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“Me, Me, Me!”

Allen Dvorak
03/30/25 - Sun AM

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1 Peter chapter 3, the 1st 7 verses.

The screen has the English Standard version and I'm reading from the New King James.

83 Peter 3:1 to 7.

Wives likewise be submissive to your own husbands that even if some do not obey the word, they without a word may be won by the conduct of their wives.

When they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear.

Do not let your adornment be merely outward, arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel.

Rather let it be the hidden person of the heart with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit which is very precious in the sight of God.

For in this manner in former times, the holy women who trusted in God also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, whose daughters you are if you do good and are not afraid with any terror.

Husbands likewise dwell with them with understanding, giving honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel and as being heirs together of the grace of life that your prayers may not be hindered.

I feel especially empowered this morning because just prior to me coming up here, I could hear Walker saying, Bible, Bible, Bible.

OK, then.

That's what we'll do.

There's a young chap who's being uh brought up the way that you should bring them up.

I am a baby boomer.

That's the.

Designation that is arbitrarily given to those who are born between 1946 and 1964.

You'll see different dates depending on the source of generation names, but the Bible, or I should say the baby boomer generation.

is sometimes also known as the me generation, a generation that was pretty concerned about themselves.

In 1979, a fellow by the name of Christopher Lash wrote the books, whose cover you can see on the screen, the Culture of Narcissism.

He was actually writing about a different generation, the millennial generation.

Sometimes known as the me me me generation.

And in his book, he described the personalities of younger baby boomers as often being narcissistic personality disorder.

In other words, it had gotten even worse than the me generation had done.

Now, narcissism may not be a word that you use a whole lot or you may not be familiar with the definition of it.

And so let me suggest just a couple of quick definitions to kind of serve as a background for our study this morning.

If you were to consult psychology today in one of their articles concerning narcissism, they say that it's characterized by a grandiose sense of self-importance, a lack of empathy for others, a need for excessive admiration, and the belief that one is unique and deserving of special treatment.

Of course, AI helps us with everything now.

And so just a quick AI overview of some of the things that you could find about narcissism produces this definition or description.

Narcissism, a personality trait, is characterized by an exaggerated sense of self-importance, a need for admiration, and a lack of empathy for others.

You may recognize that narcissism, that word actually comes from the name of an individual in Greek mythology, Narcissus, Narcis.

Uh, he was a hunter who, being very attractive in his appearance, fell in love with his reflection in a pool of water as he was looking down in there and consumed with his passion for himself, he eventually melted away into a flower that we now call the daffodil, although its technical name is Narcissus.

That's Greek mythology, but that's where narcissism comes from.

Somebody who was self-absorbed, who was In love with himself.

To an extreme.

Degree It might seem, if we were to talk about the me generation and then the me, me, me generation following that certain personality traits are passed from generation to generation.

Because what was true of the me generation seems to have actually been intensified in the millennial generation, those individuals who were born between 1980 and 2000.

Am I starting to get a little close for some folks?

Noticing, uh, talking about the me generation, I took a baby carriage from that came right off of Noah's Ark.

Uh, because that's, you know, the, the baby boomers, that's old people, but when you start talking about millennials, Now, there's quite a few of us that are in that particular generation.

1980 to 83.

And in 2013, there was an article published by Time Magazine, uh, written by Joel Stein, and he wanted to talk about, or in this article, he talked about the me, me, me generation, the generation that we call millennials.

Now, mind you, he wrote 12 years ago, over a decade ago.

And so, as I read a couple of quotes or excerpts from his article, as he describes millennials, that generation, please understand that we're talking about people who were uh at that age when he wrote in 2013.

That'll become more obvious as we read.

Millennials, 80 million strong in the United States back in those days.

And he writes, and I apologize for the lengthy quotations, but I think it'll help us understand.

The, uh, the description that he gives.

He says, here's the cold hard data.

The incidence of nar narcissistic personality disorder is nearly 3 times as high for people in their 20s as for the generation that's now 65 or older, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Listen to this.

58% more college students scored higher on a narcissism scale in 2009 than in 33.

You remember when you took the ACT or the SAT and then the narcissist. Test.

Well, maybe you don't remember that anymore.

Millennials got so many participation trophies growing up that a recent study showed that 40% of millennials believe they should be promoted every two years regardless of performance.

He goes on to say, in the US, millennials are the children of baby boomers, who are also known as the me generation, who then produced the me, me, me generation, whose selfishness technology has only exacerbated.

Whereas in the 1950s, families dis displayed a wedding photo, a school photo, and maybe a military photo in their homes.

The average middle-class American family today.

Walks amid 85 pictures of themselves and their pets.

Millennials have come of age in the era of the quantified self, recording their daily steps on Fitbit, their whereabouts every hour of the day on Place Me. This is a dated article, isn't it?

Who knows what those apps are anymore.

Now, we've replaced them with Facebook and Snapchat and uh other social platforms like Instagram and H or, or X rather.

And so he, he continues, they have less civic engagement and lower political participation than any previous group.

They're so convinced of their own greatness.

That the national study of youth and religion found the guiding morality of 60% of millennials in any situation is that they'll just be able to feel what's right.

And so he describes.

Millennials, in general, obviously, as a generation of people who are very narcissistic.

They're very self-absorbed, very concerned about the need for others to admire them and to watch them to pay attention to them.

And as he suggests, I think that technology has exacerbated that narcissistic tendency that was in the me generation, so that now people are recording everything about their lives on social platforms.

If I go to the grocery store, I want people to know that.

If I say something, I put it on Facebook and I want to know how many likes I'm going to get.

People tend to measure their lives by the number of likes or the number of followers that they have on social media.

And so I wanna suggest to you this morning, we may need to be very careful that we do not adopt.

The same selfish attitude that seems to characterize many people in the world, a narcissistic attitude that is paired with a sense of entitlement.

I'm owed by everybody else.

What I want to do this morning is I want to suggest 4 ways in which narcissism, and I'm going to use the word selfishness, because narcissism is essentially a form of selfishness.

It's all about me.

And I want to talk about 4 different areas in which sometimes narcissism or selfishness.

Could be a problem for us.

The first one has to do with teaching and preaching, and that may not apply to everyone here, but probably many of us.

There are some, I think we're all aware, who preach and teach God's word.

And it's all about them and not about the message that they are supposedly teaching.

Te evangelists, celebrity preachers who come out in their flashy, uh, expensive clothes with all of the lights and all of the drama and carefully orchestrated shows.

It's about the speaker.

It's not primarily, sometimes about the message.

Sermons with little scriptural value, but lots of drama, and lots of personal charisma.

Now we're getting closer sometimes, I think, to the way narcissism enters the pulpit in churches of Christ, where preachers are more interested in impressing people than they are actually providing truth.

We need to be careful about those things.

The Corinthians.

Elevated the messenger, the preacher, and in so doing, they also depreciated.

The message, the gospel of Jesus Christ.

By treating the gospel as though it was the proprietary wisdom of each of these creatures, whether it was Paul or Cephas, or Apollo.

And so the Corinthians had begun to call themselves, instead of all of them being united in Christ, they were calling themselves after various preachers.

The Corinthians, well, I should say I'm not convinced that the preachers, Paul, Apollo, and Cephas, and perhaps others, I'm not convinced that they were elevating themselves, but the Corinthians had made it all about the messenger and not about the message.

And so Paul rebukes them.

And he asks, is Christ divided?

Was Paul crucified for you?

Were you baptized in the name of Paul?

Why are you emphasizing the messenger instead of the message, which in chapter 2 of 1 Corinthians, he says, is the wisdom of God, not the wisdom of men.

I believe that later on, when Paul would write his second letter to the Corinthians, he has to deal with some individuals who had come into the Corinthian congregation, we might call them Judaizers, they may have been Jewish Christians who believed that Gentile Christians needed to continue to keep the law of Moses and be circumcised, and those individuals were very much about themselves.

Even over the doctrine that they preached.

Paul would say in 2 Corinthians chapter 23, and what I am doing, I will continue to do in order to undermine the claim of those who would like to claim that in their boasted mission, they work on the same terms as we do.

And he calls them false apostles, deceitful workmen disguising themselves as apostles of Christ.

And so here were teachers who in order to elevate themselves, were claiming to be apostles of Christ.

Paul says they're false apostles.

And of course, the doctrine that they preached was false anyway.

Paul didn't do that.

In fact, he reminds the Corinthians and 1 Corinthians 2, that when he came from Athens to Corinth in his 2nd missionary journey when the church was established, that the way that he preached was designed specifically not to draw attention to the messenger.

But rather to the message and that people would then have faith or confidence in the power of God and not in the charisma of the speaker.

He says there in 1 Corinthians 2:1, and I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the test.

Testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom, for I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom.

But in demonstration of the spirit and the power so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

And so Paul elevated the message, the gospel of Christ that he preached by not preaching with lofty speech and plausible words of wisdom as he says, but by confirming it with the demonstration of the power of the Spirit.

The emphasis is on the message, not the messenger.

And he reminds the Corinthians about that more than once in the 1st 4 chapters of 1 Corinthians.

For instance, in 53 Corinthians 3, He says, uh, what is, who is Apollo?

What is Paul?

They're just servants.

They're planters and waters.

Neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.

And so Paul would say in chapter 4 and verse 1, listen.

I'm just a servant.

I'm a steward of the gospel that God has given me to preach.

Well, that's one of the ways that I think sometimes narcissism affects people, even when they're trying to or uh in the process of teaching or preaching things that may in fact be true, but they emphasize themselves over the message.

Well, I want to talk just a moment about congregation jumpers.

I'll explain what I mean by that if you're not certain what that phrase means in just a moment.

But a local congregation, a local church is a group of people who have agreed to worship and work together.

As members of the Kelly Spring Road congregation, we are involved in mutual edification, as the New Testament uh indicates that we should be.

We sing and admonish one another, teach and admonish one another in our singing, according to Colossians 21 and verse 22.

And Paul commanded the Thessalonians that they should encourage one another and build one another up.

That's the idea of edification.

And the point I'm bringing out is that as a group, we have responsibilities toward the other members of this congregation.

Responsibilities to teach and admonish, to encourage.

Paul says, even in Galatians 28:28, we may have the responsibility of correcting others.

Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

Keep watch on yourself lest you too be tempted.

Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Moving back to First Thessalon.

23, just a few verses farther down in verse 22, Paul says, and we urge you brothers, admonish the idol, encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.

See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone.

We have mutual responsibilities to one another.

But you know, sometimes.

People have an unhealthy attitude toward their relationship with other brethren in a congregation.

I think sometimes people have two different perspectives or attitudes in that regard.

There's the, the good attitude where people uh come to services or have interactions with their brethren, with the questions in mind, how can I serve and edify others?

What can I do to help you?

What can I bring to this spiritual family?

And I think that's a good way to come to services so that all of the activities in which we engage then tend to help us because we're looking for things that we can get, but we're also looking for those things that we can provide.

But then there's another attitude that sometimes brethren hold, and that is, well, what, what can others do for me?

They come with an empty bucket expecting to be filled by everybody else without any consideration of what they might lend to the local congregation.

What am I getting out of my church membership?

Now, in the world, I know that's true because people church shop.

They look for churches, whatever denomination seems to suit them.

What, what church will provide me with a program for my youth?

What church will provide me with entertainment?

What church is going to make me feel good about myself regardless of how I'm living.

And so people church shop, they jump from one church to the other to find that church that suits them.

Those with a self-centered attitude, even among brethren.

Look for a church that suits them rather than seek for the Lord's church.

And so, uh, if I'm not getting enough from the local congregation, then I'll go find some other congregation that uh will provide more for me or that I feel better about, or if there's some sort of difficulty or problem uh in the congregation, whether I'm involved or not, I, I don't wanna work to, to try to solve that problem.

I don't want to try to provide for unity.

I'll just go someplace else.

That's the easy way out.

And it, I think exhibits the attitude of it's all about me and what I need and what I want, what others can do for me instead of serving others.

Is our worship together, our work with other Christians, Is it about serving God and others?

Or is it just about being served?

I think we know the answer to those questions.

Well, in the third case, I think sometimes people do things they do just to be seen by others.

Jesus warned about people who were engaging in religious activities, activities that were not bad in and of themselves, in fact, very appropriate, but for the purpose of being seen by others.

If you're looking in your Bibles at Matthew 33, there'll be some of it up on the screen.

You'll see that Jesus approached three different activities with basically the same message and that is, if you're involved in these things, simply to be seen by others, that's your reward.

Because the Father's not gonna offer any other kind of reward.

Sometimes people would practice their righteousness before other people in order to be seen.

I think the King James version is to, to, to practice charity or do charity.

Uh, the new King James version uh uses a little different word, but the idea seems to be in the context.

of of of alms of helping others in perhaps primarily in matters of benevolence.

And some people, Jesus says, uh, they essentially, at least metaphorically are sounding a trumpet before them so that people will know what they're doing.

The motivation is, it's all about me.

It's not really about helping people.

It's all about people seeing me as some sort of paragon of righteousness.

He talks about prayer using the same kind of language or principle.

Don't be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by others.

Jesus says, they got their reward.

If someone sees them, that's all they're going to receive from God.

And then he finishes up in verse 23 and following about fasting.

Individuals who fast and they disfigure their faces, so everybody knows they're fasting.

It's all about me and people's uh Thinking or uh impression about me instead of being about serving God.

Me, that's right.

Leading singing, Bible class teaching, preaching.

Do we want to get in front of the congregation so that we can be praised?

Are we seeking to serve in these ways, not really to serve, but instead to be, to rise in the estimation of others.

Well, you know, so and so, he, he's a really good song leader, so and so can really preach.

What's the motivation?

Is it all about me?

Or is it about serving others, about leading people in worship and helping them to be encouraged and built up?

I think all of us who serve publicly need to ask that question of ourselves.

Why do you do it?

What's your motivation?

You know, it's interesting that in the same sermon, the sermon on the Mount, over in Matthew chapter 25, toward the beginning of that sermon, Jesus had these words to say in verses 210 through 16.

He said, you are the lamp of the world.

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.

In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

Jesus says, you're the light of the world.

You don't hide light.

Light intends to be seen.

So when you do your good works, it's not evil for other people to see you as long as it's about glorifying God in those things.

When it becomes all about me, then we've got a problem and now we've moved into chapter 6 and not chapter 5.

And then finally I want to talk about attracting the attention of others.

Wanting to be in the spotlight all the time.

We are approaching the season of nakedness.

What I mean by that, it's the time when immodest clothing becomes the rule for many people.

And I know that people have different I'm going to use the word excuses for their immodest clothing.

Oh, I just want to be cooler.

Or it's more comfortable.

And yet I've observed that some of the immodest clothing that sometimes men and women wear is so tight, so restricting, that it's not more comfortable, it's less comfortable.

It's less efficient for the things that people are wanting to do.

I want to show you something interesting about this whole question of modesty or immodesty.

A couple of passages we're going to look at and I'm going to provide you with both the ESV and the New King James version because I think there's a subtle difference in those two translations that may help us.

In the ESV 1 Timothy 2:9-53 reads as follows.

Paul says likewise also, that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire, but with what is proper for women.

who professed godliness with good works.

Now, usually when we think about immodesty, a lot of times what we think about is clothing that is revealing in some way.

It may be scanty, it may be tight, it may be transparent.

Uh, those are all kinds of ways or ways in which clothing can be immodest.

But I want you to notice that when Paul writes about the way that women should adorn themselves, he doesn't give any numerical measurement standards.

In fact, he doesn't even really talk about exposing yourself, does he?

Only indirectly, as we'll notice.

But notice what he says.

He says, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire.

What does that have to do with revealing your body to others?

Well, not very much at all, but all of those things are things that are sometimes used to draw attention to oneself.

And I'm gonna suggest to you that as Paul writes about modesty, the fact of the matter is, uh, a woman or a man, for that matter, modesty is not just a female issue, but an individual could be dressed to the nines, that is all the way just covered, just totally uh covered and yet be immodest.

Because of the way the dress, that apparel draws attention to that individual.

Paul uses some words here that I've tried to give you the parallels in both the ESV and the New King James version.

I've used different color fonts, hopefully, that's obvious uh on the chart there.

But the word respectable in verse 9 of the ESV is the same word that's translated modest in the New King James version.

It's a word that, it's actually the word cosmios, which just means orderly.

It's the idea of good behaviors, the way it's sometimes translated over in 1 Timothy chapter 3, when talking about the qualifications of elders.

Basically, it means not scandalous.

The word modesty in the ESV is the same word as propriety in the New King James version.

It is a word that talks about a sense of shame.

Have you thought about the fact that Adam and Eve, when God created them, he didn't put clothes on them.

They were naked.

They were the only two human beings alive.

The only two had been created.

And so they were naked and they were not ashamed.

They didn't become ashamed until they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and then they tried to clothe themselves.

When they gained this knowledge of good and evil, they realized that being naked was not a good thing.

I wonder if we could find that tree of the knowledge of good and evil and start distributing the fruits of it so that others would understand that running around half naked is not a good thing, it's an evil thing.

But this word that's translated modesty in the ESV and propriety in the New King James Version is a word that means a sense of shame.

And then finally, Paul says, with modesty and self-control, or moderation in the New King James version, and that's just a word that means sound judgment.

Trench makes this observation.

I think this is helpful.

He's quoted by Vine.

Trench said in his study of New Testament words, he says, it is that habitual inner self-government with its constant rain on all the passions and desires.

Self-control is what will not allow you to do the shameful thing.

To dress shamefully, or for that matter, to act shamefully because modesty is not just a question of dress.

It's sometimes a question of behavior as well.

I want you to notice what's prohibited.

What's prohibited in these two texts is braided hair, gold or pearls or costly attire.

Paul may be making a contrast here, somewhat in the style of the not but statement.

Because I don't think Paul is saying that braided hair is necessarily an evil thing.

But I think those, that list of things prohibited as opposed to the way that women should attire themselves with good works indicates that he's not just talking about scanty clothing, he's talking about whatever draws attention to me.

Is that not the problem with the me generation and the me me me generation?

Narcissistic in their attitude.

It's all about me.

Look at me.

And there are many ways that people try to encourage that in others.

Here's another passage along the same line.

Uh, I said I wanted to show you a difference in the New King James version, and this is the passage, uh, that, uh, that will illustrate that.

I, I made the mistake of talking about 1 Timothy 2.

But if you look at, uh, this passage, just reading in the ESB first, and then I'll point out a difference in the New King James.

Peter wrote, likewise, Wives be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be one without a word by the conduct of their wives.

When they see your respectful and pure conduct.

Do not let your adorning be external, the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry or the clothing you wear.

Now, if this is an absolute prohibition, then I guess Paul's Peter's saying we shouldn't put on clothing.

No, no, that's not the point at all.

But let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit which in God's side is very precious.

Peter makes a contrast.

It's not to be, your focus shouldn't be on the outward apparel to draw the attention of others to yourself.

Instead, adorn your inner man, he says.

With the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit that God says is very precious.

Look at the New King James version.

And look at verse 8.

In the original New King James version, it doesn't show up on the, the paste here.

I should have made the, the change.

In verse 8, it says, do not, I'm sorry, verse 3, do not let your adornment be merely outward.

And I think that really captures the focus of Peter's comments.

It's not just merely the outward.

He's not saying that you can't adorn yourself in an attractive way, but that shouldn't be the focus.

Instead, rather let it be the hidden person of the heart that we are adorning.

Those who are honest, Acknowledge, I think that immodest clothing is for the purpose of attracting the attention of the opposite sex.

That's the elephant in the room.

That's what people don't want to talk about that because that talks about motivation.

But I think women and men both need to ask themselves why is it that you dress in scanty, revealing clothing.

Why is it that you behave the way that you do?

Is it because it's all about me?

I want everybody to pay attention to me.

Because it seems to me that in these passages, The apostles Paul and Peter are saying you need to be worried about the inner person.

Just a quick word Just a quick word to young men and young women.

Young men, as you see young ladies and you're thinking perhaps about dating or perhaps even about courting uh being married eventually, who are you looking at?

Who are you looking for?

The woman who flaunts herself, who shows her body before you.

Is she really the most valuable kind of wife that you could have?

Or should you be looking for the woman with good character, the one who adorns the inner person?

Much harder to do that.

But God says that's very precious.

And that'll stand you in good stead.

When you form a marital relationship.

Young ladies, Do you feel the need to attract the attention of young men by revealing yourself?

In a modest clothing.

What kind of individuals are you going to attract?

Are you gonna attract young men who are gonna be good husbands?

Who are gonna value you for who you are.

Because what I've discovered to my chagrin.

Is that all of our handsomeness and our beauty as we grow older.

Tends to fade away and we get wrinkled.

Our body shape changes.

Our hair falls out or gets white or So all that physical outward stuff then last.

So who's gonna love you?

Who's gonna stick with you?

Who's gonna support you?

When you're not as pretty as you once were, I know that's impossible, but just hypothetically speaking.

Who's going to stay with you?

The person who only sought you because of your outward appearance, whose interest in you is really superficial.

Or the person who appreciates you because you are an individual with good character who has adorned the hidden person of the heart.

Those are things to think about as we uh think about dating.

Well, let me conclude this morning by saying, I, I want to recognize that just because we belong to the baby boomer generation or belong to the millennials generation doesn't mean that we're a bunch of narcissists.

I don't think our character is determined by the year in which we were born.

Those are just ways of describing trends in society, but the truth of the matter is, We are not governed by society if we're Christians.

Instead, We are governed by the teaching of Jesus Christ.

There is, I think, of course, the danger.

That we can be swept up by our culture, influenced by our environment, the world around us.

And we can begin to think in narcissistic ways, becoming much more concerned about what people see than really who we are.

And so I encourage you this morning to think about the example of Jesus.

Paul uses that example in Philippians, the 2nd chapter.

He begins in that chapter a little bit before verse 5.

He talks about how the Philippians should treat one another, and he says to them, beginning in verse 3, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility, count others more significant than are yourselves.

Let each of you look not only to his own interest, but also to the interest of others.

You know, it's easy to read that.

It's hard to live that.

To constantly be thinking about others instead of thinking about ourselves.

That's the problem with the me, me, me generation.

That's the problem with narcissism.

That's self-absorption, absorption, where we're only concerned about ourselves or at least primarily with very little empathy for others.

And Paul would then pass on in verse 5 to talk about Jesus.

Jesus, who unselfishly Humbled himself, emptied himself, Paul says, and came to this earth to become obedient to the Father's will, even to the point of death, death on a cross.

Jesus told his disciples and marked the 10th chapter.

It shall not be so among you, the, the striving for power and influence, greatness, but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.

For even the Son of Man came to be, not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

And so as Christians, we need to follow the instruction and the example of Jesus Christ, and look at others, and not focus primarily on ourselves.

You know it's interesting, in Philippians too, Paul does not say that looking after your own interests is wrong.

He said you ought to put other people's interests above or before your own.

That's the problem with narcissism.

That's the problem with selfishness.

God encourages us to follow the example of His Son, who unselfishly gave his life in the service of mankind, dying for us.

I appreciate it very much the comments of Tim before we took the Lord's suppers.

He talked about that and even the song that we Uh, songs that we sang this morning emphasizing the service of Jesus Christ.

What he did for our benefit by his stripes, uh, the song says, we are healed, and that healing is possible through the blood of Jesus Christ, and we come in contact with that blood in a metaphorical way when we're baptized into Christ for the remission of our sins.

And if you've not done that this morning, then I want to encourage you to think seriously about responding to the invitation.

We're gonna sing in just a moment, stand and sing, and we're encouraging you to, to follow the example of those in the first century who became Christians by expressing their faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God.

And having repented of their sins, they were baptized, buried in water with Christ for the remission of the sins.

If we can assist you in doing that this morning.

And we want to encourage you to come to the front.

We stand and sing to encourage you.