0:00 What a revolutionary thought that Jesus came not just for me but came to obey his father. It changes the way I think of my Christian life as not one that is centered in myself. 0:20 What can I receive? Okay, I receive salvation. I got a ticket to heaven. What else can I receive from God? What can I receive here on this earth? What can I receive for my children but or for my spouse or for my life here on earth but 0:37 what can my father get out of my life how can I obey my father Jesus at the age of 12 when he was found in the temple it says don't you know imagine 12 year olds here kids over here imagine saying this as a child or as a 0:55 young person he said don't you know I should be about my father's business. He came to this earth not the byproduct was the primary purpose he came was because his father said you need to go down to earth to die for shil 1:13 to die for each of and he said I'm going to obey he came about here he came down to this earth for his father's business that's a great example to me and so I want to talk about this how I can follow that example and be about the father's 1:29 business. Anybody who's a parent of Jenzers, you'll understand this progression. I once was called daddy by my younger kids. Then I became dad 1:46 and then now I'm just bro. Actually, I'm not even bro anymore. I'm bro. I just like just letters are just disappearing. I might be B next, I guess. just did a joke. That's the progression. And as disturbing as that might sound, it's 2:04 actually been a beautiful progression, at least in my life with my children to go from daddy to dad. And and I I see my relationship with Heavenly Father and Jesus. We're told that Jesus is the eldest brother among us. Uh he's the 2:20 eldest of the brethren. As we got adopted as sons and daughters of our heavenly father, we get to call Jesus bro. And but I want to talk about this progression. We heard about daddy from this devotional. I want to talk a little 2:35 bit about this progression from daddy to dad. A child calls her father or his father daddy. As they grow a little bit older becomes dad. What's the difference between daddy and dad? It's a question of maturity. It's a question of knowing I'm now a son. I'm 2:55 now I'm now a daughter. I'm not a child. What does that mean? All of us are called to be children of God. But not just that. All of us are called to be sons and daughters of God. What's the difference between a child or a son or a 3:08 daughter? A child is not necessarily obsessed about the father's business. A child when he sees dad, he might be more concerned with us. If you have a one-year-old or 2-year-old, they're like, "Okay, what what toys do you have 3:23 for me? What's the toy I can play with?" If the toy is taken away from me, it doesn't matter that you're there and you're smiling at me, I'm going to cry cuz I need that toy. What's the other mark of a child? When the father leaves the room or they 3:41 they said, "So, the father's not there. father leaves the room, he's just around the corner, they get anxious. That can be the testimony of our lives as children. We're about if we we can be we can come to a new covenant church like 3:53 this, we can experience salvation, but we can live lives of immaturity and just never grow up from being children. be a child that's essentially being more about what can I get from this church or it's got a good Sunday school program 4:10 for the kids or my kids will ra will be well raised around families like this or uh what can the Lord do for me financially or for my health or for uh my ministry and these are things where these are toys at the end of the day 4:27 these are toys or I get anxious when a situation doesn't go my way and I forget that the Lord's around the corner. He's right there. I can't see him. He's not in the room right now. That's a child's response. What is the son and daughter's 4:41 response? The son that grows up, the one that can call the heavenly father dad says, "I'm about my dad's business. I'm here for something much bigger than my job, my career, financial prosperity, my health, 4:59 my kids, my family, my ministry. Those are all means. Those are all gifts from God. My children are alone from God. They don't even belong to me. My body doesn't belong to me. If you look at the example of the two children, the two sons, you don't 5:16 have to turn that. I'll just walk through this real quick. The in the story of the prodical son, we have two sons, right? We have the youngest son and the older son. There's one thing common between both these sons. There 5:28 two odd very different things. uh about them. One was repentant, came back to the Lord. One was proud and was staying at home and uh just obeying every command but was expecting something in return. But there was something common about both of them. 5:42 I don't believe either of them at the time at the end of the story and we hope that both of them grew into this or repented and grew into this. But I don't believe either of them understood what it meant to be a son. How do I know this? We read about the 5:56 younger son. His response was, "Hey, my I'm eating this pig's food over here. My if I go home and I just tell my dad that maybe he'll let me be one of his servants and I can have some food." So, what did he come home for? He came home 6:13 for the food, right? What did the what did the older son say? The older son said, "Hey, I' I've obeyed every single command of yours. Everything you told me to do, I did. Not one command of yours have I neglected. But yet you didn't give me a 6:29 goat or celebrate me. So he wanted the food too. And I hope that younger son after he came home. And there's a sense of that when we see the youngest son when he comes home, we don't have to turn there. But he prepared something to say. He 6:44 prepared something to say to the to his father. He said, "I've sinned. Can you make me a servant?" But as soon as he said, "I have sinned," he didn't get to complete a sentence. You can read that in Luke 15. He didn't get to say, "Can 6:55 you make me a servant?" Because the father interrupted him and said, "Put a robe on him. Put my ring on him. Let's celebrate." The father said, "No, you are a son. Let's get to you. Let's get some sandals on your feet. Let me 7:09 give you my authority, which is what is signified by that ring, and let's get about the father's business." He didn't want him as a servant. And so we can see there that these are things that can distract us even if we're serving the Lord or we're 7:27 doing work in the home. Husband and wife might mind that say like can't you see I've done so much to support my husband over the years. I'm there's a sense of entitlement. How come he's not doing a sense of comparison? How come he gets the he gets the 7:43 celebration and I don't? And I believe the growth from child to son or daughter means we need to be redeemed from these things. We need to surrender. What does it mean to grow up so to speak? It means that I'm emptying myself 8:01 of these self-centered mindset that I have. The things that would have me be consumed with what can I get out of it? And it maybe but we we may not admit it to ourselves. We say no no no I'm not interested in it. But it'll be tested. It'll be tested when I 8:19 don't get the recognition. When I don't get a thank you for my service in the home. When I don't get a thank you for the meal that I cooked. When I don't get a thank you for serving in the church. If I was serving unto God and if I was 8:32 about the father's business, it wouldn't bother me cuz I'm not I'm not doing it for my spouse. I'm not doing it for my children. my children are not doing it for for me if they're serving if I'm serving the church. I'm doing it for 8:44 God. So there's no sense of wanting to have that gratitude. And you see at the end of the prodigal son story what the father was expecting. The father says Luke 15:31 he says son you have always been with me. All that is mine is yours. 9:00 That's all it is to be a son is say I am content to be with my father and know that all that he has is mine. What is he has? It's not physical prosperity. It's all it says in second Peter 1 that he has everything that pertains to life and 9:18 godliness that we can become partakers of his divine nature. That's that's the promise. He has everything we need for that which is of eternal value. that which is of the father's business. He's not promising me that I'm going to 9:36 live a long life here on the earth. I'm not going to get sick or I'm not going to I'm going to be very financially prosperous. So he's saying I have given you everything pertaining to life and godliness. Everything of eternal value 9:48 I've given you. And the son and the daughter recognizes that. So that what that's what we must be after. We must be after what the father said to the son which is Lord I just want father dad I just want to be with you I know all that you have is mine I 10:04 just want to be with you I want to be about your business and that's what we want to pursue is constant fellowship with the father in his presence is fullness of joy as we've heard recently at his right hand our pleasures forever more psalm 16:9 10:18 and that's my only experience over the last 15 years I would say is many things in my life I would say grew strangely dim. Many earthly pursuits I can't explain it but they just grew strangely dim because the sun got brighter and brighter and 10:37 brighter and I couldn't see the stars anymore. It doesn't mean that I don't have an interest in sports or in being ambitious and being successful at the company I'm working at or even ministering in the church. But those are 10:50 not idols. At the end of the day, I'm working before the Lord. I'm speaking at the church as if it is the utterance of the Lord so that he may be glorified. I'm raising children not as if they were my own, as if they were 11:03 on loan to me by God because they belong to God. I treat my body no longer like it's my own, but it belongs to God. It's been bought with a price. And so these things like academic pursuits for you young people, your career, 11:19 your family belongs to God. Your family can become an idol in your life. Ministry, overcoming sin, I'll say that again. Overcoming sin is a means to fellowship with the father. It's not the golden itself. You can take pride in that and say, "Hey, 11:37 even the even the oldest son in the prodical son's story, he obey he's claiming I obeyed every command." That was his goal was to say, "Okay, I'm going to obey every command." He was not content to say the reason I'm obeying 11:50 every command is because that's part of the father's business. And so, dear brothers and sisters, young people, I want to say, pursue intimacy with your father. Know your heavenly father as a dad. Fellowship with the Father is what we're 12:06 about. And all these other things will go strangely dim. If you're struggling with a sin that's plaguing you. If you're struggling with a habit that's plaguing you, stop trying to fight the darkness and turn on the light. What does that mean? 12:20 Say, "Lord, what I'm after is not victory over this sin." That's a means to an end. What I'm after is this sin is keeping me from intimate fellowship with you. It's poisoning me and it's separating me. It's it's like a power outage that's 12:39 keeping the light away from me and it's keeping me from being in intimate fellowship with you. Why would I want it for the sake of having intimate fellowship with you? I want to hate the sin. I want to stay with that's what it means to have the 12:52 fear of the Lord. I don't want to bring even a piece of this sin into your presence. I don't want to treat it lightly. May the father's business and fellowship with your heavenly father be your primary motivator for everything you do 13:08 for serving in this church as well. Romans 12 verse 1 and 2 we know this verse very well often shared often quoted Romans 12 1-2 says therefore I urge you brethren by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice 13:25 acceptable to God which is your spiritual service of worship. We've heard this many times. Worship is not just singing to God as some churches will have you believe. That's praising God. Worship, true worship, which you can sing about too. But true 13:41 worship is presenting your body as a living and holy sacrifice to God. Or to extend that I can say sacrificing everything pertaining to your life. your body, your family, your finances, your job, your academic pursuits, 13:59 your health, your situations, your trials, your cares. Offer it up to God. That's your spiritual act of worship. Verse two says, "Do not be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." And that's how 14:13 you prove God's will, that which is good, acceptable, and perfect. And there's a renewing of our mind every day. Every day the Lord will point us something in our lives which is conforming to the world and he's saying stop conforming. Renew your mind. Be 14:26 about the father's business. Here's an area of your life where you're not about the father's business. You're busy doing your own uh you you're pursuing something. It's starting to become an idol in your life. Renew your mind every 14:39 day. And that's why we believe the Lord the atomic unit is the day the Lord this is the day of salvation. It says in the Bible and the verse I quoted earlier, right, which is 1 Corinthians 6:19 and 20, which says, "My body is the temple 14:53 of the Holy Spirit. I no longer belong to God." How I use my eyes, they've been bought with a price. how I use my ears, how I use my mouth, what music I listen to, what gossip I listen to, what 15:09 social media I doom scroll, or what um shows I binge watch. Those are billion dollar eyes that the Lord paid for. They belong to him. How would you treat it knowing that he paid 15:27 a price to it? In John chapter 2, Jesus talks about the temple, similar passage to one Corinthians chapter 6. And he talks about the temple. And the people at that time, the Jews didn't understand it. And they thought he was talking about the 15:44 physical temple, but he's actually talking about his body. This verse spoke to me one John chapter 2 verse 19 to 21. It says Jesus answered them in John 21:19, "Destroy the temple and in three days I 16:03 will raise it up." And the Jews then said, "It took 46 years to build this temple and you will raise it up in 3 days." But he was speaking of the temple of his body. And we know that God, our heavenly father, raised Jesus Christ in 3 days. And I'm 16:17 here to say God, whatever you're dealing with, whichever area of your life has been unsurdered. God's calling is he can raise that up, too. And this verse was a little bit special to me because it said the Jews said it took 46 years to build this 16:31 temple. I'm 46 years old right now. And I'm and I read this verse and I said, "Lord, you're trying to teach me something here. There are parts of my life that I've sp I've spent 46 years building up whatever it might be. Pursuit of a 16:46 career, pursuit of academics, pursuit of some something in this life that is displeasing to you. And the Lord's saying, "Put it on the altar. Sacrifice it. Sacrifice all 46 years of your striving. I will destroy it and I will raise it up 17:04 with the father's business." That's the promise for us today. Whatever. Well, it's not a word of connation. It's a word like we heard. It's an invitation to renew our mind with something more the Lord disco Lord shows us today or 17:18 tomorrow and says, "Lord, I'm going to offer it up on the altar." As I was meditating on this, I thought about this. If my body and my everything about me belongs to the Lord, it belongs to the Lord. The moment I take back control of it and do my own 17:37 will in a way you can say I'm stealing from God. It's robbing from God cuz it belongs to him. The eyes belong to him. The eyes belong to him. My children belong to him. If I start to idolize these things, if these things start to 17:50 become an idol in my life, it is robbing what belongs to God. And there's a passage which talks about this in Malachi. Keep in mind what I shared from Romans chapter 12 which says we are we are called to offer up our bodies 18:06 as a living sacrifice. Malachi chapter 2 Malachi chapter 3 actually Malachi chapter 3 verses 8-12 says Malachi 3 it's the last book of the Old Testament Malachi 3:8 it says will a man rob God yet you are robbing me how have you 18:24 robbed me in this passage it's talking about Old Testament where the offering was meant to be tithes and lambs and bowls oxen but we know what an offering is right 12:1 We are offering up our body as a living sacrifice. So we think about this in new 18:41 covenant terms. It says how am I robbing God? I'm robbing God in offerings and not offering that which he has called me to offer up to him. The thing in my life that I have not offered up to him. that pursuit in my life, that situation, 18:58 that relationship, that bank account, whatever it might be that I'm not offering it up to him is robbing God. You are cursed for the curse, for you're robbing me, the whole nation of you. Verse 10, bring the whole offering into the storehouse that there 19:16 may be food in my house and test me now in this, says the Lord of Hosts. What happens if I offer it up? If I offer up everything, I will open for you. See, if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it 19:35 overflows. That's the promise. The Lord, it's a trade. I surrender everything to him. To the extent that I surrender, he's God and overflow for me. An overflow of the father's business. An overflow of the likeness of Jesus. the likeness of 19:53 Christ in me. That is not for some self-centered goal to say, "Oh, I'm a good Christian." But that will make me effective in doing the father's business. That's all about his glory. Overflowing with his glory. Verse 11 says, "Then I will rebuke the 20:09 devourer, the thing that has been destroying you, your flesh, the enemy that has been stealing, that has been conspiring with you to steal, to devour. So it will it will not destroy the fruits of the ground, nor will your vine 20:22 in the field cast its grapes and everyone will call you blessed. And if you're struggling with unfruitfulness in your life and you see an area of your life that's not unfruitful, take the challenge or the invitation from the 20:34 Lord as you've heard today to say, "There's an area of my life that I've not surrendered in this situation. There's a relationship. There's an attachment. There's an attachment to the things of this world. There's a love for the 20:49 things of the world that the Lord is asking me to surrender so that he can pour out pour out his holy spirit so that it's overflowing with me. And that's what I believe. When we are emptied, God can fill us with overflowing. What does he fill us up 21:06 with? I believe he fills us up with the fragrance of the likeness of Christ. If you turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 2, this is a passage which talks about where Paul talks about what we're supposed to carry with us as 21:24 Christians wherever we go regardless of the situation here. 2 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 12 he says now when I came to trrowass for the gospel of Christ and when a door was open for me in the Lord so what's 21:43 happening here a door is open for him to go to trass the lord has opened a door for him to go and witness to people in trass he says I had no rest for my spirit not finding Titus my brother he's not finding fellowship with somebody he 21:57 wants to fellowship with it's not his city of choice. But taking my leave of them, I went on to Macedonia. But verse 14, thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ. How does he lead us in triumph? He manifests through us 22:13 the sweet aroma of Christ, the knowledge of Christ in every place. So what happened to Paul when he went to Tras? No fellowship there, no Titus there, lonely. But he says even in trust wherever I go the Lord is going to lead me 22:32 triumphantly with how does what is the definition of triumph here? What's the difference of victory over here? It's a different kind of difference not victory over sin. Triumph is the sweet aroma of Christ. That's all it is. What is 22:44 triumph in your life? The sweet aroma of fellowship with Christ that you bring wherever you go. Whether it's a trrowass, which is a lonely place where you don't have fellowship, or it's a Macedonia where you have your Titus and your brothers and sisters whom 23:00 you're getting along with. Verse 15, for we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To one an aroma from dead to death, to the other an aroma from life to life. 23:11 There are going to be some in your life to whom the aroma of Christ will be an aroma of death. That's probably what happened in Trrowass over here. They didn't want they didn't want to hear about Jesus. And that's okay. Don't 23:24 judge your Christlikkeness based on another's response to your spirit. They're ones going to look at you and say like, "I want nothing to do with that. You're a nut. You're a Jesus freak. You know, that's that's too that's too politically incorrect for me. 23:41 Sorry. I can't go along with that." Don't let that change your conviction. That might be an aroma of death to them even though it's the fragrance of Christ to you. But to the one who is inclined, to the one who is open to to your children, to your spouse, 24:00 it will be an aroma of Christ overflowing to people in the workplace. I'm not loud about witnessing in the workplace, but I keep things like I keep a I've got a picture of the good shepherd reaching down to the sheep or 24:14 people come to me and say, "Hey, I see the way you interact with people under you." And it's no different from the way you interact with your boss. There's something different about you. You don't seem to be stressed out when your boss 24:23 is yelling at you. What's what's going on? I was like, "Glad you asked. Let me tell you what makes me different. What does that picture mean over there? Glad you asked. Let me tell you the ones who have to the ones who want to smell that 24:37 aroma of Christ the Lord will invite it in. We invite the opportunity but for others it may be an aroma of death and that's okay. And this is what the Lord's invitation for us is. So I want to challenge you. What is besides your 24:49 words? What is the aroma that's coming out of you? You may say all the words. You might give out tracks to people. You might witness to people and say like hey you need to follow Jesus. But if they see you anxious in a difficult situation or getting angry, 25:03 you might tell your children, you need to follow Christ. You need to memorize the memory verses, you need to follow, you need to give your life to Jesus. But if they see you yelling at your wife, like okay, kind of no different from the 25:17 dad of this other kid in the way they operate. Do they see the aroma of Christ? The aroma of Christ in you in your relationship with your spouse in your children is going to be a greater witness to evangelize them for the 25:30 kingdom than any word you can say. Psalms 23. This is what it means to overflow in difficult situations. Psalms chapter 23. Many of us have memorized this passage. So we should know this verse. It says you prepare 25:48 verse 5. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You have anointed my head with oil. It's a picture of the Holy Spirit coming down. My cup overflows. That means not only have you filled me and taking care 26:04 of my life so my life can be about the father's business. That's my cup. My cup is now overflowing. It's overflowing. And what is the proof of that overflow? Verse six, goodness and loving kindness will follow me all the days of my life. 26:22 Wherever I go, that's the proof of the overflow. I'm overflowing goodness and loving kindness. There's an aroma and a fragrance of goodness and loving kindness that is following me wherever I go. My wife should be seeing the the 26:37 overflow of goodness and loving kindness wherever I go. My children should be seeing that. That's what's going to build up my family. That's what's going to give them that fragrance. That's what's going to build up that church, 26:48 build up our church. I have a quick video that I want to show, a couple of videos actually. So, Sham, if you can cue that up that I recorded yesterday. Uh, that to me is a simple representation of how I believe the Lord has called us to overflow in 27:07 our families and in the church. I think you may know where I'm going 28:07 with this. We've heard the picture of the first floor, second floor, and third floor. I like to picture it this way. Cup, bowl, basin. building your up your family, building up your church. It's much simpler. It's not complicated. In fact, if you 28:26 complicate it, you will maybe destroy the church. And that's why I was trying to show with these two videos. Overflow from your cup. Overflow from your life, the fragrance of Christ into the bowl, which is your family. That's 28:38 all it is. It's as simple as that. What the Lord is speaking to you. What does that mean? Psalms 50 vers Isaiah 50:4 is a verse that we've heard many times. It says, "The Lord is the one who awakens me every morning." So every day when you 28:52 wake up, it's not your alarm clock that woke you up. If you wake up with a little indigestion in the middle of the night, it wasn't your indigestion that woke you up. It's the Lord that woke you up. That's what the Bible says. 29:05 He woke you up. What did he wake you up to to require of you? Isaiah 54:4 says he woke you up to listen as a disciple. That's the first thing I do every day. Each of us should be doing saying I'm going to listen to the Lord. What is 29:19 listening to the Lord mean? It means that I've I've uh engaged in that phone conversation with the Lord. Whatever he would speak to me through his word, through my spirit, I'm going to listen to it. But guess what? I'm not 29:33 going to hang up that phone call ever. I think one of the one of the sisters in our church uh shared this beautiful story about how she keeps in touch with her children who are in different places. In the evening, she starts a 29:47 FaceTime call, a group FaceTime call with her children, and she just keeps it running and they're busy doing their homework, their college work, and she's doing some kitchen work. And then sometimes she'll speak or one of them will speak and say 30:03 something. That's how I like to picture prayer. When it says, "We're called to pray at all times." It's just this long running FaceTime call with the Lord. Lord, you've woken me up to listen to you. I'm going to listen to you all day. 30:15 Sometimes there may be silence, but I'm not going to hang up the call. I'm not going to be out of tune. I'm not going to hang up the call. I'm going to keep that all so that when you speak up and say something, I'm ready to listen. 30:28 And when I speak, I know you're listening cuz the connection's there. And that's how I see praying at all times. So I start there. I listen to the Lord. The Lord speaks to me and then I'm convicted and the Lord uh challenges me 30:44 to an area of my life like that through the renewing of my mind to be a little to be more like him. And I take that seriously and the spirit of that there's a fragrance of that that overflows then to my family. My wife sees that, my 30:59 children see that. the cup overflows into the bowl. And then as a godly family, we take those things seriously and we come together as godly families in the church and the bowls overflow into the basin. But now if I take my 31:15 mind off of these things and I try to say, you know what, uh, I'm going to I'm going to do it my own way. I'm going to feed something of the world into my system. I'm going to serve with my own strength and not with the fountain that 31:28 is flowing into me. And that's a picture of what we saw. What is that? What is it that's contaminating? And we have to be really careful about this. We may say all the right words, but are we under the fountain of God? Are we going out to 31:41 the side? And you saw that red red liquid coming in. So the first thing is we're emptied, but then what are we filling ourselves with? And then that corruption of the world now creeps in to your siblings, to your children. That 31:57 attitude, that complaining attitude can be like that red liquid. It now creeps in. That unkind word. The children heard hear the mom speaking in a rude way to the dad and now they start speaking unkind to to each other in an unkind way to the parents and then 32:15 you bring that attitude to the church. So you can see the effect of overflow. Yet if we surrender all of it to the Lord, the Lord will effectively use us to overflow. So don't try to manufacture something to encourage another person unless the 32:30 Lord has spoken to you first, right? Unless he's filled your cup first. And don't come to the midweek group on Tuesdays or Fridays to share a word with the other brothers and sisters if you have not first encouraged your spouse at home or 32:47 your children at home. Otherwise, you're just going straight from cuppet to the basin. You've forgotten about the bowl. take it seriously. You have no business showing up to the midweek group and sharing anything if you've not 32:58 encouraged your spouse or your children. And if you if you're excited to come here and hear a message here and listen to the word of God over here, but you're not excited to listen to your spouse or listen at home, then there's a fault. Then you're going 33:16 straight from the cup to the basin. And I believe it is as simple as this. The cup, the bowl, the basin. This is how the Lord wants us to overflow the fragrance of the Lord. We heard this passage from Jeremiah 48:11 a few weeks 33:28 ago which is about Moab, right? Moab has been at ease since its youth. It has been undisturbed because it has not been emptied from vessel to vessel. The Lord will use situations on life to empty us out. And the last part of that verse says, 33:44 therefore, it retains its flavor and its aroma is not changed. The reason you retain your flavor or your aroma is because you have not surrendered that area of the life of your of your life to the Lord. And the Lord wants to transform it and say if 34:02 you offer up it to me I will open up the windows of heaven overflow and not only will it fill up your cup will overflow into your family. And this is what we see from Jesus's life. We see that Jesus Jesus from 12 to 30 he spent more no 34:18 time preaching the gospel. He focused on the second floor. He was submissive to his parents. He was building up his family at home. That was that was the bowl for him. I encourage all of you brothers to spend a little bit more time 34:30 reading the black letters of the gospel. What do I mean by that? It means that it's the it's not the red letters which Jesus spoke but it's the letters where it's it's the words of what Jesus did in private those are a picture of his 34:47 first floor second floor third floor the fragrance the aroma of Jesus that was in his life and not just his words and this is our calling as well like Mary at the feet of Jesus sitting not from a place when we serve in the church we don't want to serve 35:02 from a place of Martha ministry from a place that's saying oh what can I do how can I get busy when we serve in the home we don't want to serve with the strength that is coming off our own we want to seek 1 Peter 4:11 says we serve with the 35:15 strength that God supplies so that in all things God may be glorified so if you're serving but you're not seeking God for strength if you're speaking and you're not seeking God for utterance God is not glorified there are many people 35:28 in this world who are serving many charitable organizations God is not glorified because they're not seeking their strength from the Lord. Your service at home not glorifying to God. Martha's service in the kitchen was not 35:39 glorifying to the Lord. And we see that picture of Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus. In fact, Mary sat at the feet of I don't know if you know this, but Mary actually sat at the feet of Jesus in two different occasions. There's a story in 35:50 John 12 where um it says that Mary came at the feet of Jesus and anointed his feet with a perfume and the perfume filled the room. That must be our testimony as well that we anointed Jesus at sitting at his feet. And in that same 36:05 story, it also says, interestingly enough, in the early part of the verse that Martha was busy in the kitchen again serving. So may we examine our service. May we examine what we're doing we think we're doing for the Lord, what 36:15 we doing think we're doing for the our family and say, Lord, is it truly from a place where I've surrendered everything to you? Is it from a place where I am sitting at your feet? This is the Lord's desire for us to overflow for the 36:30 fragrance of the Lord. Let's not complicate it to be anything more than it is to overflow from the fragrance that he gives us into our families, into the church. And I believe building up this church can be as simple as that. 36:44 Amen.
