Mother's Day at Shoreline | Grace for Parenting | Grace to & Through | Pastor Rob & Laura Koke | Shoreline Church

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ Good morning, everybody. Morning. Happy Mother's Day. It is so good to have you. Today, of course, is a very, very special day. It's Mother's Day, and we would love for all of our moms to stand. So if you're a mom, a grandma, if you're an adoptive mom, if you're a mom-to-be, if you're a mom-to-somebody, stand to your feet and let us recognize you and celebrate you. Come on. Give it up for all of our moms here today. Love y'all. Wow. Happy Mother's Day. You guys look beautiful, and you are beautiful. And remain standing, if you don't mind. Just remain standing, because I want to take a moment to pray with you, and then we're going to do our creed. So just for a moment, if you're sitting next to a mom, just stretch up your hand towards them. And Father, we just thank you for these amazing, awesome, incredible women who lay down their lives and bring so much strength and joy and peace

into the worlds that they help manage. Father, we just pray that today, every single mom will feel celebrated, will feel spoiled and blessed. And Father, that they would know not only the love of their family, but Father, that they would know your love and your approval and your blessing upon their lives today, in Jesus' name. And everyone said? Amen. Amen, amen. All right, everyone else, let's stand to our feet. We're going to do what we do at the beginning of every service. We're going to recite our Shoreline Creed. If you're new to Shoreline, you could just read along. The rest of us, we say this with some enthusiasm and passion. You guys ready? Ready. Here we go. I am loved by God. I cannot earn it. I cannot lose it. I am forgiven and made brand new. In Christ, I live with passion and purpose. I am empowered by the Spirit. Let's go, babe. In the world. And to live this love revolution.

Thank you. Thank you for helping me with that. You may be seated. Literally in the middle of the Creed, I was thinking about my daughter, Danielle, who is like any day going to give birth. And the thought just kind of hit me right in the middle of the Creed and I lost my train of thought. So thank you for carrying me. But on Mother's Day, we're celebrating family. We're celebrating moms. We're celebrating this beautiful gift from God. It's God's idea. Family is His idea. And we're going to kind of share around that, this morning. We're going to talk a little bit about this whole commitment that God has made to the family and how we can be wise about it and how we can embrace His thoughts and His ideas in order for our families to be stronger. You know, our families are a part of everything, aren't they? And sometimes, you know, there are seasons when everything's good. Sometimes there are dysfunctional moments where it just feels like everything's falling apart. And then sometimes it feels like both are happening at the same time.

If you have more than one child, one might be doing awesome. Another one might be facing some challenges. But there's so much of our lives that is wrapped around family. And, you know, we've been studying in the book of Ephesians and you might be surprised at all of the scriptural real estate that the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle Paul to dedicate to family and to understanding how we can be the best moms, the best dads, how we can have the strongest families that we can. And so I hope there's something in this message for every single one of you, those of you who are actively engaged in parenting right now, some of you who aspire to it or hope for it. There are some lessons that you can learn that you can apply to your own life, you can apply to your friendships, but we're gonna talk about it in the context of the family and in the context of parenting. I wanna read to you two verses of scripture. One is found in Ephesians chapter five and the other in Ephesians chapter six. And they represent two of the, like the main points of parenting. It's like the one, two punch. I mean, this is really,

You can divide these and extrapolate on these, but these are the real critical things that we gotta understand about the parenting process. Ephesians chapter five, verse one and two. Follow God's example, therefore, as dearly loved children, and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. So the critical phrase in that particular verse is as dearly loved children, love as Christ has loved us. And then in Ephesians chapter six, it says, children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and your mother, which is the first commandment with a promise, so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on earth. Fathers, do not exasperate your children. Instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. So here you got these two thoughts, right? You're gonna love as Christ loved us, and then you're going to train and instruct. And in both of those powerful, beautiful truths, we have a chance of building what God wants for every single family. Yeah, so when we are raising our children into adulthood, it seems like they pass through a number of graduations, right?

They start out with this preschool graduation, then kindergarten, then elementary, and then they've got middle school graduation, high school graduation, some into college graduation, and all kinds of different types of graduations. And in fact, next week, we are going to have a wonderful graduation Sunday honoring our graduates. But during all these graduations, we are focused on what our kids are graduating from, you know, all these different ones. And I just wonder if we maybe think through the fact that parents also graduate from one phase to the other, this journey of parenting. You know, if you were to ask me, like, what is my favorite graduation of all? I think it was when they, you know, went from the home and then they got married and they graduated out of the home. You know what I'm saying? I mean, it's like, awesome, they're off the payroll, finally, sort of. I mean, I don't know. I think we invest a lot into our kids still, but anyway, you know, my kids, they have little bitty toddlers, they're running around in diapers all the time, and I think their favorite graduation is diaper graduation. When they get it off of that stage, it's awesome because those things are so expensive, my goodness. Anyway, seems like we focus on these graduations

of our kids, and we just want to talk through some of the graduations that parents go through, these different phases that we walk through. Because if you've ever been a parent or you are a parent, you know, you are in a certain phase and you can learn different skills, these intentional skills that God wants us to give to our kids. And, you know, if you've got a couple of kids at different ages, you might be in a couple of these phases, or if you're like the Jackson family, who is a staff church family, they are amazing. Susie's over, all of our young, our kiddos and stuff. Anyway, they are like in multiple, all of the stages, I think, at one time. But anyway, in each of these phases, there are different ways that we can express these non-negotiable truths of love and training. And before I describe those or we get into it all, all the details, I just want to, you know, give you these words of encouragement and kind of caution, and that is that parenting is not an exact science, if you haven't figured it out by now, you know. Kids are free will creations of God. And, you know, when Pastor and I were younger and we were learning about raising kids, there was a ministry out there and still is called Focus on the Family. What is he? Dr. James Dobson.

Anyway, and he had books and he had this daily podcast and you could learn all kinds of wisdom and get comfort and strength from what he shared. And I love one of the things that he shared because, you know, when you're starting out on this journey, you just kind of have this perfection idea about parenting. But he said this, he said there, where is it? Oh, there's not always a correlation between perfect parenting and perfect kids because God gives everyone the freedom of choice. And that should bring some kind of comfort to your soul. You know, you think about it, God Almighty himself was the perfect parent. He couldn't be anything but, right? But he had two kids and both of them messed up royally. You know, so, I mean, who do we think we are? to think that we're gonna be the perfect parents. There's just no such thing. And if you look at the life of Jesus, he was perfect in the way he loved his disciples. He loved them intentionally. He taught them and trained them intentionally, but one denied him, another betrayed him, another doubted him. They all kind of fell asleep in the garden in his darkest hour and then ran away from him when he really needed him the most. And so, you know, if God and Jesus, okay, if they cannot be perfect, then there's no way that we can be perfect parents.

And Rob and I, for sure, we're not perfect in our parenting. Our kids will absolutely tell you that. And so I don't think that we, well, sometimes, let me just say this. A lot of people come up to us all the time. They're like, isn't pastoring this church really challenging? And we're like, you know what? It is nothing compared to the challenge of parenting. There's nothing more humbling and there's nothing more important, honestly, than being really, really good parents, the best that we can be. And so, you know, we're still parents. We love parenting and love watching our kids now parent kids of their own. Point is, you know what? No matter what stage you are in, we never graduate from being a parent, but we do move through some different phases along the way. So we're gonna talk about four different phases. And the first one is commander. And we've got, you know, some, you know, object lessons, some illustrations. The commander phase is the sippy cup phase. It's the zero to five years of age. It's that time when your children are completely and totally dependent upon you. And so when you think about this, the first 24 months of your child's life, you function as a benevolent dictator,

telling the child basically, you know, who to listen to, what to eat, when to go to bed, how to perform a task. They are completely dependent upon you for every aspect of their lives. And during this particular, you know, phase, healthy parents will just pour out unconditional love, lots of hugs and kisses. There's a limited amount of opportunity for training at this particular point in time. And when it does occur, you ought to take advantage of it. You know, as the kids are growing up, you know, and, you know, two turns to three and three turns to four, we've noticed this with our grandkids. We have the privilege of having Sterling and Nala at our house every Thursday night. It gives Danielle and Fredlyn a date night, and it gives us some really focused time on those two. And they spend the night, and then every single morning, on Friday morning, they come into our bedroom at an ungodly hour. I mean, it's uncanny. They walk in there sometimes 5.30 in the morning, six o'clock, and Friday is our day off. It's like the one day that we get to sleep in, but no, our grandkids are there to wake us up. And I don't know how I got assigned into this, you know, role, but I am the chef that makes the eggs on Friday morning. And I have the option just to do it myself. And honestly, it's a lot easier to do it myself,

but they want to help. And I think it's a good idea, when you can, to let them help, even though it's easier at times to do it on your own. Let them help you clean up. Let them help you water the plants. And when I help them, when they help me, you know, do the eggs, literally, I pick them up and put them on the counter and they want to stir. And Nala does too now. They want to stir the eggs. They want to beat the eggs. You know what? They're not beating the eggs. They're barely moving the eggs. I have to watch them stir the eggs and nothing's happening to the eggs, but they think something's happening to the eggs. And that's the point. They want to be involved in the process. Proverbs chapter 13, verse 24, a refusal to correct is a refusal to love. Love your children by disciplining them. This is important. One of the most important skills that a parent at this age and stage of children is to be consistent in your unconditional love and take advantage of those limited opportunities to help them participate. And it's never too early to encourage, you know,

them to participate in devotions. Even if they don't even understand any words, you can be praying over them and blessing them. And, you know, now that they're in conversational ages, you know, Laura leads them in devotions at night when they're at our house, when all three of them are at our house, you know. praying over the meal. Gemma was taught a little bit differently by Emily and Luke how to pray a prayer over the meal than Sterling and Nala. And instead of fighting over it, we use both. And we just pray and we include our faith in the journey. All right, so that's the first phase. Second phase is being a coach. And that's represented maybe by a water bottle. This is ages five to 12 in general. And so at this stage, you're really trying to begin to inject the why behind the what. You know, you can't just say yes or no anymore. It's kind of like yes because, or no because. And I know it's easier to shift into just do it because I told you so. But really, it discourages kids' curiosity if we don't begin to involve them in the process and ask them if they have questions. Let them ask you about everything so they begin to understand in this process. So we want to educate our kids and help them in this decision-making process.

Of course, it takes a little bit more time and effort, okay? But, and it's harder. The older you get, just remember back, okay, this is why we do things. But I love it. We see it with our grandson, Sterling. He's five and a half. And so he really is in this beginning stages of this. And he wants to understand stuff. He's asking great questions. But you have to kind of tell him the why behind. Like the other day, we had actually all of them over. And Sterling wanted to show Gemma how we can jump from the little daybed into the little trundle that goes out underneath. I said, no, no, no, we're not gonna do that because Lala can't stay in here. And I need you to just play something else. And they were saying, okay. Well, I go into the kitchen to do whatever. And sure enough, all of a sudden I hear this crying. And I run in there and Sterling had pulled out the trundle and it was jumping and it, you know, evidently jumped on the edge or something, kind of tumbled onto the floor. And you know, he's a little bit dramatic, so whatever. But he was just fine. Anyway, and so I said, Sterling, I said, didn't Lala tell you no? Yes.

And I said, didn't I tell you why? And he said, yes, because you didn't want me to get hurt. And I said, well, then why did you do it? And he said, because it's so much fun, Lala. You know, I was just saying, I don't know if the why always works, but this is the stage that you want to inject and help them understand the whys. And so it's probably good in this season to just really remember that they are always watching you, every single thing that you do. And you wanna encourage their curiosity and their questions and all of that. But they're watching to see how you practice your faith. I mean, are you including God in all the everyday things in life? And I mean, are they seeing you, you know, when you stub your toe, just, you know, cuss? Or are they, you know, seeing you praise God in the middle of it? Unfortunately for me, it was a little bit of both. So, you know, I kind of started with the cussing, then I'd apologize, and then I'd praise God. Anyway, I had to apologize a lot, but. You've gotten much better. Last week, last week was great, it was a good week. So when Rob and I were parenting in this stage, we ran across this teaching called Parenting with Love and Logic. And it really was a game changer for our family

because it has this aspect, this love and logic aspect of challenge your kids in their decision-making process by offering them two acceptable choices or options. So you would say things like, do you want to wear this jacket or this sweater? Do you want, you know, scrambled eggs or do you want boiled eggs? You know, do you want an apple or a pear? And maybe, do you want to go to Burger King or do you want to go to McDonald's? Y'all know me better than that. I never asked, told my kids that ever in my entire life. You know, if you work for McDonald's, it's awesome. We love you, we love you, despite what you just said. We did go, actually, and play on the play scape. And I still sneak out every once in a while. Okay, so, you're moving in this stage of being that benevolent dictator kind of commander person where you're making all their choices, you're making all the decisions to helping them make wise choices. And so, obviously, you can't give them an option that you're not comfortable with because, you know, then it's not gonna be a good thing. But if you give them these two choices, then it's really helping their brains to start thinking about what choices they want to make. And the thing about this process is that once they make a choice, you have to be good with them living it.

with the consequences no matter what it is, and this kind of came to a head for us when Luke was young. I think in sixth grade he played trumpet in the band. I can barely remember it, but I just remember loud screeching noises, but he wanted to be a part of this band contest kind of performance thing at Schlitterbahn. Their band was going to go, but the deal was you had to go to two out of the three band practices. And so first one I was in charge. I was driving. We took him to the practice. Second practice he was riding his bike around the neighbor, and I said, okay, Luke, now you got to be back here by this certain time because if you miss your ride, it's too bad. And he said, okay, Mom, I'll be back. I'll be back. Well, he wasn't back, and the ride left him. Well, I was very clear, okay, number three, okay, you've got this last choice or chance to be able to go to Schlitterbahn. You've got to be back here. Sure, Mom, I'll be back. I'll be back. Well, of course, the ride came, five minutes, ten minutes. He hadn't shown up. I said, go ahead. Go ahead now without him. And I knew it was going to happen, but he came home ten minutes later, and he was like, oh, my gosh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. Can't you just take me? I said, no, that must feel horrible that you missed your ride. Oh, my gosh, this must feel horrible that you can't go to Schlitterbahn.

I mean, I was trying to validate him the best that I could, and he threw the fit of a lifetime. I mean, threw himself on the floor. I mean, he was begging and pleading. I mean, go find your dad. Nothing. We didn't budge, and I'm just saying, he's on time now the rest of his life. It was the hardest thing I think we ever did, but it was a good move. So we're moving from one phase to the next, and the next phase we went from being the commander, and then you're the coach, and then you get to the stage that you're the counselor, and this is the teenage years, okay? So now you're 13 to 18 years of age, and you've got a glass, and you might think that that's for water. It's for whiskey. No, I'm only teasing. But the teenage years, you know, I was pausing, you know, as I was thinking about this, and I knew I was going to have to talk to you about it, and I was just thinking to myself, to be honest, maybe the best advice I can give you is to just pray and fast for the next six years. Those teenage years are difficult, and some of you, you know, you're looking at me, and you say, well, you know what? My kids are awesome. They're amazing. They've never given me a day of trouble ever, ever, ever. I don't like you. Every single one of my, our kids, and not just mine, you're a part of this. Probably my fault. Yes. No, I, well, now that I think about it, no. All of our kids had challenges in this season of life.

You're still a coach, but now you're adding to that responsibility, being a counselor. As long as they're living underneath your room, you have final authority on what they do and what they don't do, but when you have teenagers, you begin to experience the reality that you're not the only influence in their life, and so you have been the primary person that's been speaking into their life, but now they're getting information from school. They're getting information from their peers. They're getting information from social media, and it's influencing, you know, their lives, and you're in competition with a lot of other thoughts, and during this particular season of life, you're really kind of stepping forward on this journey from dependence, which is how it begins. They're totally dependent upon you, to launching them into independence. I mean, that's the whole goal of parenting is that they're able to make it on their own. They still need lots of training. They still need lots of practice, but it's more in this stage that you're calling in the plays and watching them executed on the field, and then, you know, doing the evaluation afterwards, and I know that it's a little bit of a dance, this idea that you need to give them enough freedom to grow, but you also need to give them enough restraint to keep safe, and it takes divine wisdom to discern all of that. There is a difference between the preteen years and the teenage years, and if you treat your child the same way as a teenager that you did when they were in preteen, in other words, you know, you're more on that commanding side, and you're jerking the reins back when they rebel. If you continue to do that in the same spirit and in the same way in the teenage years, you might gain compliance. but you might lose their hearts. And so you have to understand that you're in a season that's encouraging independence. And the operative phrase during this season is something like, this is a decision that you can make. You can shift a little bit.

In the preteen, you're giving two options, both of them you're acceptable with, but now you're moving more to this season. Hey, there are some things you can't make decisions about. I'm still, you know, the father, the mother of the home. And so, but there are some things you can make decisions about. And I give you the freedom to make the decision and they can ask you for wisdom and counsel. You can pray and all of that. In this particular case, I saw it play out just recently with my brother-in-law, Mark. And that's Laura's brother and my brother-in-law and sister-in-law. They have a daughter, Audrey, and she's graduating. She'll be, she's a senior, she's graduating. And she was choosing where she wanted to go to college. And I saw them beautifully, you kind of, you know, kind of dance this out with their eldest child. And they said, well, where do you want to go to school? They had a passion for her to go to UT where they went to school. He graduated from the University of Texas. Hook them horns, everybody. And she was, she was really passionate about not going to school in the state of Texas. She wanted to leave the state of Texas. I don't know why, because this is God's country. But she wanted to go. And so they made a list of colleges

and they went on a college journey. And, you know, that journey was this dance of saying, hey, you know, this is a decision that you make. There were financial, you know, ramifications of it. So there was some schools that were out of the question. And yet when they took this trip together, she made the decision and he affirmed the decision that she's going to go to the University of Arkansas. What? How could that be the will of God? I don't know. But the reality is that it's in this stage that you're helping your child to grow into independence. All right, and then stage four is consultant. The consultant stage, this is age 18 and over. This is what we would consider the mug stage. And, you know, there's just no words to adequately describe when you, as a parent, you know, drop off your kid at college and you drive away for the very first time. Man, there's a jumble of emotions. Because something really does shift in your relationship. And yet we have a tendency maybe at that point to think, you know what, my parenting job is done, woohoo. But you know, the truth is I can promise you it is not over and it never gets over. You are always going to be a parent. But now you're just more of a consultant. So man, you are just praying and you are trusting and you are believing, you know, like Solomon shared with his son in Proverbs 27, 11,

be wise, my son, bring joy to my heart. You're believing that with all of your heart, all these things that you have been pouring into them, all this unconditional love, all of the training, all of the ways of the Lord, and you're just believing with all your heart that it's gonna start bearing fruit in their lives. It's kind of like, you know, kicking the birds out of the nest and just trusting that they're gonna be okay. So it's not easy. And honestly, I think all of these phases are difficult. They all have their challenges and there are beautiful things about them. But I think this phase is one of the hardest because it's about letting go. It really is not easy. For nearly two decades, man, you have been, you know, this commander and this coach and this counselor, but now you're the consultant and you kind of have to take a step back. And if you try to hold on to some of those other phases, it's like you're gonna be met with a lot of resistance and sometimes even resentment. And so we've gotta have some helpful tools that will help us in the middle of this phase. And there was a couple of phrases I just wanted to throw up. It doesn't have to be exactly this, but these are some thoughts that you can throw out to your kids in this stage that feel really right

in our opinion. The first one is let me know if I can help. You know, just let me know I'm here. If, second one, if you want a listening ear or you need somebody to talk this through with, I'm here for you. And so those kinds of statements really. Reassure them of your love it kind of leaves the door open where you can pour out your wisdom from the Experiences that you already have had in life and at the same time it really helps to respect their independence and so You know what? It's time to watch them soar in life and you know if they fall and bump their knees or whatever It's okay. You're there if they need you, but it's not so much as a parent It's really more like a friend and you know this advice kind of consultant friendship stage is this stage that we're in right now And we love it so much. We grab cups of coffee and mugs of whatever not whatever, but anyway, and we whatever We don't drink I'm not judging anybody who does but we just don't that's you know, we enjoy you know just sharing life together with them and So I kind of do love it a little bit because you know what this phase of life There's like what goes around comes around they come into us mom. They're talking back to us mom They're keeping us up all night. I just kind of smile a little bit It's wicked awesome to see that cycle play out, you know that the truth is you know when when your kids leave the house And and they might not necessarily go to college. They might go to to the military They might go and launch into a career right out of high school that happens all the time It's it's really important that you recognize, you know that that things are are shifting Someone gave me this piece of advice and Lauren I have shared this and I think it's really one of the most profound things We've ever heard about this particular season and and that is is that don't offer unsolicited advice You know Because you know you in the back of your mind you just I know exactly what you need to do But they're not gonna hear it unless they ask for it. So just have the patience to allow that to unfold

So, you know just as we're closing here today and this whole idea of love and instruction love and instruction You know what that happens all throughout the journey through all the different phases It just gets expressed a little bit differently I am convinced that one of the most powerful forces on earth is unconditional love and The verse that we quoted from Ephesians chapter 5 says love as Christ has loved us And how did he love us? And how does he love us? He loves us Unconditionally so many times we can send a toxic message to our kids with the idea I love you If I love you If you play nice if you clean up the room if you follow in my footsteps if you stay out of trouble It's always conditional and it has a shaming component to it, but we need to love Unconditionally, we love no matter what good bad obeying disobeying Angelic devilish noisy compliant win-lose a or F clean dirty living The dream you have for them or living their own dream love Unconditionally, that's awesome. Let's give God praise. This is probably the most important But also we want to do a good job of training and it says in Ephesians 6 in verse 4 It says do not exasperate your children instead bring them up in the training and the instruction of the Lord And so we do have that responsibility and the truth is we are training at all times Honestly, you know what whether your kids are in diapers They're in school or they're in a career of their own and often married You know what? You're always training and you can't just say things to them like do what I say and not what I do It just doesn't fly you really have to know that they are going to watch what you do and a lot of times mimic that So if you want them to tell the truth Guess what? You got to tell the truth if you want them to walk with generosity Be generous if you want them to walk in forgiveness in their lives knowing that they are going to face a situation Where somebody's gonna offend them and they're gonna get eaten up with bitterness if they don't forgive listen, we've got to Forgive if you want your kids to trust God They are watching how you respond in the middle of the painful the difficult as well as the good

Situations in life. Are you trusting God? And so our encouragement is just to keep doing all those intentional things that God puts in your heart, you know Have family nights go to all those gazillions of ballgames I mean take time to text on the thread between your family have the family devotions Our kids are now having family devotions. I think because they saw us doing it Deuteronomy 6 verse 7 says impress them on on your children, talk about them when you're at home, when you're on the road, when you're going to bed, when you're getting up. You know, training is just all about happening all the time. I mean, everything can be an object lesson, wherever it pops up spontaneously, with their friends or athletics or school or church, wherever. And so I was thinking about this with our own kids. You know, we had kids that were all involved in sports, and we had them in every kind of sport. I mean, just every single kind. And you just feel like you're bleary-eyed going from this thing to that thing and all of that. But we tried to, you know, make winning and losing an object lesson. Whether you had victory from your game or you had defeat, you know, when you're victorious, let's be gracious and let's be kind and let's be humble. When they were defeated or they lost their games, we'd, you know, say, still, you go over there and you congratulate them and learn from your mistakes so you can get better at whatever that particular sport was. And you know, all of our kids are so amazing. One of the things I love about them is just seeing how their hearts have grown and become so strong and so beautiful, each one of them. And Caleb, of course, went to heaven when he was 17, and you know, he was a strong kid. He was a stubborn kid. He was fiercely competitive. He was an amazing basketball player. And yet, one of the things I loved about him is that when he would foul somebody on the other team, you know, he would look over at them. He'd get this kind of smirk look on his face, and he'd kind of go like this. My bad. It was me. I mean, maybe something got through to him. I just think, you know, they watch us, and they see how we respond. And the most important things that we can do is just pour out so much unconditional love that it smothers them with God's love. And then let's make sure that we're training them in the ways of the Lord. Yeah. So, you know, next week is graduation Sunday here at Shoreline, and we're gonna

be celebrating the graduations of high schoolers and also college graduates. But there's also graduations that we as parents face. Isn't that right? And we go from, you know, sippy cup to coach with the water bottle, and we go to counselor with the glass. We are the consultant with the coffee mug. But you know what? It's all about helping them experience the communion cup. That's where we land on this whole process. We have these children that God gave to us, and we steward their journey through all the different phases and stages of their life. But the most important one is that they go from dependence upon us to independence from us, to interdependence with us, to dependence upon Him. That's the ultimate goal of all of our parenting. So let's pray. Father, we thank you so much. What a wonderful day, Mother's Day, to celebrate these incredible, iconic, beautiful women who make our lives so blessed. And Father, I just pray that each and every one of us would learn lessons from your Word that help us to love unconditionally and instruct in the way that you call us to in Jesus' name. If you don't mind, just with nobody leaving early or moving around, everyone just bow your heads and close your eyes for just a moment. I want to give you an opportunity to enter into a relationship with the greatest Father, the perfect Father, who will love you unconditionally but love you too much to leave you that way and help you to live your very best life. So if you came to church today and you would say, Pastor, I'm not where I need to be with God. I'm not living right. I'm not doing right. I need prayer. Maybe you made a decision at one point in time, but you slipped away. Or maybe you're here today, and you'd say, Pastor, I need to meet Him as my Lord and Savior for the very first time. If you want to meet Him for the first time or rededicate your life to serving Him, would you please raise your hand quickly and boldly wherever you are? Wonderful. God bless you. God bless you. Wonderful. Hands are going up all over. All of you with your hands raised, I want to lead you in a very simple prayer, and I want you to pray this prayer out loud after me. And everyone else, as a reaffirmation of your faith in God, would you join me in this prayer? Let's all of us pray together. Heavenly Father, come on. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, I thank you for sending Jesus. Jesus, I ask you to come into my heart. Forgive me of my sins. I put my trust in you and I will live for you

from this day forward by your power, for your glory in Jesus name, amen. Amen. Would you give them all a great big hand clap? All right, let's all of us stand to our feet and if our prayer partners can come up here to the front. Those of you who made that decision right now to follow the Lord, we have at our east entrance and our west entrance, we have someone who's holding up a sign made brand new. We wanna give you some information that'll really help you to live this Christian life that you just prayed to receive. We've got some photo opportunities out in the lobby. We're super excited about next week's graduation. We look forward to seeing you there. God bless you, have a fantastic rest of your Sunday and love on your moms. God bless you, we'll see you next week. Amen.