Philippians: The Key to Joy - 9
Listen! As believers in Jesus Christ, we are told that “we have the mind of Christ” (1 Corinthians 2:6), and we are commanded to “adopt the attitude of Christ”, (Phil. 2:50)
Friends, today we will be looking at Philippians chapter 2, verses 19 to 30. So if you would generously turn there in your Bible, I'm going to read that. I'm going to read a couple of other verses, and then we'll pray together.
So let's start with Philippians chapter 2. We'll work on verse 19. Paul says to the Philippians. “But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly
so that I also may be encouraged when I learn of your condition. For I have no one else of kindred spirit who will genuinely be concerned for your welfare.
For they all seek their own after their own interest, and not those of Christ Jesus. But you know of his proven worth, that he served with me in the furtherance of the gospel, like a child serving his father. Therefore I hope to send him immediately, as soon as I see how things go with me. And I trust in the Lord that I might also becoming shortly. But I thought it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother and fellow worker and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger and minister to my needs. Because he was longing for you all, and he was distressed, for you had heard that he was sick, for indeed
he was sick to the point of death. But God had mercy on him, and not on him only, but also on me, so that I would not have sorrow upon sorrow. Therefore I have sent him all the more eagerly to you, so that when you see him again you
may rejoice, and I may be less concerned about you. Receive him then in the Lord with all joy. And hold men like him in high regard, because he came close to death for the work of Christ. Risking his life to complete what was deficient in your service to me.”
Then I want to move back quickly and read a couple of verses out of First Corinthians chapter 2. Let's start at verse 14. First Corinthians 2:14-16. “But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit for their foolishness
to him, for he cannot understand them because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things. Yet he himself is appraised by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him?”
Here's the key verse.
But we have the mind of Christ and then back again. One time, please. Philippians, chapter 2:5. “Have this attitude in yourselves. Which was also in Christ Jesus. Let's pray together, please.
Father, we pause this morning to ask your Spirit's help as we think about your book. We need your guidance. We need your clarity. We need to understand. We need to apply it in ways that are honoring to you. Thank you so much for your book, for your Holy Spirit to teach us. Friends, fellow believers, to motivate us, we want to lift up to you also, the fruit of the week of VBS. We're deeply grateful for what you did, deeply grateful for everyone who invested.
People who went to work all day and came here all evening five days in a row, thank you for that investment. We're praying you'd bring young people to
faith, praying you'd bring their parents to faith. Praying you'd be able to bring them to maturity. Entrust all of these people to you and we asked for great ministry to them.
We pray for Travis and Trea today as they experience their final Sunday at Trail Christian Fellowship. Please sustain Travis as he preaches, as they speak to countless people. May they have your energy and your help and your encouragement. Pray for the people of Trail Christian Fellowship
that you would give them your provision, your courage. Everything they need
for life and godliness. Commit them to you and we're thankful for them. We pray for Travis and Trea. They're looking for a house that you would give them
clarity and guidance direction on that, please work on them.
We lift up today our Kenya team who is traveling home, some today and some in a couple of days. We pray for them. We know there's been a lot of unrest. We pray that you will bring them safely to the airport and safely back home. Thank you for the ministry you gave them. Will you please sustain and help them in all of that, Father? Lift up Bonnie Baker today as she's raising funds for the next trip to Kenya here in October. Pray you provide for, give her your encouragement. Lift up all of us who are raising funds to go to the island of old cars and share Christ in November. Prayer provision for that. Pray you work out all the details, all the logistics. Keep us under the radar of the authorities and just bring people to faith in great, great numbers. We pray, Father, for safety and help for all of our students and adults who are headed to Ecuador.
In just a month, maybe use them in great ways. May you work in their hearts in great ways. Thank you for providing every dollar that's needed for that trip. Lord, that is your crazy generosity and we're deeply grateful for that, Father. Today Father, we will also want to lift up and pray for your safety and blessing for those people in war-torn areas. We pray for your provision not only to be alive and not injured, but have food and have a place to live. Pray for your peace in Israel. Pray that you would miraculously bring about your rest there, your provision. Pray the people of Israel, people of the world, would come to faith in the Messiah. You would show them the light. You would turn the
light on for them. Father, we lift up the people in our valley. We pray that you bring them to faith in Christ. You would use us to your glory in that work. We need your help in that. We pray your safety for our congregation, for this body of believers, pray for all the bloody believers in the Treasure Valley that have your mercy and your safety and you would work and bring about
the best possible outcome of all of this.
So we thank you, Father, for your crazy kindness to us. Thank you, especially that you gave us this book. We want to be diligent in looking into it and in living it. So to that end, we entrust ourselves to you, Father, for the individuals here with needs that I don't know about. Maybe nobody does. You know and you care. Would you reach in? Would you give help, provision and courage? We thank you for this. In Christ's name, Amen.
Friends, we are told in One Corinthians 2:16 that we are people who have the mind of Christ. And then we are told in Philippians 2:5 that we should adopt the attitude of Christ. Those are two distinctly different things. Some Bible translations translate both of them as the mind of Christ, but that's not a particularly good translation. So in First Corinthians 2:16 where it says have the mind of Christ, what it's saying is we need to have a mind that the
faculties, the spiritual abilities to comprehend spiritual stuff.
These are different things that Paul was writing about:
● I Cor 2;16 - “We have the mind of Christ.”
● Phil 2:5 - “Having the attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus.”
And Paul says we already have it. When I trust Christ, I am given the spiritual capacity. To comprehend spiritual things, and in the First Corinthians passage he says. “People who don't know Christ and hear spiritual stuff, it's foolishness to them. It's crazy, it's nuts. Why do you think that way? But we have, when we trust Christ, the mind of Christ, the spiritual capacity to understand spiritual truth. Now let me give you some things that if you know Christ, you
understand, and those who don't know Christ find it to be foolishness. The first shall be last.
Forgiveness is a gift, you can't earn it. You must trust Christ. Blessed are you when you are persecuted for Jesus sake. If you even hate your neighbor, you are guilty of murder. Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, then you will have everything you need. If someone forces you to go one
mile, go with him. The extra mile also. There's probably another 500 truths that we could list that we say OK as a Christian, I understand that because I understand the upside down economy of God.
God's economy is upside down to the world. The first shall be last, the least shall be greatest. We understand this because we have the mind of Christ. We have a spiritual capacity to comprehend. So then he says, here's a different thing that you don't automatically have, but that you need to adopt, and that is Philippians 2:5. “Have this attitude in yourselves, which is also in Christ Jesus.”
It's a word that sometimes could be translated to mind, but it's better translated here. Attitude. Adopt the attitude of Jesus. It's not automatic. I have to choose it. What is the attitude of Jesus? Well, it's explained to us right after that command, and that's an attitude of a willingness to humble himself and
to serve others.
The attitude of Jesus was humility, and it resulted in sacrificial service.
So in Philippians Chapter 2, we are given three models of the attitude of Jesus and the actions that follow out of the attitude of Jesus. We'll look at 3 exhibits today.
Exhibit A: Jesus is the prime example of adopting the attitude of Jesus (v.6-8)
● Glorious, eternal God
Verses 6 to 8 of chapter 2 Jesus is the prime example. He had an attitude of service and what did he do? Well, first of all, he existed as eternal God. He's glorious. He's powerful. He's all knowing. He's eternal. He exists in brilliant white light. He has a green rainbow around him. He is a terrifying being in that sense. He's an amazing being.
● First Step down: taking on Humanity
That's how he exists. It's natural to his being. He didn't earn it. He didn't gain it. He didn't build himself up to it. He's been that forever. And starting from there, he takes a massive step down. By taking on humanity, he didn't get rid of his deity or even diminish it, He added to it humanity. He became the God man, stepped down from where he was in unapproachable light to the God man. The thing that always amazes me about it is it's not a temporary like a 33 year deal, it's a forever deal. Forever He is the God man. Forever He possesses and exists in this human body. He stepped down.
● Second step down. He stepped down by submitting to crucifixion.
He willingly gave himself to be crucified. The most humiliating, painful, excruciating. Torturous slow death. You can possibly imagine a person being crucified dies of asphyxiation. Their chest capacity fills up with fluid. They can't breathe anymore. There can't be a more horrible way to go out than being unable to breathe. And Jesus for our sake went out that way. He gave up
His life. You can't take life from a being who possesses life. He has to lay it down. And He did lay it down. So the attitude of Jesus was humility. And then he demonstrated that in a double step down of sacrificial service.
Now you look at that and say wonderful, bless God, thank you that he did that.
And then I'm told to live that way, have that attitude and make those choices.
I would personally be helped by a non God person who did the same thing.
Because we're coming to two people who were not God who did exactly the same thing as Jesus did, they adopted the attitude of Jesus, and they followed that adoption up with the exact kind of behavior that Jesus did. So I said to you that Exhibit A is Jesus.
Every time Paul talked about a person in the book of Philippians, he spoke about them in regard to their Koinonia in the gospel. It's a word that we usually think of as fellowship, but in this case it's translated partnership.
Every person he referenced, he referenced in the fact that they were joining him.
In the partnership of advancing the gospel, and these are two guys that we're going to talk about in a minute. Who joined him in this advancement of the gospel? Paul was passionate about Jesus. Therefore, he was passionate about the last thing Jesus said to do, make disciples. Fish for Men advance the gospel
because we are passionate about Jesus. We're also passionate about the thing he told us to do. The last thing he did was make disciples. Fish for men, bring people out of the darkness into the light.
Now friends, you may think to yourself, OK, are we really doing that? Are we as a body really doing that? Well, my answer is not like we should be, but we are doing that. And we're going to keep doing that. Let me give you some examples. Number one, gospel outreach at VBS last week. That was a trainload of energy invested. Why? So that students, kids would trust Christ. Their transformation would affect their parents. Their parents would come to this church. Their parents would trust Christ. That was our motivation in that we want students to grow up, but we want students to come to faith. We support a bunch of missionaries around the world who are giving the good news about Jesus.
We support some Cru Campus Crusade for Christ workers down at Boise State. There's sharing Christ on a weekly basis at Boise State and that's part of our part of our personal outreach. We have members flying home from Kenya today and Wednesday from sharing Christ in Kenya. We have upcoming
trip of 15 students, nine adults headed to Ecuador to share Christ door to door at prearranged gospel appointments. We are supporting that. We are excited about that. Richard Putman and others recruited them and it's just a wonderful opportunity. We have 12 of us going to the Island of old cars in November. Share Christ door to door, morning and afternoon at prearranged gospel appointments because it matters that they hear about Christ. July 27 on this platform, we have a speaker named Larry Moyer. He's going to do a thing called “You Can Share It” weekend training, how to share the gospel of Jesus.
He was my teacher in seminary 45 years ago, not making that up. He's been doing evangelism for 55 years. He is a brilliant man and cares about the Gospel ridiculously. I have been so helped by his training. He's doing that here on July 27th, and at the end of April of 26, wild game feast where we will put in this room, God willing, on a Saturday night, 350 people will have all wild game to eat and we will give away a rifle.
Larry Moyer will stand up and tell some hunting stories. And then he will give the gospel. We'll probably have about 30% women, 70% men. That night we'll have 54% who don't know Christ hear the gospel in this room on that night. Jesus matters to us and therefore the gospel matters to us. We want to be just like Paul and in all of those things. So here's the two people who are demonstrating to us the attitude of Christ and then the actions that follow it.
Exhibit B: Timothy worked out his salvation in a lifestyle because he adopted the attitude of Jesus.
Who is Timothy? Well, Timothy was a Christian. He was raised in a town in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey, called Lystra. His father was a Greek Pagan, an unbeliever. His mother was a Jew. He was raised in the Jewish faith. On Paul's first missionary journey, apparently Timothy came to faith, maybe not directly from Paul, but certainly through the teaching of Paul and the people Paul impacted.
So Timothy became a Christian in about 15 years removed from the death of Christ and the resurrection. Timothy came to faith at that time. And then on the second missionary journey, Paul brought him with him to help him. And he helped establish churches in Corinth, Thessalonica, Philippi, and Ephesus. He was a coworker of Paul's, a disciple of Paul. He was a great friend to Paul. And now we're in AD 61 or 62 when Philippians is being written. When Paul is referring to him and saying I'm going to send him to you.
According to tradition, he died in AD 97, martyred because he opposed Pagan worship. So this man probably came to faith in 47, was probably killed in 9750 years of pursuing Christ, deciphering people for Christ, and helping Paul, of course, until Paul's martyrdom in around 68 or so. So here's how Timothy was like Jesus.
● He was generally concerned for the well-being of others. (v.19-20)
Genuine concern for the well-being of others. Paul uses the same word here that he uses in Philippians 4:6 when he says be anxious for nothing.
But the word has two different connotations. In verse 4:6 it means. I am anxiously worried about something and I'm not giving it to God. I'm just holding onto it and trying to fix it with anxiety. But that same word here means genuine concern. It's a deep concern about somebody and something. The difference between those two is the same word, same spelling. The difference is this. When I'm anxious, I'm taking the need not to God, but to my own ability to worry. I'm just going to worry real faithfully, real intensely and for a long time.
But when I'm genuinely concerned, I'm taking the need to God and saying you can't fix it, Father, I need you to fix it. And so he says this is a man who cares so much about you as deep concern for you, and he's turning his care of you over to God. Versus verse 21 and chapter 2, verse four,
● “He sought the interests of Christ above the interests of other people.
That's why he was an example of the attitude of Christ that he had adopted, that he had a willingness to let his own stuff slide. In order to help other people. Now, friends, in my experience, I don't have so much of an issue that I
don't care about people. I do care. It matters to me. People's lives matter intensely. The bigger challenge is would I be willing to let my stuff slide to look after their interests? So you've got a Saturday coming up. You plan to fix that shower that's been broken for three months and you just haven't got at it and you're going to do it Saturday. We're going to fix this. We'll be done with this. And then Friday night your buddy called and said, hey, I had six guys lined up to help me move tomorrow. Three of them had dropped out. Could you bring your pick up in your trailer and help us? We really, really need you.
So the shower's not being done tomorrow. I, if I adopt the attitude of Christ, have to be concerned about my own interests, but willing to let them slide in order to meet the interests of others. And Timothy was the kind of person who was willing to do that. He set stuff aside so that he could have a ministry for Christ, and he basically set aside whatever career he could have had. Verses 22 to 24.
● He served Paul like a child serving a parent. He served others in advancing the gospel. (v.22-24)
I don't know when, when your kids are young, you don't necessarily feel like they serve you that much. Maybe. But then you get older and then your kids are saying, hey, hey dad, let me come over and paint, you know, paint that or let me come over and clean that gutter or, or hey Dad, let me drive you here or there. Hey, mom, we really need you to move here to Boise so we can be really close to help you. And that's sort of a thing. Your children began to serve you, God willing, as you get older.
And what Timothy, what Paul is saying here is this, this man's been serving me all the time. He sustained me. Paul in other places says, I don't know how I would have made it without Timothy. It was a huge blessing to him. He's
a massive help to me. He calls him his son. Some people think that's because he led him to faith, which may be true, but he also calls him his son because they had that kind of compassion, that kind of relationship, and they were loved that intensely.
● He was willing to undergo difficult travel for the sake of others. (v23-24)
Now, I don't know how much you've thought about this, friends, but travel at that time was different than travel at this time. Some scholars think that Paul walked about 10,000 miles in the cause of the gospel. Best we can tell, Timothy walked 6000 plus in the cause of the gospel and he was willing to
walk all over Asia Minor to share the news about Jesus. And it was very difficult to travel. Sometimes it was on foot, sometimes on a ship. Paul himself had shipwrecks. I mean, it was just it was, it was challenging stuff.
Now I have a buddy who's a missionary. He lives in Texas. He's a retired multi multi multi millionaire. He's a full time missionary, and has a huge compassion for the Far East. And he travels to the Far East continually, and he does it on his own dime. He doesn't raise money. Now, I'm not falling for him doing it. He's got the money for it. God bless him. You know, not this, not a knock on him, but when you travel first class to the Far East, what happens there's like 3
flight attendants falling over each other to give you a warm towel or another drink or another snack and your chair reclines to a full bed and you can rack out. It's not like those of us in cattle class, you know, there's a kid kicking the back of your chair and your knees are in your chin, you know? And you know you have to go get your own water or whatever.
It's a different trip. It's not to travel that Paul and Timothy experienced. I've read this to you many times. I want to just give you a nutshell of it. 2nd
Corinthians 11 Paul says. You know, my travel was frequent journeys, dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangerous in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren, labour, hardship, sleepless nights, hunger, thirst without food, cold and exposure.
This is the kind of travel that Timothy and Paul are doing for the gospel.
It costs them. It costs them and they were willing to do it. They paid the price to travel, to help other people. The truth is, most lost people in the world do not live in the Treasure Valley. They do not live in the Treasure Valley. There's lots of people here. We're doing our best to share with them.
But the vast majority of the lost people live a long, a long way from here. And sometimes you fly from, you know, here to Dallas to Frankfurt, to Madrid. And you take a bus down to Gibraltar and you cross Gibraltar in a ferry. And then you take a car for 9 hours into Morocco. And you know, it's a long way from here. And when you get there, you're exhausted. Part of the hardest part of missionary work for me was just the exhaustion?
Traveling, you're in a Land Cruiser somewhere in northern Kenya. You're just doing this for five hours. It's exhausting. And these people were exhausted for the sake of the gospel and they were willing to do that. Timothy was a sterling person. Warren Wiresby said this regarding the mind of Timothy. The submissive mind is not the product of an hour sermon or a week seminar or even a year's service. The submissive mind grows in us as we, like Timothy, yield to the Lord and seek to serve others.
It's a long haul process to get this kind of mind, to have the mind of Christ,
to adopt the attitude of Christ.
Exhibit C: Epaphroditus worked his salvation out in his lifestyle by adopting the attitude of Jesus
In serving these other people. He's only mentioned once in the Bible. It's here in the Philippines. He's a man who came from Philippi with a financial gift to Paul in prison in Rome and now Paul's getting ready to send him back to Philippi with this letter that we're reading that we're studying. He's getting ready to send him back. He's called a brother, fellow worker, soldier, messenger, minister and he is a great friend of Paul because they had a common savior. They had common work, and they were working together in the gospel Koinonia partnership.
Now Epaphroditus means. This is the name given to him belonging to Epaphrodite. So Epaphroditi was a Greek goddess, the goddess of sex. Pleasure, physical life, and his parents apparently worship this goddess.
And when he was born, they named him after her. So he had a Pagan start.
You know, he's a slow start out of the blocks, spiritually speaking. He's a
Pagan man when he was born and when he was raised. But he came to faith in Christ and his salvation in Christ trumped everything, everything.
The most important thing about you is not your name, it's not what family you started in, it's not your track record, it's not your physical appearance, it's not your wealth, it's not your ethnicity.
The most important thing about you is your relationship with Christ.
Epaphroditus had that. He traded out his Pagan life for this identity in the Lord Jesus Christ. And he's like these other two men in that he pursued Christ.
He had the attitude of Christ. Here's the evidence, verse 25,
● He was a messenger of the gospel. He was a messenger of relationship
truth. Verse 25,
The word messenger is the same word we use for apostles and Paul didn't meet. He was an apostle because he had never seen the risen Christ. The 12 were called apostles who had seen the risen Christ. But the word at its core means just messenger. He's taking a message that I need to take, and he's the one who is going to take this message.
● He acts in the best interest of these people.
He comes from Philippi with a financial gift and he walked to Rome to give the gift to Paul, who was in prison. 1200 miles. So walking from here to Amarillo, TX, wow. 400 hours approximately. I figured that out based on three miles an hour. 1200 mile walk to bring money from the Philippians to Paul. And then he gets there and Paul says, I need you to take this letter back.
To Philippi. And he's taken aback. Who in here would be willing to walk to
Amarillo and back to take a letter from me? Nobody's going. I understand it's a crazy walk, but his walk is part of his gift. You know, he brings money to Paul, but the long walk is part of the gift. He was willing to do it.
● He ministered to the needs of his mentor. (V. 25)
He helped Paul. Paul's in jail. He's in a rented house that he's having to pay for. He's changed to his soldiers, but he can't leave the house.
Well, if you can't leave the house, you need stuff. You need food. You need stuff brought in, you need stuff taken care of. And apparently Epaphroditus was the guy leaving the house and doing this and helping with all this. He ministered to him. He had these kind of skills of and, and commitment to do that. Verse 26,
● He longed to spend time with the Philippians and to relieve their fears.
He longed to be in their physical presence. I have a friend who went to college away from home. He said about every other month his mom would call him and say son. I have to come home this weekend. I have to lay eyes on you. I have to see my boy. Let me tell you a real great rabbit hole to get in which is to watch YouTube videos of soldiers returning home without telling their families.
Those are cool and emotional. They say I've got to hold my child and this is the kind of feeling that was going on in Epaphroditus. He wanted to be with them.
● He was emotionally invested in the wellbeing of other people. (V.26)
Their lives mattered to them. He had a heart level motivation to help them.
Galatians 6:10, “Do good to all men, especially those of the household of faith.”
Just do good to all Christians. But he paraphrased, had that plus the fact that in his heart he wanted to do good to all Christians. But here's an amazing thing.
● He suffered illness and he risked death for the cause of the gospel.
On his 1st 1200 mile walk, he got deathly ill. But he kept walking and he got to Rome in horrible condition, and Paul thought he was going to die, and the Philippians heard that he was probably going to die. He was in miserable condition. But he kept walking and he got there and he paid the price. People have died of martyrdom for the gospel. People have died of disease for the gospel. They go to inland Africa back in the day when their bodies couldn't deal with it. There was no medicine. People have died in travel for the cause of the gospel. He almost died and traveled for the cause of the gospel.
There's an early group of missionaries in Britain called” One Way Missionaries: in Britain mid 1800s. They would go out and they would pack their belongings in their coffin because they knew they weren't coming home and they were going to need a coffin. There's a man named A.W. Milne went to Vanuatu at that time. It's called New Hebrides. Miniature island in the South Pacific. He goes out there for 35 years, dies. They use the coffin he brought with him.
Bury him, his epitaph in Vanuatu says “When he came there was no light at all.
When he left, there was no darkness.” What a price. Amen. Thank you. What a price to pay. AW, Milne, we don't even know what day he was born. We don't know what day he died. That's about everything we know about the man. And here we are rightly applauding him for giving his life for the gospel.
Well, Epaphroditus came awful close to doing that. Paul said I'm glad he didn't because I would have sorrow on sorrow if I had lost him. It would be miserable if I would have lost him.
Here's the people, Jesus. Premier example of having the attitude of Jesus and the actions. Timothy, secondary example. Epaphroditus, another example.
Central Truth: Is it possible that the most critical indicator of Christlikeness… is humility and the sacrificial service that accompanies it? I'm just asking for a friend. Capital F.
Just asking for a friend. Is that possible? The most critical? Character of
Christ likeness. I want to give you the same idea in a little different way as I close, which is to say this. Have you ever thought about the fact that every place Jesus went, life was better? Every place he showed up, life was better.
So he went to Earth and there was light. He went to Jerusalem and he taught the scribes and the scholars when he was only 12 years old. He went to Cycar, an entire village of Samaritan's trust in Christ. He went to the region of the Gadarenes, and a man with a legion of demons was delivered.
He went to Bethany and Lazarus came back to life. He went to Canaan and an embarrassed family had wine for a wedding. He went to a rich young ruler and told him the truth about his idol. He went to Capernaum and healed Peter's mother-in-law, went to Jericho and gave sight to blind Bartimaeus. Went to Calvary and paid for all of our sins. Went to heaven and interceded for us.
Everywhere Jesus went, life was better. I think it's based on Philippians 2.
This is our call. To be the kind of people. Who have sacrificial compassion for others who are imitating Christ, who have adopted the attitude of Christ, who are willing to pay. Who are willing to let her own stuff slide so that everywhere we go, life is better. There's a lot of people this week at VBS who paid. They went to work all day. They came to the building at night. They worked 4 hours again, whatever. Got home at 10 at night, exhausted. And they did it five days in a row. Both staff and lay people. A lot of people. What if everywhere we
went, life was better?
“So what?” for me personally:_______________________________
Let me pray for us. We are so grateful, Father, for your son. So grateful
for his attitude. For the unimaginable price he paid. Grateful for Paul, Timothy and Epaphroditus. Grateful for your book that teaches us. Who to be, how
to be, what to do? At least entrust our lives to you in this day. We're thankful
for your kindness to us. We pray in the Lord Jesus name, Amen.