Hate Me Now, Thank Me Later

Well, if you have a Bible, we're going to be in Song of Solomon, chapter 8, as we wrap this up. And we want to start with a question, and it's a good one. Yes, the question is. The question we're going to ask is, why would you base your sexual decisions on a song? Why would you base your worldview? Why would you base the decisions you make, how you build your imagination of what love looks like? Why would anybody make choices when it comes to sex based on a song? Right, well, that's exactly what we're doing. This is a 3,000-year-old love song. And we're etching it into our hearts. We're etching it into our minds and our imaginations. But why? That is such a good question. Why would we base our sexual decisions on a song? And I would just say, that's the wrong question. Because you are doing it no matter what song you choose to base it off of. I mean, you could choose to base your sexual decisions off of these words. Long live cowgirls. Never going to settle on down girls. Leave you in a lonely ghost town world where the sun don't rise. Rodeo for one night. Love you like a Mustang. One hand on them giddy up reins.

Hole in your heart with some good aim on a goodbye ride. So it doesn't last long. I don't want any girl who wants to settle down with me. But I want to ride that rodeo all. So these are words. One time. That are searing into people's hearts and minds when it comes to sexuality. Or we could base our sexual decisions on these words by Taylor Swift. Religions in your lips. Even if it's a false god, we'd still worship. We might just get away with it. The altar is my hips. Even if it's a false god, we'd still worship this love. So blatant. The real. Yeah, get your 10-year-old daughter and get her on out to see that show. That's for dang sure. But here's the reality. We are all basing the thoughts, the feelings. What we're singing gets stuck inside of us. And so we should, in passing, say that why would we let things into our mind that are going to get stuck into our soul? So the question is not, are you basing how you think about sexuality from a song? The question is, are you picking the right one? For God has given us not just any old song.

He gave us the song of songs, the greatest of all songs, to frame how we think about human sex and love and dating. Well, and God knows this. God knows that what we put into our minds gets into our hearts. What we put into our hearts gets into our minds. And so that's why he wrote the Song of Songs. And unlike Morgan Wallen and Taylor Swift, his song actually is for maximum sexual pleasure. That's right. In our lives. You listen to Cardi B or Megan Thee Stallion or these songs that are, it sounds like, oh, that sounds so romantic. But the reality is, when you live swinging in your single years, just being out there, just going crazy, doing whatever you want, you would think that leads to the greatest sexual pleasure. But study after study after study shows that swinging singles have the most sexual problems, give and receive the least sexual pleasure. And this is like data from the American Journal of the Medical Association, OK? They show that the Americans who have the greatest maximum sexual long-term pleasure are married couples past the age of 50 who have chosen to lock down with a spouse and to approach things as God has given us his game plan. I love that, by the way. Something to look forward to.

Yeah, something to look forward to. What I love about that is that as the wrinkles increase, your eyesight gets worse. So it's a wash. It all just works out. And you just get to enjoy it, right? It's just fantastic. That is funny. All right, now where this book ends is where we're going to begin today in Song of Solomon chapter 8. And spoiler alert, where we're going to find is this commitment that the book ends with, the song ends with, this praising of sexual love to the end, to the grave. It really is a till death do us part ending. And she's saying, I'm your bride or die. Yeah, right. Gangsters for life, yo. Gangsters for life. We are in it for this thing. Just like Jenny and I have already purchased, we own the grave plots where we're going to be buried. We can go stand there next to Linya Lyon and see where we are literally, our remains are going to be laid to rest to await the resurrection. This is the game plan as this song ends, that it really is ending. This is where we die. We die, we do it together.

But what's cool is chapter 8 is going to give us sort of a backstage pass to the inner workings of that kind of a commitment, the backstage pass to that kind of resolve. And the title we've given for this message is, Hate Me Now, Thank Me Later. Hate me now, thank me later. Jenny, why don't you read verse 5, where we left off at verse 4 last week, and we'll pick it up from there. Great. Verse 5. Who is this coming up from the wilderness, leaning upon her beloved? I awakened you under the apple tree. There your mother brought you forth. There she bore you, brought you forth. OK, we're going to see four things today as we work through this, and we just got the first one. The first thing we see that's on our backstage past tour of their Till Death Do Us Part commitment is unity. What is it going to take to remain in a marriage for the long haul? Unity. And this verse, and really all of scripture, defines unity as walking together. So if you want unity, you must walk together. You can't drift. You can't stay apart. You have to choose.

This is the direction. This is how we're going to walk. We're going to walk this way. Movement, walking together. And remember, they're coming back from this romantic getaway. And aren't those the best? They're the best. Except when you get in a big fight on your romantic getaway. Remember when that happened recently? Yeah. But let's not talk about that. But let's never fight again. Never fight again, no. But the back end of it, as I recall, was amazing. OK, anyhow, so they went on this trip, and they're returning. And as this verse starts, they're seen in the distance. And at first, it almost looks like one person. But then you realize there's two, because it says she's leaning upon her beloved. The silhouette of them almost seems like it's only one person. And what a beautiful picture. Yeah, but they're arm in arm. Yes. Together, they're walking, they're talking. She's leaning on him, whether she wants to or not. She maybe wants to make him feel strong, wants to make him feel like. And I just love that closeness. I love that.

I love walking with you and talking with you. It's the best. And as they walk and talk, they're conversing about an inside joke regarding an apple tree. And you're like, I want to know about this apple tree. We don't get that full disclosure to the very end. But that doesn't really matter. The point is, it's their inside joke. And that really is the beauty of walking with one person over time, is the way you get to collect those inside jokes. We have our own version of the apple tree. Right, and there are many. And you can rack them up and stack them up. And for us now, I mean, we're preaching this book. The last time we preached verse by verse through Song of Solomon was 18 years ago. Yeah, we were four years married. Yeah, and just to think about, we were only four years married. The strategy we had on dating and engagement and getting married was strong. But the actual how to fight, we didn't have a lot of material yet. We lived out the experience, yes. And now where we're at, I mean, we just have so many more versions of the apple trees. And for them, they'll talk about, oh, breath, apple on the breath. And apple, feed me with apples. But it's a thing that they've connected with. And they've fought to stay connected,

even through adversity. Yes, and so much of marriage is guarding against distance because separation may occur. We have to guard against the distance that so easily drifts in between us. With all pure things, separation occurs. So you've got to shake up a good juice. If it's bad juice, it doesn't matter. If it's good juice, it's going to separate. Shake up the freshness. So the good things, separation is going to naturally occur. So you have to fight to keep that from happening. And like we learned last week, fighting to return, fighting to keep the dance going, and being a part of the same dance, and not you doing the tango and me doing the waltz, but us together returning. So we're not going to have a naive image that we're never going to fight. We're never going to need to go to our respective corners. That's going to happen. But it's return, return, Solomon. Return, return, Shulamite. Return, return, let's get back to dancing. Getting back on the same page. Pro tip, the little stuff is going to be the worst. It's going to be the little foxes that are going to sneak in. And so we're fighting to stay on the same page when it comes to sex, to stay on the same page when

it comes to finances, to stay on the same page when it comes to our kids and our time. We're trying to remain spiritually united. We're trying to remain relationally, emotionally connected and united. And so we're going to always work to walk together, just as they do, into the sunset. Unity. Unity is key. And the next thing that we see is longevity. Longevity. And the recipe for longevity is fierce commitment and jealous tenacity. I love in this verse when she says. Because she's now speaking. Now she's speaking. Well, she was just speaking, wasn't she? No, that was someone else. OK, that was him. Number six. Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm. For love is as strong as death, jealousy as cruel as the grave. Its flames are flames of fire. a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, nor can the floods drown it. If a man would give for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly despised. Yeah, so good. These are essentially their marriage vows.

And almost you can picture as they're walking on the road, the wilderness road back towards Jerusalem, always up to Jerusalem, they're remarking. And part of the conversation is these vows that she's now reciting once again. And I love when people write their own wedding vows. That's beautiful. That's special. But don't let your wedding vows be decaffeinated. Don't let them be, you're the jelly to my peanut butter, and you're the milk, and I'm the Oreo. No, listen. Their wedding vows have the words fire, hell, flood, jealousy, grave in them, vehemence. You just get the sense of passion, possession, permanence, perseverance, power. It's just real. It's gritty. And a couple of things about that. First of all, there is this sense of, like we said, this is to the end. You are my bride or die. There is no backup plan, right? Because she compares it to the grave. Now listen, when you die and go to the grave, I don't know why they put gates, and walls, and fences around cemeteries. Those who are on the outside don't want to get in. Those who are on the inside can't get out. So it's silly that they always have walls.

But the reality is, once you're in there, you're in there. Until the resurrection, you are in there. So they're saying, you can't just, when it's not good, get out of this thing. They're saying, there's no backup plan. We've burned the ships. This is it. Then there's also this sense of what suffering can and can't do, because they describe a flood, not being able to quench the love, not being able to take us out. And this, of course, brings to mind the parable Jesus tells about what can happen if you build your life on a rock. Suffering doesn't take out the marriage. Our experience has been. Well, that's what builds a strong marriage, is the suffering that you go through. But not even just the suffering, because everyone suffers. Anyone does suffer. But when you suffer well, when you suffer with Jesus as the center, as the rock of your foundation, that changes everything. In fact, it brings you together. There's a sense of blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who grieve. Blessed are those who mourn. Then she uses this phrase, if a man would give all his love up for the wealth of his house. And really what this is saying, you

have to kind of peek through the cryptic language differences. It's the movie Indecent Proposal. Hopefully, you've never seen it. Don't ever watch it. It's Robert Redford, Woody Harrelson, Demi Moore. There's a character in the movie who's a billionaire. And he's attracted to this girl, but she's married. But he finds out that they're poor. And so he approaches the couple with a proposition. I'll give you a million dollars for one night with your wife. And they end up saying yes. And the man gives his bride up. I'm spoiling it so they don't ever have to watch this rubbish. The reality, though, is this verse says, if you did that, you'd be despised. Because what you would get for giving that up, no matter how much money you get for that, would be just you're giving up the most valuable thing. I think about this. They can make more money. But they don't make more Jenny and Levi. They don't make what we got. There's no price tag for our marriage bed, our union, what we have fought for, and what we have fought through, and the beauty that has come from that jealous tenacity and the fierce commitment for both of us to catch us the foxes, that we're not going to allow pornography into our marriage, which would erode the marriage like a cavity rotting out a tooth, that we're both are going to catch ourselves

when we have a momentary like we're looking at something. Nope, we're going to fight for it. This is our marriage bed. This is us. This is what we are willing to say no to everything else and yes to each other. Amen. And this is the long haul. This is marriage and longevity and the commitment to make it far. And it shows the reality is the gates of hell will try and come against the marriage because it matters. Why does she have to refer to flames and floods and offers for indecent proposals? Because that's what the enemy, he's always going to have that forbidden fruit that he's ready to offer. And should we lower our gaze and stop meeting each other's needs, then there's going to be always some slithering serpent up going, are you really happy? Do you realize how much happier you'd be? And for us to nurse those little grudges and she doesn't think about me, then all of a sudden there's someone there to affirm you and give you the compliments about your spouses and giving. So it's being aware this is a battle and the stakes are high. And if we are to see the blessing of God come upon the whole country, it starts in the home. It starts in the marriage bed with all the plants

and the intimacy of a man and his wife. And so we're aware that this is something that the enemy does want to come take. Why? because it's precious and because it's important. And it's powerful. Amen. All right, so we've seen unity, longevity. And the third, and we'll take a little bit of explanation, is strategy. Number three is strategy. And the strategy is specifically a strategy for sexual purity, something the Bible points us to again and again and again, that God wants there to be purity when it comes. And that's what we're presenting as distinct from what culture offers. And if we're going to arrive at the correct strategy that leads to sexual purity, what are we going to need? We're going to need two things, right choices and right voices. There must be, and we cannot get to, a successful strategy without the right choices and the right voices. Let's read verses 8 and 9. We have a little sister, and she has no breasts. It's about time someone else has to read that word. I've read it 100 times. I think I already did in my engagement talk. OK. What shall we do for our sister in the day when she is spoken for?

If she is a wall, we will build upon her a battlement of silver. And if she is a door, we will enclose her with boards of cedar. Levi, take it away. This is huge. This in the song now is the voice of her brothers, which we know from earlier in the song is actually her stepbrothers, because she describes them as her mother's sons. What we think is going on here is her dad died and her mom remarried a man who already had boys. They become her stepbrothers, OK? So they're now singing previously about a situation where they were meeting with each other going, how are we going to fight and advocate for our sister who's prepubescent? So she's maybe 10, 11 years old, thus no breasts, right? And in that culture, these brothers would be the defender of this girl because dad's not there to do this. So they're meeting with each other going, OK, how do we fight? How do we set her up for success? And the answer is, it's going to depend on her choices. The strategy has to be adaptable. Are you tracking with me? They can't say this one size fits all. This is how every young child's going to get shepherded all the way to sexual purity and the altar and amazing.

No, they said, no, no. We're going to have to cater and tailor how we lead and serve her depending on the choices that she makes. And if you install the right voices, they're going to lead you depending on your right choices or your wrong choices. So they say, well, if she's a wall, meaning if she doesn't let anybody into the garden of her sexuality, she's the kind of person that we're seeing that character form day by day, then we can just basically adorn the top of it with silver. Now, silver was not a military medal. It was an adorning medal. It was a medal for decorations. It was a medal for festivities. You would use a ceremonial sword made of silver to knight somebody. You're not going to actually go to battle with a silver sword. So they're saying, basically, if she makes the right choices, then eventually we're just going to get a show up at the wedding in tuxedos and shake everyone's hands. And our job would be pretty easy because she made the right choices. But they said, if she's a door, if she wants to save a horse and ride a cowboy, if we're seeing the wrong songs getting stuck in her soul leading to the wrong kind of friends, the wrong kind of pull, then we're going to have to lead differently.

They said, then we're going to have to board her up with cedar. Some of us parents understand that. We've had that child. We get that, right? Board that door. And we're watching our kids. And we're saying, are we seeing door? Are we seeing wall? Do we need to go and buy some silver and rent a tux? Or do we actually need to get barbed wire and clamped down? Like, how much rope does this child deserve based on the choices that we're seeing? Yeah, so you're saying wisdom, discernment in parenting. And I also want to say, why is it, as a church community, we know that coming out of fifth grade, middle school, it's like, man, that's pretty young. Some of that's pretty intense. But go listen to the top 40 most popular songs on Spotify. What are they advocating when it comes to sexuality? Look at some of Prince's lyrics. I mean, the world is dragging our kids' minds into the gutter. We're lifting them up to the heavens. We're saying, seeded it with Christ in the heavenly places. We're saying, learn about the birds and the bees from the one who made the birds and the bees. Amen. Right? Yes.

And listen, listen, she didn't have breasts when this strategy began. So they're saying, 10, 11, 12. Listen, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. We're not waiting for them to find out on social media about sex. We're not waiting for her to find out about this over here. Listen, it's better to have it before you need it than to get into a situation when you wish someone would have told you about it. And so we need to call out a generation and warn a generation. Amen. I love that these verses praise virginity. It praises it. And two thoughts on that is virginity is not something to get rid of. Wow. I feel like our culture today is like. Like, hey, are you still a virgin? Are you? You haven't lost your virginity as though it's something like you need to get rid of as quick as you can, like a hot potato or something like that, right? And neither are you something to get rid of if you had given it away or had it taken from you. Fantastic. So that's the tension of it's always better and no matter what that we find in the New Testament. It's always better to do things God's way.

But grace, this altar is soaked in grace where we're saying, hey, no matter what you have done or have had done to you, you're not damaged goods. You're not to be thrown out like the garbage. There is still value. You're created in the image of God. Jesus Christ can make all things new. He redeems. He heals. He can, you see what I'm saying? We're saying he is willing to step into your life. Even if you would hear this all going, man, I wish I had had some brothers board me. I was cedar. Man, I wish in my season of being a door there hadn't been a lack of voices. And by the way, as a church community, this is why. We are always going to fight for the mandate God has put upon our lives to be that voice in proxy. Because it wasn't her dad. He wasn't there. So someone else steps up. That's the power of the local church. Do you realize you single people, you get to be a part of the fabric of this church and a part of the voices getting planks of cedar ready and steering in the right direction and being the voice warning in the way that they should go. And it takes, really, a village to see this kind of successful proof of concept of Shulamite

like she did in her life. We're supposed to fill the gaps as the church. That's a good way to put it. And when I was 10, I first heard this in my own life of, save your gift of sex for your husband. And we want that for this young generation. We want that for the kids in our church. We read this and we go, OK, wow, that's pretty cool. That's pretty cool to understand her brothers were doing that. She had no idea that was happening. What'd she pick? What'd she choose? Well, we don't have to wonder. Because they said, is she going to be a door? Is she going to be a wall? Are we going to adorn it with silver? Are we going to get some razor wire, right? And she tells us the answer. Verse 10, Jenny, what'd she say? She says, I am a wall. And my breasts like towers. Then I became in his eyes as one who found peace. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. OK, now check this out. Solomon means peace. Solomon means peace. Shlomo, Jerusalem, city of peace. She said, I became a wall. I was not a door.

And I fortified my sexuality. I didn't lower my standards. I didn't let men worship at the altar of my lips and my hips. She said, my breasts were towers with snipers. And now all the men are awake because there's boobs and guns. This is the perfect formula, right? And she says, what was the result? The result was God led me to peace. And not just peace in general, peace in particular. God led me to Mr. Peace. Solomon was characterized as a man of peace, distinct to his father, David. It was a man of war. So the point was, she chose to not go the way of the world, think, I need to get this if I'm going to get it for myself. Now, she was poor. She was a peasant. You think, well, you've got to lower your standards, girl. You've got to put out. You're not going to get a man if you don't be willing to do this. And she says, I'm going to follow God. I'm going to be a wall. I'm going to be chased. And look what God did. Look what God did. He led her to the perfect man, the man of her dreams, but not by her chasing the man of her dreams, but by chasing God. And he caused the dream to chase her. Do you see what God is willing to do? Amen.

So good. Lastly, we see that this is their number four, history. It's a look back of what they've been through or what their story was. And it's a look forward. That's right. Jenny, let's read verses 11 through 13. And what we're going to be looking for is evidence of two things. Ready? The two things that compose history is don't forget your love story and don't end your love story. Number one, don't forget your love story. And number two, don't end your love story. That's the history. Let's read the text. Amen. Verse 11, Solomon had a vineyard at Baal Hamon. He leased the vineyard to keepers. Everyone was to bring for its fruit 1,000 silver coins. My own vineyard is before me. You, O Solomon, may have 1,000, and those who tend its fruit 200. You who dwell in the gardens, the companions listen for your voice. Let me hear it. Wow. And let's read verse 14, too. Oh, very good. Make haste, my beloved, and be like a gazelle or a young stag

on the mountains of spices. And with that, we reach the end of the story. Song of Solomon. And this, listen, no, no, no, this will blow your mind. Because here's what she's saying. She's saying Solomon owned a vineyard in this region. And he, owning it, did not obviously want to work it himself, except when he's on vacation and wanted to do the opposite of his day job. Because his day job was working with his mind, so his hobby was to work with his hands. And he would get his hands dirty for a week, but then he'd have to go back to the reality of being the king. He hired tenant vine dressers to work the land. And did you know he chose her brothers? They were the ones he leased it to. They got the contract on running this outfit. And we know that part of what they chose to do as their tactic to keep her making the right choices was to force her to work alongside them in the vineyard. She hated it at the time. In fact, she talks about it early in the book and goes, my stupid brothers made me work in the vineyard. That's how I got this dumb tan that I hate. Oh, I hate my brothers. My brothers suck. My brothers are the worst. But maybe they did so because they started to see her drifting towards bad decisions

and the wrong company. And maybe they noticed the wrong kind of guy showing up at their house. And the text says they were angry. And I'm going to tell you something. It's sit on the porch with a shotgun kind of angry. We're going to protect our little sister. We're going to do what it takes to keep her from these wrong people. So finally, they go, no, you are having rope removed. You are coming to work with us. And she hated it. And she resented it. And they said, that's OK. Hate us now. Thank us later. You don't understand it now, but we love you so much. We're making you do this. And she said, well, I'm never going to get a guy with a tan. Who's ever going to want me if I end up not looking like the other girls that I kind of want to look like? Because every time I scroll, I want to look like the other girls. And they said, we love you. We're keeping you back. I don't care if every other kid has an iPhone at age nine. I don't care if every other kid's on social media. You see what I'm saying? They're saying, you can be different. That's all right.

You can hate me now. You can be, I love you so much. I want to protect you. I love you so much. I want to fight for you. And she's writing this song with the hindsight of saying, my brothers actually love me. I'm glad now. Why? Because one day, while at the place I did not want to be at, I met and fell in love with a man on a break under an apple tree. And I thought he was just a super suave, amazing, nice vine dresser guy. But turns out, he was the king of Israel. And I got wrapped up in a fairy tale and a princess story. Where? Where I didn't want to be. Did you know that God can surprise you and bless you in places you never wanted to be? Yes, she was where she didn't want to be. She was doing what she didn't want to do. And we can never underestimate, under authority, doing what we don't agree with. Meaning, he maybe has placed authority over you. And maybe you don't agree. Maybe you aren't down with it. And you think that it should be another way. But God can bless. Don't underestimate that authority

that God might have over you. Yeah, she was complaining about it then. But she's grateful now. But she's grateful now. She was seeing it as a heavy burden then. But she goes, oh, wow, I see now it's a blessing. Because turns out, God knows what you don't know. He sees what you don't see. He's preparing what you're not aware of. And he wants you to be ready for it. So that is, don't forget your love story. And we see this couple sort of rehearsing and reciting and talking about, man, can you imagine what it took for this providential thing to happen? They're reciting it. There's power to reciting your love story, going back in your mind, revisiting those things. This is true in your walk with God. Return and do the first things. Remember from where you've fallen. But, and most importantly, as we close. Don't end your love story. Because it's still happening. It's still going. So it's not like once, one and done. It's continuous. It's action. It's movement forward. If you say, what's your love story, and you tell something that's like, period, the end,

what are you talking about? It's not just how we met. We're continuing on. It's spicier today, right? It ends with, I love hearing the voice of my spouse coming. My heart still leaps when I hear you, when I see you walk into a room. You bring brightness into every room. I'm like, well, it took you so long to wake up. I've been waiting for you to wake up. I got so many things I want to tell you that you missed. Right? And literally the last verse, it ends with as much of a bang. The first verse was, let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth. The last verse is, my young stag, come run on the hills of Bethar and get on the mountain of spices. Like, it's like, whoa, ease up. You're just like, what's going on here? And it's, they didn't end their love story. They're still living it out. It keeps getting better. Yeah. Now what we want to acknowledge, elephant in the room wise, is that Solomon goes. was on to completely turn his back on all the advice espoused in the book Song of Solomon.

He allowed many foreign women into his life, and they turned his heart away from God. It's believed that he's an old man now, looking back as he writes the Song of Songs, with regret, shriveled, shrunken, sad, sorry, discouraged, disillusioned, but writing back going, this is God's ideal. The better question is, how do we avoid his mistake? How do we let his hindsight, because this is God's ideal, whether or not the author of God's ideal actually lived it in his own personal life, how do we avoid his mistake and let his hindsight be our foresight? Yeah, we avoid it by going back to chapter 4, verse 3, where he says, your lips are like a strand of scarlet. Scarlet, scarlet, a strand of scarlet, a line of scarlet, a rope of scarlet. What does that remind you of? Rahab, how does she live? Whosoever in the home with the scarlet line, whosoever in the home with the red cord shall not be destroyed, but shall live, not just them, but everyone that's brought into the house. How we believe God can protect us from Solomon and Shulamite's sad fate is we never stop speaking Jesus. Our lips must be scarlet. We must have the mighty name of Jesus lifted up over our lives, over our hopes, over our homes, over our beds, over our children,

over our cities. Feel free to help me preach any time you get the urge. I'm telling you, the name of Jesus can cause every demon to flee, can cause every mountain to shake. I'm telling you, the name that's above every name can exalt a nation, can protect a family, can secure a posterity, can bring about a Holy Ghost powered legacy. And so we must not ever let our hearts drift by keeping the name of Jesus lifted up over our hearts, over our homes, over our lives. Amen. Amen. And so what we're going to do, if you'll pray with me, and if you're married, if you're here, grab the hand of your spouse, is we're going to first acknowledge that some of us today have never trusted Christ for salvation. You do not have a red cord in your home. Rahab would have died had she not been in a home with a red cord. That's what she was told by Joshua in the book of Joshua. Whoever lives in a home with a red cord shall live. Whoever does not shall not. If you do not have Christ, you do not have life. If you have Jesus, you have eternal life. And if you're here today, you can trust Christ for salvation. Even a simple prayer like this, and you could pray it with me right now.

Church, pray with us. Dear God, I know that I can't save myself, but I believe you can save me because of the cross, because of your resurrection. Save me now in Jesus' name.