We are starting a new sermon series this summer called Summer in the Psalms and the book of Psalms, there's 150 of them, so we have a lot to choose from. We won't be covering them all, I assure you over the summer, but we're going to get a chance to look at some of them and they have a really remarkable way of being able to touch us at different places in our life. And so as we look at different ones, we'll pick up different themes and different expressions and different ways that God meets us because David and many of the other writers in the Psalms are always very earthy and very honest and there's not pretense in there anywhere. David lays it out, others lay it out how they feel on their request. In Psalm 77, which you can turn to in your Bible, is one of the ones we're going to be looking at here this morning to look at that. Vanessa, is your 10th racket here? Where did that go? All right, Daniel, good night. Leave my 10th racket alone. You know, I want to call myself an avat tennis player at all, but I do enjoy playing and I used to play more when I had a little bit more time and a little less kids in my life, but Vanessa is an avat tennis player and thank you for bringing your tennis racket here. I couldn't find mine here, but tennis is a sport that is very enjoyable, but tennis like every sport is dependent upon a certain few basics. I remember hearing some of my say, you know, I would love playing tennis, but it wasn't for the serve. You know, I can get out there and do different things, but when it comes all the pressure on the line, I've got to land that ball and that little squirre in the other side, you know, and I've got two chances to do it. You know, I can always want to kill my first serve and I got to dink my second one in because I miss my first serve and, you know, the serve in tennis kills a lot of people in their game. Am I, is that right, Vanessa? It can make you, it can break you, but there are a few basic principles that make the serve effective or not effective. One is your stance. Stance is important. If you don't have the proper stance or say, let's say, this is the court and you're facing this way and you're serving, there's going to be a problem. Stance is very important. Step number one, two, grip, grip on the racket is also very important. If you hold it the wrong way, the head's facing the wrong way and you're trying to serve, it's going to make your serve either better or worse. So grip is important. Another thing that's important too is holding the ball and the proper toss, getting the proper toss of the right height, right where you want it. And the last part, if I were to simplify it, simply down to four steps, would be the follow through and the serve to have it actually go and aim it the way you want it to go and at the speed you want it and so on. So there'd be at least four basic steps, at least, to a basic serve to have it down correctly. But at the same time, when you get better at tennis or when you're not, when you're actually in a real match, your goal is not to come up for the line and go, all right, step one, stance. Step two, grip. Step three, ball toss. Step four, follow through and swing. You know, one, people would be bugged by you just taking that long in your serve. But two, the idea is to have it in one fluid motion as you step up so that you get right in position and you're ready to deliver your serve right on time, right when you want it to do, right when you want it to happen. It's fluidity is what you're shooting for. The basics to be underneath there, but your goal is to have that to be one fluid motion to be effective at tennis if you were to simplify just the tennis serve. Well, there's another problem. If we change the atmosphere or change our topic or our category from tennis to life, we have life circumstances that are challenging. And most of us would say, right, hey, life would be no big deal if there were no challenging circumstances. If everything was just blissful, if everything was just happy, if everything went the way I wanted it to go, I wouldn't have any complaints. Life would be fine. But similar to that tennis serve, a major issue, a major part of it is facing life's difficult circumstances and how we're going to respond to that. And I want to propose to you that just as in tennis serving, there's at least some four basic components. There are at least four basic components of how God in His word tells us the word of faith, the difficult circumstances of life. And Psalm 77 gives us a great outline of this and lays it out for us clearly. And I'm going to bet this point that some of the steps might surprise you. But just as important as stance, you can't overlook stance, you can't overlook grip. But if you overlook some of these steps, it will greatly affect your ability to handle difficult circumstances. So as we look at that, let's read the text from Psalm 77 here this morning. It's a Psalm of Asaph, which was one of the worship leaders that David had working under him when he was raining and he was king in Israel. So it's not of David, but it is one of his close followers, but it's inspired by the Holy Spirit. So I'm going to read Psalm 77, the entire chapter here and listen to God's word. I cried out to God for help. I cried out to God to hear me. When I was in distress, I saw the Lord. At night, I stretched out, untiring hands, and my soul refused to be comforted. I remembered you, O God, and I groaned. I refused and my spirit grew faint. Say, La, you kept my eyes from closing. I was too troubled to speak. I thought about the former days, the years of long ago. I remembered my songs in the night, my heart and news and my spirit inquired, will the Lord reject forever? Well, he never show his favor again. Has his unfailing love vanished forever? Has his promise failed for all time? Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has he in anger withheld his compassion? Say, La, then I thought to this, I will appeal the years of the right hand of the most high. I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago. I will meditate on all your works and consider all your mighty deeds. Your ways, O God, are holy. What power is so great as our God. You are the God who performs miracles. You display your power among the peoples with your mighty arm. You redeemed your people. The descendants of Jacob and Joseph. Say, La, the water saw you, O God. The water saw you and ride. The very depths were convulsed. The clouds poured down water. The skies resounded with thunder. Your arrows flashed back and forth. Your thunder was heard in a whirlwind. Your lightning lit up the world. The earth trembled and quaked. Your path led through the sea. Your way through the mighty waters. Through your footprint, though your footprints were not seen. You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron. Let's pray again. God, we ask that you would let your word by your Holy Spirit take on life this morning, that you would allow it to plant seeds, to produce fruit and to grow in our hearts and in our lives for your glory. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Well, I think there's an outlining your Bolton, which we got now. That's great. And I think it'll be on the screen as well here too. But step number one, as important as stances and a tennis serve, this is extremely important. Resist being satisfied with circumstances. Resist being satisfied with circumstances. Here's what I mean by this. Look what the psalmist does here in the first three verses. I cried out to God for help. I cried out to God to hear me when I was into stress. I sought the Lord at night. I stretched out untiring hands and my soul refused to be comforted. Resist the quick easy step of being comforted prematurely. Resist that of being satisfied. The psalmist here does that ASAF does that here. He says, I groaned. I'm used and my spirit grew faint. He resisted being satisfied with what he saw around him. He refused surface, weak and easy answers to the circumstances that were challenging him in life. Now think about that for a second. If we get out of the Bible history time and we get out of the Bible world, aren't you glad that other people in history chose not to give in to easy answers, chose to resist easy answers? Think about some of these men and women. Think about Galileo. Aren't you glad that he did just look up at the sky and go, wow, that's something else. All right, what's for dinner? Aren't you glad he didn't settle for an easy answer? What about Christopher Columbus? Aren't you glad we should be right here living in America that he didn't just settle the thing out of the world. It's flat. Don't want to go too far. He might fall off the end. Aren't you glad he wondered what's across the ocean? What's over there? Aren't you glad he got any Martin Luther? Said, you know, hey, things don't seem quite right here. What's going on in the church? There's stuff we're doing here in the church that's not in God's word. Only a few people can even read God's word. What is going on? He didn't settle for an easy answer. Aren't you glad Orville and Wilbur Wright didn't just say, you know, let's leave flying to the birds because who could ever have imagined that people would ever fly? What about Martin Luther King Jr? He could have just easily said, you know, this is just the way it is. He could have taught his sons and daughters. He could have told his wife. He could have told other followers. He was a pastor. Remember, he could have just talked to his flock and said, hey, we make the best of it. Hang in there. He didn't settle for an easy answer. Think about Mother Teresa. What if she had just been content to say, you know, there are just too many needs in the world. What impact could one life possibly have? Every single one of us here are glad that some people like this in history didn't settle for easy answers. They weren't satisfied with life circumstances. They looked deeper. They went deeper. And I want to encourage you this morning to think of there's at least two ways of thinking that you need to resist this morning in whatever your life circumstances are. Whatever your challenges are right now. And one way is the forced gump theology. Resist forced gump theology. How many of you have seen the movie forced gump from the past? Okay, most of you. What's forced gump theology? Life is like. You never know what you're going to get. I mean, I mean, this whole, this whole movie was kind of on this whole idea of a fate. This whole idea of you just don't know what's going to happen, what's going to connect together. And just kind of sit back and see what happens and be amazed. This is not for the Bible teachers. This is not what the Psalmist is saying here. God is not working with the box of chocolates. God has plan a and he's never felt a need for plan B. God has a plan. He has a purpose. Psalm 33 says this the Lord foils the plans of the nations. He thwarts the purposes of the people. But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever. The purpose of his heart through all generations. Reject force gump theology in your life. But don't just stop there. Reject Yoda theology. Remember this guy? Reject this theology as well too. Well, there's the force. I have a Yoda imitation, but I'm going to spare you from that. Okay, there's the good side. There's the dark side. And there's this battle waging of power. And if you're not careful, the dark could quickly and easily overpower the good. Let me give you an insight. God has never broken a sweat. He has never looked at Satan and trimmered and trembled. He has never thought about the plans of sin or he's never worried about the evil men and women that have sought to control and manipulate and abuse people in our world and thought, oh my goodness, what am I going to do? I hope I get more people on my side than it's on the bad side. This idea of this sea saw of power between good and bad and what's going on. There ain't no sea saw. God's not breaking a sweat. And we can rejoice in that. Luke 11 20, Jesus says this as he has been accused of casting out demons from people by the power of Satan, he comes back and says, hey, you guys don't understand what's going on there. You know, if Satan's divided against his own kingdom, then his kingdom can't even take a stand, but he comes back at the end of that and says, but I drive, but if I drive out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come to you. If I'm really not part of Satan's forces, then it's by the very finger of God. I'm driving out the most powerful forces of darkness. You get this picture of just kind of the parents use that sometimes with the kids. You know, you're on the phone and they're interrupting you and it just takes a certain look and the finger. Not now, okay. God just needs a finger. Probably a pinky finger at that. Reject force-gump theology. Reject Yoda theology and understand that God is working God as a plan. When I think about this, even in my own life personally, and that's probably the reason I'll be honest with you, I was drawn to studying the Psalms here because I'm at a stage of my life right now, in place in life, where I am identifying with David. It's been a challenging few years for me personally, for Larenine or marriage, for our family. We have really since the opposition of darkness, as we have sought to plan a church. We've sought to move deeper in God and our relationship with God. We've taken steps of faith. It has not come without opposition with that. But as I look at this, I'm realizing and I'm learning and I want to invite you to learn with me that resistance to being satisfied easily, quickly, or with service answers is so important because God calls us to go deeper in the psalmist here under the inspiration of Holy Spirit, cries out to God and will not be satisfied with simple answers. You know, this couple of weeks ago, we talked about the jar thing, and by the way, I'm glad, actually, those are extra cards. Daniel, once you get those out there, we'll have these extra cards over here, but we have decided as a church to take some steps here, to talk about real life struggles, to talk about real issues. We did this a couple of weeks ago. If you wanted to write on a card where you really need to see the power of the Holy Spirit in your life, and we did this on Pentecost Sunday, celebrating the Holy Spirit's presence, write something down, stick it in here as a step of faith and say, God, you know, this is something out of my power. If you don't show up and be God, I won't ever see it happen. I can't do it and flesh it out of my own. I'm not strong enough. And we as a congregation have a jar full of things here. This can be, and I want it to be, if you haven't participated, or maybe you have something else you want to stick in. Anybody is welcome to do this. But if you call Christ's kingdom church home, I really want to challenge you to do this, to resist, to not be satisfied and say, God, I'm going to cry out to you. This is a jar of people who are crying out to God. Come be a part of this during communion at the end of the service. Feel free to come up, open up the top. Daniel is going to have extra cards over here. I'll grab those from here real quick. Just bring your pen up, share it in half, put one side, keep one side to keep for yourself, fold over the other half. So it looks like this. Put your name on it and stick it in here. And then our hope is that as we see God respond, as we see God answer our prayers over the summer, take your card, place it in the other jar, which Daniel will have back up there in a second. I don't want to remind us of God's work. Resist. Let your resistance, though, not stop there. Let your resistance lead you to reexamine. That's number two. Not only one, should you resist being satisfied with circumstances, but number two, you should reexamine the circumstances compared to his character. Reexamine the circumstances compared to his character. Look at verses four through nine. And by the way, these salons in there, these these dramatic pauses, musical pauses, give us a great breakdown of how this works. After that first section there, he pauses and he goes into this, you kept my eyes from closing. I was too troubled to speak. I thought about the former days, the years of long ago, I remembered my songs in the night, my heart mused and my spirit inquired with a Lord reject forever. Well, he never show his favor again. Has his unfailing love vanish forever. Has his promise failed for all time? Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has he in anger withheld his compassion? Aceh, if you're writing the song goes on, he doesn't just stop resisting, but he reexamines a circumstance that's compared to God's character. And you know what he notices? He notices the inconsistencies. He looks at this and goes, wait a minute. God doesn't reject forever, does he? But it seems like it. God doesn't refuse to show his favor because he's been so gracious to us. But I don't see his favor right now. God calls himself a God of unfailing love, but where is his love? God says his promises will come true. Where are the fulfillment of his promises? God says that he will be merciful, but has he forgotten to be merciful for me and my circumstances? God says that he will not withhold his compassion for those who are broken and can try to hurt. But here I am, God, and where is your compassion? He reexamines his circumstances with the character of God and resistance is important as it is just as the grip of a tennis racket is important. We must combine resistance with reexamining who God is. Consciously acknowledge the tension. And that's what happens here. He says, wait, these things don't line up. My circumstances in my life seem inconsistent with the reality of who God says he is and who he is on my behalf as a believer in him, placing my faith and trust in him. They seem inconsistent and he doesn't sit here and try to have again the easy answers. He feels the tension in his reexamining. Don't refuse or don't let yourself not feel the tension. It's part of the process that God encourages to do. But let me encourage you to do what he has, he continues to do too. He looks, as he looks as his circumstances, he compares it to the work of God. And although a staff is writing the Old Testament before Jesus Christ came, we have the luxury of looking at this and following this same model after the coming of Christ. And Romans 8 32, the Apostle Paul writes, and he says this, he who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? What's he Apostle Paul saying? He's saying, look, look at the character of God. If God would give his own son to die in the cross for you, do you think he's going to leave you hanging in your circumstances? Do you think he's not going to respond there? And he says, clear, hey, give me the greatest gift. There's no other spiritual gift that you need that's not going to come alongside as well too. If God met your greatest need in sending Jesus, he won't desert you in your, look at some of these examples, he won't desert you in your relationship barriers, he won't desert you in your financial struggles, he won't desert you in your marriage problems, he won't desert you in your parenting struggles, he won't desert you if you're struggling with health issues, he won't desert you if you have job issues and problems. I just picked a few, did I catch anybody, did I hit anybody? I hope so. If he sent Jesus and he be cared enough to secure your eternal destiny, he's not going to forget your temporal circumstances and your need as well. As I look at my own heart, my own life and circumstances, you know, honestly, I have and I've asked these exact same questions and if I were, you know, courageous enough to read my journal to you, which I'm not, you would see that I would say that, look, I don't see regards, promises and faithfulness are lining up with my current experience of life reality and it's driving me crazy. I'm living this and perhaps some of you maybe are too as well but re-examining is an important part. What are the inconsistencies in your life this morning? What doesn't line up between what God has said about himself and is true about him and his love for you with what you are currently experiencing and don't pretend it's not there but say, look, there is something that doesn't seem right here. Feel the tension, re-examine the circumstances compared to his character and after re-examining, do number three, remember his character transforms circumstances, his character transforms them. How do God show himself trustworthy and to be reminded to Asaf here? Asaf looked at God's history. He looked at what God had done in the past versus 10 through 15. Then I thought to this, will I appeal the years of the right hand of the most high? I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago. Asaf's got to do something with it. He's got to say, I don't get what's going on. I've re-examined it. It doesn't seem to fit so he starts to remember. He remembers. God created an incredible universe and a beautiful garden for man and woman to live in. He remembered that God always offers hope to the hopeless. God provided a boat for Noah. God delivered his people from slavery in Egypt. God gave his people his law to follow and he might have stopped there but we can go on having the New Testament history as well. God gives his people his savior, his perfect law keeper. God gives his people his Holy Spirit as we celebrated with Pentecost a few weeks ago. God promises to return and restore all things. Read the book of Revelation again if you've forgotten. The end has already been written. Asaf remembered, we need to remember what God has done in the past. How has God shown himself trustworthy from your personal history with him? Think about it for yourself. What about for you? Think about your own family album, your own personal album of pictures, reflect and think about his goodness. How has he blessed you even before you knew him as a savior? Did he protect you? Did he take care of you? Did you have meals to eat? Did you have a home to live in? Did you have provisions from God even before you cared a rip about God? How faithful has he been to forgive you of your sins? Take a little while to conjure up a list of some of the things that you would want nobody in this room to know of. And remember that he knows and he is forgiven if your faith is in Jesus Christ. How does he provide for you even now when you are unfaithful? I'm willing to bet. Not any of us here have gone without it and had to skip a meal this week because we had nothing to eat. I'm willing to bet you've got a place to lay your head tonight.
I'm willing to bet and as I look, it's confirmed you have clothes to wear. That's a good thing. He has continued to be faithful to us when even when we are unfaithful to him. How has he delivered you from trials in the past? Think about before like, oh yeah, I remember a few years ago, man, I went through this real big trial and God was faithful. He was there. His promises gave me hope and in purpose and he led me through that and I learned through that and I grew closer to him. The Psalmist also says here in verse 13, notice, your ways of God are holy. Holy means set apart and Isaiah 55, 8 through 9, familiar verse to some of us says this, God says, for my thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways, my ways declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. You know, that's kind of an eloquent nice way of God saying, look, you don't have a clue compared to what I understand and know and what I'm doing. I mean, be like you parents, trying to teach your two-year-old about how a computer works. Well, son, you said, you know, you sit down here and hear some mouse and hear things and their binary numbers involve zeroes, lots of zeroes and ones in the programming here and you know, most of us don't even know any more than that if we know that, right? It's just not going to work. You're not going to be displaying on a computer to your two-year-old, but your two-year-old or three-year-old or sin can probably start working it and using it. God's ways are higher than ours. His thoughts, we get a smidge of them. You know, we read the Bible and he's somehow like me goes to seminary and studies theology and we think we know a lot. We haven't begun to scrape the tip of the surface and this is the God who loves you and is in control and is powerfully working. And I'm daily trying to remind myself and meditate on God's faithfulness in the past to me. That's what's carrying me through a difficult challenging season of my life and it will carry you through too and how I know that because God says it will because history has proven that. Are you meditating and remembering this morning about his faithfulness? Have you embraced the model that God gives us which is one of trusting him, trusting him, not figuring it out first, but trusting him. And you might figure out some in this life. Most of it you probably won't figure out until you get to heaven and have a perfect renewed mind again and we're with and face to face. The purpose is not figuring out, the purpose is trusting, trusting. Only after resisting, re-examining and remembering, can we actually do number four, right? And this is the serve. This is where it really comes in and happens what you're shooting for and it's this rest in his character, rest in his character. One of the things that's driven me to this place here guys is I'm tired. I am physically, emotionally, spiritually, socially, whatever else you want to add in, they're tired of working to try to find rest versus trusting and finding rest in that. I'm trying to figure it out. I'm trying to make sense of it all rather than resting in who he is, trusting his faithfulness from the past. That's what ASAP does here and what is ASAP doing these last few verses. You start talking about, you're like thinking, when is he talking about a storm? It's time like the water is raging and the depths and the clouds pouring out water and the lightning flashing, what's going on? Well, you get a little more clue towards then. He's talking, he talks about the path that led through the sea. What is ASAP doing? ASAP is pulling up the most powerful memory he possibly can. What is it? Written in his time. What is it? The parting of the Red Sea. The Israelites being delivered from Egypt, from bondage, from hundreds of years of slavery and coming across the Red Sea, the greatest miracle of the time. Another than the resurrection itself, we would probably say, is there a greater, more powerful display of God's power than it was, delivering his people, parting the seas, then walking across on dry ground, farrowed his army following and the seas swallowing them up. He brings up the most powerful memory that he probably has of God's faithfulness. And he begins to what begins to look like a song. He begins to respond in worship, begins to bathe and bask himself into what God has done. Trust in his power also to work through you. Because if you think about it, notice what he does here at the very end. You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron. Now nobody written during this time has forgotten who led them through the Red Sea. So why does he bring it up here again? All he had to do was talk about the Red Sea. But he says, you led them. You led them through the hand of Moses and Aaron. He reminds himself that God and his graciousness, God has chosen to use us. He's chosen to use feeble, struggling people that are overwhelmed with circumstances sometime. He's delighted himself to use people like Moses and Aaron. And I know you think Moses is a really cool big strong guy. But you're forgetting the fact that Moses came in his own power to try to save his own people, killed a person in the process and fleeced from Egypt. And not for a couple months, not for a few years, for 40 years. He basically resolves his life as a failure. All right, here I was born given and protected by God. Remember the story raised as one of Pharaoh's sons. Saul that I needed to help my people and did it my way and murdered a guy in the process and had been kicked out of the country. And now for 40 years, he's 80 years old before he goes back. I'm not aware of anybody in this room that's 80 years old. And no, I'm not. Now he we're close. You know, we think by an 80 year old man who thinks his life is done, who's given up. It feels like he's a failure. Look what he came from. Son of Pharaoh. Now he's a shepherd. And God has sent some bags. And now you're ready. And remember, he's a guy saying, well, lulla lulla lulla lulla lulla lulla, don't send me. I can't speak. That's what he says to the burning bush when God's talking to him. I'm not your man. But he was. Because he was prepared and would rest in the character of who God was with that. Now, the picture of this, by the way, if you think about this of rest, is not a hammock. Some of us think, oh, rest in this character, that means like, you know, give me a hammock. I was on vacation last week in the place we were staying at, had a hammock, and I would have gone on the hammock, but some of the kids broke the hammock before had a chance to get there. We had a bunch of other kids, yeah, you're one of them, that's right. But hammocks, man, those are pictures of rest, at least in my mind, you can find a hammock between two shady trees, which this one was, on a plantation of 700 acres, this was a wonderful thing, but that's not the kind of rest that we're talking about here. And that can be confused, I think they, oh, my God, just wants me to kind of go to sleep in him. I think this is a better picture of it. Now, I don't know who this person is in this picture, but I guarantee you this, that he inspected this equipment beforehand. I guarantee you that he has had some kind of training, maybe a little bit, maybe a lot in hang lighting. There has been all kinds of steps of moving, of acting so that he can rest, so that he can go out, and this is a beautiful picture of rest, I'd love to do that, never done it. But don't think this is the disconnecting and doing nothing, this is moving and walking and encouraging and resting in the one that's carrying you, resting in the one that created the wind that will carry you safely through. It's a picture of that kind of rest. Rest is our work as Christians. Don't hear me saying this one, we don't have something to do, we do. Our work is to rest. That's our work to rest in him. And the reason I'm saying it so strongly here is because it takes work. The last two or three years, God's been telling me, it's gotten you to rest. And it's taking me two or three years, and maybe a few more, I don't feel like I've arrived, because I'm not figuring it out. I'm real slow, I'm real thick up here. It takes work to rest, to understand this, to resist, to re-examine, to remember, it takes work, it takes meditation, it takes effort. If you're like me, exhaustion can lead you here to this place. And just remember, a doctor who treats you in the doctor's office from the hospital, he's looking always for the underlying source of the problem. You come in with an illness, he's going to be looking at your blood sample, he's going to be looking at other things. God graciously buys Holy Spirit, is continuing to lead us people to look deep. You think your struggle is with your circumstance. God's saying, no, you're missing it. I'm allowing you to have this circumstance so you can go deep and realize that even in the midst of your circumstances, you can rest. You can rest in who I am. You can walk encouraged in who I am. You can rest confidently in that. The question is this morning, are you working towards rest or are you doing the work of rest? Let me say that again. Are you working towards rest or are you doing the work of rest? Don't work towards rest, but do the work of rest. It makes all the difference in the world. As we review here, number one, resist being satisfied with circumstances to re-examine the circumstances compared to his character. Number three, remember his character transforms circumstances. And number four, or don't leave it, rest in his character. Rest in his character. It's time to get to work. Church, it's time to rest, let's pray. Father, we come before you as a people who, if I'm a suitable reflection and model of this, I'm not sure to what degree, but I think to some degree, a people who are tired, a people who are weary, or people who are working towards rest, then a people who are in the work of rest. So, God, will you come and do that? Work in our hearts this morning. Will you come and give us that kind of hope? Will you come and God give us the grace to come and to truly resist, to come and cry out like the psalmist did and not to take easy answers. God to come and compare that with your character. God to come and trust and see the power of your Holy Spirit transforming us in our circumstances by who you are. God, that we might rest in you, that you might be glorified, that we might see your power displayed, not for the goal of making your lives more pleasurable, even though that will, ultimately, the God for the sake of your glory, for the sake of your kingdom, that your name might be proclaimed, that your good news and gossip might go forth, not just in word, but indeed, and in story after story of people hearing out your faithfulness to a group of people in East Orlando, to small little church called Christ Kingdom Church. May the stories spread around this world, God, of how you were working in the midst of your people here. We pray that you would do that. We pray this in Christ's name, amen.