most beautiful kingdom in existence. God takes the weak to confound the strong. He takes the foolish to confound those things that are wise in their own wisdom.

He takes the nobodies and the nothings of this world and things that are despised to bring to nothing everything that stands against God in opposition to him and its own strength. Paul says, I was with you in weakness and fear and in much trembling.

I was with you so that you could see something greater than myself carrying me and manifesting his power through me. Oh, I thank God. Oh, I thank God. I thank God with all my heart for these truths. In chapter two, verses seven to nine, we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, which was the hidden wisdom, which was ordained before the ages for our glory.

God’s Strength Revealed Through Moses and Joshua

And Paul said, there's a wisdom that we speak of the victory of Christ, the willingness of God to give his Holy Spirit to us. When we ask the willingness of God to make us into so much more than we could ever hope to be, to give us giftings of the Holy Spirit, which are abilities of God that we don't naturally possess.

And you see what, when we're living in the natural, we can't, we can't move to the spiritual because we're still trusting in ourselves. If the natural men would have known what they would have released, as I said earlier, they would not have crucified Christ.

The men of this world, they would have let him go and declared him King. If they had known what they were going to be releasing into the world, but God has revealed them to us through his spirit. And we've received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit who is from God that we may know the things that are freely given to us by God.

You see, Moses was eventually called and he delivered a nation and conquered an army, not in his strength, in his weakness, not when he was 40 with a sword, when he was 80 with a stick, not when he was a powerful speaker, but when he stuttered, not was when he was full of confidence, but when his confidence had left him, suddenly he finds himself before a burning bush.

He finds himself before the God of all creation, the God of all creation, who says, now I have a man that I can use. Now I have a key that can open a prison door. Now I have a voice that can rouse the greatest army on the face of the earth, because I now have somebody who knows his own weakness.

I have somebody who I can work through. And when my power is made manifest, he will not touch the glory for he knows that this power has come from me and from me alone. Let this pulpit be a burning bush for you this morning, a place where you meet with God, a place where God starts speaking to your heart, a place where you start to understand God has allowed you to be weak.

God has allowed you to live in the wilderness. God has allowed you to exhaust your natural strength because he has a plan for your life now that is bigger than anything you could ever have imagined. Joshua, who had taken a city by listening to the voice of God and ended up embracing an enemy by listening to his own voice, comes back to listening to God and they conquer an entire land and nobody could stop him.

And he himself recognized it's not in the power of human intellect that this battle is won. It's not by clever reasoning. It's not even by counsel where they took counsel, but not from God, only from each other.

It's not by strategy. It's not by committee. It's by the spirit of almighty God. When God speaks, David, the king was delivered from the consequence of his own mistake and he was restored to his rightful place.

And he won great victories for God. When he came home after trying to live by his own ingenuity and trying to survive by his own instinct, he found himself in a place where it seemed like everything was lost.

Have you ever felt that? His future was lost. His family was gone. His integrity was in ashes and the men around him wanted to stone him. And so what did he do? He called for the garment of intercession and he began to pray.

And when he sought the counsel of God, again, he found the strength of God. Again, he found out who God is and always has been willing to be for every generation, every person, every individual, every man, every woman, every old person, every child.

He found out something that you and I need to rediscover again in our generation that out of our weakness, God's strength can be manifested one more time. He doesn't need our strength. He doesn't want our plans.

He doesn't need our human effort. He doesn't want our reasoning. He wants our obedience. He wants us to pray and he wants us to walk in the way of the Holy Spirit. And David got up and he began to pray.

And he said, Lord, shall I pursue? Shall I pursue? He had only 600 men and there was a whole army that he was fighting against. The numbers were astronomical that were against him, but God said, get up and pursue and you shall without fail recover all.

We've lost a lot in this nation, in our generation. It seems like we've lost our schools. It seems like we've lost a whole generation. It seems like our college students are being radicalized against God and country.

But I say to you and me in our weakness, get up and pursue. And without faith, we shall recover all again. If we don't believe that out of our weakness, we can be made strong, then we have learned nothing from history.

We've learned nothing about God. We've learned nothing about scripture. And we have indeed as a church testimony in our generation come to a screeching halt. We've literally hit a brick wall where we can go no farther.

We're not affecting our communities. We're not winning our society. We're not winning the moment. The enemy is dancing around our families. But in almighty God, if my people were called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and seek my face and seek my victory and seek my word and seek my power and seek my glory and seek my strength.

If my people called by my name will humble themselves and pray, humble themselves means I can't do this. Humble themselves means I'm in the wilderness because I've tried to do this without your strength and you've not let me succeed.

Lest flesh and exalted self above the name of Christ shall humble themselves and pray, seek my face and turn from their wicked ways. There is a point, my brother, my sister, that walking in the flesh in the kingdom of God is a wicked thing.

There is a point where the denial of God, prayerlessness becomes a wicked thing. It is not a good testimony in the sight of God or in the sight of heaven. Then I will hear their prayer, forgive their sin and heal their land.

The Church’s Responsibility in a Darkening Generation

We're at a pivotal moment in the history of this country. The plan of God has always been through his church. I thank God if he gives us a moment of breathing by divine intervention at whatever level he chooses to do that, at whatever secular level, I thank God for that.

But the ultimate plan of defeating darkness is in the hands of God's people. It's not in government, it's not in the Supreme Court, it's in the hands of God's people. That's why it's more important in this generation than ever before that we recognize that God is willing to give us back his strength in our weakness.

All it requires is honesty. All it requires is humility. All it requires is an honest assessment of where we are and stop the bragging and stop the trumpet blowing and stop that boasting and just say, this is who I am, Lord.

I'm in the wilderness and I'm weak. I feel like you called me a while back and I blew it. I tried, didn't happen. I couldn't do it. That's where God's to you. I know you couldn't do it. That's why I didn't allow you to be successful in it.

We turn back and we just say, Lord, I've been trying to survive by my own instincts and it's led me into defending things that I should be defeating. God, forgive me. Forgive me, Lord, for trying to even use your word to defend a practice that I know is wrong, clearly.

Forgive me, God. Forgive me, Lord, for trying to walk by my own ingenuity and not leaning on you. Forgive me for stealing myself in pride and saying, no, this is right and I'm going to stay on this course and this is where victory is going to be found.

The Altar Call: Surrendering Human Strength to God

Here's my altar call. I want to be a spiritual person. I want to be a man or woman, whatever the case is of the Holy Spirit. I don't want to be governed by my own strength. I recognize that God is willing to give me strength.

He's knocking on the door of my heart. If I will open, he says he will come in and he will sit down with me and sup with me. That means he will spread before me a table of provision and strength. Even in the presence of my enemies, he will stretch out this table.

But I need to open my heart and I need to recognize, Lord, my ways are not your ways. I ask you, Lord, to guide my life. I ask you to lead my life. I ask you to take me where you want me to go and make me into what you want me to be and give me what I need to complete the journey.

It all has to come from your hand now, Lord. You have something deeper. You have something greater for me than what I have for myself, something more profound, more powerful. Yes, it may cost me something, but think of the cost to others if I don't follow this path.

I want to be a man or woman of the Spirit. Now, Father, I thank you, Lord, for the word that you have spoken today. I thank you, Lord God, for the testimony and witness of your Holy Spirit in this service today.

All throughout our time of worship, I'm sharing every part of it, Lord. You have borne witness to something that you are calling again a people to yourself who out of weakness will be made strong. All we can do is do what people have done for thousands of years.

We bend our knee before you and say, Jesus Christ, be Lord of my life. Holy Spirit of God, be my strength. Guide me, guard me, empower me. Open my eyes and give me vision for what my life is supposed to be.

It's bigger than what I can see with my natural eyes. Help me, Lord, to be delivered from my own thinking. Help me, God, to be delivered from my own ways and bring me into that place of power that can only be found in a weakened vessel.

I thank you, Lord, that these things are hidden from the wise and the prudent in their own sight, but revealed them to babes. I thank you, God, that there's nobody in this sanctuary that's weak enough that they don't qualify.

I thank you, Lord, Jesus Christ, that you will make us a voice to be reckoned with in our generation. And you'll make us a living testimony that can't be denied, just like the Apostle Paul, that we can say your faith ought not to rest in the wisdom of man, but in the power of God.

And I thank you for this with all of my heart. As a church, I pray, Lord, that you would lead us into the future governed, guided, empowered by your Holy Spirit. I would ask that you keep this testimony alive, burning brightly, that no matter how dark the days get, that we can be a people filled with the oil of your Holy Spirit, pointing people in this generation to the coming bridegroom.

Prayer for the Fearful, the Failed, and the Weak

I pray, Lord Jesus Christ, for those that are among us today who are fearful and afraid and feel like such failures that they doubt that you could ever use them again. I pray that they would have the courage to get up and out of their weakness to be made strong.

I ask you, Lord, to give us a song in this church that we've never sung before, a depth of worship we've never known, a gratitude we've never fully expressed for your presence being lived out inside of our lives.

I thank you with all my heart for guiding us, for guiding me. I thank you, Lord, that you will keep this lamp burning. I praise you, God, with all my heart, that you are willing to make every person in this sanctuary and those that are listening online an evangelist, truly a living witness of who you are.

God, thank you. God, thank you. God, thank you. I praise you in Jesus' name. We're going to stand in just a moment, and I want you to get out of your seat in the balcony of the main sanctuary. If you just say, God, I want to be a man or woman of the Spirit.

I'm going to ask the elders and pastors if you'd join me here, please, at this pulpit. The scripture says, out of weakness they were made strong. That's my prayer for you today. They turned valiant in fight.

There was a courage, a supernatural courage given that only can come from God. You have to know it's all God to have that kind of courage. And they caused the armies of darkness to flee. So may that be said about us.

May that be said about this church. May it be said about you. Those who recognize your need, whether you're here at the altar or still in your seat, you recognize your need. May it be said of us when we get to heaven.

Out of weakness they were made strong. They became valiant in fight, and they put to flight these armies of darkness that wanted to swallow the testimony of God and steal hope from the whole generation.

They put them to flight by the Spirit of God, by the Spirit of God. Would you join me? We're going to pray. Father, thank you, Lord God, for your strength. We bend before you, Lord, and recognize that it's only by your Spirit, not by our might, not by our power, but by your Spirit that the victory is won.

A Church Empowered to Push Back Darkness

And so, Father, God, in Jesus' name, we ask you to make this a church of the Spirit. God, that we would be led of your Spirit, empowered of your Spirit, guided by your Spirit, enabled by your Spirit. Not just when we meet together on Sunday and Tuesday, but all throughout the week, everywhere we go, every single person, Lord.

God, that you would do exploits through us. Holy Spirit, that you would speak to us in our hearts and give us courage to face this day. That you would push back darkness, Lord, through the people who recognize their own weakness, Lord.

That you would push back darkness, for we know we can't do this in our own strength. There's no amount of cleverness that's going to push this dark day backwards. It has to be you, Lord. And so, we bend our knee to you, Lord God, and we ask you for the strength that only you can give.

God Almighty, we ask, Lord, for the grace to be the people of God that you have desired us to be. Not who we think we are, but who you have desired us to be. Take us out of our own thinking, out of our own ability or lack thereof, even self-loathing.

Deliver us from that, God, and bring us to a place where we say, it's all of Jesus. It's all Jesus. Everything is Jesus. My life is Jesus. My power is Jesus. My journey is Jesus. My cleansing is Jesus.

My righteousness is Jesus. It's all Jesus. My victory is Jesus. Anything I do for the kingdom of God is Jesus. It's all Christ in me, the hope of glory. Oh God, I thank you, Lord, for the testimony and the witness of scripture, and the fact that you are opening our eyes to these great truths again.

Lord, we're not looking for something new. We're looking for something old to be made new again. And God, we just thank you for bringing us back to the upper room, back to that place where out of weakness, they were made strong.

Out of their own failing, they stepped into the marketplace and saw 3 ,000 people bend their knee to Christ. God almighty, these same ones brought the gospel to us. And we ask, Lord, that we might be used of you to bring the gospel of salvation to another generation.

Intercession for Children and the Next Generation

Have mercy on our children, Lord, in this country. Have mercy, Lord, from those that are murdered in the womb to confused in grade school to told there is no God in high school and radicalized in college.

Have mercy, Lord, God, for the enemy has come in and crept into this whole society and is darkening the minds of our children. We call out to you, Lord, as they once did, the children of Israel. And then you found a weak man.

And you said to that weak man, I've heard the cry of my people, and I've come down to deliver them. And so God, we come to you as weak men and women, Lord. We come to you in our weakness. We come to you in our foolishness.

We come to you in our inability. We come to you with all of our mistakes and our failings and our failures and say, oh, God, speak to our hearts and we will obey you, Lord. Lead us, God, and we will follow.

Call us, Lord, to be deliverers in this generation. We will allow you to do your work your way. God, give us the grace to obey you. And Father, we thank you with all of our heart today. God, I pray for my brothers and my sisters at this altar today, Lord.

Let the grace of Christ be on them. Let there be a new awareness of a new life being lived out inside of them, oh God. Give them strength, Lord. Give us strength as a church age, Lord. God almighty, forgive us, Lord, for trying to promote your kingdom as a church age, God, in a way that it can't be promoted.

Make us men and women of the spirit again. Oh, Holy Spirit, come. Jesus, you said, if you know how to give gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask?

So we ask today without reservation, Lord, we ask for your Holy Spirit. God, empower us. Visit us, Lord. Lay us on our faces. Whatever you have to do, do that, Lord. This is the cry of my heart and the cry of your people.

God, we thank you, Lord. With everything in us, we say thank you. We thank you, oh God, and we praise you, Lord. We bless you, Jesus, for what you are doing and for how you are going to do it among us.

Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Lord Jesus,.

Closing Prayer for Strength, Humility, and Renewal

Thank you for hearing the cry of our heart today. Lord, we want to serve you in our generation. Thank you, Lord. In our weakness, you have found something to work with. Lord, we just pray, oh God, that we would truly believe, Lord, that no matter where we find ourselves today, Lord, if we will look to you, oh God, you will lift us.

If we look to you, you will strengthen us. Lord, it is not finished, Lord. You love us so much and your work in us, oh God, is a real thing. We thank you, Lord, that the weak are made strong even to the enemies being put to flight.

Lord, we know it has to be you. Lord, we know in this last time, Lord, you will not share your glory with flesh. Lord, we glory in our weakness because we know the next step has to be by the spirit and you will get all the glory, that your church will be unified in humility and your church will be unified, Lord, in calling on your name and taking the next step in the power of the spirit.

Lord, we will know the things of the spirit because, Lord, we're walking that way. That's how the church will truly know each other. So, Lord, we thank you for the hope today that you've not given up on us, that you love us, that there is a way forward in the power of the spirit, which is available to every believer, that, Lord, you've canceled out, Lord, our sin, but our weakness will make us dependent on you, that the mighty power of the spirit may flow again to defeat darkness.