Clear Eyes. Pure Hearts. Can’t Lose. - Pastor Rasool Berry

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey, guys, this is Naeem, and you've reached the Mosaic Church Podcast. So excited that you're part of our listening community and love for you to be even more connected. So check out our website. There's more content there and there's more opportunities for you get connected in our ministries and events as well. Also, love for you to share this content if this is blessed to you. I know that God wants to use you to bless other people with it, so share this podcast if you will. Lastly, would you consider supporting this ministry? This is made possible by other people's generosity, and I'd love for you to pay it forward. Join us to reclaim the message and the movement of Jesus together. So would you consider giving to this ministry? I know that God is able to do immeasurably more through us when we come together. Thank you so much. God bless you and enjoy. [00:00:56] Speaker B: Hello. [00:00:58] Speaker A: Good morning, friends. How we doing? Good. Okay. Okay, let me do it again. Let me do it again. I feel like the energy is a little low. Even though it's 11 o'. Clock, right? How we doing? Yes. That's what we want. That's what we want. Here's why we want this. Okay, Listen, even the camera guy is like, hey, he's excited. All right, so here's why. Here's why. Because we got a guest in the house and he told me to tell you that he. He and I are best friends. That's not true. That is not true. But we are new friends. We are new friends, and we. I'm so excited that he's going to be here. He's a pastor in Brooklyn, New York. Yes, Pastor Rasool. And he is also on staff at Our Daily Bread. He's the content director of content there. And so, yeah, I just feel like what we're doing here at Mosaic is so. It's so special. It's so unique. And I thought, you know what? He is the perfect guy to speak into us. And so would you. Would you make some crazy noise? Okay. Make him uncomfortable. Okay. Make crazy noise as he comes on up. Come on up. [00:02:10] Speaker B: Brooklyn's in the house. Yes. Thank you. Well, thank you so much. I'm so grateful, Pastor Naim and Pastor Kristen for the invitation to be here. We've known each other over the last few years kind of briefly in similar circles with the Mosaics Conference, which is a multi ethnic, multicultural church planning network, folks that have this similar vision. But I have to say that when they invited me, it was an easy yes, because upon just seeing and hearing the stories, the insights of this church. It really is something unique that God is doing here. And I just wanted to say that to you because sometimes you can kind of. It can be old hat to be like, oh, man, this unique community with this unique leadership. But, no, it really is unique. And so can we give it up to them as leaders, you know, for the environment that's been created? So I've had the opportunity to watch several of the sermon series for this God bless you series, and I was really excited to contribute to it for a couple reasons. One, the vibes here are great. Just from a. Just straight up vibe check, it's very similar to the Bridge Church where I'm the teaching and family pastor at in Brooklyn. So if you ever come through the city and there's an opportunity for you to worship, know that you fit right in. And this will be a great feeling and vibe. But the other thing that really struck me immediately when I watched the series was that clip of the intro with the sneezing, Right. Because here's a little thing about me as we get to know each other. I had bad, severe allergies when I was growing up as a kid. And the main way that. Because that manifests itself differently, some people get teary and irritated eyes or hives. For me, it was sneezing. And I would sneeze no less than ten times a piece. Like, there was this one moment where I was in fifth grade where, you know, sneezing attack happened. That's what we called it, a sneezing attack. And I actually sneezed out of my chair backwards. Now, it wasn't one of those cute, like, sneezes. It was the one, like, with the baby where you saw, like, the mucus. Can we say snot? Even though it's church? Like, it was snot. It was just gross, right? And so, you know, it's pouring through my hands, and I'm still. I'm sorry, but I'm. And I'm going to the bathroom, and my classmates are mockingly saying, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you as I go down. And so thank you for helping me relive that childhood trauma. But the reality is, you know, it's just the question of God blessing you. And what does that really mean? Because you hear that phrase and that statement, and I'm so glad that this series is linking into that one last set of folks I have to introduce you to is my family. I am married. My wife's name is Tamika, and my daughter's name is Arianna. And we've been in Brooklyn now for 10 years. You can show that picture to kind of get to see them. And Tameka is actually born in North Carolina. She was. North Carolina is one of those conscious states where like 60% of the time, someone in North Carolina doesn't know where the other city or town in North Carolina is. So she was born in Edenton. Anybody know ever heard of Edenton? You know, okay, a couple people. But I totally expected that in North Carolina. It's a fascinating thing about this particular state where people are like, nah, I never heard of that. But we are excited to be here. So getting back to this, God bless you and the Beatitudes, which we've been looking at in Matthew Chapter five. And this is part of the Sermon on the Mount, which is the longest section of teaching from Jesus that we get in the Gospels. And that's important because it's meaning that length is there for a reason. And I kind of call it Jesus magnum opus. It's like his greatest hits compilation of teaching in one space. And in it, that Sermon on the Mount that he's proclaiming his agenda as the true King of the Universe, we were just singing the song, I have nothing else fit for a king except for a hallelujah. And we can sometimes lose sight of the fact that Jesus isn't just my homeboy. Jesus isn't just a cool friend, but he's also the unique and actual and accurate and dutiful king of the universe. And he's explaining his agenda in Matthew chapter five and in A Sermon on the Mount, and he's contrasting that agenda to the small kings of this world. And so what we see here is the kingdom of heaven versus the kingdom of God. And he starts each phrase with blessed. Now again, you know, if you've been churched all your life, you hear that hashtag blessed all the time. But it's really a statement and a summary series of success or what we would consider what is life? What makes a full life? Say amen if you want to have a full good life. And that's what everybody was chasing and looking for. And Jesus is giving his insight and perspective on it. And these pronouncements reveal how different Jesus kingdom is from. From the kingdom of this world. And you see it no clearer probably than in verse eight in chapter five, which is what the verse I've been tasked to unpack. So let's go there. It says, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Now, I'm not going to affront. When I was first Assigned this verse, I was like, oh, this is like the basic, easy one. Like, this is not really that it got the same sizzle as some of the other ones. But then as I started to study and dig into it, I realized how wrong I was that there's so. Such richness in this. And so can we unpack that real quick? This will go a lot better if y' all talk back to me. So, yeah, Bridge, you know, we do a little call and response thing. Amen. Thank you. Thank you. Just not for me, but just to help it move along, I don't have to check back in to make sure I haven't lost you. So. Blessed are the pure in heart. That word pure has so much significance and resonance throughout the scripture. You see it in verses that talk about, you know, like, the refiner's fire, right? And how God will purify us like metal that needs to be pured from its impurities by heat that is turned up super high in a furnace. We see pure in the Levitical sense of the word. I call Leviticus where Bible plans go to die. You know, people be like. You know, they read through Genesis. They're like, oh, yes, it's all narrative Exodus, okay? It gets energetic. You know, they'd be like, whoa, that turns a corner. And all of a sudden you start reading these, like, laws, and it's like, wait a minute. The fabrics, you can't mix that and what's going on. Well, one of the things that gets clarified in this verse is that this purity, that those. Those laws were pictures and snapshots of what ultimately would be fulfilled and revealed in Jesus. And one of those things was that they're not mixing. The fabrics was actually a picture of. Of purity being. Not mixing motives, not having anything unclean. And ethical aspects of purity means free from corrupt desire, from moral purity. When we talk about that and we see that in the Scriptures, the Greek word here that is translated pure is catharos, where we literally get the word cathartic from. And when you talk about things being cathartic, like when you see a movie and it's sad, or you have a conversation with someone and tears just come out of nowhere, and you're like, oh, oh, I feel better now. And it's because that cleansing aspect purifies and clarifies. But right here, when Jesus says, blessed are the pure in heart, his teaching is colliding with the culture. See, we have to remember that he's not just in Galilee in the Sermon on the Mount, but he's also in Occupied territory. He's part of a group of people in Israel that have been oppressed and conquered by the Roman Empire, the big bully of the day. And so at that point, we're starting to see that we have to understand Roman society and norms and values, and their values were shaped completely differently than what he's saying. And so his sense of being a king is coming up against Caesar, who was supposed to be king. And this is what Rome said was valued. Power, prestige, shrewd alliances, cunning and strategy. In the Roman mind, a purity of internal motives was not admired. Success was. Rome was built on self promotion and domination. It was something that would be considered naive and even dangerous. To be talking about pure in heart like that just sounds like you just don't know how the world works. The Roman mindset was, you must either deceive or be deceived. So if they heard Jesus teaching this, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. They're like, wait, you mean the pure heart? The people that always get rolled over? And you might be one of those folks that at some point have felt like a doormat, felt like you've been rolled over by just having a sense of purity of intentions and heart, and may have said, you know what, I'm not doing that anymore. And certainly in modern American culture, purity heart is still not admired. I did tell y' all that I live in New York City, right? A place where, you know, some people have the motto, if you're not cheating, you're not trying. Literally. There's a guy, P.T. barnum, that was known as the big Barnum and Bailey Circus, that has. If you ever heard the phrase, there's a sucker born every minute, like, there's a certain ethos that says, if you're stupid enough to let me take your money, then I have a right to have to try to take it from you. Like, that's P.T. barnum. But it's not just New York, it's also just our society. I live next door to someone who used to be a reality show producer. And she got out of not just being a reality show producer, but the entire industry because she saw so much in which people in these reality shows, these producers would not just, it's not reality, y', all, they would literally create conflict. They would lie on one contestant or cast member about another so they could capture it. And in some cases, she saw that someone who had an addiction, they would give them drugs and make them available so that it could have something like interesting intention to show in the film. This is real talk. It's not real. And so often we live in a society that just wants to show the best versions of ourselves. We see this with social media, where we practice manage people's perceptions of us, we curate a certain image of success. We don't show our low lights, we show our highlights. We live in an age just like Rome. In business, we may call it pr. In politics, they call it spin. And in our own relationships, we call it protecting the other person. But it's really emotional manipulation. The world says be shrewd. Jesus says, be pure. What works in the world doesn't work with God because as he says in Samuel, man looks at the outside, but God looks at the heart. So when Jesus says, blessed are the pure in heart, he is confronting a world that believed that purity would get you crushed. And he flips the script on it. And it's interesting when we say blessed are the pure in heart. We also have to recognize that when he talks about the heart, that this isn't just emotions, but the Hebrew concept of the heart was the core of who you were. It was where right thinking happened. It was where wisdom lived. It was where decisions were formed. It was where obedience comes from. So to be pure in heart is. Is to be clean and free from mixing that which is innocent with that which is corrupt. And I have to clarify here, because a lot of times when we talk about pure or purity in the church context, there was this thing called purity culture that sometimes could cause us to recoil. This emphasis that was really about legalism and focusing on outward behavior that manifested itself in these strict rules and tests and purity pledges and outward symbols that really produce more shame, fear, and spiritual performance than a healthy relationship with God. That is not what Jesus is talking about. That's why he says pure in heart, because purity of heart means really undivided loyalty to God, integrity of motives and a moral wholeness. Purity in heart is inner consistency. That's what integrity is. That you're the same person when nobody's looking as you are when everybody's looking. But it's also not about perfection, but it is the opposite of hypocrisy and duplicity and divided allegiance. And it shows up the test for this being. Pure heart shows up when you least expect it. You know, I had a situation few weeks ago where, you know, as Pastor Naim mentioned, I'm bi vocational, so I'm a teaching pastor and family pastor in Brooklyn, and I also work with our Daily Bread ministries and doing a lot of different content, creation and I live, you know, it's a pretty full thing sometimes. And on top of that, I'm not an organized person. I am disorganized. I just, you know, my wife just. It's a burden that she carries all the time. And one of these. I was out in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in our headquarters, and I had just done a grueling day of recording for a couple days, like, oh my gosh, 10 episodes a day for this podcast that we do called Discover the Word. Hashtag, subscribe, like, discover the Word. But so I kind of just turned my phone off and just kind of was like, hung out with a friend and just kind of just unwind it because I was just exhausted. And then I turned the phone back on at like 10 o' clock and I see all these messages like, where are you? Are you okay? I had totally forgot that I was supposed to teach a workshop with families via Zoom, ironically, on technology, and I just blew it. And there was folks that had organized it that were frustrated, that were disappointed. And you ever had that moment when you realize you've really messed up and you're like, how do I spin this so that it doesn't look like I'm just the worst? Right? So, like, maybe I can kind of exaggerate. There's a little bit. I was thirsty, there was a little tickle in my throat. Maybe I'm sick. Maybe that's what happened. Maybe there was an accident that and all those temptation to try to protect myself and my reputation really emerged. But, you know, I told the truth and it just explained. I just totally forgot. I'm sorry. And it took more than an I'm sorry. Like, it was like, okay, what do we need to do to kind of make sure that this doesn't happen? And we had to put some things in place to get some help and some support and assistance. And it was difficult, but it was also good because purity of heart frees us from manipulation, from hidden agendas, from double talk. And it creates relationships that are based in vulnerability and honesty and transparency. People who are pure in heart become safe, people that others can trust in. And that's why Jesus says, blessed are the pure in heart. And he tells us what the payoff will be for they will see God. There's an intimacy, there's a connection. And there's something that we more that you get when you just remove the fakeness. You know, there's that word sincere, which in the Latin is literally without wax. Because those vases, that would have cracks in them, people would fill it in with wax, so that they would pretend like they were completely whole. And that's what not being sincere is, that's what not being pure heart. I'm just pretending and I'm not showing people my cracks. But instead what we see here is Jesus says that they will see God. Now this verse can be a little bit confusing because in Exodus 33:20, God tells Moses, you cannot see my face, for no one can see me and live. And so how does Jesus say, you'll see God if you're pure in heart. And Moses is taught, you can't see me and live. It's important to understand that there in Exodus is speaking about God's full, infinite, undiluted glory, his manifest presence, his sense in which, like the glory of it, we just cannot be constrained by humans. Because in our fallen, frail condition, we literally could not sustain the presence in the full blown glory of God in front of us. But the other part of that reality, when we can't see God fully, is we can't see ourselves clearly either. That's the other challenge to this, where oftentimes our own sin perception gets distorted. See, sin is not just rebellion against God. It actually distorts reality. You get no better version of that. I don't know. Back in the day, the old version of American Idol, when like they would do like the auditions and people were like terrible at singing. I mean, they were so bad. I thought it was fake until I started to lead a music ministry and we had auditions and I was like, oh my gosh, you really think you can sing? You're horrible. But it's like, wow, that's a picture of how sin can distort our vision of ourselves. Proverbs 16:2 says, all the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit. It's like. But it's not really that way. There's this image that you have oftentimes. So when we look in the mirror, in any mirror, we can kind of. It's distorted in one of two ways. Either we think more highly of ourselves than we ought to in the distortion is that we amplify and we see it almost like a funhouse mirror where we're bigger or we think too lowly of ourselves and we just kick ourselves like we're just not worth anything. And sometimes there's this like worm theology that if you grew up in church, that even reinforces this sense of low view of ourselves. And I remember this because in my case I didn't grow up in church in Fact, my parents had joined the Nation of Islam when I was born, which is where my name comes from. Rasul is Arabic. It means prophet. And so I was raised in that for a couple years, but then afterwards I just kind of was in a secular home. But by the time I was a senior in high school, I was a what I would call a secular self righteous person. You know, I was national Honor society, president of my class in high school, voted best role model. So I just thought I was a good person. Just that I didn't need God or these like this religious stuff. I would get in debates with Christians because I'm like, how do y', all, you know, this is just a crutch. And then what happened was, what had happened was my senior year. I'll make this quick. In high school, I wasn't really popular for most of school. The sneezing that just, you know, people that kind of stretch. But, you know, even as they say, a broke clock is right twice a day. And so senior year, I had two girls that liked me at the same time, and I decided to be with both at the same time. Got caught because you can't be a player if you don't have game. But in any case, the one girl said, you're no better than other guys. In fact, you're worse because you think you're better than them. And that was the moment where God took the mirror onto myself and showed me that you don't see yourself how you think you see yourself. It's distorted. And so then I confessed to the other girl. I'm like, I'm depressed because I actually did think I was that dude. And she said, I forgive you. And I said, why? And she said, well, Jesus has forgiven me for everything that I've done, so I don't think I should hold it against you mind blown. Wait, hold on. How does that work? She's already invited me to church. I started hearing the good news that there was. The problem was I could not clean myself. I could not be pure myself. That was the bad news. The good news was that Jesus had already done the work for me. And so now here I am, Rasul, preaching at a church led by Naim. God is doing the work, y'. All. I'm saying natural human vision is always self skewed. Which way does this tend to skew when you look in the mirror? Sin can also make us hide from ourselves and others. The pure in heart shall see God because God transforms them. Think about it like going back to this aspect of not being Able to see God, like in all of his glory. Right. Like, we can't even see the sun in all of his glory. Like, please, you know, don't just like look up and stare at the sun because you will blind yourself. Yes. Even during an eclipse. But, you know, there are some animals that can see sunlight. In fact, you know, our brother Jeff kind of was giving us a hint or a clue earlier when he pointed out that mighty majestic bird. Yes, I live in New York, but I was born in Philadelphia. So fly eagles, fly. Go birds. And you know, actually eagles are animals that can look into the sun. They fly and they have. And this is why they have protective membranes over their eyes. They have slit pupils. They have built in filters and reflective layers that allows them. And that they need that because as they fly and soar and look for food, they can actually see a mile down the road, a mile away, literally. And these adaptations increase their ability to face intense light. So it's the same sun, but they have different capabilities and different capacities. And in Matthew 5, 8, Jesus is inviting us to be remade with the capacity to increase our capacity to experience the glory, the goodness, the purity, and to see God like we never could before. It's not that God changes, but he's announcing that God changes us. And how do we get that change? Well, all of the whole motif of this aspect of sight and light we see throughout the Gospels. In John chapter 1, verse 14. Look at what it says in verse 18. It says, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory, glory as the only Son from the Father. Verse 18. No one else, no one has ever seen God, the only God who is at the Father's side. But he has made him known to us. Jesus has made the Father known. And so when we look at Jesus, we can see God. So we see God by seeing Jesus. And when we say see, we mean see. Like, I finally understand. Like, I finally get it. Like, when someone explains to you what six, seven means, and you're like, oh, nothing. Okay, I see. But I can remember my own issues. I didn't know that I was nearsighted until middle school. Like, middle school, my teacher would see that I would sit up in the front to take notes. And he was like, I think you need to get your eyes checked. I'm like, why? They're fine. I just need to sit in the front to get notes. And I remember the first time that I went out of the optometrist's office with like glasses and corrective Lenses. I saw that you had some glasses. Can I borrow those? Pastor Naeem, thank you. Thank you so much. Let's see. Oh, wow, that's interesting. Now I can see your thoughts. I can actually see the future now. These are pretty strong, but I remember actually, I don't even know if there's anything in here, but I walked out of the door and all of a sudden the world look clearer and brighter. And I see some people nodding and my bespeckled brethren and sister. And know what that's like when you finally get these corrective lenses and all of a sudden you can see. And it was like a whole new world. Like, oh, this is how the world is supposed to look. This is dope. And that is what it means when you finally get to see God. Because blessed are the pure in heart. And this is what Jesus allows us to see, gives us clarity. Thank you for being able. I'm going to rock those later. To see God. This is why in Isaiah 6 when he says, I saw the Lord and two things happened, he saw God's glory like he never had before. And then he saw his own sinfulness like he never had before. Woe on me. A woe unto me, for I'm a man of unclean lips, of a people of unclean lips. And then God purified those lips, purified and said, now who will go for me? God's light reveals and it heals. This is why in 2nd Corinthians 3:18, we read, and we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of God, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. But this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. You know what this is saying? He's saying, by beholding God and seeing him in his glory and his clarity, it changes us that God is so radiant in his glory that we cannot be the same once we encounter and experience Him. The more clearly we see God, the less inflated pride looks, the less crushing shame feels, the more dignity we perceive in ourselves, the more accurately we recognize our own sin and the more clarity we see our own purpose. Jesus helps us be remade to behold Him. And when we behold God, we become more like Him. So I want to just offer you kind of three quick, specific points that purity produces. One, purity produces integrity over image. And so many of us yearn for that. How can I just be me and not worry about being accepted? It produces relationships with no hidden agendas. Don't we want that where I can just be myself and not have to try to work it and Try to pretend like I'm something else or try to be in this pecking order or office politics. And this type of purity also produces justice. There's so much suffering in our world right now. I mean, families are being separated and disappeared. Even at a time when affordability and housing insecurity and food insecurity is just reaching new levels. Benefits are being cut to even help support these folks who are struggling with this. And even there, James gives us very simple clarity about how to think about and respond to those type of crises. Look at what he says in James 1:27. Religion that is pure and undefiled. There's that word again. Pure before God the Father is this to visit orphans, not make them, but to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. Brothers and sisters, oftentimes we hear this word, stainless ste, and we just think of moral, personal piety. But going back to this Roman Empire context that Jesus is preaching in, to be unstained from the world when I have privilege, when I have power, also means to not be tricked into thinking or seduce, that I should by right have an exertion of that power to make it benefit me the most. You see, a pure heart doesn't simply ask, what do I want? What's going to benefit me the most? What's going to benefit me in my tax bracket? But it asks, what does God want? And we see imperfectly now, but the beautiful thing about it is in First John 3, 2, we see that won't always be that way. It reads, we know that when he appears, we shall be like him because we shall see. See him as he is. We are in a journey of beholding and becoming, beholding God and becoming more like him, beholding more like him and becoming more like him, beholding more like him and becoming more like him. Until one day, we fully behold and are transformed by that. There was a TV show a while back called Friday Night Lights. Anybody remember that? Anybody a fan of Friday Night Lights? I mean, this is. This is south football country. I just heard like a Yup. Any case, there was a guy named Coach Taylor who was the head football coach there, and he had a saying. Anybody know that saying, clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose. And here, a few millennia earlier, Jesus is essentially saying to us, clear eyes, pure hearts, can't lose. Clear eyes. I'm willing to face the truth about myself and to see God as He really is. Not made in my image, not me making myself in my image, but as I truly am and as God truly is, that clarity of sight comes from purity. This is why we have to say search me O God and know my heart. We don't get that clarity internally. We need new lenses to help us with that. And I would encourage us to even try to name the self deception that we're prone to and to confess that the second is pure hearts asking God to sanctify your motives. Where do I need to change this? And this is why he's trustworthy. In Hebrews 4:12 we read, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two edged sword. Look at his piercing to the division of soul and spirit, joints and marrow, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Sometimes we need to look at the Word and see what what God says is really true of us. And when we do those things, we can't lose because we get to reframe victory. Because victory isn't according to who just gets to dominate and gets to do their will like Rome did. But it means that the vision is right and my heart is right. Even if there's an immediate short term failure. It means you can't lose because your character won't collapse under pressure, your values won't shift based on the crowd. Your identity isn't anchored in your performance. One day up, one day down. It's the kingdom mentality, a kingdom of God, not the kingdom of this world where success is faithfulness, not applause and victory is obedience, not just outcomes. The church, we need to embrace this type of perspective in order for us to be reclaim the movement and the message of Jesus. I love that mission because it needs to be reclaimed today from the distortions. And so I just want to leave you with this as we close, just three opportunities to respond and some of these you can. One of the, the first one you can actually do in our response time as we pray together. And one is honest confession to God. This week there's no substitute for being pure at heart other than to recognize what are the impurities in me that I need to have refined by the fire of God's glory. Second challenge and invitation is to do one act of justice and mercy this week. How do I reframe my vision so that I see those that I tend not to see? Because that's what happens when you're pure in heart. I mean that could just be as simple as making a little care package in advance and leaving it in your car so that as you see somebody on the roadside with one of those signs, you don't just have to avert your eyes and pretend you don't see, but you can actually see and be prepared and say, God bless you. And then lastly, invite an accountability partner. You know, we're told in scripture, and this is a tradition that oftentimes in the evangelical and Protestant traditions have kind of been lost, that confession isn't just a vertical expression, but it's also horizontal. We're told in James, confess your sins one to another and be healed. There's something valuable about that. If your eyes see clearly and your hearts stay pure, the world can't defeat what God is forming in you. So I'd love to close with just an opportunity for us to pray together. And as I pray, I just want to invite you wherever you are right now. Maybe you're at a place where, like me when I was in high school, I thought I could just be good enough in my own effort. And then I realized, oh, I need Jesus to purify me. This heart, this heart ain't doing it by itself. And you can pray to actually invite Christ into your life to purify you today. Or maybe you're here and you've done that before, but got a little bit sidetracked, your vision got a little bit obscured. You can also pray to respond in that way. And then thirdly, just an opportunity to just see clearly, God, where am I missing you? So if you wouldn't mind standing with me if you're able and willing. And I just in a posture expression of that posture of wanting to receive God's sight, those corrective lenses, I just want to invite you. You don't have to, but it might be a good gesture to just open your arms in front of you in a posture of receiving. And I'm just going to pray. And in the stillness of your soul, if you agree with this prayer, you pray along and call out to God even after you hear something I say, let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you for the fact that you tell us that even though we live in a world where we purity of heart is not always celebrated and even sometimes it's mocked and scorned. Thank you that you tell us that in your kingdom and what is really reality, blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. And God right now, we ask to see you and we recognize that Jesus is the lens that you've given us to see you through. We believe that your death and your resurrection gives us new life and gives us new sight. We believe that though we have gone off in different paths and blinded our own eyes to your glory or to ourselves that you are committed to restoring ourselves sight. And just as we have to go back to get our eyes checked every year, that you are making adjustments so that we can still see ourselves clearly. And Father, we lastly just pray that you would just help us invite others into the process. This is why we need a church. This is why we need community. Because we have blind spots. Help us to remove those blind spots blind spots and receive feedback from others. Not get defensive. But see the willingness and opportunity to confess is an opportunity to respond to the corrective lenses that you need to give us. Thank you God for this time. In Christ's name, Amen. Thanks for listening to this message from Mosaic church in Charlotte, North Carolina. For more audio and video content, visit us at MosaicChurch TV.