There was persecution in Jerusalem after the stoning of Stephen, and the believers were scattered. Some of them went as far north as Antioch, Syria, about two hundred miles north of Jerusalem. No evangelists, no prophets, no teachers, no apostles with them, just a bunch of scared sheep. But the hand of the Lord was upon them, and they preached Christ, and many believed. An amazing story. And then we read these words, you don't need to turn there. Then tidings of these things came unto the ears of the church, which was in Jerusalem. I think that's the only time that phrase is used in the scriptures. The ears of the church. You see, they had their thoughts, their heart, their mind tuned to their brethren who had just left. They were eager to hear what had happened. So they heard the great moving, great work of God, and so they, uh, sent for Barnabas. He was probably in Cyprus, but they sent for him, and he came, and they sent him to go and see, uh, give the report, see what was going on. Notice these words. Barnabas, who when he came, that is to Antioch, when he came and had seen, are you listening? And had seen the grace of God. You can see it. You can see. Look around. Look around. People in front of you and behind you and beside you. They're miracles of the grace of God. Truly, he giveth more grace. Our text is Philemon, you know that by now. Philemon, Paul's letter to his friend, sending back a runaway slave, old Onesimus. While you're turning there, let me say, would it surprise you if I told you that we're all slaves? We're all servants. Before we came to know the Lord Jesus, we were the servants of sin. Scripture's very clear, read it in Romans six. And we yielded our members to that, to the enemy, father of the dark, enemy of our souls. And then, by the grace of God, we got saved. So we become the servants of righteousness now. We're still servants. Some people act as though when they got saved, they became the CEO of righteousness. No, that's not the way that goes, no. See, we, we never change jobs, we just change masters. If nobody ever told you, let me remind you. You gave up every right you ever thought you ever had. You didn't have any rights anyhow. The devil's standing in the corner in the shadow, smirking and grinning. You thought you were doing your own thing. But when you came to Christ, we all gave up every right we ever thought we ever had. We didn't have any anyhow, but we relinquished those rights to him, the new master, and we voluntarily now, out of love and appreciation, serve him. We're delighted to serve him, for indeed he is the best of masters. Verse one, Paul's letter to Philemon. Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother. To Philemon, our beloved friend and fellow laborer. To the beloved Defia or Chipas, our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God, making mention of you always in my prayers, hearing of your love and faith which you have toward the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints, that the sharing of your faith may become effective by the acknowledgment of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus. For we have great joy and consolation in your love because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed by you, brother. Therefore, I thought I might be very bold in Christ to command you what is fitting, yet for love's sake I rather appeal to you, being such a one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ. I appeal to you for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten while in my chains, who once was unprofitable to you, but now is profitable to you and to me. I am sending him back. You therefore receive him, that is, my own heart, whom I wish to keep with me, that on your behalf he might minister to me in my chains for the gospel, but without your consent, I wanted to do nothing, that your good deed might not be by compulsion, as it were, but voluntary. For perhaps he departed for a while for this purpose, that you might receive him. No longer as a slave, but more than a slave, a beloved brother, especially to me, but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord. If then you count me as a partner, receive him as you would me. But if he's wronged you or owes you anything, put that on my account. I, Paul, am writing with my own hand. I will repay. Not to mention to you that you owe me even your own self besides. Yes, brother, let me have joy from you in the Lord. Refresh my heart in the Lord. Having confidence in your obedience, I write to you, knowing that you will do even more than I say. But meanwhile, also prepare a guest room for me, for I trust that through your prayers I shall be granted to you. Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, greets you, as do Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, Luke, my fellow laborers. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. We are slowly but consistently making our way through this little book. We have finally gotten past the introduction. That's the first three verses. And we started, uh, yesterday, uh, thinking about verses four through seven, which I've entitled Prayer and Thanksgiving. There's a, there's a great progression here, and I want you to get it. I'm going to go over it and over it and over it, but it's, it's really neat, and it's not hard. It's right in the text. First of all, he says, I pray for you. We talked a little bit about that. We'll go back to that in a moment. Then secondly, he says, now here's the reason for the prayer. I heard some things. And then he says, now this is the purpose for the prayer. I heard some things. And then he says, now this is the purpose for the prayer, that your sharing might become more effective. We'll talk about that. And, and then he said, here's the explanation for the prayer, that we might have great joy and consolation. Think about it. He says, I'm, I'm praying. Here's the reason that I'm praying. Here's the purpose for the prayer, what I'm praying for, and here's the explanation of the prayer. It's all right in the text, and it's beautiful. I go back and just mention prayer again because it is such a neglected subject. Uh, I don't know why we're so easily intimidated. Many years ago, when I fir- the first assembly that I ever attended, uh, was in nineteen seventy nine in Northern Ontario. Uh, as you- as I've said before, I was raised in a Methodist church, led to the Lord by a Presbyterian, went to Campus Crusade for Christ, then on to a non-denominational Bible school, and then ended up in an assembly for various reasons. So believe me, I'm not biased, I'm not poured into the mold, I don't know a lot of things. Matter of fact, when I first got to this assembly, I noticed a very small assembly and a lot of elderly people, and every, uh, Lord's Day, they all said the same prayers. It's amazing. You could just about set your watch by it, you know? This guy'd get up and he'd pray, and then that guy'd get up and he'd pray, and then that guy, and I thought, man, we could have a Sunday school here. We wouldn't have to do this every Sunday. I didn't have such a great appreciation of the Lord's Supper. I came from a background of Bible school and teaching, and you should be into the word all the time, all the time. And then the longer I sat there, the more I began to appreciate. And it took me a long time. You know, repetition is a good thing. Did you know that? It's a good thing. And after about six months, I started listening to the prayers that these brethren were praying. They were Christ honoring. They were God exalting. There were prayers of praise and thanksgiving and worship. It just kind of went over my head. They were just words for a while. Now, I got to know one of these brothers and, uh, older men, and he said, well, you know, when I get saved, I didn't know anything. He said, I went to a prayer meeting, we all sat in a little circle, and he said one guy got up and he prayed, and when he sat down, he stepped on the foot of the guy next to him. He said, that meant you pray now. And he said, well, he jumped up and he prayed, you know, when he sat down, he stepped on the guy's foot next to him. He said, that's how I learned to pray. I think in the days to come, I learn more by their prayers than they did by my preaching. There is something about it. It don't take much size to criticize. You could pick me apart. Yes, it wouldn't be hard to pick me apart. And consequently, it wouldn't be hard for me to pick you apart. That's not our job. Our job is to build up one another. If you don't have something good to say, probably good not to say it. Just build up your brothers in Christ. Prayer, prayer, prayer, always praying, always God honoring, always praying for the best. He prayed, and he prayed, and he prayed. Now let's look at verse five for the reason for the prayer. The reason. Hearing of thy love and faith which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints. Hearing of thy love and faith. You might well ask yourself the question, who to hear it from? Well, i- if you right away you say, oh well, Onesimus would have told him. Hm. I'm not sure Onesimus was really paying a lot of attention to his master in those days. I don't know if he was or not. If he was, he was probably very critical. I mean, maybe he did know something that, uh, Philemon was religious, or that they had a church in their house. He could hear the singing sometimes or some- I don't know what was going on. Perhaps Epaphras was there helping him. Maybe he knew about it as well. I'm not sure. But one thing I like about this is that when love and faith are expressed, people hear about it. I like that. Do people hear about your love and faith? You know, these are both words of action. Without any corresponding action, you don't know about love and faith. They're words of action. On resurrection ground, you might remember the Lord Jesus said to Peter, Peter, do you love me more than these? Well, I mean, they just caught some fish, and it was all of this, and people are forever trying to figure out what the the the these is. Now let's just forget that for a minute. Do you love me? Peter said, yeah. The Lord says, then do something to prove it. Feed my sheep. You see, love is always a word of action. Sometimes your wife will say to you, honey, tell me you love me. And the guys go, I love you, you know. Like one guy said to his wife on their wedding day, I love you. If that changes, I'll let you know. Like, you know, that's not the way women operate. Let me tell you something. When, when a woman, when a wife says to her husband, um, honey, tell me you love me, uh, she's not wanting a verbal response. She's wanting a manifestation of love. She's wanting a demonstration of love. She's wanting love to be acted out toward her. And you heard me say this before, most women want to go on a long walk. Like, I- my philosophy is, if you can ride, why would you walk, you know? But women like that, you know? Take them in your arms, give them a kiss, take them out for supper, get some flowers, go on a long walk. Demonstrate, that's what they're looking for. Manifest. God did not sit in heaven and say, I love you. He manifested it. He stepped out of heaven. He came down in the person of his son, and he demonstrated it, love. The Lord Jesus said, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments. Hm. I, I, I suppose then I could deduct from that, that to the degree that I keep his commandments, to that degree I love him. To that degree. I- I- I- how much do I appreciate him? We were talking about that. How much do I honor him? That is basically, uh, gauged by my obedience to him. If I love the Lord, I will follow the Lord. If I love the Lord, I will follow in his steps. If I love the Lord, I will try by the grace of God to keep his commandments. I will, I will try by the grace of God to honor him in my life, and as I do that, I manifest my love to him. Love, a word of action. Could I ask you the question? Do you love the Lord? How are you manifesting that? Well, he said, I've heard of your love. Well, he heard of their love because there was some action going on with that love, and we'll see that in a minute. And, uh, uh, he, he heard about the love because he heard about the way in which love was expressed. That, that's great. But then he says this, he says, uh, hearing of thy love and faith. Oh, now we got another noun of action. See, faith, like love, is empty unless there's manifestation, unless there's demonstration. A lot of people just go kind of snaky when, when you get to James there, and they say, oh, wait a minute, I don't know how to, you know, faith without works is dead. Oh my, what are, what are we doing here? You know, don't, don't get excited about that. There's nothing wrong with that. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. Read the text sometimes. James says, now if a man says he has faith, but didn't have any works, can that faith save him? What kind of faith? What? Saying, saying faith. I can say I'm the president of Toyota. Does that make me the president of Toyota? Well, of course not, but I can say that. Watch this. I am a Christian. Does that make me a Christian? Well, of course not, but I said that. Can the saying faith, no evidence, no demonstration, uh, no explanation, no works to follow, is that real fa-? That's not real faith. Real faith has corresponding evidence to it. Now, you can't get the cart before the horse, I understand that. You can't say that my works produce faith. No, they don't. My faith produce works. If it's real faith, listen. Think about it like this. The poor sinner comes to Calvary, and by the grace of God, he embraces the Lord Jesus by faith, and and the Lord Jesus comes into his life. That's what we say. Uh, the the the w- our bodies are the temple of the Spirit of God. Uh, Romans eight and nine, if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of his. So, uh, now the very person of Jesus Christ and the power of his Spirit takes up residence in my body. The Spirit of God, the person of Christ now resides in me, inside. And then quite naturally, you don't have to prime the pump here, brothers. Quite naturally, he works himself out of my hands and my head and my feet and my mouth, and my life begins to change. Why? Because it's the real deal, that's why. I don't have to make up a testimony. I don't have to say, oh now, because I'm a Christian, I've got to do this, and I've got to do that, and I've g- oh. Some of you heard me say this before. The day I got saved, got saved by the grace of God, at nine o'clock in the morning. At midnight that night, I was partying, drinking at a bar, at a nightclub, carrying on just like I would norm- you'd say, well, you can't do that, you're a Christian now. Well, nobody told me I couldn't do that. I was just on the road, I was just going. But that night, something happened. The Spirit of God, I didn't even know it was the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God began to convict me. I couldn't say that word, and I certainly couldn't have spelled it at that time. I wouldn't know what that was, but I got a feeling like my earthly father had walked into that nightclub, of which he never drank or approved of drinking, and he was watching me, and I got so uncomfortable I had to lay that drink aside. I was drinking a pint of whiskey a day on August the twenty ninth, nineteen seventy, is the last drink I ever had, folks. The Lord just encouraged me, and I didn't even know it was the Lord. Put the bottle down, walk away. It was like he said, Joe, we are not going to live like this anymore. I got a better life. Natural. It came out. And then those days following, and right to this very day, he's still chipping away at my life. Doing what? Manifesting himself. Faith is like that. If there is no change, and I'm talking about permanent change, after seventeen years, I got, um, an invitation to go back to my, uh, uh, home church, uh, which was a Methodist church back in Sardis, Mississippi. It was, it was a miracle. It was like Paul going to the synagogue, you know? I mean, I went back home to preach the gospel 3 days, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. So I don't think they ever had that, and and they invited me, of all people, to do it. When I got to the church, it's packed. I mean, there are chairs in the aisle where the slaves, listen, this church was so old, there was a section, uh, upstairs in a balcony where the slaves sat. That was full. I looked out there that morning, and who was there? My old cronies were there. The guys I played with and fought with and raced with and drank with and gambled with, and all the guys that I tried to witness to when I got saved seventeen years ago, they are there. Why? Because it's real. That's why. Seventeen years later, it's real. Real faith. And I didn't think, now I got to do this and do this and do this, but faith was real. And faith has evidence. And every day that you live for Jesus Christ is another weight of evidence that he changes lives. Do not give up. The Apostle Paul said, I heard some things. This is why I'm praying. I- I heard some things. I heard that love's being acted out and demonstrated. I- I- I- I've heard that faith is real, and it's evident, and people are seeing it. And he even goes on to tell us, does he not? It's toward the Lord Jesus Christ and toward the saints. N- look at it again in verse five. uh Love and faith, which thou hast toward. Notice the order. I think it's si- significant. See, it's to the Lord first, isn't it? He- he's the master. Everything's to him first. A- a- and so this love and this faith, first of all, is expressed to him. Listen, that's the reason worship always comes before service. That's the reason sanctification always comes before service. Uh, sometimes we say to people, now you need to surrender your life to the Lord. You know, you need to present your body a living sacrifice to the Lord, and they go, OK, I will, you know, wait, hold it, hold it. What kind of sacrifice? Holy. Acceptable. Listen, you can't have a joint hanging out of your mouth with a can of beer in your hand and say, uh, I'm going to the party tonight, but tomorrow I'm going to serve the Lord. I'll just give him my body. That it doesn't work like that, folks. I'm sorry. He never has accepted just any kind of a sacrifice, and he will not start with you or me. Holy and acceptable unto the Lord. You say, well, I got a dilemma. I- I- I can never be that holy. Uh, yes, you can. God had never asked you to do anything you couldn't do. That wouldn't be fair. He'll give you the grace. He'll give you the strength. He'll give you the power. He will give you the mercy. He will work with you, but you must want to do that. God feeds the birds, but he don't put the worm in the nest. Amen? Let me tell you something. He will work in your life, but you have a responsibility. You have a responsibility. So, first of all, it's to the Lord, in my expression of love to him. It is, uh, my expression of faith to him. The just, we start by faith, we live by faith, we end by faith. And then one day he pulls the blinds, so, ah, faith gave way to sight, there he is. But while we're on earth, it's faith. So now notice, faith to the Lord and love to the Lord is now being expressed toward the saints. Now that's pretty good. I like that. Matter of fact, I, I think that's the proper way. First to the Lord, then toward all the saints. Now, how am I going to know, how are others going to know that my love and my faith, which I have toward the Lord, is real? It's going to be acted out to the saints. As much as you've done it to the least of the brethren, who have you done it to? The Lord Jesus sent them out, and he said, now if they accept you, they accept me. If they reject you, they reject me. Don't, don't ever forget that. The Lord sitting right beside you in symbol, in type, in principle, in his body. That's him. If the Lord Jesus was here physically, I mean, we, we couldn't do enough, right? We say, Master, what would you want? What can I do? Uh, uh, can I do something? I mean, you wouldn't wait on him to command you to do anything. You'd just do it, right? You just want to do it. Well, listen. Why don't we treat our brothers and sisters like that? You, you wouldn't criticize the Lord, would you? Oh, God forbid, no. Well, then why do you criticize your brothers and sisters? You wouldn't judge the Lord, would you? Well, God forbid. Then why do you judge your brothers and sisters? He says, I'm praying. The reason I'm praying is that I've heard something. Now here's the purpose of the prayer. Look in verse six. verse six. That, or in order that, the the old King James says the communication. That's not bad, that's talking, isn't it? The idea of the word here is fellowship or sharing. That the communication or the sharing of your faith may become effectual. You say, well, I thought he was already doing that. He is. Well, why did he pray it would become effective or effectual? Do you know what the biggest room in the world is? The room for improvement. Amen. Listen, none of us are where we ought to be. We are not. We all need to be built up. We all need... Listen, when I got saved by the grace of God, the man that led me to the Lord invited me over to his house. And when I got over there, he had a teenage daughter going to the University of Alabama at that time, it's nineteen seventy. and I had supper with them. And, um, while, uh, while we were waiting on his wife to finish off supper, uh, Mr. Borland, the man that led me to the Lord, he said, now his wife's name was Dixie. He said, now, yeah, here, here's a little gospel track. I want you to go into the kitchen and lead Dixie to the Lord. I said, what? Now, Dixie's saved. This is not a joke. What does he want me to do? Practice. You ever practice sharing your faith? Uh, brothers and sisters, um, you, whatever you do long enough, you get good at. Listen, you just need to practice. Don't be ashamed of practicing. I felt so, uh, it was unbelievable. I go in there and I got this four spiritual law track, you know, from Campus Crusade. By the way, that's the same track he used when I trusted Christ, so I'm kind of, you know, that's all right with me. I don't mind using those tracks. So, anyhow, I go in there and I s- and I, I start trying to, and I felt so stupid doing that. And of course, she plays the devil's advocate at this point. She said, no, I don't believe that stuff. Wait, that's the wrong answer. Wait a minute, you're supposed to say everything right here. Practice. Practice. He says, I'm praying for you because I heard of your faith, and he says, I'm praying for you because I want your f- your faith, your love, uh, your, your sharing, your fellowship, the expression of that, I want that to be more effective and more effective and more effective. Do you think you have it down pat? No, you don't have it down pat. Every time you get in a situation where you can share your faith, you go away from that, and this is what you say, oh, I wish I would have said, oh, I wish I would have thought. It is true, isn't it? We're not quick about those things, it seems. Now, let me clarify something. Nothing in the flesh pleases God. Not even your witnessing, okay? This is not witnessing in the flesh. For years, I thought if I was with somebody more than three minutes, I had an obligation to give them the gospel. I was taught that, actually. You, you get your testimony, you get it down, you get it down to a three-minute presentation, and if you're with somebody, before you leave them, you give them that three-minute testimony and challenge them for Christ. That haunted me for a few, few years because I missed some guys. Now, man, I got most of them because I was pretty determined to do that, but then I'd miss some, and then it would haunt me. And then I realized something. Jesus didn't talk to everybody down the street. He passed a lot of people. And then I began to realize, Joe, in the flesh, this doesn't work. You get a profession of faith, you don't know if it's real or not. I mean, listen, I'm not against witnessing. If you know me, you know that's true. But to witness in the flesh, that's not too good either, is it? That's to take the efforts of the flesh to try to do the work of God, and that will not work. What you need to do, if I could encourage you, is to be sensitive to the Lord. You be ready, ready to give an answer, ready to share Christ, ready and willing to communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ, but never force it or cram it down somebody's throat or make them. Now, ha- having said that, and I- I'm on storytelling here, I'm taking my time, but listen, I think you'll benefit from this. A brother and I were doing some door-to-door work. We came to a home, uh, the people invited us in. They were a little bit interested. He got a little more aggressive, little more aggressive, little more aggressive, to the point I'm feeling real uncomfortable about right now. Matter of fact, I felt so uncomfortable, he was, he had them in the corner, and there was no way out. And I said to him, I said, brother, I said, I'll wait for you in the car. I left. I said, oh God, this could not be right, what's going on here. And I went out in the car, and I prayed about it. In a few minutes, he came out and he said, wonderful, they trusted the Lord. I said, they didn't trust anybody in there. They said whatever they needed to say to get you out of that house. I have never heard such a thing in my life, you pressuring those people like that. He said, I've never done that in my life before. I was constrained by the Holy Spirit. Those people genuinely got saved. That was years ago. As far as I know, they're still going on for Christ today. I was the one out of tune. You see, you can, it goes both ways, you understand. You must be led by the Spirit, the Spirit of God. So he says, I'm praying that the, the fellowship, the, the sharing of your faith will become effective. Now, here's the secret. He said, I'm going to tell you, Philemon, how that is going to happen for you. Watch this. That it's going to become effective. How? By the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus. You want to be effective? You find out what you have in Christ. You, listen, the other day we talked about the power of the gospel. Uh, Paul said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is the power of God, uh, to t- to to save anyone that will believe. It's the power of God. Now, once I understand that it is not me, but it is the message of Christ itself, then that delivers me. I don't have to be intimidated. I don't have to be shy, but I need to be faithful. I need to be gracious, and I need to be kind. I don't need to be pushy or ob- obnoxious. I have to watch my approach. But if I can deliver, by the grace of God, the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, I'll, I'll even go this far, part of the gospel. It has three parts. Maybe I don't even get to the third part. I don't know. But if I can represent Jesus Christ in a positive way for the sinner, I am least leaving the door open for the next Christian to walk through it and continue that gospel witness. I'll tell you why I think that's important. I've talked to some people, and they are turned off big time. I- I heard this before. My neighbor, we- we had just moved, and, uh, our neighbor, this is years ago, um, uh, had a sheet metal shop. I'm a sheet metal worker. I wanted to go and visit him. I went down to visit him. I and uh, and I said, well, I just moved three doors up here, and I saw your shop. I just want to tell you that uh, that was my occupation. I'm in the Lord's work now. I'm a preacher of the gospel. I don't have nothing to do with that, he said. I said, boy, you must have got stung pretty bad. I said, what happened? He said, I had a friend. I thought he was a friend. Said he came in here to my shop and he said to me, Mr. Walton, Harley Walton was his name, said, Mr. Walton, said, if you don't, if if you don't become a Christian, if you're not born again, I can't be your friend. He said, I want nothing to do with that. I said, well, Mr. Walton, I said, I'll tell you what, I'll be your friend whether you ever get born again or not. How about that? Well, he didn't know what to say to that. You see, somebody had closed the door for the gospel in that man's life. Now, if the Spirit of God tells you, I know by experience, you do what the Spirit of God tells you, but don't get angry, don't get pushy, don't, don't get demanding on these people. They can't get it. They can't understand it. Every one of them must take a step of faith. So he's praying that as you know what you have in Christ, and that's a whole another series itself, then you will become more effective. You're just a channel, you're just the ambassador, you're just a little person, you're just a piece of clay, you're just part of the body, you're just out here, the head's in heaven, and he's directing his body, and you be directed by that and be encouraged to become more effective. And then I close quickly with this, the explanation. For we have great joy and consolation because the hearts of the saints are refreshed. We should all be like Philemon in this. Listen to this word, refreshed. Listen to what it means. To cause or permit one to cease from any movement or labor in order to recover and collect his strength. Is your home, your life, your ministry, your testimony a pilgrim's rest for the other believers? You see, Philemon, no doubt a wealthy man, he's got slaves. But this man is using what God has granted to him to minister to the saints that they might be refreshed. You know anybody that's run down, beat down, discouraged, tired physically, emotionally, mentally? Why don't you go refresh them? Why don't you go refresh them? Why don't you give them a chance to just stop for a minute and regain their courage or their strength. I don't know how many older wi- women are missing a lot of opportunities when you got these younger mothers who are just stressed out. My goodness, you know, you you walk into the house, they got one baby on their hip, they're stirring some soup over here in the pot, and they're pushing another one over here like this, and one's pulling at the coattail, and the guy comes in and says, oh, I had a hard day at the office, you know. Good luck. There's a lot of older women that don't need to be working at Walmart or Sears or McDonald's. It needs to be doing some home work. Do you understand what I'm saying? It's missing among the saints. And gentlemen, I don't care how much you enjoy hunting, fishing, and golf and everything else, I do too, but there is a ministry for us that we might refresh one another. And the Lord help us. Let's pray. We commend, Lord, these thoughts again, praying that anything of the flesh might be erased. Lord, we don't want it. Sometimes we don't even know when we're doing it, but you do. And we commend the principles, the thoughts, the prayers, the reason for the prayers, the effect of the prayers, that we might even pray. Oh God, help us to pray effectively that others' faith might be lived effectively for Christ's sake and the building up and the refreshment of his body. Amen.