You can grow the muscle of honor by listening with the intention of fulfilling their vision. God promises to lift you up in honor at the right time if you humble yourself under His mighty power.
And it's not that we don't want to honor the Lord. It's not that I didn't love my parents. It was just that there needed to be some maturing that needed to take place. So in honoring, we're gonna talk about building that muscle of honor. Honor is a muscle.
You can grow it. You can get good at it just by bringing awareness to asking the Lord how can I honor? So honor means I was like, if you honor someone, you give them high respect. You have great esteem for for them, for what they think about, for what they do, for who they are. Hi.
Does anyone have you jump up here real quick? Can you walk like a navy on up here? So Romans-12:10 talks about outdoing 1 another and showing honor. So I'm gonna I'm gonna outdo Heidi at showing honor. By honoring her, I'm gonna "go low".
So Heidi, I honor you. That's what I'm gonna do. I honor you. And if you're gonna outdo me at showing honor, what would you do? Give me a second though.
Give just a second though. I honor you though. No. Wait. But I honor you though.
So this is what it looks like. Thank you. Yeah. Give it a Friday. Give it a shot.
That's what it looks like to outdo 1 another and showing honor. And what I wanna point out is that in showing someone else honor, what I actually had to do is go low. Yeah. Okay? I had to be humble.
I had to go low. And then for her to outdo me and showing honor, she went lower. And so that's what honor looks like. When we give honor to others, we're lifting this up and we are going low, humbling ourself. So there's this connection between honor and humility.
They have to take place together. So we're gonna talk about that as we go. So be aware that when I talk about humility, that's a way to honor. And when I honor somebody, I'm putting them above me. I'm putting their thoughts above my thoughts, and now I'm gonna start living for them.
So now it looks a lot like love too. Okay? So we're a lot of things. It also looks like sacrifice. If there's an authority position, it it often looks like obedience.
Okay? So honor has some practical elements, but it's really a hard issue. To put someone before yourself is to die to yourself and to live as Christ lived. Now this is something that he empowers us to do. We have the same power that conquered the grave.
That's what lives in us. And so with that power of Jesus, I am able to freely and easily be humble to lift someone else up. It's not by the denying part or using my muscles. I love you more. It's actually through submitting myself on to Jesus.
And I'll easily submit myself onto my brothers, my sisters. So something that's really important in honoring somebody is to know someone else's thoughts. If I'm gonna I'm gonna honor somebody, put their thoughts before mine, I need to know them. So I need to be a really good listener. Okay?
So when you're getting ready to honor and practice this growing this muscle, I want to think about how listening is the first step to that. Okay. So there's **listening to obey** and there's listening to fulfill. Those are kind of tied. When I tell my I have a I have a 3 year old Isaiah and a 1 and a half year old Judah.
They're wonderful children. Now, Isaiah, he's he's amazing. He's also 3. So he's learning to listen. And I'll say, Isaiah, you gotta pull on your shoes.
And he'll say, me no dudes. And he'll start telling me why he's not gonna do it. And I'll say, Isaiah, you have to put out your shoes. We're gonna go to the park. And he'll say, park.
Let's go. Park. Yeah. Car ride.
Isaiah, did you remember what you've happened to you? You gotta put on your shoes. And he had forgotten because he wasn't listening with the intention of following through. He wasn't listening with the intention of obeying. So when you listen to somebody that you're honoring, you're listening with the intention of of doing what they're asking you to do.
Now, my husband and I, we've had some businesses together, and I don't work on them as much. Now, I work with the children more. But when we were really doing a lot together, he would sit down with me and give me tasks to do. And when I would sit down, I'd say, oh, wait. Wait a second.
I need a piece of paper. I need my phone. I need to take notes. Because if I'm listening to fulfill his desire, his vision, I'm going to fully understand his vision. So I'll start taking notes.
So I want you to think about this when you're with your when you're with your boss or when you're with somebody that's giving you a task to do. You're gonna think thoroughly. Okay. So they want this done. What are the questions that I need to ask right now so that I can fulfill it without needing to ask again?
That's honoring someone's vision. That's saying, I take on your vision fully and I desire not just so that I hear the, oh, I need advertisements done. Alright. Well, how many do you want? What's the budget?
Where do you want them delivered? And what's the color scheme? Like, I'm gonna start asking questions so that I can fulfill this to the greatest extent that I can, taking on their desire to fulfill a great vision. Whatever that vision is, I'm gonna fully embody myself to be able to to be who they want me to be in that moment and fulfill what they have me to do. So there's listening for those things.
There's also listening to understand. So if you're in an argument with somebody and you're trying to get your point across, oftentimes, if you're listening to respond, you can't listen to understand. Those things just don't work in our brains at the same time. So it's good to take a moment and say, I'm gonna listen to this person to understand. I want half my hurts.
Let's just set those aside for a second because I need to understand this person that I'm desiring to honor. I need to honor you. K? So honor says, live for you. Every part of me, I live for you.
I'm gonna set aside my own desires, my own thoughts, my own tasks for the day. I'm living for someone else. And it truly is servanthood. There is servanthood in honor. Now, I know you're wondering, how does honoring others benefit you?
It was like, I'm so glad you asked. *1 Peter-5:5* and 6. *1 Peter-5:5* and 6. In the same way, you who are younger must accept the *authority* of the elders. And all of you dress yourself in *humility* as you relate to 1 another.
For **God opposes the proud**, but he gives grace to the humble. So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God. And "at the right time", he will lift you up in honor. Can everybody say, at the right time? At the right time.
Is that Isn't that funny? It's at the right time. Now, when I think of the right time, it's often different than the Lord's time. But I'm telling you right now, the Lord's time is the right time, not my time. So in due time, he will lift you up in honor.
We're gonna come back to that. So so just keep it in you. Okay? *Luke-16:12* says, and if you have not been faithful in what is another man's, who will give you what is your own? So if you build another man's vision, God will build yours.
That's how this works. You build another man's vision. If you submit to someone else, if you show honor and go low and serve someone. Now, for as long as I can remember, I wanted children. I wanted to be a mom.
I wanted to have kids. And I knew that that was something that the Lord birthed in me, that it was a desire that he gave me. And 1 time, I was on the phone with my mom, and, you know, with family, this often time happens. You can get easily frustrated with family, and it's just can be the littlest things. And it's just because this familiarity that you can have with them, where you just get frustrated with them more easily.
And I got off the phone with my mom and I felt frustrated. And I went to the Lord and I said, what is this? Like, something's not right. I don't there's something in me. We gotta figure this out.
And I thought he was gonna tell me how to convince my mom that I was right. Like, that's what I thought was gonna happen here. Like, I need to be able to communicate well to her with why I'm not right. Help me, Lord. And he said, Moriah, you want me to give you children?
You want to be a mother, but you're not honoring your mother. It broke my heart and I've never been this ache since that moment. See, I was dreaming about a day where I have kids and this great relationship, but I wasn't doing my part as a child of my mother in honoring her and the sacrifice that she made for me and who she is. See, the character to carry your dream will actually mean built through serving someone else's. The character to carry your dreams.
So the ability, what you need to be, who you will become, how you will be shaped, it will grow, it will be built by doing that for somebody else first. Isn't that so cool that God allows you to learn those things, maybe make mistakes in someone else's field? That's pretty that's pretty amazing. And it I really believe that honors my mother has made me a better mother because I've learned what looks like. And I know I know even those feelings of not wanting to serve my mom.
And I can speak to that in my children now. And I'm like, oh, this is gonna be such a good lesson. Oh, this is so beautiful. The first person they're gonna learn. I know your father didn't wanna wake up your Oh, it's so good.
So how does dishonoring affect you? Let's just start with complaining because I really think complaining is a root of a lot of dishonoring. Complaining is dishonoring, but it's such a heavy root because it's the first step towards rebellion, and rebellion is witchcraft. Okay? Let me just prove it to you.
*1 Samuel-15:23* rebellion is as simple as witchcraft and stubbornness as bad as worshiping idols. So because you have rejected the command of the Lord, he has rejected you. Okay. So we're gonna throw out complaining. Complaining.
I I gotta gotta confess you guys. I wrote this sermon before yesterday. Like, this has been in there, and I complained yesterday. And then I went to practice my sermon, and I thought, oh, no. Oh, no.
Like, I gotta learn this. This is this is why it's so good for me to teach this stuff because I'm like, oh, God. That was for me. That was for me. You know, the the Israelites, this is somewhere around Numbers-11.
The Israelites are are wandering through the wilderness and they're being led by Moses. So Numbers-11:1 says, soon the people began to complain about their hardship. And the Lord heard everything they said. Then the Lord's anger blazed against them and he set a fire to rage among them and he destroyed some of the people in the outskirts of the camp. That's just from complaining.
Yeah. Exactly, Hebrews. He don't play. That's exactly right. A little further down, Numbers-11:10, it says Moses heard all the family standing in the doorways of their tents whining.
And the Lord became became extremely angry. Moses was also very aggravated. Complaining makes God angry. Edit Ambrb, your leaders. In the next chapter, so even further down, it says that Aaron and Miriam were questioning Moses' leadership.
And God came down, had a meeting with them to say this, why were you not afraid to criticize my servant Moses? You should actually be afraid to criticize the Lord's servant. Complaining is the devil's foothold to you missing out on your opportunity to honor someone. And that will lead to you missing out on your opportunity to be honored. So if you only submit when you want to, it's not actually submission.
So who are we supposed to honor? Now, easy answer is everyone. All of us. Everyone. We should all honor each other.
But let's really break it down. *Romans-13:1* says, everyone must submit to governing authorities for all authority comes from God. And those positions of authority have been placed there by God. So anyone who rebels against authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and they will be punished. For the authorities do not strike fear at people who are doing right, but as those who are doing wrong.
Would you like to live without fear of the authorities? **"do what is right"* and they will honor* you. And so nice and simple. Now, I want I want you to notice, God places all authority. So I want you to just take a minute and do do a rundown of who is authority in my life?
I want you to think about the president. I want you to think about the government. I want you to think about police officers. I want you to think about your children's teachers. I want you to think about your bosses, your managers, your husbands to the wives.
Right? Like, want you to think about any sort of authority that you have in your life, God has placed them there. God has placed them there. We're not gonna say, oh, you know, I don't really view them as authority because I don't really agree. God placed them there.
*Hebrews-13:17*. We're doing a lot of scripture today, so I hope you all will wear your running shoes. *Hebrews-13:17* says, obey your spiritual leaders and do what they say. Their work is to watch over your souls, and they are accountable to God. Give them reason to do this with joy and not with sorrow.
That would certainly not be for your benefit. Ain't that a good verse, pastor David and Courtney. That's a good 1. That is such a good 1. See, when I when I'm dealing with my kids in in the room and I and they're not listening to me and they're going a little crazy, my husband will come in and he'll just say, you guys, you're gonna drive your mouth crazy.
You better stop. That's what this verse says to me. It's the Lord coming down and saying, you better not drive them crazy. Like, it's not gonna benefit you if you drive your spiritual leaders crazy. If you have leaders that are asking you to be somewhere on time, you shouldn't drive them crazy.
You should be there on time. If you need to respond on planning center, you should respond on planning center. If it's gonna drive them crazy. I'm glad you guys are enjoying this because I'm serious about it. I'm serious about it.
You're gonna drive crazy, and the Lord doesn't want that. And he says, it's not gonna benefit you, and it just won't. Let's not do it. And there's so many people in the Bible Bible that had to serve a leader in order to be promoted. We could read pretty much the whole Bible, and we'd be here a while.
But man, it's all about honoring somebody before you. And and I'm talking people had to serve kings who were heathens. Like, weren't even good leaders. They were heathens. They were trying to kill Christians.
And so like Daniel serves Nebuchadnezzar. Joseph serves Pharaoh. Esther serves King Xerxes. They're all stepping into a position where they have an opportunity to honor somebody who in maybe their culture does the deserve honor. But the Lord places all of glory.
And he uses those people. He does. He uses even unbelievers, and he places them in authority. And the only way to be used is to say, I'm gonna do what's right. Right?
That's what the verse said. I'm gonna do what's right and then they will honor you. It's the only way. It's just is to humble yourself and to go low and in due time, he will honor you. I love the story of David and King Saul.
So before David becomes king, he's running away from King Saul. King Saul is chasing him down. He's pursuing him trying to to kill him, and he is the king. And David has chances to kill king Saul while he sleeps. 2 different chances where it would have been easy to just take his life and say, man, now this guy isn't gonna try to kill me anymore.
But he says, no. The both types he says, no. I will not lay my hand against the Lord's anointed. This is the Lord's anointed 1. King Song is trying to kill him.
What worse a leader could you have? But he says, no. This is the Lord's anointed 1. And he stands a far way off. And he says, I'm not gonna do that to you.
I wouldn't lay much hand against you. You are the Lord's anointed 1. And you say, man, these people that don't deserve honor, there are people people in my life. Maybe you're thinking of somebody that could say, would like to honor them. That's that's gonna be a challenge for me.
*1 Peter-2:18* says, you who are slaves must submit to your masters with all respect. Do what they tell you, not only if they are kind and reasonable, but even if they are cruel. Now, I do wanna make a note. There's a difference between honor and obedience in a relationship and authority. Okay?
So if somebody in authority is asking you to sin, you can still honor them without obeying them. Okay? If my child disobeys me and I'm not asking him to sin, that would not be okay. And say, buddy, you gotta put your shoes on. I'm the mother.
That's how it works. If somebody who is cruel ask somebody else to sin just like he did with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, the king Nebuchadnezzar did with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they could say, you know, you can you gotta do what you gotta do. Throw us in the fire. You can do that. Yeah.
Our God will save us. And even if he doesn't, he's still our Lord. We're not gonna say he's not our Lord, so we're not gonna bow down to you. That's I I don't do that. You could say to your boss, hey, I won't steal.
I don't cheat. I don't lie to people. It's not what I do. I'm I'm a servant of the king of the Lord. So I honor your position, but no.
I'm not gonna do that. It's against what I believe in my faith. So it's okay to say no, but you can still do that with honor. Now, if you had If you had bad parents growing up, I can I can see this being like a challenge for you? But I want you to remember that God placed all authority.
He chose who your parents would be, and God did not make a mistake. He actually said, you know what? This is gonna make the perfect DNA. You are some of your mother. You are some of her father.
And he looked at you being created in your mother's womb and said, that's my girl. That's my boy. That's right. That's right. And when you take the opportunity to *honor* your parents, even even if it's just you're honoring them for the life that they gave you, you will be able to receive the reward of that gift.
You will say God did not make a mistake in this design and and who he made you to be, and honoring them will only allow you to receive blessings from them. Honor is when you recognize who someone is without stumbling over who they are not. Yeah. That's good. I made the food.
*Honor* is when you recognize who someone is without stumbling stumbling over over who who they they are are not. Not. And when you place someone at that place of honor, you say, you know, used to say, you know, my dad's not my dad anymore. But now I'm gonna say, you know what? You are my dad.
I I do put you in that place, and it is a place of honor. It's an honor to be a father. It's an honor to be a mother. And when you place that then in that position, you are able to receive what the Lord did when he decided that would be your mother or your father. It doesn't mean that they had to be good.
It doesn't mean that you have to say, oh, it was okay what they did. No. We're not saying what they the the bad things that they did was okay. But I'm saying, God, I trust you. I trust your design.
I trust in who you made me to be and you'll be able to receive that. And you'll be able to receive who you were made to be. You won't say, oh, I get that from my dad and I don't like it. I get that from my mom. I don't like it.
No. You could say, Lord, how do you want me to use this? You gave me this. You gave me this DNA. I received that.
So we *honor* government. We honor spiritual leaders. Who else do we honor? We honor each other. You know, the the word talks about how the church is a body, and we're all different parts of this body.
Let let's read that. It's 1 Corinthians-12:21. The eye can never say to the hand, I don't need you. The head can't say to the fee, I don't need you. In fact, some of the body that seems weakest and least important are actually the most necessary.
Necessary. And the parts we regard as less honorable are those we clothe with the greatest care. So we carefully protect those parts that should not be seen. While the more honorable parts do not require this special care. So God has put the body together such that extra honor and care are given to those parts that have less dignity.
This makes for harmony among the members, so that all the members care for each other. If 1 part suffers, all the parts suffer with it. And if 1 part is honored, all parts are glad. If you feel like you have a certain role in the body of Christ, which you do, but if you understand that vision, it can get easy to say this is the way to Christian. This is the way to follow Jesus.
Right? And and maybe you're the feet and you're you're like, I'm good at this. I'm good at this walking stuff. This is what I do. This is what everyone should do.
And then you're like, oh, man. The eyes, they always get so distracted. They're like turning me every which way, and then I I don't like what the eyes are doing to my role. You have to take a step back, and in your own way, figure out how the Lord is telling you to honor them. Sometimes it's a step of obedience.
Sometimes he's gonna ask you to bless them, to reach out to bless them. Sometimes it's gonna just say, you know, I'm gonna pray for them. Because it should change your part. Whatever you do, it should change your heart from the inside out to make you say, man, I'm thankful for the eyes. I don't stub my toes when the eyes are around.
What a blessing these eyes are. We should also honor the elderly. I know I I talked about that just a little bit, but I wanna I wanna take a minute and just dig a little deeper into that because we live in a culture where we have a lot of information at our fingertips. We can say, man, we don't more than any generation ever knew because of all this technology and the things that we could do. And it can pump us up in pride.
Alright? So I wanna take a minute to to honor those who are older than us, and I wanna read a letter. It's just a portion of a letter that John Adams, who's our second president, wrote to his wife, Abigail Adams. He says, I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, sanctuary, tapestry, and porcelain.
Do you see the level of weight on each task? It gets lighter and lighter. Our choices have become lighter and lighter generationally. I get to do whatever I want. Isn't that amazing?
I don't have to to have a farm and and live out and and work the land if I don't have to because we have purpose room. I get to worship wherever and whenever I want because people fought for my freedom to do that. See, it's not always about the older generation understanding the younger generation and being able to fit into our culture. It's actually about realizing that we are standing on levels of generational *sacrifice*, of generational obedience. See, they fought things generationally so that you wouldn't carry those burdens.
And you say, oh, I've got a little bit of stuff for my parents and it I can't believe they did that to me. Listen, they have been wiping off generational heaviness and have gifted you your life in the greatest season. You were made for such a time as this, and a foundation was laid for you to be here. So I want you take time in your day to say I need to grow the muscle of honoring the elderly. Anybody that's older you, but especially the elderly.
If you have a chance to have a conversation with them, to pull on their wisdom, they have lived years and made *sacrifices* and and have brought us to where we are today. We also honor children. I honor my children by listening to them and by training them up in the way of the Lord. Now the most honoring thing that was ever said to it was to my son Isaiah, was said by Heidi Hunter. This baby, Isaiah, he was fresh at the time.
He was a fresh baby just out of the oven. And Heidi comes up and looks into his face and says, we are going to learn so much from you. This woman has wiped his butt, wiped off his stunt, held him while he cries. And she still knew to prophesy, to say, the Lord is gonna give you wisdom. He's gonna give you understanding.
And because she was able to honor him, she now gets to receive the wisdom that he is going to give her in due time. We did. When Jesus went to Nazareth, he he goes home and he's ready to do ministry. He's gonna do miracles. He's ready to.
But it said that he's not able to do miracles in his hometown because nobody honors a prophet in their own hometown. There's something about seeing a child grow up that makes you say, remember when you were just young and silly. But they're not anymore. They've grown in the Lord, and you can miss out on what God is doing through them, even when they are a young child, to say, man, I'm gonna learn something from you. God is gonna pour out of you.
And it honors the child. See, in the same way, Jesus was in his home own hometown. They looked at Jesus and said, isn't he Joe 's son? Isn't he Mary's son? I don't know, man.
I remember when he had stopped running down at his nose. Dishonor shuts the door on miracles. And *honor* opens the door to miracles. Isn't that cool? God just uses anybody.
Even me, even you. God uses anybody. And if we could honor that in 1 another, if we could honor who God actually called you to be, as if you were that right now in fullness, we would see a lot more miracles. We'd say, man, God can just pour out of you. That's beautiful.
When you honor others, you do honor God. *1 John-4:20 says, if someone says I love* God, but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar. For if we don't love people we can see, how can we love God when we cannot see? If you want to know how much you love God, ask yourself, who do you love? Who do you love least is how much you love God.
Who you honor least is how much you honor God. Right? You have to be using those baby muscles in.
Oh, I love you more. Oh, I honor you.
We gotta grow the muscle. So we're gonna start honoring. Jesus honored us with his whole life. He lived purely. He died for us.
He raised from the dead. All of who he was was for us. The most unselfish lives. Jesus, the most humble example. He kept going lower and lower and lower and lower and lower.
He washed our feet, and then he washed us from the inside out. He went as low as you can go, and now he is at the highest place of *honor* because he went the lowest. Because he humbled himself the lowest. I think we we like to think that we're all equal in the kingdom of God. It's a nice thought.
That's how it works. *Matthew-20:16* says, those who are last now will be first dead, and those who are first will be last. I think sometimes we think this looks like a like we're all tree in positions. Like like who's gonna make it least and first? And now look, I'm gonna grab this.
Alright. So you are like this tree.
We just pull it. Pull up. Right.
Okay. You are like this tree and the Lord is gonna work on you. Right? You're gonna have you're gonna have some care. And you as a tree, your desire is to go way up high.
Like, the the goal is for these leaves to go high. That's always the goal. Okay? And and the Lord is gonna plant you somewhere. He's gonna take you out of this pot.
Look at all those nice roots. He's gonna break up these roots a little bit, and he's gonna start planting you. And then he's gonna send somebody to tend to you. So maybe your pastor or your boss or somebody around you is gonna take some time and they're gonna they're gonna start working on you. They're gonna push down all these roots.
Man, this tree needs some how manure. Right? Yeah. How manure on this tree. That would be lovely.
And you're this tree and you're going, man, this is cum. It pushing
me around a little bit.
I don't like this. It's uncomfortable. I just wanted to do my own thing. You know, I'm trying to get up here. Just let me get up here.
Let me work on my own leaves. And they're down at the roots. See, the roots are where humility comes from. The roots are where character comes from. Right here.
So if you focus on your roots going deep, guess what will happen? The tree will grow up. Right? So in due time, he will lift you up in honor. That's how that works.
So it's a death that brings you up. Right? What if somebody comes along maybe? Maybe you're in a small group and your leader says, you know, let me just correct this thought in you here. Yeah.
That'll do. Be like, wait a second. I'm trying to go up. I'm trying to go up. Why would you cut that off of me?
I'm trying to go this way. You just chop that. I worked hard for those leaves. But see, in order to grow and in order to bear fruit, you have to be pruned, you have to be planted. And if you try to lift yourself up without the help of where you are planted and who he's having tend to you, you will lift yourself up.
All this dirt will wash off. And those leaves up there, they're gonna crisp up in the sun, and the roots will dry out. God cares more about your character than he does your call. And without the character of these roots, without the the tending of leadership, without the tending of authority, you will not be able to carry the call that he has for you. It's not that your desires are wrong.
It's not that you don't desire things that are good. A tree should grow. He probably put a desire in your heart that is for you. That's what he does. He says, oh, man.
Yeah. Someday, you're gonna be this big and you're like, woah. Let's go there tomorrow. Let's do it. I'm ready, God.
And he goes, no. You're you're not ready. You're not ready. You need to submit to the authority. Allow yourself to be pruned.
And you know what it takes? It takes being humble and it takes going lower. And if you'll just continue to lower your self, you'll find yourself on the floor, and then you'll start digging it deeper and deeper. When you humble yourself, you give yourself an opportunity to grow. If somebody brings a critique to you, you can say Instead of saying, hey, let me just explain why I did what I did there.
Let me just I'm out of this. Or you can lean into it and say, yeah, teach me. I'm gonna go low here. I'm gonna go low to you because I I wanna learn from you even if it's a brother. Even if you're like, you know what?
You're not an authority of me. Let me just outdo in showing honor. Let me figure out if I can get my roots deeper here. Let me figure out if I can have more humility here than what I than what I had before. It's an opportunity to grow in humility.
What we're gonna do is we're just gonna take some time with the presence of God. I think that there are some thoughts that probably went through your head that were like Maybe you thought of a person and you're like, they're a hard person to honor. Maybe just somebody came into your mind and the Lord is trying to press on you saying, hey, I want you to do something to show honor to them. I want you to live for them more. And and we're gonna take a time to just hear from God.
Okay? So we do believe that you can have a relationship with the Lord. We believe that he is speaking to you, and he will speak to you clearly. And sometimes it feels like an impression. Sometimes it feels like a thought.
Sometimes it it sounds like a small whisper. People can be spoken to many different ways. So I wanna just take a moment and figure out what who does the Lord gonna have us honor? And Lord, where are you planting me? Where have I planted and who do I honor?
Lord, speak to us. Baby, you're hearing, I need to I feel like there's a presence of my wife or my husband next to me. Need to figure out how to honor them. And then I want you to ask, Lord, what could I do? And ask for just a specific example.
Maybe it's writing a letter. Maybe it's giving a financial blessing to somebody. You're honoring them with your whole lives anyway. So just take a a moment to to decide right now, to listen with intention to the Lord that you're going to follow through on honoring a person in your life to grow that muscle. I really feel the Holy Spirit on this and I I don't want to end it too soon.
So what we're gonna do is I'm gonna have elders come up, deacons come up to pray for people. If you feel like there's something in your heart you'd like to repent, you'd like to share the testimony of this moment, have somebody to hold you accountable to, you find a friend to share that with. It's really important that you decide in this moment to follow through because this moment can pass you by. Then the Holy Spirit is on this, and he's talking to you he speaks to you. Okay.
I'm gonna have Heidi close this out, and then we'll have a time of prayer with you. And I'm just gonna pray as as you guys can decide whether you're going to a friend or coming up here to share your your decision. Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for your honor. Thank you, Lord, that we get to do all that we do onto your glory and onto your honor. We commit ourselves to you, Lord.
Thank you that in due time, you lift us up in honor. What what glory you are. What beauty you are. We love you, Lord. We submit to you.
You are good. Amen.