Jesus, teach us. Help us learn from your word. Help us learn from what you've taught us and show us something about ourselves and about each other and about you that maybe we didn't realize before. I pray all this in your name. Amen. All right, let me ask a question real quick. I think many of us can relate to this. Have you ever had someone in your life that you would describe as a kindred spirit? Are you familiar with that phrase, kindred spirit? That's a phrase I wasn't familiar with until I got married, and my wife made me watch this show called Anne of Green Gables. Has anyone here seen Anne of Green Gables? Yeah. It's great. It's a great show. This is what happens when you get married. Those of you who are single, when you get married and like you start to share things you're passionate about with your spouse, and they have to, they have to watch. Like they have to enjoy it with you, right? So there were movies that I was like, oh Megan, you've never seen this movie, we have to watch this movie. And then she's like, well, if I'm gonna watch your stuff, you've got to watch my stuff. And her stuff's worse than my stuff. It just flat out is. My stuff's way better. And so I have to watch all these things. Like Anne of Green Gables, I'm not complaining. Guys, if you've never seen it, let me just frame it for you. If you've ever been deeply curious about what life as a 13-year-old girl in rural Canada was like in the 1900s, like the early 1900s. If you've ever sat around and thought about, like, man, I wonder what a 12-year-old girl up in Nova Scotia was doing in 1912, watch Anne of Green Gables. They'll tell you all about it. And the the simple answer is not much. Not much. They don't do much. They walk around, they have dinner. That's really it. That's all that happens. But somehow it's turned into like a 12-hour show that you have to watch. I'm not bitter. But I've watched a lot of Ann of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlee, and I've watched them all. And one of the things that Anne talks about is kindred spirits, you know, having a person that you're just connected to. And I think we've all experienced that to some degree. We've all had people that, you know, we we like, we have shared interests with them. That's great. But then we also have people that like we just click with these people. It's like we share the same spirit. When I was in college, I had a friend named Kevin, total kindred spirit. And the way we met was actually kind of awkward. Um, I worked at a chilies near where I went to college in Kansas City, and then my my freshman year after college was done, my college got hit by a tornado. Just got like my car got totaled, it was crazy. And because of that, like I had to move back to Springfield where my parents were. So I moved to Springfield and I just transferred from my Chili's up in Kansas City to the Springfield, Missouri Chili's. So I show up one day and I'm just like the transfer. I'm the new guy. And I come in, I'm meeting all these new people, and everyone at the Chili's starts talking to me about how they I remind them of a guy named Kevin. They're like, oh, there's this guy named Kevin, and he works here. He's not here right now because he's actually on his honeymoon, he just got married, but you and Kevin, you guys are like brothers. You remind me so much of Kevin. And for days, for like a week and a half, all I hear every day is about this guy named Kevin. People come in, people I haven't worked with yet. They worked with me for about an hour. They're like, Have you met Kevin? I'm like, no, I haven't met Kevin. You know, it's really, really weird to hear about some person that apparently you would really click with. Well, then Kevin comes back, and it just so happened that the first few days he was back, I was I was gone. And so Kevin's hearing all about this new guy named Justin. Everyone's like, oh, there's this new guy from Kansas City named Justin, and you guys are like brothers, and you even kind of look alike and talk alike. You guys would really click, you should be friends. Then came the day where Kevin and I were scheduled together for the first time. And it was the most awkward experience of my life. Have you ever tried to set someone up on a date? Has anyone here ever been that person? You're like a matchmaker, you know? Like if you ever see people do that, they do all this work to try to make these people fall in love. And then when the people meet, there's all this like expectation. Because they put so much into it, they really want it to work out, so they kind of like look and they're like, oh, are they clicking? And they're like putting their fingers together in a really creepy way, and they're, you know, they're way too into it. That's what it was like for me and Kevin. That's what it was like because all these people had been building it up, like you and Kevin are gonna be great friends. You and Kevin, you're you're like the same person, and we meet, and we're just standing there, and I was like, Oh, you're Kevin. He's like, Oh, Justin. And all the people around us are like, guys, guys, look, it's it's happening, it's happening, everyone come. But they were right. Kevin was awesome. Kevin and I were like, I mean, literally could have been brothers. We clicked right away, we had all these things in common. We start talking, we had a blast, and we did even sort of look alike and talk alike. In fact, we used to use that to our advantage to have fun with people who would come in. And so if we were bored, we would like trade off where I would start a table. I would go up to them and say, Hi, my name is Justin. I take their drink order. Then Kevin would come back like a minute later with their drinks and just keep talking as if there hadn't been a change. And then he would like get their food order. I would then come back a few minutes later with a refill and talk to him and say, hey, your food's gonna be out really soon. And we just like go back and forth, and it was awesome. Because number one, when you have a waiter, usually you don't like look him in the eye. You sort of pay attention to them, but you don't always like really make eye contact. And about halfway through, the people would look at us and they'd sort of, you could tell they wanted to ask, like, are you the same guy who was just here? But that's a very strange question to ask someone. So they just wouldn't, and we would just have fun messing with people. We had a blast. We had a blast. Kevin's awesome. Guess what Kevin does now? He's a pastor, that's right. He's a pastor in Michigan. I just got off the phone with him earlier this week. It was it was awesome. So sometimes you just have people that you click with. It's like a kindred spirit, more than just a friend, someone you really deeply share a connection with. And we have this tendency of thinking that's a really rare thing. But what if I told you that it's actually far more common than you maybe realize? In fact, what if I told you that you have a shared connection deeper than you can really even know with thousands and thousands of people on this planet? Millions, really. In fact, in this room right now, there are hundreds of us who should be able to describe one another as kindred spirits. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. Now, for some context, if you're just joining us, we're in a series right now called United. We're studying Ephesians middle of chapter two through the middle of chapter four, where the writer, a man named Paul, talks all about how we are united as believers. If you're here this morning and you're not a Jesus follower, you haven't figured out kind of where you stand with that, so glad that you're here. Just take it in process. But for those of us who would consider ourselves Jesus followers, we have to understand that the desire of our Lord, the desire of Jesus, was for us to be united more than we really value most of the time. In John chapter 17, Jesus is praying. This is right before he goes to the cross. He says, Now I'm departing from the world. They are staying in this world. But I'm coming to you. Holy Father, you've given me your name. Now protect them by the power of your name so that they will be united just as we are. John 17, 23, a little bit later in the same prayer, he says, I am in them, you are in me. May they experience such perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me, that you love me as much as that you love them as much as you love me. So he says, God, make them so united that the world knows that you sent me. Paul, who wrote Ephesians that we're studying right now, also wrote in 1 Corinthians, I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, you can tell Paul's almost begging. Like I'm saying, I'm coming to you, I'm begging you in the name of Jesus, he says, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church, rather be of one mind, united in thought and purpose. Be of one mind, united in thought and purpose. We are called, challenged, encouraged, desired by God to be united together. To be deeply united together. And guys, we live in a time when our world needs to see some semblance of unity. More so than any time I can remember in recent history. Like, is our world united right now? I mean, it used to be, well, we could say, hey, the world's not united, but we are the United States of America. But right now, there is more division in our nation. It's popping up every single day. And there's no one around us that seems to really care about unity. You may follow this in the news, but my heart broke when I read that there were 11 people murdered in a synagogue attack that happened this weekend. One of the things that we love as a church, we talk about it a lot, is the tree of life. That's a symbol of who we are as a church. We we say that we're a tree of life church. And the name of the synagogue that was attacked in an act of racism and violence was the tree of life synagogue. I read that, it just made it hit close to home. And if you look at the response from politicians, the media, you name it, there's only one thing that anyone's trying to do, and that's that's shift blame. Point fingers. There's no unity. Like the elected leaders that we have, they don't they don't even care about coming together. We live in a culture right now where if you disagree, we we villainize you. If you don't hold our values, if you didn't vote for who we think you should vote for, we think you're a horrible person. So we don't live in a culture right now where we see much unity. What I'm saying is that is that our country needs the church to show it what unity looks like. Our our country needs the church to be the church and to live unified. Jesus needs us to fulfill that dream that he had for unity. Because where else, where else is our culture going to see that? We have a responsibility to be unified. And what's amazing is that because of Jesus and our relationship with him, we are so much more united than we think. Last week we talked about how we're united by blood, that the blood of Jesus has made us blood, that we are actually family in God's eyes. We've been adopted into God's family. So sitting around you right now are not fellow church members or churchgoers or Cherokee County or Cobb County residents. Sitting around you right now are brothers and sisters. And in God's eyes, like it's it's legit. You're brothers and sisters. But we have to learn to think about each other that way, to treat each other that way. We're united by blood. Today, we're going to continue reading in Ephesians chapter 2, verses 18 through 22, when we find something else that we're united by. He says, Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us. So now you Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens along with all of God's holy people. You are members of God's family. Together we are his house, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. And the cornerstone is Christ Jesus Himself. We are carefully joined together in Him, becoming a holy temple for the Lord. Through him, you Gentiles are also being made part of this dwelling where God lives by his spirit. So we talked about this last week. If you weren't here, the movement of Jesus began in the Jewish community. The Jewish people and the Gentiles, a word that just means anyone who's not Jewish in Scripture. The Jewish people and the Gentiles, they lived very separate lives. But all of a sudden, the movement of Jesus began to break those barriers down, and people are coming from all walks of life, from all races, ethnicities. They're all coming to Jesus, and so this amazing thing is happening in the church that really doesn't happen anywhere in culture at that time. People are just coming together. And they're united. And they're united by the blood of Jesus. But but what it says here is that they're also united by the Holy Spirit. By the Holy Spirit living in us. Now, I want to talk for a little bit about the Holy Spirit. And this is always a fun conversation for me. It's a really fun conversation for me because when you talk about the Holy Spirit, it just really depends on who you're talking to. It can get can get very awkward very fast. In fact, I was uh I was talking to someone not that long ago, and this is a person who knows that I'm a I'm a pastor, they know that I work at a church, and they were talking to me about another church, okay? And there was no one around us. It was just us, no one in the room. I'm saying I'm telling you that because what's about to happen next is you need to understand for the context. They said, Well, they're they're one of those churches. And I was like, Oh, what do you mean? And again, no one's around us. They went, they whispered, they went, like a Holy Spirit church, you know? And I was like, Well, shouldn't they all be? You know? And it's so funny because when you start talking about the Holy Spirit, you get this wide range of responses. For example, I'm not doing this to to like sift anyone from anyone else. Um, how many of us grew up in church? Like at a fairly young age, we started going to church, okay? Those of you who didn't raise your hands, you don't have to feel bad. A lot of us have so much that we have to unlearn just so we can connect with God. And sometimes I'm a little jealous of those of you who don't have to unlearn all that we had to, right? You got to come in fresh. But those of us who did grow up in church, raise your hands one more time. You grew up in church, at least from a young age. You guys are responsive this morning. Amen. Um, how many of you grew up hearing often about the Holy Spirit? Okay, so I'd say maybe half. You guys, different than the first gathering, only about a quarter raise their hand in the first gathering. But it's amazing how the vast majority of us that raised our hand saying, Yeah, I grew up in church, did not raise our hand saying, yeah, we talked a lot about the Holy Spirit. Which is crazy because Jesus talked about the Holy Spirit all the time. Some of Jesus' most powerful promises involved the Holy Spirit. The New Testament talks about the Holy Spirit left and right. If I handed you a Bible and you read it and believed it, you would walk away believing that you need the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit's gonna give you all these amazing gifts and abilities, and you're gonna rely on the Holy Spirit. And yet we don't talk about the Holy Spirit much because it's just kind of weird. God the Father, we get that. The Son, Jesus, yeah, I get that whole dynamic, but Holy Spirit, like what's that all about? So sometimes we just avoid the hard the hard topics or the confusing topics, and the Holy Spirit doesn't get nearly enough air time. But make no mistake, according to Scripture, the Holy Spirit is God. Like when we say God, we mean God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They are all God. All of them. Three persons, one God, and if that's confusing, it's because it kind of is. It's God. And you know, it's it's like shampoo, conditioner, body wash, and one. I usually use that analogy, it's a real thing. You know, it just solves the whole Trinity problem. Just go by that and you'll understand. But the Holy Spirit, according to Scripture, is every bit as much God as Jesus or the Father, and yet, so often it's like this one aspect of God that gets amputated from the conversation. And that can't happen. Because according to Jesus, we need the Holy Spirit. And according to what Paul writes here in Ephesians 2, it's the Holy Spirit that unites us. That we're joined together by his Spirit. That the Holy Spirit actually brings us closer to one another, that we all share the same Spirit. We see the Holy Spirit all throughout the Bible. If you read the Old Testament, by the way, the Holy Spirit shows up. You never know when he's gonna show up. It only happens every once in a while. It's kind of sporadic, but when he shows up, something big's about to happen. In fact, I think most of us have a real life example of that very thing that we can all relate to. How many of you feel a positive emotion when you hear this music? Guys, go ahead and cue that up. How many of you get positive and excited when you hear this? We all know what this is. Does anyone in the room not know what this music is? Okay, good, good. We all understand this. You guys can stop that. That's the ice cream truck music, right? Do you remember what it was like to be seven and hear that music? The panic that would happen inside of you? Because there was never like a forewarning. No one ever came by the day before and said, hey, tomorrow, four o'clock, ice cream truck's coming, be ready. You had no idea, it was never on a regular schedule. It wasn't like the ice cream truck comes around once a week at the same time. It was just like you had to be ready. You just had to be ready because at any moment you hear that music and you knew you've got like 30 seconds, and you freak out and you run, you find your mom, you're like, mom, money now. You got it's gonna be now, mom. Why do you have such a giant purse? Give me five dollars, and you like freak out, you find money, you run out your yard, you're like waving money at this truck, you know, flagging it down, the truck stops, and then 15 minutes later you made your choice because it's like 500 different varieties of ice cream. And the pressure you felt as a kid, when you hear that music, it's like ah that's like the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. You never know when he's gonna show up, it's always sporadic. There's no way to like to predict when it's coming, but when it does, everyone freaks out because something big's about to happen. That's not the perfect analogy, okay? All analogies break down at some point. But in the New Testament, things change. When Jesus shows up and dies on the cross, everything changes. And the Holy Spirit goes from being this entity, this person of God, that we can encounter every once in a while when he shows up, to something very intimate for us. For example, Romans puts it this way. Chapter 8, verses 15 and 16. You've not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God's spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him Abba Father. These are scriptures we've read many times. For his spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we're God's children. So when you give your life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit actually comes and joins with your spirit, actually comes and lives inside of you. Now, some of us are like, yeah, I hear that. I believe in Jesus, I don't think I've experienced that, I don't feel like that. But time and time again, Scripture makes it clear that if you've given your life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit is in you. I mean, go back to verse 20 in Ephesians 2. He says, Together we are his house, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, and the cornerstone is Christ Jesus Himself. We are carefully joined together in him, becoming a holy temple for the Lord. Now that word temple to the people this was written to meant the dwelling place of God. That's where the presence of God lives in the temple. And now we're the temple. Through him, you Gentiles are also being made part of this dwelling where God lives by what? His Spirit. And so if you've given your life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit is in you. Now you may need to grow in your ability to discern the Holy Spirit, to feel the Holy Spirit, to communicate and understand when the Holy Spirit's leading you into something, that's fine. We can all develop differently. But but make no mistake, if you belong to Jesus, the Holy Spirit is in you. And if the Holy Spirit's in you and in me, and in the person sitting next to you, and in the person that it's behind you, if the Holy Spirit's in the same person who lives in another state, another country, another part of the world, if it's the same spirit that lives in us, what does that make us? Kindred spirits. That we literally share the same spirit, regardless of your background, regardless of how you grew up, regardless of your skin color, regardless of your country of origin, your ethnicity, your socioeconomic status, regardless of what you do, regardless of who you vote for, what you believe about doctrine or politics or anything, regardless of all of those things, you have the same exact spirit living in you as your brothers and sisters in Christ. It's the same spirit. That's pretty awesome. But we often don't think about one another that way. We often we often see people who like the same football team that we like more as kindred spirits than the people who share a faith that we share in Jesus Christ. That's challenging. You know, I'm a I'm a big Duke basketball fan. Anyone want to boo? Go ahead, boo. Hey, that's better. Like it used to be. I'm getting to you guys, you know, that's good over time. Or maybe you're you're you're like numb to it. When I meet someone who's a Duke basketball fan, I kind of freak out on the inside. You know, I'm like, ah! It's like a kindred spirit thing. Like, maybe this can be a new buddy of mine, and we can talk about basketball and we can have these conversations, it's just gonna be great. And you know, Duke has a really great team every year, and are we cheating? Probably, but like, you know, we can live in in like blind joy right now until you know, whatever. So I really don't think we're cheating, but you know, it's kind of suspicious. Whatever. Okay, so anyway, like I meet someone who likes my same team and I get excited. Do I get excited when I meet someone and I find out they they they love Jesus? Like if I meet someone and I find out that they love Jesus, do I feel the same joy? Do I just have the same like, oh man, you love Jesus? I love Jesus. We have so much in common. Let's talk about Jesus. Let's get together, let's hang out, let's let's talk about all the things God's done for you in your life. I want to I want to share with you what He's done for me. Like, let's talk, because we're kindred spirits. We often don't feel that way when we meet another Jesus follower. We're so quick, so quick to dismiss the very thing that unites us more than anything in this world. We are kindred spirits because we share the same spirit. Do we love each other like that? Do we treat each other like that? Do we get that excited? When we meet one another and talk with one another. Like we we go to church together, right? Yes? We're in the same room? You with me? Okay? And and and I'll just be honest, I sit, I like I stand here every week almost, and I scan the room, and most of you all sit in the same spot. You know? There's a few of you who are kind of shifty. Like every once in a while, like I see like Sinatras. You guys are about two rows further this way today. Usually you're like right there. Am I right? Am I right? So what are you doing? You're messing with me. It's freaking me out a little bit. Like, come on. You know? There's a very few of you will go from like here to there the next week. You know? There's a guy in the first gathering named Bob who I guarantee you has sat in the exact same seat for like six straight years. He is he's a constant. He's like the North Star for me when I'm standing on stage. Like he's always in the same spot. We're creatures of habit. How many of us, and I'm not saying that I'm not making you feel guilty by the way, I'm just saying like maybe we should see each other differently. How many of us have sat in the same relative seat for years, about five or six feet away from the same people, and we don't know their name? Like we see them and we go, you know? Hey. Is it because we just maybe don't see them as brothers and sisters, and we don't see them as kindred spirits? Is it because we don't maybe realize the deep connection that we have? That we're not united by proximity and we're not united even by our church affiliation? Like if I drive down the street and I see a car in front of me with a bumper sticker for a different church, do I go, that's my brother, kindred spirit? Do I feel that? Like I should. And that gets to me. It really does get to me because I'm realizing that what what Paul is describing here, this deep connection, this love, this unity that should exist between Jesus followers. Like I don't, I don't often see that in the church. I don't often see that in my life, and that has to be different, that has to change. We're kindred spirits, but it doesn't always always feel that way. It doesn't. And we can be okay with that. We have to be okay with understanding like why? Like, why don't we feel like kindred spirits, even though we are, according to scripture? And the answer is because we're very different. We're very, very different. Even though we share the same spirit, the same spirit seems to manifest in very different ways in all of us. There's a lot of people that I know through this church, and I'm like 100% confident that if not for this place, if not for being united through this church, I would never have hung out with you ever before. Probably we would never interact at all. We don't share the same interests, don't have the same personalities, don't have the same tastes. And it's almost like God did that on purpose. Like he did. In fact, we see this 1 Corinthians chapter 12 would be the classic chapter in scripture. Paul talks about this a lot because the the church in Corinth, like they just they couldn't get along. He's like, look, there are all different kinds of spiritual gifts. In that church, certain people were elevating their abilities and saying they were more important than other people because they could do this and other people couldn't. And he's like, look, there are there are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same spirit is the source of them all. There are different kinds of service, but we serve the same Lord. God works in different ways, but it is the same God who does the work in all of us. He's like, look, y'all are very different people. You have different ways of being wired and different ways of living out life, but it's the same spirit that's the source of everything. Sometimes it becomes so easy for us to fixate and focus on our differences. It's not hard to focus on the differences in the people around us, is it? That's what amazes me about being a dad with four kids. You know, it's funny. If you buy the same ingredients at the grocery store and you put them together with the same recipe, you tend to get a very consistent meal, right? That's not how children work. It's weird. Same ingredients, same recipe. Megan and I are the same two people, same DNA, and yet somehow every child comes out totally different. Different in like every way imaginable. It's a surprise when you have kids. You're like, oh, this one doesn't ever shut up. That's this one, that's awesome. This one doesn't have a mute button, you know? This one has more energy than is humanly possible. This one can stay up till 4 a.m. just by willpower alone. You know, this one can't stay awake in a car for more than five minutes. So everywhere we go, they fall asleep, and we have to wake them up to unbuckle them, you know. This one likes this kind of food. This one hates the same kind of food. So now we have to buy all kinds of like it's the same, we're the same people, Megan and I, yet we have these human beings that that we produce that are totally different. And it's so easy to spot their differences, and it's easy for them to do the same. They fight so much. We try to do things to make them like get along, and it's so hard. The only solution we found is just to make them hug each other if they get in a fight. Like that's the best. Just hug. You're gonna hug each other for like five minutes. You're gonna hate it. You're gonna hate it so much you're gonna love each other. And and they get frustrated with each other. Sometimes I end up coaching my kids on things that I'm horrible at. That's a very convicting experience as a parent. When you're telling your kids things in the back of your mind, you're like, I'm not good at this at all, but I'm talking to you as if you know you should be. Yesterday, my oldest was was really frustrated with our four-year-old because they were supposed to clean the basement together. And you know, she's four. And so he was mad because she's not pulling her weight, you know. And I'm like, dude, when you're four, we didn't make you do anything. He was an only child at four years old, so he we were like, you didn't do anything at four, and so she's actually ahead of you when it comes to helping out around the house, but that didn't really work with him, and he's just frustrated because she's not doing what he wants her to do. And I said, Okay, dude, hold on. Think about it this way. Let's say I gave you soup, and he reminded me that he hates soup, and I was like, it's an analogy. Okay, I'm not gonna make he doesn't like soup, which is silly. Soup is wonderful. So if you were hypothetically eating soup and I handed you a fork, would that be a frustrating experience? He's like, Yes. Why? Because the soup would just fall through the fork. Okay, okay, so you would be frustrated because the thing you're using isn't capable of doing what you're trying to do with it. Well, what would happen if you said, you know what? Forks are useless, forks don't work, forks are horrible, all the forks need to go away, all spoons. Everything's a spoon now. And you know, don't you love it when you have kids who think they're smarter than you? That always happens. Because he's like, Well, Dad, you know, a lot of the things that you use with forks you could technically use with a spoon as well. I'm like, I okay. Like, are there any foods that are better with a fork than they are with a spoon? He's like, Yeah, okay, okay, thank you. The point being that sometimes you need a fork, sometimes you need a spoon, maybe you're frustrated with your sister because she's a spoon and not a fork, or the other way around, and I'm frustrated and confused. And I'm just saying, like, you get the analogy, right? Sometimes we get frustrated with people because they're not doing what we want them to do, but maybe they're actually wired to do something different than what we think they should be doing. And that happens with the church. Paul uses a different analogy, the analogy of a body. Read, read first first. I just developed a lisp on on command. Did you hear that? That was awesome. Everyone read 1 Corinthians, chapter 12. Okay. 1 Corinthians chapter 12, read that. And Paul goes on and on about how we're we're the body of Christ. That we're the body, and some of us, it's like maybe we're an eye. But the eye needs the ears. Some of us are hands, some of us are feet, but we're all one body. And how silly would it be if the body all of a sudden decided only one part of the body is useful? We have these differences, but they're actually designed by God to be there. I love what Paul writes in first. I'm gonna have to, I'm freaking out every time I say that now. First Corinthians chapter 12, verse 13, he says, we have all been baptized into one body by one spirit, and we all share the same spirit. He goes on and on in that chapter to talk about how we're part of this body, and we have these different purposes and these different functions and different abilities, but it's one spirit. Worship team, you guys can make your way out. So far, I've talked about kindred spirits, ice cream trucks, and forks, and I know that those are very different topics. I'm sorry. I was hitting the eye this week, though. Did I mention that? So, you know, just consider that. If I could if I could tie a neat and tidy bow around this, all I would say is simply this. We are all very different people. We all have different strengths, we all have different weaknesses, we all have different viewpoints and perspectives. But we have one spirit, the same spirit that lives inside of us. That's a very special thing. And we have to make a decision as a church. As the church. Not just our church, but like all churches. We have to make a decision. Are we going to be unified or not? Are we gonna be unified or not? Are we gonna be like like everyone else in the world who lets petty differences determine who we who we talk to, who we converse with? Are we gonna get mad every time we find out that that someone differs with our opinion on some issue in the world? Or are we gonna be different? Are we gonna recognize the beauty in the fact that God has given us this one thing in common? That it does not matter where you're from, what you're about, what you're into, what you've done, your past, your background, it doesn't matter, none of that matters. It's the same spirit. And if I if I criticize a brother or sister in Christ, I'm criticizing the same spirit that I have. But if I cause division in the family of God, I might as well divide my own body. Because it's the same body that I'm part of. It is time for us to love each other like we're called to. It is time for us to unite together. You know, honestly, as a pastor, which by the way is not like my title, it's a job. I didn't even want it. But I love it. Because it gives me a very unique perspective. As a pastor, I don't ever want to stand here and ask you guys to do something and see you as like attendees. This is not an event. I don't ever want to like announce something and hope that the people who go to our church, like that's the wrong way of talking about it. And I I've been guilty of that way too many times to count. Like the people who go to our church, if if I describe you that way, I am way off the reservation. If you describe yourself that way, I go to that church. No, no, no, this is not a thing you go to. This is not a building, this is not an organization, this is an organism, it's a family. We should be united that way. We should love each other. And and I don't have some program to announce today. I'm not gonna start saying, hey, from now on, here's how we're gonna put this into motion. We're gonna start coming to this event and doing these things and all that. I'm just saying, like, we gotta love each other and talk to each other. We have to care enough about the fact that we share the same spirit that when we look at someone who sits three feet away from us and we don't know their name, we're like, I will not settle for that. That will not happen anymore. I'm gonna know that person, whether they like it or not. You know? And if they're weird, you just move to a different area. You sit over there now. You know? All that to say, I love you guys. I love you guys. I love this church, I love this family. I love, I love that I've spent a third of my life here. I love that my children have grown up here. I love that I get to share in in the ups and downs with people in this room. I I love that I get to be here for some of the coolest moments that happen in your lives, and I honestly love the fact that I get to be alongside you when you're in a really difficult situation because this is a family and we are kindred spirits, but we've got to start believing that. I believe the church in America would be so different if we actually just believed what God says. If we just believe what God actually says. And He says we're united. So let's be united. Let's love each other, let's start talking to each other. Like I would love it, I would love it. I'm just gonna confess something to you guys. And I want you to know I'm not frustrated with you, but I used to be a youth pastor. Do you know how often I had to tell the youth to stop talking to one another when I was teaching? It was like, guys, please, for one second. I would love it if one Sunday I had to do that with you. That would be amazing. If you were so connected to each other that you're like, oh yeah, that guy's talking now. You know? Now, like, within reason, okay? Don't get out of hand. But do you know what I'm saying? I would just love, like, let's let's have community. Let's decide to do it. Not decide for the church to plan a summer event where we have blow up games and stuff, and then we'll come and we'll sit. No, no, let's just decide that every single morning when we get together, we're gonna talk to each other, we're gonna pray for each other. Let's decide to walk up to one another and say, How are you doing today? What is your name? You're my brother. How can I pray for you? Is there anything going on in your life? Can I come alongside you? Let's just make a decision to do that. I'm gonna decide to do that. Dan, you've been married for like a week. How's it going? You probably have to say thumbs up, but like, yeah. Actually, Renee, Renee, how's it really going? Good. She said good, not great. She said good, Dan. You know? Like I look around this room and I see these people, so many of you, I love you guys. But I haven't done the job that I need to do to connect with you. I don't want this to be a place where we just say the same small talk stuff that we say to everyone else in our lives. I don't want to walk around on Sundays anymore and just be like, hey, how are you? Oh, I'm great. I've been busy. Yeah, me too. Okay, cool. Well, the weather's sure nice. Yeah, awesome. That is not a conversation kindred spirits have. That's a conversation people who don't like each other have. I love you guys. Let's start acting like that. Let's start talking like that. Let's start serving like that. Let's start loving each other like that. Does that make sense? I'm all right, good. So I can shut up now, and we can just do that. Okay? So here's what I just want to ask. I'm gonna pray right now. We're gonna sing another song. It's a good song. It's about the Holy Spirit. So I didn't even have to whisper when I said this, but the Holy Spirit. But when this song is done, you have a choice. And there's but no pressure. There's this is never a place with pressure. Some of us have places to go, places to be. Like, we gotta get out of here, right? I don't know. Maybe mingle for like five minutes. Linger, talk, pray. Find someone around you that you haven't talked to, someone you maybe haven't connected with in a while, someone you've never met, and just take two, three minutes, five minutes today. Who knows, ten minutes? Hang out, have a conversation, sit in the coffee shop, sit, sit across from someone and talk and pray. And let's begin to be united and live united because we share the same spirit. It's real. This is a real thing. All right? Alright, pray with me. Jesus, thank you so much for this amazing group of people. Thank you so much, God, for this church. I believe that you are you are doing things in this place. Lord, I believe that you're working in our hearts. God, I believe that you have a purpose for this church that we haven't even tasted yet. I really do believe that you have something this church is meant to do that is powerful and unique. But God, I also believe that that will not happen unless we're united. God, I believe that we're meant to be like a chariot. And a chariot is only powerful because all of the horses are going in the same direction. All of the horses are united together with the same purpose and the same goal in mind, God. And if we're all going in our own directions, if we're only focused on our own desires, our own wants, our own needs, our own problems, if that's all we care about, if we just come together on Sundays to sing a few songs and learn a little bit, and then we go our separate ways, we will never be the church that you've created us to be. And so, Lord, I'm asking that you would unite us together. I'm asking, God, that you would give us a love for one another, that we would have a genuine curiosity in the people around us, that we would actually see one another as people capable of teaching us things that we can never know apart from them. That we would understand, God, that the people you put in this place have so much to offer. That we have the ability through you, through your spirit in us, to teach one another amazing things about life, to help each other in our in our biggest areas of weakness, to come alongside each other, to see things that we were we'd be blind to otherwise. God, I pray that you give us a love for one another, unite this church together in a way that the church has never seen before. So that people will know that you are real, that you are powerful, that you are holy, that you are good, and that your love really is the glue that holds us together, that your love really is what unites your people. Jesus, we want to fulfill your dream of being a united church. And that's not gonna happen because of a program or some type of initiative. It's only gonna happen by your spirit being inside of us and growing our faith. And so I pray that that happens right now, that we begin to do that, that we just say, Holy Spirit, bond us together like never before. It's in your name we pray. Amen. I love you guys a lot.