Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Hey, guys, this is Naeeb and you've reached the Mosaic church podcast. So excited that you're part of our listening community and I'd 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 to 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.
[00:00:57] In today's world, states of worry and concern are considered all too normal. As christians, we should display a sense of hope. In North Carolina, the dedicated people who aim to spread this hope are part of an elite squad known as Mosaic. These are their stories. I mean, sermons.
[00:01:15] Here's a sermon.
[00:01:18] Hey.
[00:01:20] Hello. Hello.
[00:01:23] How are you feeling this morning?
[00:01:25] Nice. That's awesome. Well, hey, if you are brand new, if you're joining us online, here's the deal. We are concluding our series and we're having fun with it, okay? We're talking about conspiracies and we're having some fun with it. We're actually going through the book of colossians, but, and this is last installment. So this is last episode of it. And really quick, though, before I get into chapter four of Colossians, I want to ask you something. I want to find out a little bit about who you are. Friends, you know, since we've journeyed together, at least some of us, for the next couple of years, you know, months, whatever, whenever you start joining, here's what I want you to know. Here's what I want to know. Escape rooms. Escape rooms. Anybody know what escape room is? Right? You guys know? Okay, fans or no fans, okay. Escape rooms. Okay. Make some noise if you are a fan.
[00:02:13] Okay? If you are not a fan of escape rooms, make some noise.
[00:02:18] Right? Yes. Yes. Thank you so much. You are my people. Okay? Now, recently we went to, for a birthday, we went to escape room, okay? For this person. And we're like, you know what? We'll do it. But I'll tell you what, man. Ashley has to, and I have to, too, but Ashley has to, like, get geared up for this because the level of anxiety in escape rooms is a little. Wow. Like, it's a little much. In fact, one of our friends, Caleb, we're stuck in this room, right? And who comes up with this stuff anyways? Psychopaths come up with this stuff. Okay. Actually, it was a Japanese. It started in Japan. And by the way, rage rooms. You guys know about rage rooms?
[00:02:56] Okay, a little too excited.
[00:02:59] We can pray for you. There's the cross of Jesus.
[00:03:02] Like, no, I don't want the cross. I want a hammer and I need a room. Do you know that rage rooms were started by Japanese as well?
[00:03:11] Kid you not. Anyways, I digress. Anyways, so this friend of ours, I'm, like, looking for him at one point, I'm like, where is he? And they set up these rooms elaborately. And there's a dog. There's a dog house there. And I noticed that Caleb is inside the dog house, just hanging out there with his phone. He's like, oh, I can't take this anymore. Like, the level of anxiety is a lot. And I wondered, okay, so we have these entertainments, these things that we do as a society, especially in the US. But why do we do this? I think there's so many reasons. But one of the reasons is because we like to figure things out. We love to figure things out. That's why we love conspiracy theories. We go, okay, so why I gotta figure out what's the real story behind this? What's really going on? We like to figure things out. The problem is, is in life, when you don't figure things out and you can't figure out your next step, you can't figure out what's gonna happen after this divorce. If you can't figure out what's gonna happen after this loss, you find yourself hopeless, you find yourself helpless, and you find yourself with anxiety and stress and fear and doubt. And the truth is, is that so many of us, we live in a world that gives us so much information. I mean, we can get access to so much information these days. The problem is information. Just us knowing stuff does not give us a. The peace that we want, the peace that we need. And so that's why we've been talking about this conspiracy of hope that God has been a part of. In fact, it's God's subversive plan to, in fact, be with us. And so I've loved this because I think based on the conversations I've had with people, it's given people a sense of redirection. Of like, okay, this is what I need to figure out. If there's something to figure out. It's Goddesse. God, who is a mystery, invites us to be in a relationship with him. And if we do that, we find ourselves, like, trying to figure him out. And the beautiful thing about it is that he wants to be found out by you. And if we. The more you find him, the more you get closer to him, the more hopeful you are. And so that's why we've been going through the book of colossians. No, week one, I talked to you about this. That Colossians is not necessarily a book. It is a. Help me out with those of you who remember. It's a what? It's a. It's a letter. It's a letter. It's a letter addressed to a different church, not our church. But we stole the mail.
[00:05:47] Stole the mail. And we're like, hey, this could apply to us, which it can't, which is, you know, and so this guy is in jail writing this letter to this church. He did not know that thousands years later we would be reading his letter going, oh, wow, okay, okay, what's going on? And so what happens is that he writes this, and then in the 13th century, we take the letter and make it into book form. And so that's where we get chapters and verses. And so what we've done is basically taken the letter. It's top secret because there's a top secret thing in the first part of the letter, which is chapter one. And let me remind us of the secret. Right? This is the secret. Colossians 127. Some of you should know this by heart by now. It says, this is the secret. What is it?
[00:06:30] No, whisper it.
[00:06:33] Christ lives in you. Whisper to someone that you know. Christ lives in you. Even today. Even today. He lives in you. He lives in you. That's the secret. And so week one was this idea that hope lives in us. It loves. And so you are never without hope. You're never helpless. You might not be able to see how this is gonna turn around and how your relationship is gonna get healed and get better, but there's no point in time whether you are without hope. That was week one. Week two was this is that. Hope is shameless. It's shameless that God has given us this hope and that you and I are containers of God. And so though we might find that we are containers of guilt and shame, that we find that we're containers of pain and sorrow, or maybe lies, or maybe you grew up in a religion that said, you're basically a container of sin. That's what you are. You contain sin. And the goal is that God wants to get rid of sin in your life. The truth is that Paul says that actually you were made to inhabit God, to carry him. And so you and I need to live shamelessly, and we have the opportunity to live shamelessly. And then week three, which was last week, we talked about that. Hope is now also a choice. It's a choice that if we practice it, it will manifest peace in our lives. So many of us want peace in our lives. So many of us want. And we figure out ways to cope, and we figure out ways to kind of manufacture peace in our lives. And I've done it. You've done it. We do it. We do it. We watch our favorite shows, watch sports, watch things, whatever entertainment, ambition, whatever you want to do to find ourselves never in a place to be, stop and go, okay, I don't know what I'm doing in my life, but the good news is that God's saying, hey, I'm gonna give you this hope. This is a conspiracy theory. I'm giving you this. The world maybe might not experience this, but you can if you understand that it is a choice. And you have to begin to practice hopefulness and practice and change your tone and change your ways. And if you do that, it will manifest. It will create the peace that you want. That's why I love baptism Sundays. See, that is a choice. It is a choice to move towards God. It's a choice to say, I'm choosing to live a different kind of life. And so I'm so proud of the people who are doing that. I know that it's a sobering thing. I don't want everybody to get baptized. I want you to know, hey, what are you doing? And when you do that, it is a special moment because it's a choice. And our choices, man, they changed our mindset. They change our lives. So this week, how does Paul end the letter? How does he do it? So it's like chapter four. And what's interesting about this is, because it's a letter, and if you've ever read it, it's like, how do you end a letter, right? It's like, see you later. Thanks again. Okay. P's, all those kinds of things. And it's pretty much the same thing in this letter. And so when he starts talking about this letter, he goes, hey, let me address a few things here. I just want to move the conversation about hope a little bit of before I end this thing. And so he gives us, I believe, like, basically three major points. He basically starts off by saying. He says, hope. I want you to understand. Takes community.
[00:10:03] Hope takes community. Hope. Takes what? Community. Community. It takes community.
[00:10:11] We have some spanish people, spanish speaking people in the house. Anybody? We've got some. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how do you say community in Spanish?
[00:10:19] Comidi. What? Comidad. Comidad. Yes, we do. We do. Now, every. Every week, I've realized that I've been giving you Urdu words. I don't know if, you know, if you've been following along. You're like, every week he's like, his subversive plan is for us to learn to speak Urdu. Maybe. Maybe. So can I give you an urdu word for community? Can I do that? Right. Cool show as well. Anyways, the word is. What is the word? What is the word? It is. What's interesting, though, is because I'm speaking in English, I have to switch to, like, Urdu thinking. Okay. But it's like. It sounds like brotherhood, doesn't it? But it's bharadri. You want to say it?
[00:11:03] Yeah. Bharadri is the word.
[00:11:07] Mushaideen. Mushaedeen is another word which I love because I speak a little bit Arabic, but I love that phrase as well.
[00:11:15] All those words just say community. Right. But in my culture, in the arab culture as well, in the basically eastern culture, the word community means very differently and is lived out very differently versus the western culture. So when you think of community, you think of, I don't know, maybe the community you live in or the community. You're part of the community school you go to, the community church that you might have been part of. Just. It's very selective. And so we look, we divided up the city to communities.
[00:11:48] Well, in the eastern meaning of the word, community actually is not selective. It's very inclusive.
[00:11:56] All of a sudden, if you are an arab person, if you're a muslim person, if you are part of that region, when you say baradri, it means that you're not just part of my city, my village and all that. You are part of something that's bigger than me.
[00:12:15] You are included in all of that. Mushaedin, which is an arab word, means that we are the collective. And so you are part of the collective. Who are you? What town, what city, what nationality? Doesn't matter. You are part of the collective.
[00:12:30] You are all part of the collective. See, that is a very different meaning of the word community. But when you take that idea of, like, we are part of a collective. When Paul talks about it, he's not talking to a western culture. Remember, it's a letter was written to people who understood the idea of being a part of something bigger. And so the crowd that he's talking to are filled with jewish people. They're also filled with Greeks and people who are not necessarily jewish. But when they become a community, it doesn't matter who they are.
[00:13:08] What happens is that they belong to this community, and they belong to one another.
[00:13:14] The word, the meaning of this word, if you take it out of what we might be used to in the english language, it means, you belong to something, but you belong to one another. You belong to each other. There's a sense of, like, this divine responsibility that takes on. And so when Paul ends the letter, he starts off talking about that. So the first thing he says is, let me read you part of the verse here. He says. Starts off. He says, I want you to do this. He says, I want you to pray for each other. Pray for each other. Here's how he says it. He says, pray diligently. Stay alert with your eyes wide open in gratitude. Very interesting. Now, this is the paraphrase translation, which I love, because it really gets us to the heart of it. He keeps on going. He says, don't forget to pray for us, that God will open doors for telling the mystery of Christ, even when I'm locked up in this jail. Now, what's interesting, he says, hey, I want you to pray for me. I pray. I pray that doors will be opened, not physical doors, because that's not happening. But I'll tell you what, doors will be open for conversations that I might have to talk to people about this bharadri, this community that we're a part of, and I just pray, pray for each other. I want you to pray for each other. Then he keeps on going. He says, pray that every time. Every time I open my mouth, I'm able to make Christ plain as day to them. He says, I want you to pray for me. We are linked together in prayer. What's interesting, though, is when we talk about prayer and getting better at prayer, can we be honest? We talk about my prayer life, right? Like, maybe even if you grew up in a particular denomination or a church, you go, okay, how is your. What prayer life? Your prayer life. And people who are really good at prayers, their prayers come true. Their prayers happen. Okay? Now, if you claim to have, like, amazing prayer life, and you were like, I am master prayer, I'm gonna have a master class in prayer, but none of your stuff comes true. You're like, I'm not going to that class. Right? And some denominations are based off of people who are like, I said it, it happens. Name it, and you claim it, it happens.
[00:15:30] And if it doesn't happen, we fake it. But whatever, we got to do it because we say it. And it's like this divine, supernatural Harry Potter spell thing. I'm going to do it. I'm going to say it. And if it happens, because whatever I say, it'll happen. And it just gets weird in so many ways. And that's why some of us have just left prayer, some of you. And I know that I did that for a while.
[00:15:57] I did. Honestly. I mean, you're a pastor. You get paid for this. Yeah, whatever. I just. I mean, I prayed my prayers and not prayed my prayers. I just.
[00:16:07] I just.
[00:16:09] Nothing I pray for just happens, okay? So why do I bother? Anybody thought of that? Why do I even bother?
[00:16:15] So when Paul says, hey, I want you to take prayer and I want you to pray for each other, what he's saying is, I want you to remove prayer from being your prayer life.
[00:16:24] I want you to use prayer for other people, not for you. Like, I don't want you to get good at praying for yourself. Just get a good at praying for each other. Like, think of prayer as seeds that you need to sow. What seeds are you sowing?
[00:16:41] You're like, no, no, no. But I want my garden to grow. No, no, no. These seeds will never grow in your garden. If these seeds will never grow in your garden, how many seeds are you sowing?
[00:16:51] That's challenging.
[00:16:53] Cause I'll tell you what, I want my stuff to come true.
[00:16:57] But here, here God says, hey, I want you to pray. I want you to pray for each other because you're part of this, Bharadri. You're part of this community, you're part of this collective, and you're responsible for each other, which is so strange to me because I got introduced. I got introduced to a prayer with religion, okay? By religion. Most of us think about this. Most of us, our first introduction to God was through religion. The problem is that religion can introduce you to God, but it cannot foster relationship with him.
[00:17:32] You can't. You can't do that. And for some of us, we just stay there. We got introduced to God. Like, I got introduced to God in muslim context. It's so funny because I learned so many things about religion, because I grew up in Kuwait in the Middle east, and I had my own views. But what I realized is it's so similar when you put the religions together. It's just the same stuff. Like say your prayers. Have you ever heard that? Say your prayers, right? We do that same thing. We do the same thing. You gotta say your prayers. So the other day, I was talking to my mom, and I called her because, I mean, I call her almost every, every week. If I don't call her. Yeah. If I don't call her every week, there's a problem, okay. Or she calls me. But anyways, I called her because I got a text message from her. Now, my mom doesn't speak English.
[00:18:20] She speaks a little broken English, but she can't text, actually, she should not text. Do you know what I'm saying? She should not. But I get these videos from her. I'm like, what is mom sending me videos? And it's TikTok videos.
[00:18:34] Mom is sending me TikTok videos. This is the pakistani, almost 80 year old woman. I'm like, do you even know what TikTok is? Why are you on TikTok? Let's ban that thing. I mean, let's just do that because my mom does not need me on TikTok. So she sent me these videos, and they're muslim prayers. They're, like, Muslim Islamic in arabic prayers. Three of them. Blessings over me in TikTok. I was like, what is happening in this world? Mom's on TikTok. Okay? I called. I was like, mom, what are you doing? What are you doing? Stop using your phone, okay? She's like, oh. And she starts giggling.
[00:19:07] I was like. Like, she figured it out. She was like, I figured out how to work this thing. And I was like, now I'm gonna get muslim prayers sent to me every week. She's like, I just want you to start the day off right. And she just send me these prayers. What's interesting is that my mom has always been a prayer person. Prays for people and all that. My dad, I have never seen him pray, ever. He passed away a couple of years ago. I've never seen that dude pray. The only time I remember going to Friday prayers with him, he was hating it. He didn't care for it. He didn't like it. He did not. And the fights between my mom and dad were always about who's gonna pray, what's gonna happen, what's gonna happen, and, like, you should pray and all that, and you should be the, you know, you should show your sons how to pray. And my dad's like, I don't care and that kind of thing. And what's interesting about that is that I find myself going like, you know, I don't. As I'm older, I get. I've learned certain things about my mom and certain things about my dad. The problem is my dad, one of the reasons, one of the reasons I believe that he actually, in fact, struggled with a lot of depression. And I'm not saying this is for everybody. I'm not saying this is for everybody. It's a lot of. But for my dad, for my dad, the reason why he was so depressed a lot in his life was, honestly, he was very self centered.
[00:20:31] And prayer removes you out of you being the center.
[00:20:36] It's the only way. And so he says, hey, please pray for each other because actually it moves you out of self pity. It moves you out of helplessness. It reminds you that you're part of something that's bigger. You are, in fact, called by God to do supernatural things, but you need to get out of there. So pray for each other. Let me give you one tip, okay? Pray for each other. I do this all the time.
[00:21:02] I pray in my car for random people. I'll stop at a light where I'm going down, and I'll just say, God, show me who I need to see. Show me who I need to see. It's like him saying, you know, I need you to pray with wise eyes wide open. Just show me. So I will randomly look at a group of people and I go, God, I just pray. Just pray protection over them. I don't know. Just pray protection over them. Or I'll feel like. I'll sense of like, hey, like the other day, I was like this. It made me just so, I don't know, emotional. I just looked at these teenagers and I was like, God, I just pray for their dreams to come true and nothing would harm them.
[00:21:38] I don't know them. But, man, God's spirit moves when you do that. So pray for each other. I'm getting emotional. All right, next, what does he say? Next thing he says here, he says, reach out to the others. Reach out to the others. Okay, colossians four. He says, use your heads as you live and work among outsiders. Now he's talking to people who maybe are not part of this christian community. And he says, don't miss a trick. Make the most of every opportunity. Be gracious. Be gracious in your what? Speech. Speech. The goal is to bring out the what best in others in a conversation. Hold on. What if just christians believe that?
[00:22:28] What if all the christians on social media.
[00:22:32] Believe that. Live that out. My goal is to bring out the best in others. In an online conversation.
[00:22:43] Friends, christians leave some of the worst comments.
[00:22:50] Awful. He keeps on going. He says, don't put them down, not cut them out. Don't do that. Don't do that. When we name call, when we do things, and he's saying, hey, friends, this is so important for you to do this. And this is a great opportunity for us. Friends, we have the best opportunity. Mosaic church has a great opportunity to reach out to the others, and not like we're gonna go reach out to save them from hell. No, we're reaching out to love them into heaven. You know what I'm saying? It's a little different. It's like showing them what heaven could look like. It's with our mouths, with our conversations, and we do this constantly. Constantly. I hear how this church is so accepting and so inclusive and so loving and be kind and being kind and polite.
[00:23:38] That's part of our culture. And the reason is, is because I've told people this, and I will continue to tell people, if you're gonna be a jerk, you are not welcome here.
[00:23:46] Like, right. Seriously, if you're broken, messed up, whatever, incarcerated, whatever that word is. Freshly out of jail. All good. Addict. All good. Every whatever. Good, good, good. Been a murderer. Okay. Good. Come on. But if you are going to be a jerk, there's the door.
[00:24:08] Because what we're trying to do is we're trying to have this collective that reaches all the people who feel like outsiders.
[00:24:15] All the people. And I got to tell you, so many people feel like I'm being like they're outsiders from the christian church. So many people feel like they're outsiders. I mean, I hang out with a lot of people who do not go to church, okay? And they just feel like we are the other. What's interesting to me is, like, they just feel like I'm not really a pastor. They're like, you're a fake pastor. Because I just think that you shouldn't be with us or hang out with us or we should not be this close friends if you're like that.
[00:24:47] It's so, so sad. So extremely sad. In fact, this week I got a conversation. I got a call from a guy who does this global ministry. And one of the things that they want to do is they go to cities and they build this triad of, like, christian, jewish, and muslim leaders. And so what they do is identify the leader for that city. And so they pick a imam, which would be a muslim priest, and then they pick a rabbi, and then they pick a pastor. I know. It's like a joke, isn't it? Like that. Okay. Anyways, and so this guy was calling me, and he was like, hey, you got highly recommended of being that guy for Charlotte, and I just wanted to ask you about who you are and all that. And so as we're talking, we're talking about how hard it was for him to find religious leaders in all of those who would actually be willing to have conversations without trying to prove each other right or wrong.
[00:25:49] It's so strange to me. And he was like, man, it's so hard. It's so hard. You would think where cities would have be, like, a city like Charlotte would have so many mosques and so many synagogues and so many churches that people. There would be so many people wanting to. Willing to work together, sit in a room together, and show how we can, in fact, have shared values. Not shared culture, not shared beliefs, but have same shared values and honor them and sit together. And so I was like, hey, sign me up, you know? And so we're going to do that, and our church is going to do that. Now, friends, it's. It's hard. It's. It's hard work. It's extremely hard work. Moving out of, like, this idea of, like, hey, to reach the others, you have to understand, no, they're not like you. And it's okay. It's okay. What you think is disrespectful. It's respectful. Like, I grew up with Indians in India. In India, but also in indian homes, when you see elders, guess what you do? You touch their feet out of respect. I remember the first time I walked up, and I'm Muslim, and my friends are Indians and all that. And I saw his mom, and I just. I was like, okay, I'm just gonna do this. I went and I touched her feet, and she was like, oh, thank you. Thank you. And he said, it's a blessing from your elders. Let me just tell you, Muslims don't bow down to anything but Allah. It was a big deal. It was a big deal. It's a big deal. Like, it's huge. But all these different cultures, I mean, Koreans, right? They bow. They bow, and it's a sign of. It's a sign of respect. They bow all the time. It's a beautiful thing. Like, Arabs and Muslims will do this if you retouch them. If you're like, you say something, they'll do that. They'll do this to do this. It's a sign of, like, my heart connects to you. I do. This is it. This is it. It's a beautiful thing when you look at others as an expression of the creative God who made them. It is a sad life when we find ourselves just in our own group, not reaching out to others. And so Paul's in jail going, I wish I could go out and throw a party. I'm stuck.
[00:28:01] I think Timothy is here somewhere, but go do this, friends. Go do this. He says, hey, pray for each other. Reach out to the others. And then he. Lastly, he says this. He says this. He says, serve one another. Serve one another. He says, after this letter has been read to you, make sure it gets. Make sure it gets read also in Laodicea and get the letter that went to Laodicea and have it read to you. So basically, he's saying, hey, I'm sending this letter to you, but also sending another letter to Laodicea, and I want these letters to be read. I want you to do that. Would you do this to me? Would you do that for me?
[00:28:51] And he says, oh, yes. Tell Archippus, do your best in the job you receive from the master. Do your best. And then he says, I'm signing off in my own handwriting. Paul, remember to pray for me in this jail. Grace be with you. Now, this section is the short section, short part of a longer section, where he lists out and gives shout outs to, like, nine different people. And he goes, hey, by the way, can you do this? Just shout out to so and so. And he's acknowledging everybody's efforts that have been part of his life, and he's reminding them, hey, remember this and do this and do this and do that. And what he's actually saying is, I want you to live a life serving one another.
[00:29:35] See, the distinction between us and followers of other religions is our willingness to serve one another.
[00:29:48] I think it's so hard for us to understand that because we live in a world, we live in the US, where, you know, it's about you, it's about.
[00:29:59] I mean, capitalism is a beautiful thing, and it's an ugly thing. You know, it allows us to do so much, but then it also makes us just wanting to serve our own purposes and our own needs. I mean, that's why books about your purpose and our calling sells so much. Serving is a whole different deal. Whole different deal. But here he ends. He says, hey, hey, I need you to serve one another. So let me just ask you guys, okay? Let me ask you guys, okay? What do you think is what do you think is a church that the world needs? In fact, it's so funny, because when I say this, what is the church that the world needs right now? I do believe it's a church that serves one another, that the people there are serving one another. But it got me thinking about, like, you know what? The next series of conversations, like, we spent four weeks here. The next five weeks, I think I'm gonna be talking about, and we're gonna be talking about the church that the world needs right now.
[00:31:07] The church the world needs because the church is actually the people that the world needs right now desperately needs right now.
[00:31:14] And I believe it starts, though, with us this morning talking about or thinking about, hey, are we willing to serve one another? So Pastor Christian talked to you about this.
[00:31:25] He talked to you about volunteer teams, talked about how we're going to entice you with watermelon and things like that, right?
[00:31:32] Let me tell you why we do this. We do this is because we know. We know. And we have seen, we've heard stories of people who come into a church community and then find friends here because they were on some kind of a volunteer team.
[00:31:49] And once they find friends, they become best of friends. Best of friends. Best of friends. And so there are, there are teams here that you can, like, there's a hospitality team, a youth team, worship m kids, facilities production, creative arts. We've got opportunities for all of us to do our part, and I wanna ask you to do it. For those of you who do not volunteer your time, I want you to do it. I'm asking you. And here's why I'm asking you. I'm asking you because I know. I know that when you serve, it changes you. It changes you. I mean, just this week, I was talking to a gal, and she was like, and, I mean, just have a. There was just a moment. She was like, you know, I used my, recently, my, my close friends just moved. They left town, you know, and for jobs and all that. And, I mean, I don't think she really wanted to say this out loud, but she just did it. And she's like, I'm just lonely.
[00:32:55] And I'm like, I'm so. I know what to say. And the first thing I said was, come to Mosaic. I was like, come, come. And she was like, it's so hard, though. It's so hard to find friends again and build that, you know? And sometimes, you know, I've heard women say it's harder for them more than guys because guys will be just, hey, superficial friends. You know what I'm saying? Like, hey, bro. Hey, bro. We don't know each other anyways. We're good, but women need an actual, real relationship, and it's hard. Friends, people who've been serving in mosaic, I mean, I listed some of them. There's a couple, David and Alicia. They've been serving for 18 years.
[00:33:37] 18 years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're tired. They're tired. No, 18 years. The reason why they do that is because we've created a healthy system where people can, hey, take a break. And they've taken several breaks over the years. The coolest thing is in elementary class upstairs elementary, they teach a lesson. And the guys who teach, I know these dudes, and, I mean, there are several just young men or professionals who teach elementary. Trevor is one of them. Jace is one of them. Right?
[00:34:16] And, I mean, Trevor sells furniture. You know what I'm saying? And he's up there, and so he has to, like, if you've ever. If you have an elementary kid, if you ever walked up there, he's this guy who's the best dressed in the room. He's always wearing a tie. You know, he's looking sharp. The problem is he has to, because he serves and he has to go to work on Sundays, but he's always dressed to the nine. He was like, man, I just wish I could wear shorts. These kids are expecting, you know, every teacher to look like me. Like, you know, this is it. He comes dressed, and he's been doing that for years. They've been doing it for years.
[00:34:52] Why does that?
[00:34:55] It's a beautiful thing. Juani is another volunteer. Okay. I love Wannie. I'll tell you why. Because she has the thickest spanish accent in the world. I walk by, and she's talking to the kids, and I'm not gonna mimic her. I don't know. But I'm like, she's talking to them, and they're listening. Cause they're like, what is she saying?
[00:35:14] And she is like, going off. I'm like, this is amazing that our kids are introduced to someone with a different background. It's a beautiful thing, but I'll tell you why. But it's so hard for bilinguals and even some immigrants to come be a part because they don't feel that they belong and they can't contribute. And some of you might think that I can't contribute.
[00:35:39] Yes. Yes, you can.
[00:35:42] You can definitely contribute.
[00:35:44] One of the couples here, Lynn Vickrey.
[00:35:50] Lynn Vickrey and Sherry Lyn's been Lynn's been praying over your. Over these chairs for, I don't know, I think 17 years, maybe more. Like, at different places. Like, she comes. Let me just tell you, it's not because all her prayers have come true. In fact, we walk through some very devastating things in our life.
[00:36:14] And, in fact, I mean, last week, I think when I noticed her before services, I just looked at her and I was like, I know the stuff you're going through, even right now. And I don't know how you muster up the faith to pray for other people, but it's what. It's what they do. It's what they do.
[00:36:35] So, friends, let me ask you, like, what's keeping you from just, hey, signing up, we'll figure out the details of, like, hey, where, when and where and how and all that. Because we want this position to be tailored, made for you. And we want you to love what you do not. We don't want to guilt you. We don't want to shame you. No. We want you to serve out of gratitude. Like, case in point, is my daughter, Noora. Okay, who serves? Okay, I'm gonna shout her out now. Here's the thing. Okay, Nura, let me just keep this in here.
[00:37:12] Cause she's out there with them kids. She doesn't like kids right now. She prefers an animal. Any day, every day.
[00:37:22] The girl has made so much money pet sitting. It's ridiculous. It is ungodly the amount of money she has made just taking care of pets. You say you need to babysit. She's like, nope, you got a snake? Okay, let's do it. You got a bunny? Yes, I'll do it.
[00:37:40] And she's serving in m kids.
[00:37:43] I'll tell you what. She's. She's just. She's the host. She just helps coordinate the classes. She's like, as long as I don't have to touch a baby or interact with a kid, I'm like, you're fine, you're fine, you're good. Just adults. Just adults. So what if you were part of a church that could tailor make a position for you that you would love?
[00:38:06] You would love and be excited to come? That's what you want. That's what we need. Not people serving out of shame or guilt. No, man. Just. They're excited to learn new things and figure it out and serve people. So, enough said.
[00:38:22] These two things you'll find in your chairs, in front of you in a pen. And so I'm gonna do this. I wanna pray, and I'd love for you to just fill this card out. This is the card you need to fill. And if you don't know, if you don't know, like, this is all the menu, but if you don't know, you can just circle, like, m kids, youth, whatever. You wanna circle, circle a couple. If you are like, I don't know for sure, we'll contact you.
[00:38:47] And let's serve together, friends.
[00:38:50] It makes life so much, so much better when we serve together. It makes our lives, everybody's lives, so much better, and it's not a whole lot.
[00:39:02] So let me pray for us. And then we'll turn up the lights just a little bit to give you some reading light. And then we'll do the last song, and then we'll baptize. Cool. All right, let me pray for us. Lord. God, thank you so much.
[00:39:17] Thank you for your love for us.
[00:39:20] God, I'm so grateful for this community that I can be a part of this baradari that allows me to recognize that I'm a part of a collective and that we don't just belong to you, we belong to each other.
[00:39:33] God, I pray, make me more responsible for the people around me.
[00:39:38] God, I know I got all my stuff that I got to deal with, but give me eyes to see.
[00:39:44] Give me a heart that would feel for other people. Give me a hand that would serve not my own plans, but plans for someone else.
[00:39:58] God, change us.
[00:40:02] God, I know that if we do all these things that we've been talking about, we'll have so much hope that we would know what to do. It would be overflowing out of us.
[00:40:16] Overflowing out of us.
[00:40:19] So, God, I pray that, God, that we would be people of hope, the loudest voice of hope this world has ever known by the way we, the way we live and how we value people.
[00:40:39] God, allow us. God, I pray for wisdom for some of us as we're trying to figure out what we need to sign up for. Maybe there's a fear or hesitancy.
[00:40:50] God, I just pray that we would be bold, courageous to just take the next step.
[00:40:57] Got to give them wisdom in Jesus name.
[00:41:01] Thanks for listening to this message from Mosaic Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. For more audio and video content, visit us at Mosaicchurch TV.
