How to Build a Life of Faith That Lasts | Crossroads Church

Question, who feels like their life has gone exactly how they expected right now they're exactly where they would have intended? Probably not many others. I hope that lands well. If not, charge my mind not my heart. But most of us had an idea of how our life was supposed to go. The ingredients seem pretty straightforward. Work hard, be a good person, then life adds something unexpected. Disappointment, setback, a loss, bad diagnosis, something we never would have chosen and yet over and over again those are the moments God uses to shape a person's story. Good people, my name is Miko. Thanks for joining us here at Crossroads. We've been going through this series called Origin Stories looking at people we call heroes of faith but none of them had a life that went according to plan. The good news is God does some of his best work with unexpected ingredients. No matter you really believe that for yourself or not, you're in the right place. Today we're looking at a guy who should have never remembered or celebrated thousands of years later. God is something different than mine. An origin story is the part nobody talks about. The part before confidence and success, before anyone knows your name. It's false starts, wrong turns, and total failure. It's the beginning. Every person you admire has one. The Bible may just be the greatest origin story ever told. It's a book about how God meets people at the beginning. In the beginning, God creates. In the beginning, humanity is formed from dust. In the beginning, there is possibility, purpose, and relationship. Then things fall apart. But God rebuilds and enlists humanity in the work of restoration. The Bible is full of people who eventually become known for things like faith and courage, wisdom and sacrifice. We call them heroes of the faith, but none of them started there. The story God tells is about him meeting ordinary people in ordinary places and inviting them into something extraordinary. Today's origin story is about Abel, whose obedient sacrifice became a legendary example of faith. I have been on staff for 17 years and I lead our teaching and strategy. I'm often in the back room with our teachers talking about, you know, what are we going to say? We should change this, take this out, try this, stuff like that. Every once in a while, Kyle likes me to get up here because he says it creates empathy. It's been seven years since I've been up here. Seven years without any empathy. So I guess it is time. A little about me. I have been married to Allison for 19 years now. We have 19. We have one more next year, 20 years. 19 years. We have three daughters. London 16, Annabelle 14, and Becca age 10. Earlier this week, my oldest daughter, unprompted, says, you are teaching this weekend, right? I said, yeah. She said, you know, a lot of

kids in our school go to Crossroads. Which was like a shot across the bat. And then my middle daughter adds like an hour later, if you don't do a good job, it comes back on us. So I have the full support of my family up here. So that feels great. So the best thing for me to do is to tell you a story about them, right? So I have been around Crossroads a long time. And I always heard Brian Tome say, you want to be first to market with your kids. Great parenting advice. You want to be the one that they hear from first. On anything. Any of the difficult stuff. Drugs or sex or whatever. You want them to hear from you first. That sounds like great advice. So I wanted to do that. So this is like eight years ago. And I think my oldest daughter, probably seven or eight at the time. And something comes on the TV. I don't remember what it was. But it was weird. And she had a question. What does that mean? And I'm like, this is my moment. So I say, London, you can ask me anything. And I will tell you the truth. No matter what it is. If it's scary, if it's weird, no matter what it is, you ask me and I will tell you the truth. And she gets really quiet. And I start to panic inside. Because I'm not ready. I haven't thought this through. I'm not ready for what comes next. And she looks at me and she says, Daddy, what is Area 51? I'm like, ironically, it's one thing I'm not allowed to talk about. My middle daughter, same situation. Daddy, what is kid prison and what do you have to do to be sent there? I'm like, are you planning something right now? My youngest daughter, different situation. I'm asking her questions. She's like four. years old, sitting around the dinner table. I said, Becca, what makes your mommy a great mommy? Without hesitation, wine. So, she's very observant. No. My wife insisted, I know she's here right now. My wife insisted that I tell everyone, for the record, she is not a wino. So that is on the record, that's true. All right. Twenty-six years ago, I walked into a Crossroads. And that's back when we were meeting in a Montessori school auditorium at the time. So it looked very different. So I've seen a lot of things happen over the years. However, the DNA has not changed. And when I walked into that auditorium, the reason I did is because I believed that living a life of faith would lead to a better life. But I didn't know what that meant. I didn't know what faith was, faith and what. I didn't know how it worked. I had all kinds of questions. I'm a natural skeptic. I saw a lot of stuff in Christian culture that I didn't like. If I tried, I failed. And oftentimes I didn't feel like it. So I had all those questions. And I'm going to assume that you came here today because you feel similarly. Because you think, if I can be faithful, I think that

would lead to a better life. But you don't know exactly how to do it. The Bible story we're going to look at, we're going to go to an ancient, ancient Bible story, one of the earliest in the Bible. But I think it can unlock this for us. Because I think it does make faith simple. It doesn't make it easy. But I think it does make it simple. This is going to be a three-point message today. And I should tell you that in preparing this message, I noticed some outages in my own life that were kind of surprising that I've been wrestling with, which I'm going to point out. And then also, a little warning, early in my message, for about three minutes, I'm going to talk about money. All right? Just three minutes, and we're going to get through it together, I promise. All right. So let me pray. God, thank you for this day. Thank you for this opportunity. Thank you for bringing us all together. We're all here to meet with you, and I pray that you will show up. Please show up. And yeah, let us encounter you and learn about you. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. All right. We're going to start with one of the most ancient biblical stories. So second only to Adam and Eve, because we're talking about their kids, Cain and Abel. Now why are we doing that? Well, if you've been to any other weekends of the series, you've seen that we've been mining from Hebrews chapter 11, often called the Hall of Faith. Hebrews is a book in the New Testament of the Bible. It comes after Jesus. And chapter 11 lists a bunch of biblical characters who are celebrated for their faith. So we figured, why don't we just teach about those people? I'm sure they have stuff that they can teach us. And the first person mentioned in the Hall of Faith is Abel, Adam and Eve's second child. Let me read it to you. Hebrews 11, chapter 4. I'm sorry, Hebrews chapter 11, verse 4. So what actually happened? That Abel, thousands of years later, is called out as having faith that still speaks today. Well, let's read the story. It's not that long. So we're going to go back to Genesis chapter 4, the first book of the Bible, the first thing that happens after Adam and Eve. Genesis chapter 4, verse 1 to 5. Now Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, I've gotten a man with the help of the Lord. And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain, a worker of the ground. In the course of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground. And Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering,

but for Cain and his offering, he had no regard. So the first thing is, you kind of ask, like, really? Like, what the heck's going on here? Right? Because it kind of feels like my kids make me Father's Day cards, and the first one I take, I'm like, oh, this is beautiful, honey, thank you. And the second one, I rip it up and throw it. I'm like, this is crap. Is that what's going on here? No, no. And we're going to talk about that. Remember, this is early on. The rules are being written, right? The fundamental principles are being put in place here. And Abel does something here. He establishes a very important principle about faith, which is why he's celebrating. And that is to get the order right. Faith equals first. This verse says that Cain is a farmer. And it says, over the course of time, Cain gives offerings to God. That means he's bringing in crops, and he's setting some aside over the course of time to give to God. Most of us will look at that and say, attaboy, well done. Right? You paid the God tax. Good job. Good job. But does it really show trust in God that he does this? Compare him to his brother Abel. Abel's a shepherd and he brings the firstborn of his flock. That is a huge risk for a herder. Why? Because every lamb is capital, right? And also you don't know what's coming next. So you give the first, you don't know if anything's coming next, which makes you incredibly vulnerable. And that's the key here. By giving his first, Abel is making himself vulnerable to God, saying, I trust you. And that forces us into faith. For you football fans, training camp started this week. I am a Browns fan.

I was, yeah. I was, I was born into it. And remember we taught, we taught suffering, perseverance, character, hope, full of hope, full of hope because of all the suffering. Now, first round draft picks are incredibly valuable, right? You learn that when you trade away three for a quarterback with 22 pending lawsuits. You also learn that when you spend one on someone like Johnny Manziel. Not every team can be the worst team in the league the year a generational talent like Joe Burrow comes out. It just doesn't work that way. But you learn the value of first. Those first round draft picks are so important, right? Because they're first and you don't know what's coming next. By giving his first born and thereby getting the order right and making God first, Abel is making himself vulnerable before God. He says, I trust you over all else. And that's what God commends him for and says his faith. Our relationships are defined by what we do first. Who do you call first? When you get the promotion, you get the diagnosis, you make the team. I would argue that is your most important relationship, right? Your first call, why? Because that information is valuable

and it makes you vulnerable to share it. My wife and I married for 19 years. I know within half a word if this is a good call or a bad call, right? Because we've been doing this for 19 years, we've been vulnerable with each other. What you do first is the most important thing in your life. Now, I said I was gonna talk about money, three minutes. That's it, bear with me, okay? This is why we teach the tithe at Crossroads, which you may have heard before. There are people in your midst who tithe and we define tithe as giving the first 10% of your gross income to your local church. Not just 10%, which don't get hung up on 10%, totally different message, but not 10% of the whole, the first 10%. Why? Because that's a principle, it's because of the story. That's a principle that creates a proper order and puts God first. And when we put God first in our lives in any way, not just money, we just find that things start to work out better. Proverbs 3, nine to 10 says, honor the Lord with your possessions and with the first fruits of all your increase. So your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will overflow with new wine. I do this every paycheck.

Get paid every two weeks, my wife gets paid every two weeks. The first thing I do the morning of payday is I go in and I give. And I do it and I give out of the gross, not the net, why? Because if I give, if I let taxes be taken out first and I give to the government first, that means I'm putting my faith in the government and I'm not putting my faith in the government no matter who's in charge. I want God to be first in my life. And it doesn't matter if I pay my mortgage first and then I give probably, I don't know, probably not. I think it is good for my soul. But I'll tell you what, the day that I don't have enough to do all the things, I hope I'm found faithful and I'm turning to God and saying, I'm relying on you. I have faith in you because I'm putting you first. So that's why we tithe, not because Crossroads, not for the money to do ministry. No, it's because we wanna build faithful people. And it's a principle established early on. Money part's done, okay, relax, we're moving on. Here's another example. This is one of my wife and I, where I think this is where we absolutely failed in our life to put God first. So after we had our first child, Alison was feeling very strongly the Lord saying,

I want you to leave work. And that was really scary for us because she had always wanted to work and she had always worked. And that was more at the time, more than 50% of our salary if she quit her job. So she ultimately did leave her job, but we did what many people do. We compromised to protect ourselves. She left her job, but took a different job. And that different job looked really good. More exciting company, I think she got a raise. We're like, oh, this is great. This is great, like we're following what the Lord said and we're making more money, like this is awesome. And then it started to go downhill, of course. Hours changed, pay changed. Then we have our second child, she comes back from maternity leave and things get really bad. They change the hours, they add more hours, the whole job changes. And it's at that point we're like, I think we should, I think it's time to be faithful. So she quits her job and 50% of our salary walked out the door that day and we did not have a plan to replace it. That day she's praying to God saying, I trust you, but if you can encourage me in some way, I would love it. At the exact same moment, I'm at work, I get a call to come down to the front desk, this box showed up anonymously, I still don't know to this day who sent it. It looks like a ransom note. Whatever you need, God's got you covered. And inside that box are 24 $100 bills. I still have no clue where it came from. I think that was God using someone to encourage us to say, I got you, put your faith in me, make me first, be vulnerable in front of me, and I've got you. And I'll tell you, this box still speaks to us 15 years later. It's been sitting on the shelf in our office for 15 years, I knew exactly where it was. Because we see it all the time and it still says to us, I got you, be vulnerable in front of me. It's not just about money though, there are other ways of being faithful and giving your first. Prayer, let me ask you this, you get sick, I'm a big fan of modern medicine, I'm a big fan of prayer, but which one do you do first?

You get sick, is the first thing you do, go to Dr. Google? And then you go to a real doctor? And then if that doesn't work out, you go to prayer? Or is the first thing you do, prayer, and then go to Dr. Google, and then a real doctor? It's just the order. Do both, but you get the order right, well maybe not Dr. Google, but do both, you get the order right, and I think that's where God shows up. Here's another one, relationships. You meet someone for the first time anywhere, and is the first thing you do, was what I think God wants us to do, which is say, how can I benefit this person? Or is the first thing you do, say, how can I get something out of this person? I think it's a lesson in putting God first. If you want to be faithful, just start looking for where you can put God first in your life, and make yourself vulnerable to him. That is a great start, and that's what Abel teaches us. Now part two, let's talk about Cain, because Cain is a cautionary tale, and I'm going to read you this, I'm going to read you the rest of the story, it's a little longer, but just bear with me, because I want you to hear the whole thing. All right, back to Genesis. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The Lord said to Cain, why are you angry? Why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? If you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, and you must rule over it. Cain spoke to Abel, his brother, and when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him. Then the Lord said to Cain, where is Abel, your brother? He said, I don't know, am I my brother's keeper? And the Lord said, what have you done? The voice of your brother's blood is crying to me from the ground, and now you're cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it shall no longer yield to you its strength. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth. Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, you've driven me today away from the ground, and from your face I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me. Then the Lord said to him, not so. If anyone kills Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him. Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bore Enoch. When he built a city, he called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch." This is all we know about Cain. So Cain is giving to God over time, right, setting some aside. He thinks he's doing the right thing, that doesn't work out. Then he gets angry about it. That leads to violence. Then he lies when he's called on it.

Then he tries to defend himself. Then after he gets punished, he complains, right, and he's worried other people are going to kill him. Which, little side note, at this point there have only been four people introduced in the Bible, right, Adam, Eve, Cain, and Abel. So who are these other people? It's a fair question, and I think it's exhibit A that Genesis gives us God's truth about creation, but doesn't give us the full picture. And that's okay to ask that question around here. Okay, God still shows Cain mercy and Cain ultimately builds a city which is a symbol of protection in the ancient world because cities are surrounded by city walls. For many biblical scholars and theologians, Cain is the first person to adopt religion as his defense mechanism. He's trying to make it look good, he's not, he's not, he's just doing the right thing, right? He's trying to do the right, or not even trying to do the right thing. He's trying to make it look good, and then when he gets called on it, he defends himself in every way possible to protect himself. This is called out later in the New Testament. Jude, Jesus's brother, writes a letter to some other believers who are having difficult people in their midst, and here's what he says, but these people blaspheme all that they do not understand and they're destroyed by all that they, like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively. Woe to them, for they walked in the way of Cain. Cain is a cautionary tale, because we cannot fake faith. Cain tried. While his brother made himself vulnerable before God, Cain did not. He only worked to protect himself. Faith equals first, not fake. Jesus says in Matthew, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name? And then will I declare to them, I never knew you.

Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness. This verse haunts me a bit, because I work for a church, and it is very easy for me to look like I'm doing the right things, and I'm being faithful. I don't want to do that. And let me give you two examples. I'm going to say something very controversial, something you may have never heard up here before, especially someone who's worked at a church for 17 years. I don't like worship music. I know, I know. Let me say, let me say, first, our worship leaders are incredible musicians, incredible. And they write a lot of the songs that they play up here. They're amazing. The ones I know personally are even better humans. They are faithful, they are wise, they are fun. I absolutely love them. So we should all just be grateful to be led by them. Problem is, I don't like worship music. You're not going to see me with my hands up. On Wednesday mornings, we have all-staff worship, and it can get pretty intense, and I'm often kind of standing in the back, just kind of watching, because here's what's happening inside my head. I told you, I'm a questioner. And every lyric, I'm asking myself the questions, what does that mean? Does that fit with, do I believe that? And by the time I get through those, they've moved on to another lyric, and I'm doing it again. And if I get through all of that, then the questions are, do I feel that way? I don't think I feel that way. Am I supposed to feel that way? Does that person feel that way?

I don't think they feel that way. They're looking at me. Am I supposed to feel that? Do I have to have my hands up? Like, it's nonstop in my head, right? I just cannot get into it. And I'll tell you, when I'm at my worst, the people who are really into it, I'm judging them a bit, like, you don't really feel that way, right? But when I'm at my best, I'm jealous. I'm saying, I wish I felt that way. I wish I had that. It's an ongoing struggle for me. I'm working in a church. It would be easy for me to fake it. I know all these songs. I hear them all the time, right? I could lip sync the words. I could put my hands up. I could do the sway, right? I could do that. But that would be fake for me. It would be fake. I'd be faking it. Now, this is one of the outages I noticed in my life, though. This has left me wondering, how in my life am I really showing God praise and reverence and adoration? Where am I? Is there something in my life where I'm really doing that? And I've kind of been left wanting, like, I haven't found it, and I'm kind of disappointed by that.

And it's something I'm thinking about. Is there something I need to change in my life to get to that point? There is. But it needs to be truthful and real. Here's a second one, also controversial. I don't usually pray before meals. Now, before you send me emails, I know Jesus prayed before meals. So I am not standing on solid ground here, I understand. But for me, it was such—it was so fake for me to do that. It was not real. It was just, you know, just going through the motions. saying the words, right, just to get to the meal. And, you know, because I don't pray before meals, it leads to a lot of awkward situations where, you know, people expect me to, because I work for a church, right? So we go to lunch and all the food comes out and everybody gets quiet and they're kind of looking at me and I like to start moving my fries around. I might put one in my mouth and sometimes I will bite because it's really awkward and I will pray. But usually I just don't do it because I don't want to fake it. But like I said, Jesus prayed before meals. So he modeled regularly giving thanks to God. So I've been asking myself this question, where in my life am I really doing that? Like truthfully giving God thanks and gratitude. And I'm also a little disappointed in what I discovered there.

I don't think I'm doing that very well. That's something that I think I'm gonna have to work on, but I share both of those examples just to say to you, we don't want people faking it around here. You don't have to fake it around here. If you are into worship music, by all means, be all in on worship music, be in the aisles dancing, like go for it, right? If you're one to pray before meals, by all means, make it the greatest prayer ever, please. But it's okay if you don't always feel that way because you cannot fake faith. All right, part three. Paul writes, I've fought the good fight. I've finished the race. I've kept the faith. Henceforth, there's laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge will award to me on that day. And not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing. Paul finished well. I wanna finish well. And I want you to finish well. I am thrilled. I'm so excited for everyone who got baptized today. Man, that is the most vulnerable thing you can do, right? Putting God first and you can't fake it, right? You're going into the water.

And that is just amazing. But I want us to talk to the rest of us. Those of us who've been in this for a couple of years, even a couple of decades, because you know, as you go through all the things, as you go through school and kids and job changes and tragedy and triumph and all the questions and all the moves and everything, you know, it does not always feel that way, right? It doesn't always feel that way. But the real goal is to stay faithful through all of that. I once heard our Anywhere pastor, Andy Ryder, say that there's a faithfulness measured not in days or weeks, but in years and decades. That's the type of faithfulness that I want. Faith equals first, not fake, to the finish. Someone on our staff told me, he said, you know, if you ever got a tattoo, to the finish would be a sweet tattoo. I said, you're right. So I asked him to mock it up, like what I would look like. So if I get a tattoo, that's what it's gonna look like. To the finish. You're gonna have many times in your life when you fail to put God first. You're gonna have times in your life when you fall into religion or even fake it. Jesus said, we're gonna have trials and tribulations, but it's very important that we put that into perspective. I saw a clip of Roger Federer, the tennis great.

He did a commencement address at Dartmouth University two years ago, and he said something that I think really gives some insight into faith. Hear what he had to say. Perfection is impossible. In the 1,526 singles matches I played in my career, I won almost 80% of those matches. Now, I have a question for you. What percentage of points do you think I won in those matches? Only 54%. In other words, even top-ranked tennis players win barely more than half of the points they play. When you lose every second point on average, you learn not to dwell on every shot. Isn't that amazing? 80%, he won 80% of his career matches, but only won 54% of the points, just over half of the points. And I think that's a great way to look at faith, which is try to get more wins than losses. Now, you might hear that and think, I have a losing record, I'm never gonna have a winning record. And I would say to you, well, the good news is that's the gospel, is you don't have to have a winning record. You only have to believe in Jesus. But once we have that as our baseline,

then I think a great attitude is just to say, I'm gonna try to get more wins. If I lose today, I'm going to move on, I'm going to try tomorrow. If I lose this one, I'm going to try to win the next one. And over time those start to build up and you build a life of faith that is completely resilient to everything that life is going to throw at you. Let's return to Abel and Cain for a moment. The word Cain in Hebrew means possess or get. It comes from Eve's quote, I have acquired a man. The word Abel, however, means breath or vapor. Something that's not permanent. So the one who is celebrated for his faith is the one who represents moving on. Whereas the one who is a cautionary tale is the one who represents holding on tightly. This is how we finish well, by adopting that attitude, that Abel attitude. We say, I'm going to trust you. I'm going to keep putting you first. I'm not going to fake it. And when I lose, I'm going to move on and try to win the next one. Move on and try to win the next one. And we have to help each other do this because we can't do it alone. We have to lift each other up when we fail and say, it's all right, get the next one. Paul said, therefore, encourage one another and build one another up. The people who gave us this box, whoever they were, were encouragers. They've been encouraging us for 15 years in that one act. Now, I'm going to give you a gift at the end of this service. But before I do, I want to end by telling you about one of the most faithful people I know. And he would disagree with that. He would say I'm not faithful at all. But it's my friend Dave. And Dave has every reason to not be faithful.

Dave was abused in the church at a young age. Dave experienced bankruptcy at a time when he was trying to raise a young family. He then got back on his feet, and he's been very successful in his later years, which frankly is one of the biggest threats to faith because we start to rely on our own success and our own money and our own efforts. Dave is a lawyer. He's a critical thinker. He reads all the books, and he asks all the questions. Like, I don't understand this. I don't get what this means. Why this? He has all the questions that you and I have. And 18 months ago, if you had asked Dave to make you a top 10 list of the closest friends in his life, in that 18 months, three of them have passed away early from different medical issues. And just about a month ago, just days after officiating the celebration of life for one of those friends, he got a call that a fourth has extremely serious cancer. He has every reason to not be faithful. But every year, Dave has an event at Christmastime where he invites over 100 guys for bourbon and cigars. He pays for the whole thing. These are business acquaintances and friends, and many of them have no faith or lost their faith a long time ago. But at the end of the night, Dave will stand up on stage every year, and in his own way, he actually changes it every year, which is impressive, but he says the same thing. He says, I believe there is a God. I believe he's good. And because of that, I want to be there for all of you and encourage you. And then he tells everyone in that room, all you have to do is text me four words. I need a beer. And I got you. And I'm there for you.

Dave recently shared an email with me that he sent to his friend, the friend who's currently battling cancer. And I'm going to read you a part of it. Here's what he said to his friend. He said, we've both seen some of the worst of religion. For me, that started when priests abused their trust and position of power. We've witnessed firsthand people justifying questionable actions based on some convenient theology or obtuse interpretation of the Bible. It's easy to give up on all of it. Believe me, I've tried. But I can't. I can't shake my belief that this is not our only existence. I have witnessed and experienced too much love and too much grace in my life to deny the existence of God. My faith may be amorphous, but it is unshakeable. I'm leaning into that right now to help navigate or understand what the hell is happening. I want to encourage you to do the same. Consider it another form of the treatment regimen. See, he said his faith is amorphous. It's able. But it's unshakeable. That is faith. Despite all the questions and all the doubts and all the things, putting God first, making yourself vulnerable, not being fake about it, and using it to encourage other people. Now, I said I want to give you a gift. And I said I don't like worship music, but I do love music. And I heard a song about a year ago. And the first time I heard this song, it made me cry. It's not a Christian song, but I heard it. It made me cry because I wanted someone to sing it to me, frankly.

And I want you to hear it. You don't have to do anything right now, but just sit back and take this in. Let's be with you. Amen. We'll be right back. Where Adam stepped in for the first time, at last he was a man. Saw the dogwoods, held some in my hand. Smiled, man, well he told me to stop and count them all while I can. The key to life is the joy in the journey, but you don't know the end. So let's stay out here for a while, my friend. Let's stay and walk the line till the end. And I know you're tired, yeah, so am I. We can't take the same road again. So let's stay out here for a while. I took a look and I saw the line where he stepped foot for the last time. I took the first bite. Born in a battlefield to stand tall as giants. It's right with the wind, yeah, our story winds up with footsteps by our legs. So let's stay out here. Let's stay out here. So let's stay out here for a while, my friend. Let's stay and walk the line till the end. And I know you're tired, yeah, so am I. We can't take the same road again. So let's stay out here for a while.

I told you the first time I heard that, I cried. Because I want someone to sing that to me and I wanna sing it to you. We gotta encourage each other to the finish, to be faithful to the finish, because at the finish, God has indescribable good things for us. Now I know the lyric, I know you're tired, hell so am I, we'll generate some emails, I understand. And let me just say, I'm just gonna say this, like I do respect your position, I get it, I understand. And we talked about it, but we decided to leave it in, just like it was in Dave's email, because that's real emotion. And that's what we wanna, that's the real feeling that we are in this together. And if we walk beside each other and carry each other to the end and we stay faithful, we continue just to put God first, to be vulnerable to Him, to not fake it to the finish, that what He has for every one of us individually and us as a church community is beyond our imagination. So let me just pray for you before you go today. God, thank you for all the people in these rooms. I just pray that you will, if they weren't encouraged by this message, that you will encourage them in some other way today, that you will just carry them, carry them forth and be present

as we all continue to put you first. So in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Good people, thanks for joining us today and spending time with us in a word. My encouragement is simple. Don't just hear God's word today. Take one step because of it. Maybe that's opening your Bible. Maybe it's spending a few quiet minutes in prayer. Maybe it's forgiving someone, asking forgiveness, simply saying yes to whatever God is putting in front of you today. Whatever that next step is, take it. And if this message encourages you... We love to hear from you. Send us a videogram or write to us at prison at crossroads.net. Our team reads every letter. We love to walk alongside you. Till next time, keep pursuing Jesus. Keep opening his word. Keep saying yes, one day at a time. See you soon.