Happy Mother's Day. So glad you're here. I hope you had a delightful weekend filled with

fellowship and joy and God.

My oldest son, Judah, asked me and my wife a good question the other day. He asked us

how wind can shape rock over time. How can it change something so firm? How can it change

something so, so big and so strong? And I had to go way back into, like, the recesses of primary

education. I could not answer the question very well. We stumbled around trying to answer it,

but it reminded me of an important truth.

It reminded me that we as a people, as a church. And we as individual Christians are constantly

being formed into a kind of person and a kind of community. It's unavoidable, for better or for

worse, we are being shaped. We're being formed into a kind of church, a kind of body of Christ,

a kind of people with certain beliefs and certain affections and certain motivations and and

certain character. That's why I can laugh with my wife, how we met about 20 years ago, and I

can laugh with her about how we are completely different people.

It's almost like that old. First version of ourselves doesn't even exist anymore. And the same can

be said about congregations. I mean, think about this church which is 20 years old, around 20

years old now. It's changed a ton, especially in the past six to eight years. We are changing day

after day, week after week, month after month, and we are being formed by truth or by error,

by forces outside of our control. One of the things that is foreign to us as people in an

individualistic culture is the idea of. Being spiritually shaped, collectively we think about spiritual

growth as something that happens merely individually. But the New Testament is speaking to

churches, to the church. And so Christianity is both very personal and it is also very corporate.

It's very collective in nature. For instance, we are saved individually through Jesus Christ, and

yet we are saved corporately as a body through Jesus Christ. We are united through faith to

Jesus Christ individually. We're united to God through faith in Jesus Christ, collectively salvation

and redemption. And the spiritual life is both very personal and very collective. We are

constantly being formed and shaped into a kind of people and a kind of church, for better or for

worse. So let's consider some of the things that shape us together as a church. Well, I think the

most formative thing is the teaching and preaching that takes place in a church.

Are we teaching and preaching and hearing truth or error or think about church leaders Church

leaders and their character, what they say, what they do, how they say it, how they do it. Or

think of church members and the group life that you have together, or the influential members of

our church. How are they living? What are they saying? How are they saying it? Or think about

popular books that may circulate throughout a church and that people start reading these

particular books and those books start to form us as a people. Or think about traditions that

churches have. Every church has tradition, and I don't know if it comes as a surprise or you

already know this, but the Bible speaks to Biblical tradition and Apostolic tradition that not all

tradition is. Some of it is God made, some of it is Apostolic. Paul himself says we handed down

these traditions to you. And So what are the traditions of a church? Let's think about liturgy,

worship, liturgy for a second. Some of us might get scared of the word liturgy, but. But believe it

or not, every church has a liturgy. Even the churches who try not to have a liturgy that becomes

their liturgy, right. Every church has content that they teach and sing and pray. Every church has

form and structure And rhythm and cadence. Those are things that make up a liturgy of worship

and discipleship in the church. All of these things are forming us what is prayed and how it is

prayed, what is sung and how it is sung and the music it is set to. All of these things are forming

us collectively as a church. We're being formed. We're being changed and I myself see this

play out, for instance, when you come to church on Sundays like you are today. You may not in

that moment sense or perceive how you're being formed or how we're being formed, but you go

to church for five years in a row under good teaching, with singing and prayer and gospel

entered worship. And you look back over those five years and you see the cumulative massive

effect information it's had in your life and it's had on a church. So what is shaping you and what

is shaping us as a church Are the things that are shaping us shaping us into the image of Christ

Are the things that are taught and prayed and sung. Are those things forming us and shaping us

into the kind of church that Christ purchased us to be. Sort of the bedrock comfort in this line of

thinking is that Christ is building his church. I'm so confident of that, that God will finish the good

work He started in us, that he saved us by grace. He raised us with Christ, and he is forming us

into the kind of people he will want to be. He wants us to be. So we one day will be like Christ.

Christ will accomplish his will, and we can rest in that. We can rejoice in that But growth and

change and spiritual renewal is not automatic. It's not something that we drift into, just like

marriages don't drift into health and strength, just like kids don't drift into adulthood without some

kind of intentionality In our passage today, Peter presents two powerful truths that help

shape us and form us into the Church. God wants us to be. Two truths that form us and shape

us into the Church God wants us to be.

So look at First Peter chapter 4. Verse 7 through 11. The Word of God says this: “The end of all

things is at hand therefore be self controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers.

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins. Show

hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one

another as good stewards of God 's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles

of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies In order that in

everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion,

forever and ever. Amen.”

There are two transformative truths right off the bat that frame this whole passage. OK, the first

transformative truth is that there is a future reality, a future reality, and it is this that the end of all

things is near. The end of all things is near. Look at verse 7 again. Verse 7, The end of All

Things is at hand. That is framework number one. That is a transformative focus of the Church.

If we want something to form us and shape us as a community, if we want something to

motivate us towards perseverance in the faith, towards growth and godliness, If we if we need

something to sort of pull us into the destiny that God has saved us for, it is this that the end of all

things is near . How often do you and I think about the end of all things When you go to bed at

night, do you ever think about the end of all things? When you wake up in the morning,

do you ever think about the end of all things? Do you ever think about the last trumpet?

Do you ever think about the Archangel? Do you ever think about the heavens being ripped open

and the eternal Son of God descending with the glory of the Father and His holy angels? Do you

fixate your mind on this in Christ? If not, I can tell you it is one of the most transformative things

you could start to practice. The end of all things is at hand. The final judgment is coming. This is

why the Apostle Paul would say things such as this. We must all stand before the judgment seat

of Christ. Therefore we make it our aim as Christians to please Him. We make our entire life's

ambition to magnify Christ because he is coming And we must all stand before the judgment

seat of Christ. Can't you feel the weight of that The power of the end of all things In two

chapters, chapter three, you don't need to turn there, but you could write down verse 11 if you

want. Peter talks about in detail the end of all things. It's a powerful text. And then he says

something like this. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people

ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness? There is a purifying effect. For instance,

there's a purifying effect. To a fixation on the return of Jesus Christ. Are you fixated on the end

of all things?

It's a serious question to consider. It's like someone saying you have six months to live. When

you see the end of all things, the end of your life, doesn't that transform how you live now?

Wouldn't that change how you pray and change how you spend time and change how you

engage with relationships? Wouldn't that change how you worship here on Sundays? It would

change your life But the end of your life and the end of all things the age this age is near. It was

such a weird experience. As I was writing this, I thought of the movie ‘Back to the future”coming

out in the 1980s. And as I thought about that, I was driving downtown this week and I looked to

the left and there is some kind of building or wall and it has this, this frozen, this painted image

of something from back to the scene from “Back to the future”. It was really a strange

experience. And then I went back to the office and I'd forgotten about that picture and I started

to write again. And then I thought again of “Back to the Future”. So I think God wants me

to mention to you “Back to the Future” this morning. I have no idea why, but Marty McFly, he

goes back 30 years in time. And he encounters his parents before they're married. And he must

work to make sure that they fall in love and get married so that he can exist in the future. His

future, the future that he knows exists, he knows he lived in. It transforms how he's living in

1955. The future he knows transforms what he does and what he focuses on. And so, in the

same way, we must fixate on the end of all things, don't we? The second priority not only is the

end of all things near. The ultimate priority is glorifying

God. There's a future reality, but there's also an ultimate priority, and that is the glorification of

the Holy Trinity. All of your life, all of my life, my every breath, our church exists, guys, to glorify

the Trinity. All of creation exists to glorify the Trinity. Our worship is to glorify the Trinity Our

Bible study is to glorify the Trinity. Our prayer life to glorify the Trinity, Our life group engagement

to glorify the Trinity VBS in June to glorify the Trinity. Baptism service at the end of this month to

glorify the Trinity Your engagement with your mom, your dad, your grandparents, your grandkids

to glorify the Trinity. Your household exists to glorify the Trinity. Everything does Everything was

created tothe glory of the Trinity. In sin we felt short of we fell short of the glory of God, the

image of God.

We are redeemed by the Son of God, filled with the Spirit of God to be formed into the image of

God for the glory of God The Trinity 's glory and his glorification is the ultimate priority for our

church. And if that is sort of the motivating fabric or structure of our souls and our corporate life

together, man, we are going to be as dangerous to the gates of hell as a church we really will

be. And so we have this future reality. The end is near. We have this ultimate priority which is

glorifying God, and I love what he says here at the end of verse 11 in order that in everything,

God may be glorified . Through Jesus Christ. See, this is a Trinitarian statement. The Father

glorified through Jesus Christ. To him elong glory and dominion forever and ever And so look at

verse seven. There the end of all things frames the beginning of the text, and in the glory of the

Trinity, frames the end of the text There's a transformative focus here. It is the end, and it is

God 's glory. The end and God 's glory, guys. This if we can just fixate on these two twin realities

that at the end of all things, the Trinity will be fully glorified by creation and the end is near. If we

can focus on that, it's going to form us in significant ways as a church. So the question is, how

do these realities form us. If the heart focus, if the Church 's focus is the end of all things, where

the glory of God is pervading all of creation, how do these two realities form us as a church?

And Peter lays out four ways Four ways #1. Focusing on the end and God's glory makes us #1

spiritually alert. Look at verse 7. The end of all things is at hand. Therefore see the connection.

Therefore be self controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers .

Fixation on the end where Christ comes makes us a people, self controlled and sober minded

for the sake of focused prayer, Romans 13:11 says, “Besides this, you know the time that the

hour has come for you to wake from sleep, for salvation is nearer to us than when we first

believed”. Paul is saying that it's possible for Christians to become spiritually sleepy. To become

groggy. Have you ever been woken up by somebody out of a deep sleep that's just standing

right next to your bed? My kids do this all the time. My house is like a haunted house. My kids

just, I mean they're looking directly in my eyeballs. I roll over and bam, there they are, right

there. And my son, my oldest, did this the other day. He was just breathing on my face and then

he started poking me and I woke up and it's just dark. I can barely see this hovering head just

right in front of me. I basically jumped out of the bed. I went from this state of grogginess to

alertness like that, right? And Paul is saying wake up, wake up out of spiritual slumber. And in

verse seven there he says focusing on the end makes us self- control. This this word means

reasonable, it means sensible, it means keeping your head, it means being of a sound

mind. I don't really like the translation of self control. It means a sensible, reasonable, serious

minded person. You're serious about the things of God. You don't take yourself seriously. Like

I'm big on not taking yourself seriously. Like in the office. I am a jokester, you can make fun of

me all day long. I don't take myself seriously. But when it comes to these types of things Be a

serious minded person. That's what he's saying. The end of all things is serious. And then he

says be sober minded. Sober minded.I mean we get this, we get this idea inherently be clear

headed, be alert, be sober spiritually. Why? He says for the sake of your prayers. Verse 7. For

the sake of your prayers. Question if you and I are not serious and sober minded. If we're not

clear headed, can we be prayerful ? Will we be prayerful people. Do you think Christ Was

serious and sober minded about his life. Absolutely. Christ is the most prayerful man, whoever

lived truly human, so prayerful he prioritized. For he'd pray through the night if he had to. So

busy with ministry, he'd pray through the night I think we get so distracted mentally. We have

anxious minds. I struggle sometimes with fear and anxiety and irrational thought when I'm not

preaching truth to myself or praying. We have fear and unbelief. We have this illusion of control

in our minds. We have distracted minds, don't we, man? We have so much access to us, so

many emails, so many text messages. I have like 200 text threads on my phone. It's so

stressful. People can reach me at any hour of the day. They can reach you. Media . News alerts,

cell phones, binge watching, as many shows and movies as you want. No margin in our

schedules. And then we get choked out by our love for the world and love for riches and love for

possessions. We are anxious minded, distracted in our minds. And thirdly, I think we're careless

in our minds. We're not really serious minded by nature. What we really want, I think, in our

flesh is to have a stress free life, to live happy, to die happy, to not be stressed, to be carefree.

And that makes us on alert. That makes us unfocused. That makes us prayerless.

I thought of Daniel. Daniel was a man of consistent prayer, even at the cost of his own freedom

and life. Daniel would open his window and pray three times a day. He would pray to God. He

would glorify God When people were trying to destroy him, he would do it anyways. He was a

man of spiritual alertness, Paul said. I remember you constantly in my prayers, he says

Ephesians 6:18. “Praying at all times in the Spirit is what we're supposed to do with all prayer

and supplication. To that end, watch this. Keep alert, keep alert with all perseverance, making

supplication for all the Saints.” See, a spiritual alertness makes you prayerful. And if we're

focused and we know that the end of all things is near, that Jesus Christ is right .

On the verge of descending from heaven in all of the glory of God, it will make us alert, focused

and prayerful. Praying for the Saints, praying for our souls, praying for our children, praying

for the valley, Praying for this church to explode with spiritual power and renewal and revival. If

we see the end of all things as near that the glory of God is the goal and the priority, won't it

make us focused and prayerful? Will it? Will it not church Focusing on the end and God 's glory,

Peter says, makes us earnest in love. Man, this is important, earnest in love. Look at this in the

text above. All this is the number one thing he wants us to put on. Keep loving one another

earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. He says, above all, if there's one quality that

should mark our life as a church, it should be an earnest love. An earnest love, that without love,

Paul says in One Corinthians 13. We are nothing. We have nothing. We gain nothing. You can

give your body to be burned. You can give away all your possessions. You can serve as a

volunteer in the church. You can come to church every Sunday. You could read your Bible every

morning for an hour. You could pray for three hours and put holes in the floor with your knees.

But without love, you're nothing. I'm nothing . Above all, love one another earnestly in the Greek,

he says. Keep having earnest love. Keep having is the language there. It's the real text.

Keep having an earnest love. That means, guys, it's possible not to have an earnest love. It's

possible for us to have an earnest love for each other and lose that earnest love for each other.

It's possible for us to have big brains and great theology and freezing cold hearts. I know a

brother who was sent to New Jersey for a church plant. Sorry, a church revitalization work and

from all accounts, they had good theology, they had programs, they had gatherings. And he said

it was just such hard soil. Hard heartedness, coldness, division, toxic relationships, a lack of

love. Above all, Peter says, have an earnest love for one another. How do we have an earnest

love for one another? Well, I think there are a few ways, and I think these are central. If you're

struggling to have an earnest love for a fellow believer, what can you do? Maybe a better

question is what can God do in you?

Number one, you need to re-fixate your mind on the earnest love of God for you If you want

your hard heart to melt, like if you ever feel hard hearted, which sometimes I do. If you ever

want to feel soft hearted again, let the earnest love of Jesus Christ melt your heart. That's why

Ephesians 3, Paul says we are praying that the Spirit would strengthen you in the inner being,

that Christ would dwell in your heart through faith. Being rooted and grounded in love, you may

have strength to comprehend the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. How great and

vast and magnificent is His love for you . If you want a soft, tender, earnest heart, let the earnest

the love of Jesus Christ melts your heart. Look to the cross again, where Jesus Christ, the

eternal Son of God, became human and was crucified for you, for your sin, for your salvation,

for your redemption.

Look to Jesus Christ Who raised you from death to life? Who washed away your sin? Who

justified you through faith? Who gave you eternal glory in the gospel? Look to this Jesus Christ

to his earnest and his love for you And secondly, if you want to earnestly love other Christians,

you need to realize and remember that Jesus Christ loves them like that. It's one thing to say

Jesus Christ loves me with an earnest love. It's another thing that to change your heart when

you look at the other Christian and say Jesus Christ loves them with that intensity, just as he

loves me. What a powerful truth To know that I don't love you because of your personality, your

stage of life. I don't love you because of your humor, or lack thereof. I don't love you because of

your behavior, or your morality, or your spiritual giftings, or your influence in a church. Or

because of how much money you have, or how long you've been at this church. I don't love you

for any of those reasons. Otherwise I would not love you very well. I love you because Jesus

loved me, and I love you because Jesus loves you because you are beloved in Christ Jesus.

Because you're a born again Christian. Because you're a child of God, man. That's why I should

love you. Because of what you are. You're a Christian. You're a child of the King. You are loved

perfectly by Jesus Christ and covered in his righteousness. That's why we love each other.

That's why we put up with each other. That's why we forgive each other, man. Think about my

kids. If I loved them based on their behavior and their personalities and what they could do for

me, I would never love them. Well. They can really step on my toes. They can really be

frustrating. But I'll tell you this, I love my kids really earnestly. I love them deeply. I love them so,

so much. Why? Because they're in the family. Because they're born of me.

And if we realize that other people in Christ are born of God, we love them because they're born

of God Not because of how they behave towards me There's a power in knowing that, and he

says love each other earnestly because love covers a multitude of sins. What does earnest love

really look like in a the church. Earnest love among us looks like a forgiving church. A church

that is quick to forgive. A church that is quick to show mercy. The corporate instinct of FCBC

when we are personally or corporately wronged is to forgive according to what is true. It is to

show mercy. You see, hatred and malice exposes and shames people for their sin, but love God

's love. The instinct of God 's love is to cover sin, to forgive sin, to be patient towards sinners

God told Moses he is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love

We see the love of God most clearly manifest when he covered our sins through Christ

How many sins has God covered for you? How many of your sins has God covered and

forgiven through Jesus Christ? All of them. All of your sins. Like every evil thought, word in

action that you have ever committed or will ever commit, if you trust Jesus, he has covered them

all. And so God 's love covers a multitude of sins, meaning all of your sins And if God has

covered my sins like that How could my instinct be to shame you and take revenge on you My

instinct should be to cover To forgive Is there a place in the church. For confrontation, correction

and spiritual discipline, of course Matthew 18 is a great example of that. Jesus in fact

commands us if we're sinned against to go to our brother or sister . To tell them their fault And if

they repent, we've gained our brother, our brother Our family member, our sibling,

But notice Matthew 18 is not about publicly shaming people. That's not the goal of the process .

Notice how private it is up until the very last point. Matthew 18 is so private. It's so personal. It's

about winning relationships. It's about reconciliation and peace and harmony and forgiveness.

Hoping that people repent, hoping that there can be love again and forgiveness . If we're

focused on God 's glory and the end of all things, we will become a people of earnest love. We

got to keep moving, guys. You're not listening fast enough. It makes us happily hospitable.

Happily hospitable.

Verse 9. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. Be happily hospitable. These two

realities make us a Church of happy hospitality, Hospitality is this warm arms wide open,

welcoming of people into our life. To bless them. To serve them To extend grace to them. To

extend love to them, the love of Christ. And the end of all things and the glory of God should

make us a people who are happy to be hospitable now. Hospitality can be exhausting.

Hospitality can be expensive. It can feel intrusive. It can be abused. The early church actually, in

a document called, the Doc a the Dadake, which was written in the Apostolic era still in the 1st

century, points out how hospitality can be abused by false prophets, for instance. So they had

pastors and missionaries and teachers and prophets traveling, and they didn't have Airbnb. OK,

they didn't. They didn't usually have a six bedroom house with an extra guest suite or an extra

guest house on the back. So the church depended heavily on the hospitality of other Christians.

I mean, this was a big deal. Their homes were open. Their lives were open . And if people were

constantly coming to your house and showing up unannounced, No cell phones, no email, no

text messages, no “Find my friend” on iPhone, right? If they were just showing up into your life

and saying, I have nowhere to stay tonight, I have nowhere to go, I need to stay at your

house. I need to stay here for three days, it'd be easy to grumble, right? It'd be easy to be

irritated by that. If you're tired, especially if you're hangry, you would not be happily hospitable.

And Peter says, man, where to be a Church of happy hospitality. They didn't have three car

garages. They didn't have big fences and small tables. Their lives, because of the gospel, were

wide open. There's a comedian that does this little bit on how the culture used to deal with this

40 years ago versus now and basically how I can't, I can't do it justice. But basically what he

says is 40 years ago, you know, you, he's from an Italian family. So they 'd always have a coffee

cake waiting for their guests, right? And all the kids and the family would go to the door when

someone knocked and greeted those people and you know, welcome them in. And he says

nowadays it's like, man, when someone knocks on the door, everyone drops to the floor . An

army crawls to the closet and he says, grandma, I'll get the shotgun. That's kind of like his bit.

And so that's the difference between culture then and culture now.

Like we live in our castles. I can, I can go in my garage and I can close the garage door before I

even engage anyone in my neighborhood. I can be completely isolated if I want to. That's not

the hospitality of Christ. What can make us a hospitable people? Well, it's realizing that the

father came running and the father, arms wide open, has welcomed prodigal sons and

daughters That we are a community of prodigal sons and daughters, welcoming other prodigal

sons and daughters into our lives That if we grow hard hearted, that if we grow so individualistic

and isolated, what will become is elder brothers outside the party saying I don't want my

younger brother to have the party, I don't want him to have the fat and calf, I don't want him to

have the celebration. We'll become hard hearted elder brothers, when in fact we are prodigal

sons and daughters welcomed home by the father. We become hospitable when we realize that

the gospel is God 's hospitable welcome of sinners through Christ into his family. It opens us up.

As we see God has opened up access to himself through Christ, so we are opened up. We

need a fresh vision of the hospitality of God in Christ Jesus. We need a fresh vision of God 's

welcome to sinners into His presence through Jesus Christ crucified. We need a fresh vision

that the veil has been ripped, that the veil is torn, that the veil is gone, that God wants sinners to

have access to him through his Holy Son, Jesus, who died for their sins Man, that kind of

hospitality transforms us into a hospitable people, and gladly so. Lastly, the end of all things and

God 's glory. Makes us good stewards. Makes us good stewards. As each has received a gift,

use it to serve one another as good stewards of God 's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one

who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God

supplies in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to him belong

glory and dominion, forever and ever. Amen.

Look at verse 10 again. If you've received a gift, which, if you're a Christian, you have a spiritual

gift or more than one gift, he says use it to serve others . Then he says, be a good steward by

serving others. You're a good steward of God 's grace, a good steward A good manager of the

gift Man, it is so tempting to think that the gifts, the spiritual gifts we have, are for us. But Christ

gives you a spiritual gift for the benefit of the church. He has never given you a gift that is for

you. He's given you a spiritual gift for the good of others and the glory of God and the way you

are a good steward. Whether you have a speaking gift or whether you have a serving gift or a

leadership gift or a generosity gift. Whatever kind of gift you have, he's given that to you for you

and I to manage and to serve well with it and to build up the church with it for the glory of God

There's nothing nastier than Christians, which I'm not assuming this is you at all, but there's

nothing nastier than a Christian using their own spiritual gifts to serve themselves. To glorify and

honor themselves, to bring attention to themselves. Which is why, when? Paul, have you ever

wondered why 1st Corinthians 13 is right in the middle of chapters 12 to 14 where he's talking

about all these spiritual gifts? One body with one spirit with many gifts. The gifts are from God.

They're empowered by God. They're given by God. They're for God. And then right in the middle

of First Corinthians 12 to 14, he says, I'll show you a better way. He says the better way is love.

And he says, man, you can. You can speak with the tongues of men and angels, but without

love, you're just a noisy gong. You're just annoying. Like if I, if I speak, if I use my speaking gift

for me Then I am just an annoying selfish guy. But if I want to use my gift, well, I need to use it

for you. I need to use it to serve you. I need to use it to glorify God, because the gift is from God

for you, the gift is from God for your benefit, and your gifts are from God for the benefit of the

church.

We used to in selecting elders, we would listen really closely. At my former church, we'd listen

really closely to why they wanted to be an elder. That's really important because a man can

desire to be an elder. But the question is why? Or when we would try to put a man in to teach a

Bible study or a Sunday school class, it was like, it's really important why you want to teach this.

And if all they ever talked about was, I really enjoy doing this, I really like doing this. I really

benefit from doing this. It's not bad to enjoy it. Of course I enjoy preaching, for instance. But if

their whole focus was on, I want to be using my gifts for my joy and my enjoyment and my

benefit, I was like, hey, it's not really time for you to teach right now because you don't teach for

your benefit, you teach for theirs. You teach to bless them. You teach them if you want to be an

elder, for instance, or a Deacon for your own benefit, it's not time for you to be an elder or

Deacon until you realize it's not about you. It's not about me. It's about the glory of God and the

building of his church. Of course we can enjoy using our gifts. There's great joy in service. But

ultimately what he's saying is we're a steward of that gift for the glory of God and the good of his

church.

So as a church, what Peter is saying is focus on the fact that Jesus is coming. And focus on the

fact that our motive must be the glory of God. And that when Jesus comes, you better believe

man. You better believe that Trinity will be exalted, His glory will fill heaven and earth. And so

everything we do and everything we are as a church should be pulled into the future by the

coming of Jesus and should be motivated by the exaltation of the Trinity Church. You are loved.

You are forgiven. In Jesus Christ, you are treasured by Jesus Christ. He is forming you, and He

is forming us into His glorious image, so that one day we will rule the earth with Christ, we will

bear and reflect His image everywhere we go, and God will be. All in all.

And in the meantime, I want to ask, how are you doing with spiritual alertness? How are you

doing with an earnest love? How are you doing with happy hospitality? And are you managing

your gifts for the good of the church and the glory of God? That's how these truths shape us and

mold us. If there's any way in which you need to pray today, call out to God to help you grow in

these ways, to repent of sin, to rejoice in His grace and how He's grown you over the years, and

I want to do that now, together as a church, let's do that now.

Our Heavenly Father, We glorify and worship you and Father, we glorify you through your Son

and by the Holy Spirit The Blessed Trinity, one God, three eternal persons, the Father, Son, and

Spirit, so perfect in your majesty. So kind in your love. So sufficient through redemption. Thank

you that you've made us your people through the death of Jesus Christ, and thank you that

you've given us your spirit. Thank you that you've made us a family. Thank you at the end of all

things is near, and that's a day of glory and grace for Christians.

Thank you that your glory is the ultimate priority. So form us, Lord, in these ways. Form us into a

community of spiritual alertness, of earnest love, of happy hospitality, and of good spiritual

stewardship. God made these things. Form us and shape us by your power For your glory in

Jesus's name. Amen