Idema, George: Ephesus: 30 Years Later

Thanks, Dave. Welcome to Bethel Gospel Chapel. It's, uh, Palm Sunday. It's a day that's remembered and often celebrated at churches around the world. It's a day when crowds of people two thousand years ago welcomed our Lord and our Savior into Jerusalem, in perfect fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies concerning his life and his work. And you see those prophecies in passages like Zechariah and in Daniel as well. We as followers of Christ will often think of the final week, this final week before he's rejected and he's crucified. And, uh, and what amazes us the most is... Well, there's lots of things that amaze us about the Lord Jesus' crucifixion, of course, but one of the things that amazes us, I think, of the most is how fast man's hearts turn. So you have the same crowd cheering the Lord Jesus on, putting palm branches in their coats in the road, and in in another week they are crying, crucify him, crucify him. We don't want this man to reign over us. To begin this morning, though, I thought that I'd, uh, think back on time a bit, and it was late one evening, a month or so ago, and I was thinking back about who I was thirty years ago and what I believed about things. Happily, shortly after beginning work on this sermon, the Edmonton Journal leaped to my aid, and uh, with a series of that looked at what's been happening in Edmonton and Alberta for the last one hundred years. And uh, and they were doing this, this uh, review in, in decade segments. So I flipped back to where they were talking about what was happening uh, thirty years ago. So thirty years ago, according to an ad that you could see in the Edmonton Journal, so this is late March nineteen eighty two— you could buy a fantastic Tandy Radio Shack personal computer. You probably remember those TRS-80s we used to call them the Trash eighties. and uh, and that personal computer could possibly be running you for four thousand nine hundred and fifty dollars. Other computers from other manufacturers would run from several hundred dollars for a Commodore sixty four to several thousand dollars for something high-end like an IBM. Thirty years ago, there was some kid and he was playing hockey and his name was Wayne Gretzky, and he was on his way to accumulating two hundred and twelve points for the whole s- during a one season. Now, I'm a Leaf fan. They don't score or get two hundred and twelve points for the whole season for the whole team. Thirty years ago, a former Prime Minister, his name was Pierre Trudeau, you might remember him. He seemed to be having some trouble at that point with comments that were being made by his solicitor general. thirty years ago, the federal government allowed, uh, testing of a war device that's still being used today, and that, that device was called the cruise missile. And now you hear about it being used throughout the world. Well, guess what? It was getting tested here in Alberta long before this. Unfortunately, we've never had to see its, uh, its payload. Thirty years ago, Premier Peter Lougheed, uh, was contemplating a November election. Thirty years ago, and you might remember this if you have any farm background, uh, the old Crow rates, the cost of shipping grain, were being removed by the federal government. So that's kind of what was happening in the big picture. Thirty years ago, I had been hired while I was in school down east to come out west and to begin working with a government agency called the Alberta Bureau of Surveying and Mapping. Thirty years ago, I'd have thought you were, would have been crazy if you told me that a few years later I would have met a lovely young girl and gotten married to her. So thirty years ago, my wife didn't know that I existed, and guess what? I didn't know she existed either. Thirty years ago, I was in a closed brethren assembly. Now, there was some great things about the closed brethren assemblies. As men, we learned we had a responsibility to participate, to be involved. That could also be my dad making sure that I understood that. And uh, and we, uh, if the assembly was going to be any kind of light in the neighborhood, we had to to be ready to participate fully. Thirty years ago, my younger sister got married, so that's a blow. Thirty years ago, my sis- my children weren't even on my list of possibilities. Thirty years ago, I had no house. I had little for possession. When I first moved out to Alberta, I stayed in dorm at Lister. Hall. Thirty years ago, I would have argued with you over the value of having elders and deacons. Thirty years ago, I would have staunchly told you that the Lord's table was only limited to those in fellowship in my assembly. Thirty years ago, I would have thought that you were a heretic or some kind of liberal for using a Bible other than the King James Bible, unless you chose to use a Darby New Translation, or perhaps, maybe if you were on the cutting edge of being liberal, you might use a New American Standard Bible. Like just to, so anyways, you can think back of where you were thirty years ago. That's where I was. So let's read our passage, and our passage comes to us as being Revelation chapter two, and that's not quite what we'll start off with. We're going to back up a couple of verses in Revelation, and I'm going to get you to look with me, starting at Revelation chapter one, verses nineteen. uh Verse nineteen, it gives a bit of context. Write therefore what you have seen, what is now and what will take place later. So this is the Lord Jesus Christ talking directly to Apostle John. So John's being told to write down the things that he had seen, what is now, and what will take place later. The mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand and of the seven golden lampstands is this. The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven church. Into chapter two. To the angel of the church in Ephesus write, these are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. I know your deeds, your hard work, and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name and have not grown weary. Yet I hold this against you. You have forsaken your first love. Remember the height from which you have fallen. Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. But you have this in your favor, you hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God. So like just to begin with a word of prayer and then, uh, get into our passage. Father, we would ask that you would just again be with us this day as we open your word. And Father, it's a privilege for us to, to have the word of God, uh, made readily available to us. Uh, Father, we ask that you would help us, uh, to learn from the church in Ephesus that we won't think it's our duty necessarily to point our fingers at them and say, look what they did wrong, but that there will be as well, um, a realization that, that we need to examine ourselves too. So, Father, we would ask that you would help us as we hear your word, you'd keep us attentive and, uh, and that our minds would be open to your word, our ears would be open, and that we'd, uh, learn not just more about the Bible, which is important, but more about your heart. So, Father, we ask that you'd be with us, in Jesus' name, amen. So we're going to be, uh, parachuting a bit into the study. Uh, so I'm going to have to give a probably a little bit of, uh, context for people. So just give me a minute, I'm going to set a bit of a stage for you. So it's estimated by biblical scholars that about thirty years passes by between Paul's letter to the Ephesians and John's letter to them, which is contained in the larger book of Revelation. So thirty years has gone by, just like how we were looking a minute ago at where we were thirty years ago, as as at least as I was an individual, and as you were individuals, hopefully you were thinking the same. Paul the Apostle, in about fifty AD, is on his second missionary journey. It's likely then, again, about twenty or twenty five years after the Lord Jesus has has, uh, died on the cross and rede- and for the redemption of mankind. He's risen three days later from the dead. He has ascended to heaven. So twenty or twenty five years after that first Easter, Paul visits Ephesus for the first time. Now, if the church in Ephesus were to be compared with a plant, we would consider this the time when the seed is sown. Two friends of Paul, Priscilla and Aquila, stayed behind and began to nurture the very immature plant towards its eventual growth in the city. Now, about a year later, in about around fifty four AD, Paul's on his next missionary journey, his third journey, and he returns to Ephesus, and the local assembly is strengthened and sees growth as Paul, for about three months, teaches in the local synagogue and stays for about two years in the place. Eventually, the new Christians in this very pagan, it's a very pagan, very sexually immoral city, bring along their magic and occult books, and they had a bonfire. Notice they just didn't sell them to their neighbors. They, they thought, this is trash, let's burn the trash. It also looks like the gospel mes- message began to negatively affect the finances of those who supplied silver, occult trinkets, and, and gadgets, and whatever, whatever else you might have. And a riot occurs, and Paul eventually leaves town, but a little while later, he takes time to meet with and encourage the Ephesian elders. Now, Stan reminded us last week in his summary on the book of Ephesians, uh, Stan told us that five things marked, marked the young and increasingly thriving Ephesian church. There was love, there was unity, there was hope, there was the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and there was a complete use of the armor of God. He also observed that the Ephesian church was spiritually rich, spiritually rich church, and that made them a very tempting target for those who would steal those things that were making them so rich. So if Ephesus were a plant, this is when you would have seen some great use of fertilizers. There was, and that would have come through the ministry of Paul and and Priscilla and Aquila, and likely you could compare this to a time of fertilizing and weeding and watering and tending to the needs that are associated with a young plant's growth. Ephesus, by the writing of today, so back to Revelation now, thirty years later, has become a solid, thriving assembly work. You would look at this plant and you would say, in the past thirty years, my, oh my, oh my, look at this plant. This plant has grown into being a very visible, it's a very productive tree. It's bearing wonderful fruit. That's what you would probably think if you saw, saw the Church of Ephesus. Yet, in today's writing, the Lord Jesus Christ, picture him as a bit of a gardener here. He's an arborist, and he says that this marvelous plant, this marvelous plant has de- developed a secret disease that has the potential of destroying the entire plant. Then Jesus Christ says that he is the prescription. He has a prescription, he has a remedy to their problem. The job of the Ephesian church is to take his prescription, apply it as he directs them, and he's, and they are to carefully watch out for a continued manifestation of their problem. The word to this church is that if you do not do what Christ Jesus tells you to do, this problem will kill you. This problem will finish you off. John, earlier in Revelation, is encouraged to write then letters to seven churches, just as we've read. John was to write of the things that he was being shown. These were the things that he had seen, past tense, things which are now, the present tense, and the things which were yet to come, the future, which we tend to think of the most when we read the book of Revelation. Now, it's obvious to us that these seven churches represent actual places that existed in John's day. They are the things that are now. But also, this portion has a prophetic quality to it as well. For the futures of the seven churches are being prophesied as well. Each church is represented by a lampstand. Now, a lampstand has one purpose. The lampstand has just one purpose. The purpose of a lampstand is to hold the light, not to be the light. They are to hold the light, hold it, distribute it, make it obvious in the world. The churches are to hold up the light in the darkness of the world that they live in. I think what's more important than what John saw as he jotted down these observations of these seven churches, and they're incredible observations. More important than that, all these observations, is that this gives us a sense of what Jesus himself saw. So this is what Jesus saw at the heart of each of these churches. So each of these churches has unique weaknesses and strengths. If you and I, you and I were to compose a list of the positive and negative attributes of our local assembly here in Edmonton, how long would each column be for you? Would you focus on the preaching? Would you talk about the participation or lack of parti- participation sometimes at the Lord's Supper? Would you talk about the music that the different chairmen might choose? Would you s- talk about how you wish we had more lunches? I would. Would you talk about the color of the paint? Would you talk about the color of the carpet? Thankfully, the Lord Jesus Christ, he cuts through all that peripheral stuff, stuff on the side that doesn't really matter, and he commends or he rebukes them on just those things that are positive for their future growth, or those things he talks to them about that could cause them harm in terms of their future growth as a plant. So there's a bit of background for you. Well, it's almost all the background. There's several schools of thought on how to look at the seven churches that are listed in Revelation two and three. There's a view that these churches represent various periods of time within the Christian church age, starting with Ephesus, which was represented, representative of the apostolic period. Another view is that these actual and well-known, well-respected churches in Asia Minor are chosen by the Lord because they represent seven different conditions that can exist within it, within any contemporary church at any one time. These churches provide us with patterns to embrace or patterns to avoid. Another view is that these churches represent all the church denominations, and they give us a life cycle of a church denomination. Another view could be as well that these passages are just written really just to the churches that they were, that are mentioned, and that they don't actually have that much of significance to us today. So that's, that's possible as well. So which view is right? Well, here's the, here's a stab at the first view. Likely as, and this is likely, uh, true of many scriptures. The first point that these churches represent seven eras of time. Now this, this really appeals to my dispensational, uh, biblical framework. It melds quite readily with how the ages of the church could be represented in the Western nations. The Western nations, if you remember your Bible, are amongst the original people groups who were the first recipients of the gospel message. Now, I wrestle now with this interpretation a bit because of what I see of church growth, I see of soul winning, I see of enthusiasm for the things of God, and even the things I see of persecution for following God in many of the other, uh, places around the world. So while we may wish to call our church age Laodicean, that's a lukewarm church. We may wish to call our churches in North America Laodicean. It may be difficult, it may be kind of unfair to fix that global Laodicean label or designation to the church that's, say, meeting in South America, or the church that's meeting in China, or the church that's meeting in the Far East, or even in the Middle East, in sub-Saharan Africa. If you've been reading anything in the newspapers on Christian websites, you would have been reading of the Lord, the Holy Spirit doing a tremendous work there. He's using dreams to turn entire communities, sometimes to of former Muslims, to Christ Jesus. From what I've been able to read in newspapers from the sub-Saharan African countries, entire mosques have come to Christ. So the view that these seven churches are, are necessarily going to just fit in- into my dispensational framework, I've struggles with that now. The view then that these seven conditions that existed in the churches in the first century, though this is the second point. The view, th- this view says that these seven conditions that existed in the churches in the, in the first century can exist in any local church at any time. This has some merit as well, because we can learn from each church locally, and we can avoid the traps that six of these churches stumble into. Now, it might be easier to teach, to learn from this viewpoint, but this viewpoint really avoids the big picture aspect of the church, and that, that aspect as well is implied in this passage. Now, the third, the denominational view, has merit in that we can look at our own denominations or our own churches in our own country, and we can dis- discover whether denomination X or T or G has fallen, fallen somehow according to this measurement standard. Perhaps we can take heed, lest we too fall. Christ Jesus seems to know each of these churches individually and intimately. His judgment upon the church collective is not a judgment on the individual believers within that body. Did you catch that? His judgment is upon the church collective. It is not a judgment upon individual believers. You have to remember that. Each of these churches, be they eras of church history, be they individual church conditions that exist today, or be they denominational frameworks according to letters to the seven churches, have true Christians that attend them, that are encouraged to overcome, and each church seems to have to wrestle with those who, for whatever reason, attend but are not converted. They have no intention of ever following Jesus Christ. So each church seems to have struggle with that. So let's just consider the church in Ephesus now. Lots of times in evaluations and in performance reviews, we focus first on the positive, and so Lord Jesus Christ is that way as well. He says, I know your deeds. I know your hard work. I know you hate wickedness and falsehood. So again, remember we talked a lot about that. The Ephesians knew the truth. They could recognize what false was. The fourth, I know your perseverance. This church could walk and not grow weary. I know that you hate the practices of the Nicolaitans. So this is a hard-working church. It would seem to be a biblically based assembly which tries to test whatever is taught or said against the measuring stick, against the measuring stick of God's unchanging word. This church is steady. It doesn't seem very flashy to me. Seems to be a church that in all things sticks to the prescribed program, whether that's in times of persecution or if a new ministry technique is introduced, they seem to do s- they don't seem to jump on bandwagons very quickly. So finally now I can discuss the area where we see the Ephesian church missing the standard, losing their first love. This is likely a charge against them that I have to believe would have totally caught this church off guard. I don't think that they saw this charge against them coming in this letter. And I think that's because of the nature of, of their disease. It's slow, and it's insidious loss of passion. They probably never would have noticed it. So I'd like just to look a little bit at what we read about love in the Bible. Now, behind me, you should be seeing Matthew twenty two thirty four to forty. Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: Teacher, what is the greatest commandment in the law? Jesus replied, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment, and the second is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself. All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments. So loving God completely, loving your neighbor as as you love yourself. So if I love God and I love my neighbor, I'm gonna act in certain ways, and I'm gonna avoid other types of behaviors and conduct. That's fair enough. That starts to lay a little bit of groundwork for perhaps what some of this first love might be. This comes actually, that passage comes exactly out of the mouth of this, of God the Son. Now the Apostle John, in his first epistle, fleshed out the concept for us even a little bit more. So First John chapter four, verses seven to twelve, and then down to nine— nineteen to twenty one. Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us. He sent his one and only son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God, but if we love one another, God lives in us, and His love is made complete in us. Down to verse nineteen: We love because he first loved us. That's your memory verse. Pretty hard one. We love because he first loved us. Easy to repeat. Whoever claims to love God, yet hates a brother or a sister, is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister. So, in my opinion, God puts a bit of flesh and bones to our love of God. We can say we love God, but really, if we are not loving to the people that we rub shoulders with every day, seeing and meeting needs, etcetera, what kind of love do we really have for God? If we're familiar with the Old Testament, which many of us are, it was common to hear God using very human terms of endearment to talk to Israel. They were terms of relationship. He went, he went to lengths to discuss Israel's forsaking of its covenant vows, of its vows to be a faithful wife to one husband. That was kind, actually, on God's part. He put what he was thinking, he brought it down to human terms, something that we could understand, something that Israel in those days could understand as well. He's telling us here what he wishes, really as a husband, what he wishes he would see from the Ephesian church. Now, I know that some of the bachelors are asking, what is this first love stuff? What I don't think first love is, is the sort of thing that society calls it. So if you're ever riding on the bus with your eyes somewhat open, you see the world's fir- uh, view of first love demonstrated quite frequently. These couples seem to have only eyes for each other. They don't see the lack of potential in each other. The entire universe seems to circulate around the very words of their own very Bob or Susan. The experience of first love is very obvious to the onlookers. It sometimes brings a bit of a smile to people. Sometimes it might bring a bit of disgust to some people. Sometimes you might even see a, have a sense of concern when you see first love being demonstrated. I think what I've tried to do here is actually tell you a bit about what infatuation might be. It's not biblical first love. First love should be different than this. Obviously, love involves emotions, but true love always seems to involve the mind as well. The first love written up for the Ephesians is the love that this church, which is made up of individual Christians, this is the love that they have for the Lord Jesus Christ when they first came to him for the salvation of their sins. That's why we can read in First John, we love him because he first loved us. The church at Ephesus had at one time loved Christ Jesus with a first love, but per- but perhaps, perhaps because of their need, their focus to maintain doctrinal purity in all things. This was that part of their watchdog kind of life this church seemed to have. Perhaps in making sure that everything is dotted and all the T's are crossed, maybe because of that, to some degree, they perhaps lost their first love. So what does first love involve? Well, personally, I think it involves a joy of discovery of another person, of learning about them, of having a zeal to protect them. There's a sense of ardor, there's a sense of passion for the other person. First love begins with discovering your sweetheart, and it broadens out as you introduce your sweetheart into your world, and you attempt to enter into your sweetheart's world as well. First love happens as two very separate lives are pulled closer and closer. So the church meeting in Ephesus would have realized that they love Christ solely because he first loved them, as the letter we read from John told us. Now, I think the church in Ephesus at this point should actually go and grab the scroll that Paul had written to them. They should pull that down off the shelf. They probably almost had it memorized. And they need to be reminded of who they were in the past. Ephesians chapter two, one to five says, and this is again speaking to this church. As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world, and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath, but because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ, even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace that you have been saved. So the Ephesian church, the Ephesian Christians, because of the great love that God has had for them, were made alive in Christ Jesus. They have passed from death unto life. The passion and the love that they had for Christ should overflow in gratefulness. Now, this was witnessed by many, I think, in the city of Ephesus of the time. I think they would have been able easily to sing that a s- a hymn written by James George Deck about one hundred and fifty years ago, he- who wrote, Jesus, that name is love, Jesus our Lord. Jesus, all names above, Jesus the Lord. Thou Lord, our all must be. Nothing that's good have we, nothing apart from thee, Jesus our Lord. As son of man it was, Jesus the Lord, thou gavest thy life for us, Jesus our Lord. Great was indeed your love, all other loves above. Love, thou didst dearly prove, Jesus our Lord. Righteous alone in thee, Jesus the Lord, thou wilt a refuge be, Jesus our Lord. Whom then have we to fear? What trouble, grief, or care, since thou art ever near, Jesus our Lord. I think that's what they would have been able to sing when they first came to Christ and were amazed by what they had been saved from. They were dead in their transgressions and their sins. But over thirty years, that passion for Christ has cooled to mere religion, and we see today that even if, if Ephesus had still been confronting heretical teaching, if they were doing that for any other reason than out of their love for Jesus Christ, that motive would have been a false motive, no matter the outcome. So these short verses should cause us to examine ourselves. So we should examine ourselves. We should examine ourselves in our practice of our first love. Now, I think, personally, that's way too easy for us. We can point at a long dead church that was around almost two thousand years ago, and we can look at that and say, that was those guys. We need to look at ourselves. We can look at our own activities for Jesus Christ, and we can contemplate our motives for what we do here. Are we doing these things for Christ or for some other reason? So, I think it's fair game. Bethel's been at the corner of, of ninety fifth and one hundred fifteenth for about sixty years, double thirty. We've had lots of opportunity here to think about our first love. So, we came here today. If you came to the first meeting, you would have seen that the Lord's table was set up. There were hymn books, there were bulletins ready. Now, were these things set up by our deacons out of the love that they have for Christ Jesus, or were they set up for some other reason? Men participated in the Lord's Supper. They prayed, some gave out scripture passages and hymns. Did they participate out of love for Christ, or did they participate for some other reason? A collection occurred. Yes, we have collections. A collection occurred. Did people offer up their money out of love for Christ, or did they do that for some other reason? We enjoyed a time of refreshment, a coffee time where the purchase and and the preparation of the coffee and the juice and the treats were done by somebody. Did that person do these things out of love for Christ, or for some other reason? A chairman and an instrumentalist led us in a time of singing, tried to lead our hearts toward a worshipful attitude as we prepared to open the word of God. Was this done out of love for Christ, or was it done for some other reason? A speaker opens, and he tries to explain to you the word of God in a way that teaches and encourages and challenges you. Is this done out of love for God, love for Christ? Was there some other reason? The children in the Sunday school are being taught right now. Are they being taught out of a love for Christ or for some other reason? Now, the deacons are going to make sure that the building's all locked up nice and tight, and the lights are off, everything is secure. Are they doing this after we leave out of love for Christ, or are they doing it for some other reason? The treasurer is going to deal with all the banking issues. He's going to pay bills, he's going to forward money out to various missionaries, he's going to send money to peoples and organizations. Are these things that he's doing done out of a love for Christ or for some other reason? Over this week, you will spend time perhaps communicating through prayer and reading God's word, the Bible. You're communing with the Lord who saved you. Will you also look for opportunities to tell others of your first love? If these great things, reading the word, praying, and sharing the word, if these things are not done out of a love for Christ, what's your other reason? If you are doing these things for any other reason other than your out of a love for Jesus Christ, you should consider how far you have fallen. Repent and do the things you did at first. Think back on the love you once had for the Lord when you realized that he died for you. He bore your sins on the cross of Calvary, regardless of whether you trusted in him as your savior thirty years ago, or eighty years ago, or eight days ago. Obviously, like in any relationship, the right things can be done for the wrong reasons. Christ Jesus wants us to do the right things for the right reasons. William Ralph Featherstone w- lived in Montreal, and he wrote this song. It's the only song of his that we have. He wrote this song when he was sixteen years of age. He only lived to the age of twenty seven. m Lord Jesus, I love thee, I know thou art mine. For thee all the pleasures of sin I resign, my gracious redeemer, my savior art thou, if ever I love thee, Lord Jesus, 'tis now. I love thee because thou hast first loved me and purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree. I love thee for wearing the thorns on thy brow. If ever I love thee, Lord Jesus, 'tis now. I'll love thee in life. I will love thee in death and praise thee as long as thou lendest me breath and say when the death dew lies cold on my brow, if ever I love thee, Lord Jesus, 'tis now. In ages eternal of endless delight, I'll ever adore thee in glory so bright. I'll sing with the glittering crown on my brow, if ever I love thee, Lord Jesus, 'tis now. Let's pray. Father, again, we would just thank you for the- what you told to the Ephesian, Ephesian church. I imagine in that day would have been a, a bitter pill for them to swallow, to read that they didn't love Christ the way that they should, that they had lost the passion for Christ. Perhaps they had gotten regimented in what they did, and they went through the motions. Father, we are in the same danger, and we know it. Father, and so f- in many ways, we need to confess that often our attitudes and the things we do are not done out of, out of wanting to serve you, wanting to serve your people, but that we tend to do things sometimes just because we have to. That's not a very good reason, Lord. You know it isn't, and it wasn't good for Ephesians to be doing things because they had to. It's not, not good for us either. So help us, Father, just to, to really desire to rekindle our, our feelings of our first love. We need to have that flame burning brighter within us. To want to talk to other people about our first love. Our, our Lord Jesus died on the cross of Calvary for us, to take away the sins that each of us has done. You'd think that we should be bubbling up with praise and ex- exaltation and, and worship for him, just saying, thank you, Lord Jesus, we love you, Lord Jesus. Father, we would ask that you would just be with us as we leave this place. Help us to examine our own lives, our own activities, to find out and to think through and to be honest with you. Father, again, we just thank you again for the your word, that it doesn't just write all, all easy things, but also writes the, obviously the honest things that we need to hear. Ask that you be with those who couldn't make it here today for whatever reason, that you be with them too. In Jesus' name we do pray, amen.