[00:00:01] Speaker A: Thanks for tuning in to the Met Church podcast. Here at the Met, we are all about connecting people to God and one another. If you have any questions or want more information about what's happening here at the church, then head to our
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[00:00:24] Speaker B: Good morning, everybody. I'm glad you're here. We're in a new series, as you know, called Healthy. And the goal of our church, really, in this spring season is to get healthy in every area of life. Now, we talked first of all about having a healthy heart and what that entails. It involves your mind, the way you think, it involves your will, what you do, and it involves your emotions being healthy emotionally. And then we talked about that even involves how you handle anger and the things that disappoint you in life. A healthy heart. And then we moved last week to talk about the significance of a healthy home and how all of us want our homes to be healthy. Healthy things grow, healthy people grow, healthy businesses grow, healthy churches grow. So we talked about having a healthy home and we started talking about healthy marriages. Now, that's not automatic. Nobody has the perfect situation. You have to work on your relationship. And we talked about the significance of commitment being the key to a long distance marriage. And I just wanna celebrate one of the marriages in our church family that this morning, one of our leaders, longtime members of our church, Rudy and Tammy Knapp, have just celebrated 50 years together. They're right here. Would you give them congratulations on that?
That's pretty great. Anybody else done 50 or more? Any 50 or more? Look at you people. That is wonderful.
I heard about a pastor, he was talking to a guy that was coming up on his 50th anniversary. He goes, man, how in the world did you do that? He goes, well, he goes, to be honest with you, he I just try to spend money on my wife and make sure she's happy. He said, I spent a lot of money on that girl, taking her places, traveling. He said, for example, on our 25th anniversary, I took her to Beijing, China. And the pastor said, wow, what remark. You spend time and you spent money on her and you've traveled with her. You took her to China on your 25th. So he said, how are you going to top that? What are you going to do now on your 50th anniversary? He said, well, I'm going back to China to pick her up.
So everybody Makes it work, I guess, in a little different way. But that's something to be said, right? For 50 years. That's pretty incredible. And this morning, I want to talk about another aspect of home life. I want to talk about being single. Now, you don't hear a lot about being single in church world. In fact, I dare say probably many of you have probably never heard a talk a message on the idea of what the Bible has to say about being in a season where you are single. But the Bible does actually have a lot to say about it. Now, it may be surprising for you to know that in 2024, the Pew Research center sampled in America and discovered that 47% of Americans are single. 47%. That means they're single. And half of that number are not looking to date anyone. And they're certainly not looking for a committed relationship. Does that surprise you? A little surprise me. In fact, in our church family, about 30% of those who make up our church are single. About one in three who come to our church are single. And so when you talk about this, you don't want to make assumptions about being single, what that means. I heard about a young man leaning against a warehouse door. When the owner of the company walked through, he sees this young man doing nothing, just leaning against the door. And he looks at the young man and he says, how much money do you make each week? And the young man replied, said, I make $400 a week. The owner of the company pulls out $400, hands it to the young man and said, you can go. We don't need you around here anymore. Then he looked at the supervisor and said, how long has that kid worked here? And the supervisor said, well, sir, he doesn't work here. He's just a delivery boy.
So you have to be careful making assumptions. And so we certainly don't want to do that. So as I go into my message this morning, let me bust some myths about being married and being single. First of all, the first myth I want to bust is the idea that singleness is an identity. Singleness is an identity. If you are single, that is not who you are. That is not an identity. That is your marital status. That is not your identity. You are made in the image of God. You have great potential, you have great dignity. Besides that, the word single also means unique. You like that. There's only one. You like that. It also means free. You might like that. And so single does not mean it is not an identity. Second myth, marriage is the only God ordained lifestyle. Some people say, well, If I'm not married, I can't please God. I got to be married in order for God to really ordain my life and to use me. That is a myth. That's not true. In fact, when you look into the Bible, there are numerous people in the Bible God used greatly who were single. Can I remind you that our Savior was single? Jesus was single. God could ordained that Jesus be married, but he didn't. Jesus was a single man. And by the way, we don't know at what point in his life, but we know his earthly father Joseph passed away. Joseph is not mentioned in some of the more significant events that happened in the life of Jesus. And so most scholars believe at some point that Joseph died. Now we know Joseph was with Jesus at when he was 12 when he goes into the temple. Remember he confounds the leaders of the temple. Well, Joseph is mentioned there. So sometime after Jesus was 12 years old, most scholars believe that Joseph dies because even at the cross, when Jesus looks down from the cross and he sees John standing next to his mother, you remember what he says to John. Take care of my mom, watch after her, make sure she's good. You take care. Well, obviously if Joseph had been around, he wouldn't have had to give that instruction. So my point is for most of Jesus life, he was raised by a single mom. So if you're in the room this morning and your marital status is single and you are a parent, you're in good company. The mother of Christ was a single mom for a lot of her life. And so you have other examples, John the Baptist, the Old Testament, you have Daniel, Jeremiah, Elijah. Back in the New Testament you have Mary and Martha, you have the apostle Paul. Now many people believe because the apostle Paul was a member of the Sanhedrin, the requirement for being in the Sanhedrin is you had to be married. So many believe that Paul probably was married, that Paul was more or less a widower for the majority of his ministry. And that's significant because Paul wrote the majority of the New Testament as a single man, probably as a widowed man. So I bust the myth that singleness is identity and identity. I want to bust the myth that marriage is the only God ordained lifestyle. Here's another myth that you can bust and that is that we talked about it last week, that the grass is greener on the other side of the matrimonial fence. That's just not true. Life is good no matter which side you're on. If the grass is greener on the other side, you need to water the side that you're on, green it up, or I told you last week it might be the grass is greener because there's septic tanks leaking. So you don't want to be careful with that one. A fourth myth I would bust, and that is I need someone in my life in order to complete me. I talked about that last weekend. You don't need anybody in your life to complete you. They may finish you off, actually, is how they may complete you. The point is, you need to be healthy in and of yourself. Remember, I got into this a little bit in one of the services last week. I talked about two half people. They won't make a whole person. Two unhealthy people will not make a healthy relationship. You cannot fix your partner. So you have to focus on yourself. Get yourself healthy spiritually, get yourself healthy emotionally, get yourself healthy physically. And so that is so significant that you focus in that direction. I need someone to complete me is a myth. Here's a fifth myth, and that is singleness produces loneliness, while marriage produces intimacy. Anybody who's been married will tell you that that's a myth. It doesn't necessarily mean intimacy just because you're in a marriage relationship. And if you are single, it doesn't automatically mean you're going to be lonely. In fact, the Bible gives us instruction in Hebrews 13:5, be content regardless of the season of life that you're in. And we're actually going to talk about contentment a little bit next weekend. So I hope you don't miss that one. And so that's a myth that you want to bust. So there is a lot of myths, there's a lot of misconceptions that we have when it comes to being single and what that looks like as opposed to being married. Now, the Apostle Paul wrote an entire chapter of the Bible that talks about singleness and talks about married life. And the chapter is First Corinthians 7. And Paul was answering some specific questions that the people had in the church at Corinth. And so Paul has written this letter, First Corinthians, that whole letter, first and Second Corinthians, actually addressing some of the questions that they had. And one of the questions they had was pertaining to being sexual and being married and all of those things that pertain to that. And so Paul's answering their questions. Now I want to read you a summary in a paraphrase form of First Corinthians 7. It's in the Message Bible. Now, normally I some of the way in which The Bible is paraphrased in the Message Bible. I have a little concern with it, but in reading this, I don't have a lot of concern with this. I think it captures it very succinctly. So let me read a portion of First Corinthians 7 from the message Bible, a paraphrase that really captures what I want to talk to you about. Paul said verse one now getting down to the questions you ask in your letter to me, remember he's responding to their questions. He said, first you ask, is it a good thing to have sexual relations? And he answers certainly are parentheses. Duh. No, it's not in there.
Loosely translated, that was my addition to that context, certainly, but only within a certain context. It is good for a man to have a wife and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual desires are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them and provide for a balanced and fulfilling sexual life. In a world of sexual disorder, the marriage bed must be a place of mutuality. The husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to stand up for your rights. Marriage is a decision to serve one another, whether it's in the bedroom or out. Abstaining from sex is permissible for a period of time if you both agree to it, and for the purposes of prayer and fasting, but only for such times, then come back together again. Satan is an ingenious Satan has rather an ingenious way of tempting us when we least expect it. I'm not understand commanding these periods of abstinence, only providing my best counsel if you should choose them. And Then finally verse 7 Sometimes Paul said, I wished everyone could be single like me. It's a simpler life in many ways, but celibacy is not for everyone any more than marriage is. And then he describes singleness this way. God gives the gift of the single life to some and the gift of married life to others. Now again, that is a really good paraphrase of that chapter and if you want to study it a little more, I would recommend you could Google search that. Just look for 1 Corinthians 7 in the message and you can read through what I've just read to you. But what I want to point out are two or three things from that narrative that I've read that really are significant when it comes to understanding the power of being single or the solo mojo you might say number one, I want to talk about the nobility the nobility of being single. Again, Paul, as I just read to you in verse 8 he describes singleness as a gift. Have you ever considered if you're in the single season, maybe you've never been married, maybe you're married and divorced, maybe you're like me, you're widowed. But you find yourself in the season of singleness. Paul said you're in a season where it is literally a gift. Just as being married is a gift, that season of marriage is a gift. Well, the season of being a single person is also a gift. And so he describes it, and I'm using the word nobility because he uses the word a gift to describe the season of singleness. It was interesting because in that day, just as it is in our day, one of the challenges to being single was culture. Culture was an issue then, just as it is an issue now. You have a very permissive society. And so he is challenging singles to celibacy. He's saying, look, if you're single and you're not in that committed relationship with someone in marriage, then keep yourself from sexual activity, because you don't even have to talk to a pastor. You talk to a psychologist, and they will tell you that single sex can complicate a relationship because most women are looking for ultimately a commitment. And many men, not all men, but many men, are looking for a conquest. And oftentimes, whenever sex invades the life of a single person, there's a lot of hurt that can be done because the woman has one expectation, while the man may have a totally different expectation. And one of the challenges of the culture in Paul's day is the Jewish community. The religious establishment of that day looked down on being single. And that's not exactly untrue in our world today. I talk to singles who say oftentimes they go to churches and they don't feel there's anything in the church for them. That everything is designed and created for married couples, that everything is oriented in that way, and they kind of feel displaced. And so the Jewish thing, it was a thing, I think, in the American church, it's not by intention, it's just by simply neglect. But in many churches, there's not a lot for single people to lock in and a lot of things for them to do. So culture does, in fact, become an issue. So that was an issue. The second thing was an issue was the conduct of that Corinthian church was an issue. The Corinthian church was probably the most carnal church in the entire New Testament. Look, there's nothing wrong with a church being in the world, being in the culture, but there's Everything when the world gets inside the church. And the Corinthian church was a worldly church. It really was. They had so many issues. And Paul addresses them, as I said, in these two letters to the Corinthians. They had issues, theological issues over the resurrection. They had issues over church government. They had issues over the gifts of the Holy Spirit that was working in the life of the church. They were divided, and they were divisive in the way they handled those issues. Then there was immorality, open immorality in the church. The culture of that world had invaded the church. For example, they would have the Lord's Supper, and there were people who would get drunk at the Lord's Supper. Can you imagine that? I mean, they completely perverted the purpose of the Lord's Supper. They were actually having sex within the church. There was a term called Corinthian women, which means party girls. And. And the party girls were inside of the church. I mean, this is just totally messed up. And there were rings of sexual activity that was going on in the life of the church. That was well known by everyone. This church was messed up. And the Apostle Paul is writing, going, I gotta fix this church. It was an incredible church. It was a great church. But they had some theological issues. They had some moral issues. And so Paul is writing particularly, he's writing this chapter saying, look, God gave you all of these appetites. There's nothing wrong with having sexual appetites, but there are rules for the road. And by the way, can I say this? God never says no to something to keep you from enjoying something better. God is not a sovereign sadist. He's not the cosmic killjoy. He doesn't look down into someone's life and say, thou shalt not, because he knows, if you shall, you're going to experience something that would be even better than what he's letting you in on. In fact, I'll tell you, that was the secret to the original temptation. You remember, the devil slivers up to Adam and Eve and says, God's keeping something from you. He showed you you shouldn't do this. But the reality of it is, if you do this, he knows you're gonna have a wealth of information. You're gonna be like him. And so he's trying to hold you down and keep you back and keep you from enjoying your life. And he's trying to, you know, he's trying to oppress you within this kind of a puritanical mindset. And I just go back to saying, your Heavenly Father would not Say no to you. He would not say, don't do this if it were not in your and in my best interest. Look, God is far more interested in my holiness than he is in my happiness. He's far more interested in me being right than he is in me feeling right. And so I'm just suggesting you, you can't always trust your feelings. We talked about that when I talked about being emotionally healthy. And so be careful when you are making big life decisions based on feelings and not on facts, because you can lead yourself astray quickly in that regard. So I'm saying there were some issues within this church.
There was issues with their culture, there was issues with their conduct. And then in context of what Paul is trying to teach them, he's trying to say, look, if you're in a season of singleness and you desire to be married, then trust God's timing in this. And some of you may be in a season of singleness, and you're content with that. Trust God's timing in this. God has a plan. And God is not trying to withhold something better from you in this particular season of life. So the first thing I just want you to understand, if you're single, regardless of why you were single, see that as a gift that God has given you the gift of this season for a purpose. And here's the second thought. I want to give you not only the nobility of being single, but the mobility of being single. Here's probably possibly a reason why God has given you this season of life. Look at verse 32. I want all of you to be free from worry as an unmarried person worries about how to please the Lord. But a married person has more worries. And all of us who've been married or are married says amen. There's a lot more worries of being married. They worry about things of the world. They worry about how to please their spouse. So they are pulled into different directions. Now, he's not saying that's bad. He's just saying in contrast to being single, understand, if you're in a season of singleness, you have less responsibilities on you than if you were married. Because you would have an obligation. Let's call it an opportunity. It's a sweeter word to your spouse. And you would be trying to work out things and work through things that being a single, you don't have those same responsibilities and you don't have that same pressure, so you have more time to spend. He's saying there's a definite freedom that you have in this season of Life. There's a lot of things. I've talked to single people. There's a lot of things they say that they do during this season of life. One of them told me that they're working to learn a new language. They said, I've got a little time on my hands, so I'm trying. Another one said, I use this season of my life to improve my career. I go to seminars, I research more. It gives me the freedom of time that I need to improve myself personally. You can spend a lot of time on self improvement in this season of life. It gives you a greater mobility. And I would tell you, if you're in the single season of life, focus on being better, being a better version of yourself, getting yourself in better shape, maybe physically, if you hadn't been to the doctor, you ought to go to the doctor.
Speaking of that, I'll give you a little update on my situation. I did get a great report on my MRIs last week. They're all clear. So thank God for that.
So, good news about the bad news. The bad news is the cancer is contained in that prostate. And it looks like at this point, they're recommending surgery as opposed to radiation or proton therapy or aggressive observation. I've learned a lot about this that I never wanted to learn, right? And so I'll be meeting with a surgeon here in a few days, and I'll tell you when they're gonna do that. So I may be pulling to the right or the left here for a while, but we'll be fine.
And after you women have what you've gone through to have babies, this ain't nothing. This ain't. You know, when a man talks about his stuff and I look at a woman, she goes, come on, man.
Cry me a river, sport, you know? But you know how we men are. It's a big deal to us. And so thank you for praying for me. It is cancer and it could be bad, but hopefully we'll get this resolved and we'll move on. But you, you take care of yourself physically. And it's amazing to me how many men, particularly. I'll pick on you guys for a minute. Don't do that. You don't. When was the last time, guys, you just went to see your doctor, you had blood work, you just ran labs, you just had a physical checkup to see how you're doing. I mean, one of the greatest gifts you could give your family is to go get a checkup, do it for them. And, ladies, you are, I'd say, the same thing to you. So one of the things you could do in the single season of life, the mobility that you have now, is take care of yourself physically, get with the nutritionist, maybe learn how to eat better so that you then feel better. Maybe get with a trainer and learn, get in some positive workout routines just to give you more energy in this season of life, work on yourself emotionally, you know, read more, Turn the TV off, ignore the device and instead focus more on building yourself up emotionally, spiritually. Good night. There's so many things that being in the single season you would have time to do. We have so many opportunities of service around here. So many singles join many of our married couples and volunteering their time with the crc and many of them are serving in different areas of our church. I would tell you, I don't think our church could function at the level we function if we didn't have so many single people who are serving in the life of this church. So use this season of life, I'm just saying use this season of life to improve yourself. So there is a nobility of it. See it. God says, this is a gift. I'm using this. In this season of your life, there is a mobility, you've got a freedom. In this season of life, you can focus on yourself, get yourself in better shape. And that leads me to the third point, and that is the responsibility of being single. The responsibility. Suppose he said in verse 36, you're engaged to someone, you're old enough to get married and you want her so much that all you can think about is getting married. Then go ahead and marry that girl. There's nothing wrong with that. But it's better for you to have self control and to make up your mind and not marry. It is perfectly all right to marry. It is better, however, not to get married at all. So he sounds like he's talking on both sides of the fence. What he's. He is a little bit. What he's saying is, I can't decide this for you. You have to take responsibility for the decisions you make in life. And I would say that applies to us even today. I have to be responsible for me in this season of life. Now, I didn't choose this season of life. This is not what Cindy and I had planned. It's certainly not what I, I didn't plan to be in this season of life, but it is what it is. So I have a choice to make. And in this choice I make every day. And one of the things that I have to make and one of the things. I challenge you to make this decision. And that is first and foremost, to be happy. Choose to be happy. There's a great book called Happiness as a Choice. And you know, that's really the truth. You can choose to be happy. You can. Absolutely. In fact, the apostle Paul, when he was facing King Agrippa in Acts, chapter 26, I love this line in the King James, he said, agrippa, I think myself happy. Sometimes you gotta think yourself happy. Sometimes you have to look at not the things that you've lost, because that's not gonna make you happy. You have to look at the things you have left. Cause if I focus on what I've lost and I focus on who I've lost, I get into a spiral. I'll tell you, man, I mean, the emotion is about that deep from the surface. And when I go there, even in a message, if I go there, it just takes me away. And, man, I am broken, and my heart is broken, and it's a wound that I'll never get over. And a wound is something that doesn't heal. It's always bleeding. So if I focus on what I've lost, I focus on a wife that's gone, a granddaughter that's gone. I focus on the things that I've lost, it's not gonna bring me joy. I have to focus on what I have left. And when you think about it, the great miracle. Remember the widow and her son in 1st Kings 17, when the prophet shows up at the house and she said, I've got just enough oil and just enough meal to make one more meal and we're gonna die. Remember, he said, make me one first. And you think, what a jerk.
Remember that story? And really, the moral of the story is God was saying, make me the priority. Put me first. That was the takeaway. It wasn't the prophet being a jerk. He was saying, I represent God. And God is saying, put him first. In other words, trust him in this season of life. And the Bible said when she did that, the oil never went away and the meal never wasted away. She had everything she needed, day by day, because she trusted God. What's my point? The miracle that that widow woman experienced was not in what she lost, but in what she had left. So I'm saying, folks, one of the things, the responsibility of this season of life is I'm responsible for my happiness. You're responsible for your happiness. And you have to say, by the grace of God, I choose to be happy today. I'm gonna take whatever circumstances come my way I'm gonna trust God. He wouldn't be letting me face this if he didn't know with his power that I could handle this. So I choose to be happy in this season of life. So happiness is a choice that you can make, by the way, and we're talking about it in this season. Healthiness is a choice you make. Now, sometimes, like me, you may have to get surgery to get healthy.
You may have to deal with something in your life that may be trying to kill you in order to get healthy. So sometimes getting healthy isn't easy. Sometimes getting healthy is difficult, man. You get back into the routine of working out. Don't you hate that? Don't you hate getting back into the routine of working out? I mean, once you're in the zone, it's a little easier to keep going. But if you've been out of it and you're trying to get back into it, wouldn't it be awesome if you could pay somebody to work out for you?
It's stinking awesome. I mean, it'd be worth it. Can you imagine? Just sit there with some ice cream and going, man, I'm gonna need you to lift some more weight. That's, you know, I need you. Our arms need to get a little better. You know, we need to get toned here. We got a little flab going on there.
You know, that doesn't work that way. And it takes a while. You have to be disciplined. It takes a while before you start seeing any result.
You may have to walk a little while before you start feeling better. And you may have to. But I'm just. All I'm trying to drive home to you is we have a responsibility for our own happiness and we have a responsibility for our own healthiness. So we have to own that and own that in this season of my of life. And I'd say thirdly, we have a responsibility for our homes. Maybe singleness is not a long term season for some of you. Maybe you're single for this season and you feel like God may bring someone else into your life. We have people in this room who have been widowed and God brought someone else into their life. We have people in this room been divorced and God brought someone else in their life. We have people who've never been married. God brought somebody into their life, and that's a beautiful thing. Let me just caution you on the things that I've read about this.
Don't get into a relationship on the rebound. Be very careful that your heart is in a good place, that you're Healthy. Before you engage in that again, don't just jump into a relationship on the rebound. Make sure you have God's blessing and favor. I would give it to you this way. Don't settle. Don't settle. Wait for the best.
Sometimes good is the enemy of best. So don't wait on good when God may have best out there for you. You remember the love story of the Old Testament, the book of Ruth? It's a great story, man.
It's back there where the pages of your Bibles are stuck together. It's a little tiny love story, the story of Ruth. And Ruth wasn't looking for love. And all of a sudden, God providentially placed her on a field that belonged to this rich man named Boaz. And the beautiful takeaway of Ruth is she waited. She didn't settle. She waited on her Boaz. And girls, if God has something and someone for you, wait on your Boaz. Don't settle for Boaz's cousins, for example. Don't settle for broke ass.
Here's another one. Don't settle for lying ass.
Don't settle for cheating ass.
Sure. Don't settle for dumb ass.
Fall in love with drunk ass.
Don't get in a relationship with cheap ass or lazy ass.
Wait on Boaz.
God has somebody special for you. And by the way, let me close with this. There's strength in the waiting. There's strength in the waiting. One of the beautiful verses in Isaiah 40, verse 31. Those who wait on the Lord renew their strength. What does it mean to wait on the Lord? Now, this is a season you may be in in your marriage, you may be in this season in your business, your personal life, or in your circumstance relationally. Right now you're in a season of waiting. What is to wait on God? First of all, I'll tell you. It's not passive. It's active. When you wait on someone, you're thinking about in the car, ready to go, and she's not, you know, that's waiting. And that's a form. That's a type of waiting. But that's not what this is talking about. When the Bible says wait on the Lord, it's not passive, it's active. It's the action of a waiter or a waitress. When you go to a restaurant, in a little while, somebody. If you go to a restaurant, somebody will wait your table. Well, that's not passive, that's active. That means they're attentive to you and they're looking out for you. And they're very aggressively trying to serve you. And you're going to hopefully take care of them once they rendered that service. And so to wait on God means four different things in this season of life. First of all, it has the idea of longing for God, a desire for God in this season. Amp up your desire for God. There's a beautiful verse in Psalm 62, verse 1, where the Psalmist said, my soul listen waits upon God. It's the idea, lord, I am just absolutely desiring your presence in my life. From him comes my salvation. The psalmist said, everything I need is coming from God. And I recognize that whatever I need in life is coming from Him. So I'm longing for God. Here's another idea of waiting on God. Not only longing for God, but it's listening to God, listening to God. Proverbs 8:34. Blessed is the one that hears me. Look, waiting daily at the posts of my doors. It's the idea of someone waiting outside the door of a house for the person to exit and to join them. He said, God, I'm waiting at the post of your doors. I'm in your presence.
I'm longing for you. I'm listening to you. I'm waiting for you. Look, it's not that God isn't speaking, it's that we don't often hear him. And the way you hear him is you gotta get closer to him. I mean, right now, if you called out to your child, you have kids, over and met kids. Hey, come on, let's go. Church. Wrapping up. Get in the car. And then you went to the car and they're not coming. You would be frustrated at them, and you shouldn't be, because they weren't close enough to you to hear your voice.
So you know, in order to get them, you have to go to them and you have to speak directly at them. And even, as we said last week, sometimes being able to hear you doesn't mean they listen. But it's the idea of you gotta be in closer proximity to be able to hear someone when they speak. And this idea of listening for God means I need to be closer to Him. And that's not just a touch and go you do on the weekends. I've told you before, if this is all the presence of God you get is what you get in an hour on Sunday, you're not getting enough. You've got to learn how to listen to him every day of the week. You have to be disciplined every day of the week. Think about it this way. If you only ate one meal a week and think that's gonna be enough to get you through the week. There's not a restaurant in the world that's that good.
And if the only time you are receiving God's Word and spending time with him and worshiping him is one hour a week on Sunday, as important as that is, because he said, don't forsake the assembling of yourselves, as many do. But so much the more, as you see the day approaching, God encourages to come to church. We need that. But if that's all you get and you're not doing any more than that, it's not enough.
If you just eat one once a week, you're physically anemic. If you eat once a week, you're spiritually anemic. So to listen to him means I am close to him and I am far focused on him. The third thing is I'm looking for him. I'm looking for him. In that great study series where we did called Experiencing God, it talks about discern where God's at work and join him. There is the idea God's at work every day in your life. We're just not discerning where he is. And we need to understand that. Psalm 104, verse 27. These wait. There's our Word again. These wait upon you that you may give them their food. He said, I'm looking for you to feed me and to give me everything that I need. The last thing is, it means to live for him. Proverbs 27:18. Whoever keeps the fig tree will eat the fruit. So he that waits upon his Master will be honored. God said, I'll take care of you because you are looking to me. So singleness is just a season. For some, it may be a season that goes for the long haul. If it is, you'll know. If it isn't, you'll know. But in the midst of the season, realize the Bible says it just. It's a gift, it's a responsibility. So fly in formation.
And it's an opportunity in the middle of this to do some positive things that will help you build your life and take your life to the next level. Let's pray together.
Father, thank you for your Word.
And Father, many times we talk about how youw Word is practical. It just breaks it right down where we can understand it. And I pray all of us will take away from the service something that will help us be more effective, make better choices to be better people.
Father, your Word is not only practical, but your Word is powerful. It can break strongholds. It can forgive sin. It can change lifestyles and habits. It can conform us into the image of you.
So Father, help us to recognize that though your word is practical, your word is powerful. And when we apply it, we receive all the benefit from it. So help us this morning not to just be a hearer of your word, but to be a doer to put it into practice this coming week, to look to you and trust you, to know you know what's best. And you only want for us what we would want for ourselves if we just knew what you know.
Finally, Lord, I pray for my friends who may never have trusted you'd as their personal savior. They're trying to do this on their own. I pray you'll give them the insight, the wisdom, the courage, the humility to just pray this simple prayer and say, Lord Jesus, with everything I know about me, I right now, in this moment, trust all that I know about you. Come into my heart. Forgive my sin. I pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:36:25] Speaker A: Thank you so much for tuning in today. If you have any questions or prayer requests, please contact us by visiting metchurch.com so that we can follow up with you this week. We look forward to seeing you next week.
