Week 1 | “When Everything Feels Out of Control”

Great to have everybody here. I wanna welcome those of you joining us online, all of our Willow locations, a welcome to you. And as always, big shout out to our friends who join us at the Jefferson City Correctional Center. Great to have you. As we kick off this brand new series on the Book of Revelation, how you feeling? All right, we're feeling all right, great. I love this book. I've been looking forward to this series for quite some time, and so I'm excited that you're here to join us. Now, as we think about the Book of Revelation, if you're not quite as familiar with the Bible, no worries at all. Book of Revelation is the last book of the Bible. Most would assume that a lot of the details of the Book of Revelation are describing what's gonna happen at the end. And so it's a fascinating book, but candidly, it's a challenging book to understand. And so most people that I interact with fall into one of two extreme camps. There's a whole group of people that really avoid the book altogether. They look at all the crazy weird languages and images and symbols and like, man, that's really hard to understand. I'm just gonna not really mess with it.

There's another group that I would say becomes almost obsessed with it. So much so that they're looking at all the details or trying to draw a one-to-one correlation between the details of Revelation and what's going on in current events to try to figure out, are we there? Are we in the end? And I would argue that both of those extreme approaches actually miss the point. Because Revelation is trying to show us something. I think even more importantly, the Book of Revelation is trying to show us someone. It's actually this beautiful picture of Jesus. That sometimes in all the difficult-to-understand imagery, we actually lose sight of what it's all about. It's all about Jesus. In the message, if I could give kind of my thesis statement for this entire series, I would wrap it up with this statement. I would say this. I would say when the world feels out of control, Revelation reminds us that Jesus is still in control. That was a message that would have been critical for the first-century church to really understand. And I would argue that's also critical for the 21st-century church to understand. That sometimes our world, sometimes life in general, it feels out of control. Revelation's designed to anchor us and to remind us.

There's a tremendous amount of hope because Jesus is in control. Now, and candidly, because it's such a difficult book to understand, there's a lot of different interpretive approaches people take to the Book of Revelation. As I wanna, out of the gate, share with you the interpretive approach that we're gonna take. Now, I will just kinda start out of the gate with a lot of humility in the sense that there are multiple approaches. And there's a reason why we're gonna ground it in the way that we do because the first couple of verses of Revelation really inform the approach that we're gonna take. However, there's some godly, very smart people that I know that take different approaches. And at the end of the day, this is kinda one of those things that I would say when it comes to the most essential things when it comes to biblical faith, we need to have unity. When I say essential things, I'm talking about the resurrection of Jesus. I'm talking about that Jesus is who he said he was. When it comes to the non-essential things, there's liberty. In other words, there may be some things that people think differently about and that's okay.

We can celebrate that. Because I would say in all things, in all things, there's love. And so we just want that to be the foundation that we build everything on. But I wanna really define the interpretive approach we're gonna take to the book of Revelation. I would suggest to you throughout this series, I would encourage you to actually bring a hard copy of the Bible with you to church. If not, I would encourage you to pull out your phone and pull up the YouVersion Bible app. You can follow along that way. Or maybe you take out your phone and you take some notes. If you're taking notes, I think that would be a good thing. That way, also, if you get bored, you can text somebody. You can do your grocery list. And I will never know, okay? But I would encourage you to take a few notes along the way. I'm gonna give you a couple of interpretive principles that we're gonna apply all the way through this series. Okay, here we go. Interpretive principle number one, we're gonna say this. Revelation is an unveiling. What do I mean by that? Here's the first words of the book. It says it is a revelation from Jesus Christ which God gave to him and shows his servants what must soon take place.

This word revelation, the Greek word that's translated revelation is the word apocalypsis. What English word does that sound like? Apocalypse. Now, apocalypse, apocalypsis, literally means revelation, an unveiling, a pulling back of the curtain. helping you see what you wouldn't otherwise see. The word apocalypse and the word revelation, at least when this was originally written, meant the exact same thing. Now in today's terms, the word apocalypse is taken on a different meaning. Apocalypse in our day has kind of become this doom and gloom type of thing, this really scary thing about what's at the end. People build bunkers preparing themselves for the apocalypse. You play video games because the zombie apocalypse is coming. And so it's kind of had this doom and gloom type of mindset. But that wasn't true when this was written. The word apocalypse literally just means to reveal. I mean, kind of imagine how different that word has taken connotation in our environment. So for example, let's just imagine your brother and sister-in-law were pregnant. They're having a baby. They invite you to find out the gender of the baby and they invite you to a gender apocalypse party.

Who's going? Like none of us are even going because again, the word apocalypse has taken on this kind of doom and gloom perspective for us. That's not the picture out of the first verse of the book of Revelation. It literally just means to unveil, to reveal, to pull the curtain back so you can see. It's almost as though what the writer's helping us do is recognize behind everything that you see, there are some spiritual realities that are no less real. You just can't see them. It reminds us of the words that came off the pen of the Apostle Paul in the book of Ephesians chapter six that says, your battle is not against flesh and blood. It's against the principalities of this world, these spiritual forces in this world. It's just a reminder that your enemy is not your ex. Your enemy is not your boss. Your enemy is not your political adversary. You only have one enemy. His name's Satan. He has come to try to steal and kill every good thing that God wants to give you in life. And behind all of the conflict and brokenness in our world, there are actually some spiritual realities at play. And what Revelation is doing is peeling back the curtain so that you can see what your eyes aren't able to see. Revelation is an unveiling.

Here's the second principle. I would say this, that Revelation is all about Jesus. Like all about Jesus. Look what it says, again, first and second verse. The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John who testifies to everything he saw. That is the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. There you go. And so you're gonna see a lot of things in the book of Revelation. You're gonna run into a dragon and a beast and the antichrist and six things. You're gonna run into all kinds of crazy things. But let's be really clear. It's not a revelation of the dragon. It's not a revelation of the beast. It's not a revelation of these numbers. It's a revelation of? It's a picture of Jesus. And we can never lose sight that it's a picture of Jesus. We anchor our lives to that being the picture of Jesus. That being the primary image that we need to anchor our lives to. I think about it this way. How many of you ever been to the Art Institute of Chicago? Okay, number of you.

Now I love a good piece of art. I wouldn't call myself an art connoisseur, but I have an appreciation of really fantastic art. So every now and then I've been known to go to the Art Institute of Chicago and just admire these beautiful paintings that the people have painted. And typically what I do is I stand in front of them and I take my glasses off and I do this because that's what everybody else is doing and I'm trying to fit in, that kind of thing. Now any of you who've done it, you know when you go to a museum like that, the best way to view it is to take a step back and just appreciate the beautiful image of the art that's in front of you. Now what you could also do is you could walk up really, really close to it and you could look at the brush techniques of all the little details that were put together to form the picture. And that might be helpful, but it's possible that if you get too close, you lose the image when you get too focused on the details. I think the same is true about revelation. There's all kinds of details and symbols and all kinds of things that are so easy to get lost in the sauce in. And throughout this series, we're gonna continue to try to step back.

We do not want to lose sight of the picture that John's trying to create for us. It is a revelation of who? It is all about Jesus. Now there are three different pictures of Jesus in the book of Revelation that really anchor us along the way. One is in chapter one, one is in chapter five, one is in chapter 19. After one, we see the priest who walks with us. Chapter five, we get the lamb who's died for us. Chapter 19 is the king who returns for us. Oh, that's gonna be good. You don't wanna miss that week. Each one of these images anchors us for what happens right after it. And so you'll see all kinds of things, but it also always draws us back to the image, the anchor point, because it's a revelation of Jesus. He is the priest who walks with us. He is the lamb who's died for us. He is the king who returns for us. Never lose sight of the revelation of Jesus, because it's written so that we anchor our lives in him. Here's the third principle. Third principle, revelation should bless us more than it frightens us. I think that's important to us. A revelation should bless us more than it frightens us. It says this in verse three.

Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take it to heart what's written in it. What's interesting is the only book of the entire Bible that says you're blessed if you read it and blessed if you obey it is the book of Revelation. It's interesting that in more modern times, we've taken the book to be this scary thing, and we've used it to draw fear in people's lives. It was not originally written to scare anybody. It was originally written to bless those who were receiving it. My hope is as we journey through this book, it would not be something that wells up fear in you. My prayer is that it really blesses you and gives you hope in every single piece of your journey. Just a quick story. When I was really young in ministry, I was probably 23, 24 years old, I was invited to speak at this church camp down in Texas. The whole theme of the church camp was these images of Jesus, or these kind of names of Jesus. As I prepared messages on Jesus as the good shepherd and Jesus as the light of the world, but there was one of them, that Jesus is the thief of the night. Like that's one of the things that was said about him about his return,

that he's gonna return like a thief in the night. Now I had prepared all of these talks. What I didn't know is how the leaders of the camp were gonna implement these talks when I got there. When I got there, I found out when it came to the thief in the night talk, what they were gonna do is to wake all the kids up at three in the morning with like clanging of pots and pans and trumpets blowing and then rush them all into the chapel to where they hear this message on Jesus as the thief in the night. Now you can imagine for a junior hire that gets woken up at three in the morning, that was a terrifying experience. And so here I am as this guest speaker at this camp who gets up on the stage and you have these petrified junior hires who were crying this message that I'm about to deliver to them. And unfortunately, that's the tactic that so many people take when it comes to this book. They try to scare you into something. That is not why this book was written. It was not meant to frighten you. It was actually meant to bless you. Here's why that matters. Fear, get the next slide. Fear may create urgency in the moment, but fear never produces lasting transformation. Book of Revelation is really trying

to anchor our lives in Jesus and so we experience transformation that comes from him. I would also say it this way, that revelation is not meant to scare you, but it is meant to prepare you. In other words, Jesus says, I am coming back and you won't know when it's gonna happen, but there's no fear in that. But there is an urgency to connect your life to Jesus because if your life's connected to Jesus, you got nothing to fear because your life is anchored to the one who's gonna lead the winning team. All right, let me give you principle four. Principle four is revelation was not written to us, but it is written for us. Verse four tells us who it was written to. So it says John, now again, this is the apostle John. This is the guy who walked with Jesus, one of the disciples. If you're here for Easter, he's the one that beat Peter in a foot race to the tomb. That's this John. He's the only living disciple at this moment. Every other one of the disciples had been martyred for their faith. They'd been killed because of their belief in Jesus. John is the only one left and he's now been exiled to the island of Patmos. And he writes this letter, John,

to the seven churches in the province of Asia. They called it Asia Minor. It's modern day Turkey. In other words, this book was written to the first century church. There were seven of the churches. It was written. There'd be a traveling letter that would be read out loud to these individual churches. Why does that matter? Because I would argue the Bible can't mean today what it never meant. back then. And so if the book of Revelation is exclusively about 21st century politics, that would have meant nothing back in the first century. It actually serves us better to say, what did it mean in their context? What did it mean to them? If I can understand what it meant to them, that actually will help me understand what it means to me today. It also explains why John wrote in the way that he wrote. So if you look at the book of Revelation, there's all kinds of symbols, all kinds of imagery. Why did he write that? I heard somebody joke about it. It's like some people wonder, did John find some mushrooms on the island of Patmos? Because it seems like this psychedelic type of vision. What's up with that? I think that John wrote in an incredibly strategic way. Here's why. The Roman empire was this dominating empire in the day. Likely this was written during the time of Emperor Domitian. Domitian was a horrible dude. He decided that he was not only going to be emperor, he decided that he was divine, that he wanted the entire empire to actually worship him as Caesar. Now as a Christ follower, they weren't willing to do that. Christians weren't willing to bend the knee to Caesar. And because of that, Domitian took the lives of tens of thousands of Christians back in the first century. I mean, to be a Christian in the first century in Domitian's empire was truly a death sentence. Now John is pinning a letter to the first century church to encourage them, to give them hope that the empire is not ultimate. Jesus is ultimate. And he's got to communicate that in a way that if the Romans read the letter, they wouldn't know

what he's talking about. But the first century Christians, Jewish Christians, if they read it, they would know exactly what he's talking about. How would he do that? What he would do is he would pull language from the Old Testament, like lots of Old Testament images and symbols, because your Jewish Christians would understand exactly what those images were, but the Romans would think that he found some mushrooms on Patmos. That's how the letter got to the churches to begin with. And so the reason we have a hard time understanding the details of the book of Revelation today is because we don't know our Old Testament. We don't know what these Old Testament symbols meant. And so it serves us well to go back and say, how would this first century group have understood this book? Because how they understood it gives us the window of how it applies to you and I's life today. So these four principles, they're really, really important to us. But as that first century Christian would have really wrestled with this idea, like in modern day Christianity, we can be a little bit more comfortable in our approach. They wouldn't have had that option back in the first century. It's the Revelation begs this question that would have been on the heart of those first century believers, that is Jesus merely important or is he truly Lord? And I think that Revelation is going to challenge us to answer that question. Is Jesus just an important figure in your life or is he truly Lord of your life? So four interpretive principles. Again, I would say that Revelation's an unveiling. Revelation is all about Jesus. I would say that the Revelation should bless us more than it frightens us. And I would say that the Revelation is not written to us, but it is certainly written for us. All right, those interpretive principles, those are going to serve us the entire series. Let's jump into chapter one. We ready? All right, we're ready. Jumping into chapter one. It's one of the images that John gives us about Jesus, this powerful image. Let me start with this quote from A. W. Tozer, powerful quote. He says this, what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. Let me pause. When you think about God, what comes to mind for you? Let me dial it in a little bit more. Close your eyes for a moment and picture in your mind what Jesus looks like. What do you see? Tozer goes on to say this, a small view of God makes our problems look massive and feeds our fears. A big view of God makes our problems look right-sized and fuels our faith. Tozer says, you and I need a big, big view of God. I want you to go back to the image when I said, think about Jesus,

what comes to mind for you? My guess is a lot of us, myself included, my mind immediately goes to this long flowing brown hair, this beautifully groomed beard, this long flowing beard. I want you to go back to the image when I said, I think about maybe a lamb that he's holding very kindly or children that are gathered around him. think about Jesus, what comes to mind for you? It's kind of an image of the Jesus of the Gospels, which is a beautiful image and a correct image. Because Jesus was kind, he was generous, he was thoughtful, he was compassionate, he was all of those things. But I would say if that's our only picture of Jesus, then we don't have a full picture of his majesty and glory. And so the picture that John's about to paint for us is not just a picture of the humility of Jesus of the Gospels, which again, that is a true image. But put yourself in the sandals of your first century Christian. Again, your life was at stake just with your claim of following Christ. You're watching your friends get arrested, you're watching family members lose their life because of their faith. They don't need a kind, humble, gentle Jesus in that moment. They need a picture that reminds them that Caesar is not supreme, Jesus is. They need a big picture that realizes that Rome feels so dominant. But Jesus will ultimately be victorious. My friends, you and I need the same image

in our lives and our own hearts because you and I face all kinds of crazy things in this world. We have brokenness in our own lives, we have struggles that we face, we live in a political climate that sometimes feels a little bit crazy, and you and I need to be reminded that whatever happens in this world, it does not win, it is not supreme. Victory belongs to Jesus and Jesus alone. And so John wants us to lift our eyes and to see this incredible picture of not just Jesus in his humility, but to see Jesus in his majesty. And so he paints this vision. I would say this vision is the vision of Jesus as a reigning high priest. Here's the image. A couple of verses later in chapter one, it says this. This is John again, he's on the island of Patmos. He hears this voice, he says, I turned around to see the voice. I saw seven golden lampstands. Now we find out later in the book of Revelation, verse 20, it tells us what the lampstands are. The lampstands are the seven churches. So it's an image, but again, Revelation tells you what it means, it's the image. So here's what's important.

The first thing that he says is, you need to understand that this Jesus is not disconnected from his church. Jesus is walking with his people through all the struggle, through all the crazy, through all the things that feel upside down, Jesus is right there among the lampstands. He's right there. It says that there was somebody like, what does it say? Like a son of man. Now what's interesting is that is a throwback to an Old Testament term. The word son of man is used 107 times in the Old Testament. 93 times in the book of Ezekiel. Most of the time the word son of man is used just kind of means, it's kind of a demeaning term. Like you're just a human human. Like warts, pimples and all, like it would almost be like a demeaning term to talk about just the frailty, the brokenness, the mistake-ridden reality of humans. There's one exception to that. Daniel chapter seven. It's this picture of the ancient of Daves and the throne room of heaven. It's kind of a pretty powerful picture, but there's the son of man at the right hand of God in Daniel seven. And you're like, what's the son of man doing up there? What's up with a human being at the right hand of God?

That doesn't make a lot of sense. And then in Daniel chapter seven, the son of man's given authority and power. Their people start worshiping the son of man. You're like, what up with that? That doesn't make a lot of sense. Fast forward a few hundred years. Jesus comes along and walks this earth. The most frequent title that he called himself was what? Son of man. It never rolled off the lips of anybody else about him, because that would have been a demeaning type of term. But it's a title that he took on himself. Likely this picture of Daniel seven, because he was the one that was at the right hand of God, that's worthy of all authority and power that ultimately people would worship. It's also the image that John's referring to here, because of the details that follow right after it. So look what it says next. It says that this son of man was dressed in a robe that's reaching down to his feet with this golden sash around his chest. That's just a, you gotta get the sense that that's what a high priest would have worn. So you have this son of man who's, you've got all authority and power and might, but he's dressed like a high priest, which was the person who stood in between man and God. It was kind of a bridge builder.

We're gonna come back to that in just a moment. Now look at the, Descriptives, descriptive terms that happen next. It says the hair on his head was white like wool. That was the exact phrase used in Daniel chapter seven describing God himself. The white hair symbolized eternal wisdom, purity, defined authority, showing that Jesus shares the identity and the attributes of God himself. His eyes were like blazing fire. This fire represents the vision and holy judgment. Nothing is hidden from Jesus. He sees everything truthfully, completely, and perfectly. It says his feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace. Bronze is this refined by fire. It symbolizes strength and stability and purity. Here's what it says. Jesus, he's unshakable. Like if your world feels like it's a little unstable, falling apart, just be reminded that Jesus is unshakable. He's steadfast. He's able to stand victorious over all evil and suffering in our world. It says his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. It's kind of this image from the book of Ezekiel that communicates this overwhelming power and authority. The voice of Jesus is greater than any other competing voice of fear in our world. His face was like the sun shining in all of its brilliance.

This points to this divine glory and majesty. Just as the disciples caught this glimpse of Jesus at the transfiguration, revelation shows him in this unveiled glory, this overwhelming, radiant picture of awe. Now let's put all that together. I'd say this. Every image John uses is communicating the same truth. Jesus is not weak. Jesus is incredibly strong. He's not distant. He's not overwhelmed by the chaos of our world. He is glorious. He is the reigning son of God standing with his people with authority and power and purity and presence. Nothing messes with the person of Jesus. That in the chaos of our world, the chaos of our lives, the brokenness that we experience, the political instability all around us, don't anchor your life to those things. Anchor your life to the one who's unshakable, who's steadfast, who holds all truth, who sees us through any and everything. Let me go back to the image of the high priest. Jesus is our high priest. What's interesting is that when the word high priest got translated into the language of Latin, did you know that it literally means bridge builder? That's what the word literally means in the Latin language when it gets translated,

that the high priest literally means bridge builder. Think about what that means. It means oftentimes when you and I experience difficult things, this week I walked with a lot of people who are facing some really, really challenging things. A couple that's grieving deeply as they battle through infertility. A close friend who's facing the impending loss of a loved one. Another friend who just lost a son due to an overdose. Oftentimes when we experience the pain and the challenge and the struggle and the difficulty of this world, what often happens is we find ourselves somewhat disconnected from God. Sometimes the struggle of this world can become the great disconnector. And Revelation reminds us that the image of Jesus as strong, authoritative, powerful, he is the high priest, meaning he's the bridge builder. That sometimes because of the sin and the brokenness and the messed upness of our world, we feel somewhat distant from God, but in Jesus, we get reconnected to God. Think about how important that was in the first century. When your friends and your coworkers and your neighbors are losing their lives because of their faith, John's reminder is anchor your life in Jesus. I can't promise you it gets better tomorrow, but I can promise there is one who will stand victorious over everything this world has ever known.

His name is Jesus. Anchor your life to him. He's the bridge builder. He's the one that gets us to God in a way that we would never be able to give on our own. Because of our sin and our brokenness, that would keep us distant from God, but Jesus stepped into our brokenness. He walked amongst the lampstands. He was with his people. He took on our sin so that you and I could be rejoined with him, crossing over the bridge of Jesus so that you and I could live eternally with God. He goes on then to name some powerful truths that remind us, that allow us to anchor ourselves to him. Here's what it says next. It says, when I saw him, this is John saying, when I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. I think I would have done the same thing. Like, you see this image of Jesus, you're like, ooh, you know, he's down. It says, then Jesus placed his right hand on me. Look what he says. Do not be afraid. I don't know if you know this. It's the most frequent command in all of Scripture. It says some 365 times in Scripture, one for every single day of the year, because we need to be reminded.

This is not a book of fear, nor do we have to live in fear in the world in which we live. He puts his hand on John's shoulder and says, do not be afraid. Remember this. He says, I am the first and the last. My friends, history has a beginning and an end. And there's nothing that has happened or ever will happen that surprises him. It says that I am the living one. I was dead. And now look, I'm alive forever and ever. You think about every kingdom that's ever existed in this world, it has its own divinity or gods or religious system. And none of them are anymore. Their temples are empty. Their temples are in ruins. Because there's only one who's ever conquered death who's alive, and it's Jesus. He's a living God. He's a reigning king that you and I have one that we can go to right now in the midst of our troubles. He's alive, he's living, he's available to you and I today. And it says that he holds the keys of death and Hades. Sometimes the greatest fear that we have is that which we cannot overcome, which is death. And sometimes we fear that which is described as Hades

or brokenness or the difficult things of this world. Understand who holds the keys. In other words, you and I can't conquer death and Hades on our own. But when we anchor our life to the person of Jesus, he's the one that unlocks things in a way that we would never be able to unlock. That even if I'm a first century Christian who loses my life because of my faith, I still, when my life gets anchored to Jesus, he unlocks eternity for me and for you. I would argue this. Again, I share with you, I've been walking some difficult moments with some people in our church even just this week. A lot of us are holding really, really hard things. There's hard things in our marriage. There's hard things in our relationships with our kids. There's hard things that we're facing grief or we just got this diagnosis. A lot of us, if not all of us, are holding something hard right now. Can I remind you? Whatever it is that you're holding, there's only one who holds the keys to that thing. It's not just that he has answers. I'm telling you he is the answer. I'm telling you that he is the one that's full of love, of hope, of peace, of grace, of strength, of wisdom. He doesn't just have answers, he is the answer.

And John says, anchor your life to him. Because when your life is anchored to him, you don't have to fear anything. I don't even have to fear death because my life's connected to him. Let me make this maybe really practical for many of us. Let me talk to maybe a couple different people. There's some of us who came here today and maybe you came here today and you wouldn't consider yourself a follower of Jesus. But as I'm describing Jesus and describing Revelation chapter one, there's something that's stirring in your hearts. Pay attention to what God's doing in your heart. I would call that a prompting of God. I call that a prompting of the Holy Spirit. That is God drawing you to himself. My friends, I can't promise you that this world won't be full of a lot of hard. I think Revelation actually confirms the fact we will face a lot of hard. But Revelation reminds us that the hard doesn't win the day. That there is one who is supreme. There's one who has the authority and the power and the strength beyond anything we face in this life. And it causes us to be strong. to ask this question, is Jesus just important to you? Or is Jesus your Lord? Have you surrendered everything to him?

And if you haven't yet surrendered your life to follow him, to say, I wanna walk with Jesus, I wanna invite you to do that today. And I'm gonna say a prayer in just a moment, invite you to say the prayer with me and just give your life to follow him. For others of us, maybe we've been walking with him for a long time, but we're facing something really hard right now, like really, really challenging. And I just want you to remember the one who is the first and the last who's not surprised by anything. I want you to be reminded of the living one who is in it with you right now. I want you to be reminded of the one who holds the keys to whatever it is that we're facing. And sometimes, even if we've been following for a long time, we have to have the decision point to choose to trust him again. So wherever you're at in your journey, I'm just gonna say a simple prayer. And I'd invite you to pray this prayer with me, maybe to surrender your life to him for the first time, or maybe to hand to him whatever's going on in your journey once again. God, I'm grateful for the book of Revelation. I'm grateful that it's a revelation, most importantly, of the person of Jesus Christ. And God, the reality is we do face all kinds of challenging things in this life.

But God, just as emperor is not supreme, there is nothing in our lives that's more supreme than you. So God, we recognize that what we think of when we think about God is the most important thing about us. So God, lift our eyes. Let us see you in your majesty. So that our problems become more right-sized, and it fuels our faith in you. God, we give our lives to you. We give the circumstances we're facing to you. And we just ask that you'd move in a way that only you can, in Jesus' name, amen.