Shaped by the Silence

My name is Stephen. I have the privilege of being the location pastor for a live church. And I love what Pastor Michael shared about Christmas with a live church. We've got it two services uh three and five on Christmas Eve. And he said something that I think is important for us to understand. He had an invitation for us to uh to attend one and serve one. And as somebody who's been a part of the local church full-time in ministry uh for over a decade now, some of our family's favorite memories come along serving at Christmas Eve. It does look a little bit differently for us than what it does for other families, but there's stories that happen. There's interactions that happen. In fact, the way I like to describe it is you get a front row seat to see what God will do in somebody's life uh on Christmas Eve because we know people come to church when they otherwise wouldn't other times of the year. And so, if you're interested in serving, stop by the welcome area. If you already serve and you got a leader, you just let let your leader know. But just encourage you like be a part of what's going on. Uh because we've heard so many stories. Every year there's at least a handful of stories of people who have not been involved in church and they say God did something in my heart that day and they get connected in the next year. Uh and in fact I love even what he talked about bring being a bringer like bring people with your church. In fact I would just challenge you think of the wildest person you can invite to church is bring them be like this person would never walk through the doors of church just see what God would do invite them to church. Uh I was actually reminded as I was thinking about this uh about one of my favorite Christmas movies. Now let me just I'm going to throw a softballs. Anybody watch any Christmas movies so far this year? Anybody in the room? Okay. Um, now you can tell a lot about a person based on their favorite Christmas movies. Uh, in fact, maybe you have watched Hallmark Christmas movies because you love those and it's a hundred movies with the exact same story line. It's the same movie over and over again. But one of my favorites came up a couple years ago. It was it may have even been last year. It was uh the the best Christmas pageant ever. Has anybody ever watched that movie in the room? Have you read the books growing up? And my mom, my one my mom's favorite stories that she would tell us was the best Christmas pageant ever. And when I think about bringing people to church, I think about this story because there's a group of kids who are would be the bullies. They would be they would be the intimidators within the community and they get they get brought into church because of snacks. They came because there was food there. They get involved in the Christmas story and their life their life is drastically changed. And it's why the title of the of the movie or the book is the greatest Christmas pageant ever because God can do the impossible in people's lives. And that's why I say, hey, just bring somebody to church and just see what God would do because he's that big and he's that good and he loves people that much. So be a bringer. We're in a series that we just kicked off a few weeks ago called Authentic. And we're going to be spending time over the next several months walking through the book of Luke and the book of Acts as we study the story of Jesus, authentic Jesus, and then sto study the story of the church. And I just encourage you be at church as much as you can because there's so much to God's word. And we're going to dive into the last part of the first chapter. Uh in fact, this is like the the preceding of what many of us would know as the Christmas story. On on th Wednesday, we're going to talk about the Christmas story and that you're familiar with. Today we're going to learn about what happens leading up to that. And in fact, this is like the book end of a miracle of what God did. See, the Christmas story is preceded uh by the story of John or the birth of John who would later be known as John the Baptist. He's Jesus' cousin and and him coming into the world is a miracle in itself. See, nine out of 10 times this would be the front page of the news. This would be the story that we all remember. But because it runs parallel to the story of Jesus, many times we can just put it in the back of our mind and forget about it. Well, today we're seeing the birth of John that was prophesied that was foretold earlier on in the chapter in chapter 1. But this is such an important part of the story because we see God's faithfulness in the lives of his people in a specific couple named Zachchariah and Elizabeth. And so, if you would, would you stand to your feet? We're going to read Luke 1:57-68. Now, leading into this, it's important for you to understand, for us to understand that it's the birth of John, but it was a miracle, as I mentioned. See, Zachchariah and his wife Elizabeth were unable to have children. They had no kids. They were older in age. And this is the moment when John the Baptist is born. It tells us he becomes the Baptist later, just in case you didn't know that. Like, his name's not John the Baptist. I just want to be you understand it's your middle name the Baptist. It's not. Here we go. Luke 1:57-68. When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy and they shared her joy. On the eighth day, they came to circumcise a child. They were going to name him after his father, Zachariah. But his mother spoke up and said, "No, he is to be called John." They said to her, "There is no one among your relatives who has that name." Then they made signs to his father to find out what he would like to name in the child. He asked for a writing tablet. And to everyone's astonishment, he wrote, "His name is John." Immediately his mouth was open and his tongue set free. And he began to speak praising God. All the neighbors were filled with awe. And throughout the hill country of Judea, people were talking about all these things. Everyone who had heard this wondered about it, asking, "What then is this child going to be?" For the Lord's hand was with him. His father Zachchariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, "Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them." Let's pray. God, we love you. I thank you for your word. Thank you that that it's written by you and there's there's always something for us to take away from it. God, I pray that as we lead into this Christmas week, God, that we would be a people of expectation, anticipation, people who would listen to your voice, God, that we would hear from you and that we would study your word to see how we can apply it to our life this week. God, we thank you for the truth of your word. We thank you that you're faithful in Jesus name. Amen. You have a seat. So, what we see in this moment, it's nothing short of a miracle. As I said before, it was that they had not been able to have kids. Zachchariah and Elizabeth had not had any kids and they're they're up in age. They're older. God performs a miracle. They were they were blown away. And it's not just a baby boy who's born. It's a man who would be the forerunner to Jesus. See, we we see later in the Gospel of Luke and in all the gospels, it tells us a story of John. He was a man who stood firm in his faith, who stood firm in what God had told him to. He spoke he paved the way for Jesus to come. So, we see a moment in which he's born, which is significant. That would lead to more significant moments in John's life. But today, we're not talking about John other than that this is the day he was born. See, what we're looking at today is you and I, we're going to we're going to look at the story of Elizabeth and Zachchariah. Now, what's very different about their two stories is they had experiences, very different experiences over the course of the last nine months in which John would be born. See, we find out is that as we look last week, we understand like there's this moment where Elizabeth as a as a lady who's expecting like there's good news that happens in her story. Last week we we learned that she interacted with her cousin Mary and and they got to experience like this this joy of both being pregnant at the same time because Mary is the mother of Jesus and there's this miracle of what she's experiencing. There's this miracle of what Elizabeth experienced. They come together and there's joy that fills the room. That's what we learned about last week. We learned that she's that that Elizabeth has as much as you can good experiences with what's going on. Zachariah has a different story. Like we actually don't see any more of Zachchariah's story until we get to this portion of scripture. The last time we see Zachariah is his time in the temple in which the angel Gabriel comes to him and gives his me gives him a message of what God is going to do. Now Zachchariah's problem is that he didn't fully believe what God was saying. Now we can look at this and go, "How could you not believe there was an angel that appeared before you?" But I would say more times than not, we can wonder in our own lives, is it really true for me when God does something? We may not have a mo an angel appear before us, but there's moments and miracles of what God does, and we begin to question, is it really possible? Can I really believe? That's where Zachariah Zachariah found himself is that he began to question. And what's interesting as you read this first chapter again, you see a parallel, a comparison, a contra uh u some some differences between Mary and Zachchariah's story because Mary also asked some questions when she finds out that she's going to be pregnant with Jesus. She asked, "How can this be?" Even though the words sound very similar, her heart position was very different than Zachariah's. She began, she was asking questions to God, how can this be? Zachariah was questioning God, how can you do this? I don't believe it's possible. So his his result was different than Mary's so that we don't forget we can go back and read this in chapter and early in the chapter chapter one in 18 through 20 it tells us this is when the angel appears to Zachchariah and he asks the angel how can I be sure of this prove it I am an old man and my wife is well along in years the angel said to him I am Gabriel. Maybe he gets a little deeper. Do you hear it? Like I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God. And I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens because you did not believe my words which will come true at their appointed time. So Gabriel says, "You chose not to believe and because of your unbelief, you will experience silent from this day until your son is born." There's a difference between Mary's heart posture and Zachariah's heart posture. I love what the author Chris Te Tigreen explains. He says, "Zachariah the priest fell into a common trap like many others in his time and in ours. He made the mistake of admiring God's work in the past but not expecting them in the present. Well, he could believe on paper that God could do miracles, but when it applied to his own life, he struggled to see that it was actually possible. Maybe you've experienced that, too. Maybe there's in seasons in which you believe a miracle is possible. God is capable in someone else's life. Maybe it can apply in their circumstance, but because of the situation I'm in, I don't know that God can truly move. It's a trap. It's a common trap that was back then and is true today. So you see that moment in which Zachariah doubts and he has the consequence of his doubt which will help him which causes him to be silent. And what we see in scripture we understand it's not just that he can't speak but he can't hear either because the scripture explains that whenever they try and get his attention they have to make hand signals so that he can hear them so that he can they can get his attention. So he's not hearing, he's not speaking. So these nine months, what he is experiencing is silence. Elizabeth's story is very different. She experiences joy. She has relationship with her cousin. We don't know exactly what Zachariah's experience was other than that we know he dealt with silence. If you're taking notes, I encourage you to write this down. There is significance in the silence. Sometimes I would say more often than not that we try and bypass silence as quickly as we want as as quickly as possible. Like we don't like silence. Do you feel that? >> It's the awkward silence. We don't like silence where we're like let's get just something just it's awkward. I don't want to have silence. Like in fact, as a as a as a staff this week, we took 15 minutes before our staff meeting of complete silence. It felt like days. I'm like 30 seconds by. Are we done? Like, I can't be in silence. We We expect noise. It's so hard to sit in silence. But that's what Zachariah experienced. He was in silence for 9 months. We don't like silence. I don't like silence because it's uncomfortable. We don't know what to do. But God does a lot of work in the silence. If you've got young kids, maybe you've tried to enforce silence upon them. See how well that goes for you. When our kids were younger, we would have drives in the car and we would play a game called the quiet game. Anybody ever played that with your kids? We would play one, two, three hush puppies and it would last for about 45 seconds and then somebody would break because they didn't like silence. It's awkward. It's hard to function in silence. I'm not much better because when I when they were little, I didn't function well in silence because I knew if there was silence around the house, something was happening. Something not so good. A mess I'd have to clean up later. a mess Susie would have to clean up later. But God invites us into silence. And I would just encourage you is we're in this season that is go go go so fast-paced. Everything is moving so quickly that we would take time to slow down and to embrace the silence. As we'll see here in just a moment, what happened to Zachariah when he embraces silence is something that I think you and I can learn from. We're most likely not going to have silence forced upon us, unless you're a child, I guess. But we're not going to have it the same way that Zechariah did. We're not going to experience the same thing. So it means that you and I have to have the discipline enough in our life to be silent, to choose silence, to slow down, to remove the noise. To God, I want to focus on you. There's this verse that's found in Psalm 46. It's verse 10. You may be familiar with this if you study scripture. You may have heard somebody tell it to you. It says, "Be still and know that I am God." the cont that context of that psalm and that song. What we see is we see all this chaos going on around and it's a reminder that God says you need to be still and know that I am God. There's things that are out of your control. There's things that will happen. There's some things that maybe you cause. There's things that other people cause. But what you can know is when you slow down enough and you're still, you can know that I'm God. It's what he invites us into. Zechariah's life. We don't know exactly what it looked like. We have the the book ends of the beginning of the pregnancy and the end of the pregnancy. We don't know what happens to him in between other than that he had to experience silence. So what do we do in the silence? Do we slow down enough? Do we say those verses over our lives? Do we remember that we can be still and know that he is God? Maybe you need to do that this week whenever you go into a meeting. Before you walk into the meeting, would you slow down enough to pray and go, "God, I want to be still and know that you're God." Before you text somebody back, before you have the conversation, before you go visit your relatives this Christmas, be still and know that I am God. Not rushing through the silence, but embracing the silence because there's significance in the silence. And our lives can often be shaped in the silence. It's where God speaks for quiet, settle ourselves. God, what do you want to say? slow down enough, experience, believe that there's significance in the silence. There's a saying that you may have heard whenever you're you're having to be patient. It's like I have to wait and see. You ever heard that before? Wait and see. Wait and see. As a parent, I'm just throwing what I say as a parent. I'll tell my kids when I don't want to give them an answer in the moment. I'm like, just wait and see. I have to wait and see. I don't know. We'll wait and see. It's this passive approach to life like if I'm going to wait and then I will see. But what I would offer is that I believe Zachchariah switched that. He says, "Let me see while I wait. Let me see what God is doing." I don't have my ears and I don't have my voice. But what I can do is I can slow down enough to see what God is doing. What do I see while while I'm waiting for the next thing to happen? This is what happens. So Zechariah, he's waiting. He's not the same person that walked into the temple and he's not the same person who left the temple during these nine months. Something is happening in him. We don't know exactly what it is, but you can see by his response that God is doing something in his life. Insert in the details. Read between the lines. You can see God's doing something. So, what do we see in in verse 56? It tells us this is when John the Baptist is born. Again, he's not called the Baptist. Then that comes later. His name's just John. When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy and they shared in her joy. Again, you see like Elizabeth's story is very different than Zacharias. They shared in her joy. God had shown her mercy. She's all excited. Here's Zachariah completely quiet. Nobody to talk to. On the eighth day, they came to circumcise a child, and they were going to name him after his father, Zachariah. But his mother spoke up and said, "No, he's to be called John." They said to her, "There's no one among your relatives who has that name." Then they made signs to the father to find out what he would like to name the child. And he asked for a writing tablet. And to everyone's astonishment, he wrote, "His name is John." Immediately his mouth was open and his tongue set free. And he began to speak. Here they are. The whole community comes around 8 days after he's born. It's a celebration. And it's a little bit different, possibly a lot different for our society from what it was back then because it was a community affair. When they when they questioned and challenged Elizabeth about naming her child John, it was more than just an ask. They were inserting their opinions. These people are around them and and and Zachariah and Elizabeth felt the peer pressure of the community trying to ask questions. Why are you naming your child this? That doesn't make sense because what it was is him being named John and not someone else from their family. It spoke something. It spoke pretty loudly because typically your child would be named after someone from your family, named after their father. Why? It's because it's a lineage. Like you're you're speaking to your heritage. You're honoring your family by re by naming your child after the father. So they had that pressure. What do you mean? Zachariah is a great guy. Why wouldn't you name him Zachariah? Is there something we don't know? questions that are coming up. So, this is a community affair. It's not just mom and dad who get to make the decision. It's the community who's helping along this process. They give their opinions. They feel that pressure. Elizabeth feels that pressure. Then you have, what does it mean his name is John? Because John has significance. Just like every name has a meaning, John has a meaning. It says God is gracious. Well, but Zachchariah, its meaning is that God remembers. The Lord remembers. So, if I name him Zachariah, it's speaking to the past. But if I name him John, that's speaking to the future. Who knows what the future will hold in the days ahead? All this pressure they're experiencing in the moment from the people around them wondering. And so, what Elizabeth does is is she says his name is his name is John. And then here comes Zachariah's moment. The people turn to him and I almost feel like it's it's a slow motion cinematic view of them going, "Zachariah, what's his name?" They have to get his attention because he can't hear. They finally get his attention and he asked for a tablet because they couldn't say iPad because it was copyright infringement if they wrote that in the Bible. This is a terrible joke. It's terrible. Silence is awkward. So, Hammopad, he writes, "His name is John." He doesn't give this like, "Well, here's why we thought about doesn't give a big explanation." He just writes these words, "His name is John." And if we're not careful, we can bypass and go right past the significance of what he's doing in this moment. Because if you backtrack to the story in which he's told that he's going to have a son, the angel declares at the beginning of that story at the temple, he says, "You God will give you a son." He's declaring what God is going to do. The angel is telling Zachchariah, he's like, "You will have a son." And then it jumps forward and says, "These are all the great things he's going to do. God is giving you a son. and and your son John, what he's going to do is he's going to be a forerunner to the Messiah. He's going to speak hope to people and all these great declarations. And so on either side of it, right in the middle is what we see Zachariah is supposed to do with this information. On one side, the angel says, "This is what God's doing." On the other side, this is saying, "This is what John's going to do." And Zachchariah has been given one instruction. That's it. If you go back and look at, he's told one thing. The angel says, "You will name him John." So, he has a decision to make. Am I going to fall to the culture around me of what everybody else says for me to do or am I going to stand in the gap and go, "This is what I was told to do." His name is John. He stands firm. And what happens? Breakthrough happens. It says immediately what happens is that he's able to speak. His mouth is open. Now, if I'm in Zachariah's shoes, what I expect is what the angel had told me way back as he says, "You're going to not be able to speak for nine months." And so when John arrives, when the baby is born, there's probably an expectation in Zachariah going, you know what? I'm probably going to get my voice back. The angel said whenever the baby was born, I would begin to speak. And then what happens? 8 days. Still no ability to speak. Can you imagine what happens in those eight days? Put yourself in this story. There's probably discouragement. There's probably disappointment. He's going, "Wait a second. I thought this was how it was going to work out." And the moment arrives for him to be able to stand in the gap and speak in or to to write down what he felt like he was supposed to. The words that God had given him, he writes it down. And in that obedience, his mouth is open. I like saying it this way. Faithfilled obedience opens the door to breakthrough. It's a faithfilled obedience that opens the door to breakthrough. He was faithfilled. He believed the obedience led to breakthrough. Zachariah did not know what the future would hold other than what the angel had spoken. He didn't know exactly what it was going to be, what it was going to look like. What he held on to was the word that the angel had given him before. You and I will experience moments in our life where we wonder, "What am I supposed to do next?" Let me just ask you, have you ever experienced a moment in your life in which you wonder, "What am I supposed to do next?" What I would encourage you to do is to do the same thing that Zachariah did and go back to the last thing that God told you to do in order to move forward in the path that God has for you. If you don't feel like you have peace over the next thing to do, then go back to the last thing that God had told you and stand firm in that. That's what he does. I've had moments in my life in which I've wondered, "What does the future hold?" I've worried. I've experienced anxiety and going, "God, what? How are you going to work this thing out? I can't see the future. I don't know what's going to happen. I get all worked up and worried. What do I do in that moment when I'm at my best and not at my worst is I go back to the last thing that God told me now. I don't hear the booming vers voice of God. I've heard the still small voice in in my heart of going, "Okay, in this moment, this is what I feel like God's saying." Perfect example of this that I go back to is 11 years ago this month, I remember just getting worked up and worried. We had four kids. We lived in a small house. And I begin to just cycle through in my mind going, "God, if we have another baby, I don't know what I'm supposed to do. Like, it's hard enough with four and I don't know how we're going to manage. Kids are expensive and oh, it's tough." And so, like, I cycled. I began to like just over and over in my head just getting worked up and worried. I remember laying in bed having these thoughts going through my head and this peace came over me and it wasn't an audible voice, but it was about as clear as I could describe it. I remember God speaking. He says, "If you say you trust me, why would you not trust me with another baby?" Two days later, we found out we were pregnant with my son, Everett. You want to talk about God's timing, the peace that he gives is right on time. So, what do I do when I get worked up? I go back to that moment and go, God, when I'm worked up and I'm worried, I remind myself that I say, "I trust you. I can trust you with all things." I remember being in a being in a worship service and again I I wish I could say I was fully focused and it's not the case. My brain goes all over the place and I remember just thinking about my kids and and getting worked up and worried about the days ahead and and will they follow Jesus and what's this going to look like? And again, the still small voice came over me and it said, "I care way more about your kids than you ever could." You know, when I get worked up and I get worried about my kids' future, what I go back to that moment. Thank you, Jesus, that you remind me that you care way more about my kids than I ever could. What leads us forward is when we look backward to God's words over our life. And maybe you haven't experienced that still small voice. But each one of us, we have this and we can see God's promises in his word and what he speaks over you and I. That he loves us, that he's for us, that his mercies are made new every day. His grace is sufficient in our lives. Instead of waiting for a new word, maybe I'm supposed to fulfill the word that he's given me or follow through on the word that he's already given me. He has a moment. Zachariah has a moment. And he said, "I messed up before. I don't want to miss the moment this time. This is what my responsibility is." His name is John. He's able to speak. And then what it tells us is the response of those around him. Says all the neighbors were filled with awe and throughout the hill country of Judea, people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking what then is this child going to be? Do you like the silence? For the Lord's hand was with him. They're asking the question, what's going to happen? They're in awe. They're in wonder. But see, the angel had already told Zachchariah and Elizabeth what John was going to do. They go back to the the words that God had spoken over their life. This is where you and I can be. We don't have to be people who wonder and wonder what's going to happen. We can be people who wait with expectation. Am I going to fully know how it's going to work out? No. But I'm in full expectation that God's going to do something in this situation. While the world wonders, we can wait with expectation. I love what one author said, a book that I that years and years and years ago he write. He said, "I'm never surprised, but I'm always amazed." As a Christian, isn't that a beautiful place to stay? Like, I'm never surprised, but I'm always away. Yeah, God did that. I'm not surprised that he did it. I'm just amazed about how good he is. It's because we have to be in the same place of going, God, I expect I'm expecting you to do something. You're faithful. You're good. My job is to stand in obedience and believe that breakthrough would happen whenever I have faithful obedience for what you're calling me to. [snorts] These are the words that they spoke over over John. [snorts] She says, "You," the Gabriel, angel Gabriel says, 'You will have a great joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the eyes of the Lord. He must never touch wine or other alcoholic drinks, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even when even before his birth, and he will turn many Israelites to the Lord their God. He will be a man with the spirit [music] and power of Elijah. He will prepare the people to the coming of the Lord. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children. He will cause those who are rebellious to accept the wisdom of the godly. That's the words that Zachariah and Elizabeth could stand on. And the truth is because of their age, they probably didn't [music] get to fully see it come to fruition. They probably didn't get to see him fulfill all these prophecies and these promises over his life, but they believed in faith for what God was doing. That the reason they named him John, that God is full of grace, is they believed the days ahead [music] that God would use his life for a purpose and others would be changed. There's things that God has [music] the promises that God has given us that we may not fully get to see them to fruition, but we can be a part of the story in the process. It's faith. [music] It's trust. It's slowing down. It's quieting ourselves. It's living with expectation. It says, "His father Zachchariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his [music] people and redeemed them." Because Zachchariah got quiet for [music] nine months, he was able to focus on his time with God, not get worked up and distracted, [music] and then he was able to speak an encouraging, a prophetic word over what God was going to do. He's able to speak to the coming of the Messiah. because he got still enough to hear God's voice. Now, there's a likelihood that it will look different for you and I, but I still believe that when we slow down, God wants to speak to us. We probably [music] won't have silence forced upon us, which means that you and I need to choose silence at times. Dallas Willard says it this way. He says, "The discipline of silence is a discipline that creates space for God to [music] speak." And we live in such a fast-paced world where everything moves all the time and we're distracted by social media. We're distracted by things we see on the news. Like there's just [music] so many distractions. And not that they're all bad things. But it's important for us to slow down enough to go, God, I want to hear your voice. I want to silence the noise. I want to slow down and believe that you still speak through your word. And even in the busiest of seasons, [music] the best thing I can do is listen to your voice. Because what that does, silence [music] reminds us that God is with us. It doesn't mean that God is absent. [music] Silence never means that God is absent. It just means that he's doing a deeper work. In a time where we want things right like this all the time, God says, "Let me work at a slower [music] pace." Because when I work at a slower pace, I'm able to do a deeper work in you. >> [music] >> And as I said before, he's never silent because he's given us his word. And you and I, we can go to his word and we can see what what he speaks to us. The promises that we read in the Old Testament, [music] in the New Testament, he's never fully silent. He's never silent because he speaks to his word. He says, "Nothing is impossible for me." He says, "Greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world." He says, "When you're weak, you're actually strong [music] because my grace is sufficient in your weakness." You don't have to worry about anything. Pray about everything. Peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your heart and your mind. Do you see that? His word speaks to us. And it's when we do the deep work slow enough to believe it's [music] actually true for our lives. So my encouragement for us as we study this passage and we see God move in the life of a family, a beginning of a man's story, [music] John's life that would point towards Jesus. What I see is moments that you and I can be reminded that we have to slow down. And if [music] we slow down, I'm confident that we'll know that he is God. And so I want to pray that for us today. If you [music] would just close your eyes. But before I pray, I want to give a moment for silence and embrace the silence. God, I thank [music] you that in moments like this, God, that you call us [music] to listen to that still small voice to believe, God, the promises we read in your scripture are true for us [music] today, God, that when we know your word, we get to see your character. And God, for each one of us in the room today, wherever we are on this journey of following you, God, would we would we take [music] steps of obedience, faithfilled obedience, God, to see breakthrough happen. And God, I just pray for the person right now who just feels [music] like, I can't slow down. My life is so busy. God, would you remind them that the sun still rises [music] and the sun still sets without them being in charge? God, would you remind [music] them that you're a God of miracles, what we read in scripture, God, we still [music] see that faithfulness lived out in our days ahead. God, we thank you that you never run out. You are [music] a generous God, not of scarcity, but of abundance. God, we remind ourselves of that as we go about our week, as we enter in this week of Christmas. God, [music] we be in full expectation for what you would do and believe in faith that your faithfulness is true over our lives in Jesus name. [music] Amen.