Pastor Jerry Zepnick's sermon, titled 'Great Expectations,' examines the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well, as recorded in John 4:25-30. Pastor Zepnick emphasizes the significance of Jesus breaking cultural and social barriers to reveal Himself to the Samaritan woman, illustrating that Jesus came to save all humanity, regardless of their social status or past sins. He stresses that biblical prophecies serve to affirm Jesus as the Messiah and encourages believers to align their expectations of Jesus with the biblical narrative. The sermon highlights the transformative power of Jesus' revelation, as seen in the Samaritan woman's immediate change and her urgent desire to share her encounter with others. Pastor Zepnick urges believers to reflect on their own lives and ensure their expectations and actions align with the teachings of Jesus, emphasizing the importance of sharing the gospel and living a life transformed by faith.

Good morning, family. Good morning, brother. Today we will be in the book of John again. And so, as we go through the text and as we go through, I think ministry altogether, let's keep in mind of everything that's happening in our world, with our military right now, with Pastor and Bev, and them coming back Tuesday. Keep them in prayer.

Keep our country in prayer. Bearing precious seed in our opportunities to work with them. Keep that in prayer. Because everything that we hear from the Word of God, It's not there just for information. It's there to work on our hearts.

It's there to apply and lay over the top of our lives and affect our lives so that we can go out and do something with it. And so keep that in mind. Today, as we go through the text, it's John chapter 4 verses 25 through 30. I've been overlapping some because I find myself inadequate to completely finish a text at the end of a message. I keep on cutting it just a little bit short, so I'm going back a little bit again, but John 4, verses 25 through 30.

And as we do this as well, I want us to keep in mind the reason that this book was written. And John 20, verse 31, these are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and that believing you might have life in His name. So this is the purpose of our existence. Okay, and so we have to take take all of this that we're reading and realize that it's written for us to believe and that believing it doesn't stop there. It goes beyond that to action, that we can have life in His name.

That life doesn't look like this world's life. It looks like life in Him. And so, The text, I'll read through that, chapter 4, verses 25 through 30. The woman said to Him, I know that Messiah is coming, who is called Christ. When He comes, He will tell us all things.

Jesus said to her, I who speak to you, am He. At this point, his disciples came and they marveled that he talked with a woman, yet no one said, "'What do you seek?' Or, "'Why are you talking with her?' The woman then left her water pot, went her way into the city and said to the man, "'Come, see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?' Then they went out of the city and came to him." Let's pray. Father, we thank you this morning for this text, for your word. I pray, Father God, that our hearts should be moved and open to your word this morning, Lord God.

Not that we're already there And not that we know, Lord God, but that you are moving and working us constantly. Father God, I pray for this text that was written 2, 000 years ago, Lord God, to move in and to work in our hearts this morning, Lord. And not that we can be happy, not that we can live a prosperous life, Lord God, but that You and You alone can get the glory for it, Lord God, because You are worthy. I pray in Jesus' name, Amen. And so, we're in this text today and this is Jesus and his disciples coming back going from Judea to Galilee.

And The religious people, the zealots, they won't go the shortest way. They go a way that takes about twice as long just to avoid Samaria. And so they are going right down the middle of it. They find themselves at Jacob's well. And as Jesus is resting by the well, the disciples, they go into Sitar, the town, to get some food.

And while they're gone, This woman comes to the well and Jesus opens up a conversation with her. One of the greatest dialogues of all time. And by God's grace and blessings, we're able to sit down and listen to this conversation as it goes. And to pull it apart, to look at it, and to have it change and affect our hearts and lives because it opens a window to who Jesus is. That's so important for us.

And so today we'll get about to the end of that conversation, but we will be continually referring back to it. And what we're seeing in the text today is the effects, the lasting effects of living water. Remember Jesus said, I'll give you water that will well up from within you. You'll never need water again. This is the effects of that living water.

And so, It's important for us to understand that this conversation is taking place between Jesus, the God of the universe, and a Samaritan woman. I can't express to you how low on the scale that is in the culture of that day. And so this is a text that's long, it's drawn out. It shows that He came to seek and to save those who are lost. He didn't come to save those who need no physician.

He came to save those. And In the process, he's knocking down barriers, one after another. He's knocking barriers down that we would normally not expect to. And in the process of this text today, we see this Samaritan woman. And I want to caution us because as we go through this text, we want to think that that is a Samaritan woman like down here.

Well, at least I'm here, right? No. No. Biblically and spiritually, not a single person here is one grain of sand better than that Samaritan woman. We're in the same place.

We're lost in sin, death, death to Christ. There's not a single person here that was better than that Samaritan woman. And so, we cannot go into this text thinking and elevating ourselves above this Samaritan woman. Because really, sin is sin. And we're all lost and wretched.

And so, the important thing to remember is that God came to save all. That's the point and that's the focus. He came to save all, and when He saves, it looks different. You're not the same person anymore. Your affections are not your affections.

They're Christ's affections. And so, He came and He was knocking down barriers. Luke 5.32, I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. I want us to look at His perfect example as we go through Scripture of who He came to save, of those Nicodemus. Remember?

The religious zealot that had all the perfect actions and everything? Well, it doesn't say, but He does come to the Lord. We'll see that further down the line. But Zacchaeus, the midget tax collector, had to climb up a tree to see Jesus, remember? And he goes to his house and he eats.

And then Zacchaeus is like, anything that I've stolen, I will pay back fourfold. And so this is the kind of people. The woman at the well that we're talking about. The blind, the crippled, the beggars, the prostitutes. This is who Jesus came to save.

And you know Who else? You! You! You know why? Because we all come in that same line of sinners.

He came to save you. He came to save me. And As soon as we think that we're above that, we're looking at it all wrong. We're replacing Christ and His grace and His work on the cross. Jesus came to save and His grace is inexhaustible.

His grace never ends. In chapter 1 verse 16, it says, and of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace. Grace piled on top of grace on top of grace. It's like you're going through the buffet at Pizza Ranch. It's just grace after grace after grace after drumstick after pizza after ice cream after.

It just never ever ends. His grace is the song we sang this morning. My sins there are many, His mercy is more. Isn't that us all? The first point that I have this morning is the expected Messiah awaited.

The expected and the notes this morning are on the back of the bulletin, the bullet points here. And that's verse 25. The woman said to him, I know the Messiah is coming. It's called Christ. When He comes, we'll see all things.

In verse 25, she as a Samaritan knew of the coming Christ. She knew that Christ is coming. This was long anticipated by the Jews and the Gentiles, as well as told in the Old Testament prophecies. I always knew it was over 300, 350 Old Testament prophecies. Well, there's direct prophecies and indirect prophecies.

There's foreshadowings that Jesus fulfilled, appearances, predictions. There's over 450 of those altogether. Direct prophecies, there's over 320. But nonetheless, how many do we need? There are all these prophecies of the Old Testament that are fulfilled when Christ came.

And so she, as a Samaritan woman, knew, and people altogether knew, that the Christ is coming. They had him misidentified, for the most part, as far as what he would do, but they knew that the Christ was coming. And when He did come, this is where He would come from. Micah 5-2. But you, Bethlehem of Shratha, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to Me, the one to be ruler in Israel, who's going forth are from old, from everlasting." See, those who were close to God, they knew all these things.

This was not new to them. Isaiah 7, 14, Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Emmanuel. That's the how. How is he coming?

Isaiah 9, verses 6 and 7, Who? For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon His shoulder, and his name will be called wonderful, counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, Prince of peace. Of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward even forever The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this see the Jews were looking for for someone to come and rule and reign They knew the Old Testament prophecies well, and they were looking for that fulfillment. They were looking for someone that would come and fulfill that as a king.

Someone that would come and would rule and reign with that iron fist like I just read. Psalm 110, verses 1 and 2. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of your strength out of Zion, rule in the midst of your enemies. See, that's what the Jews were looking for.

They were looking for somebody to rule with an iron fist. And Jesus didn't fit their narrative when He came. He just didn't. And maybe this morning, You're sitting here and you need to realize that that the Jesus that you have in your mind and in your conception, it fits your narrative, but it's not biblical. That you need to change who the Jesus is in your mind to fit the Jesus of the Bible and the purpose that He came.

And so the Jews had specific Scriptures on exactly what this coming Messiah would resemble, yet with these preconceived expectations, they seemed to relatively just miss Him completely. And why? Because they were looking at themselves and what they wanted. They were looking at the prophecies, but they would pick from that what they wanted and how it fit them. And so, even the foretelling of what they would do to him and how he would suffer and die and rise again.

Here's the text that I have, Psalm 22, 16, how his hands and feet would be pierced. For dogs have surrounded me, the congregation of the wicked has enclosed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. The silence before his accusers, Isaiah 53, 7. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth.

He was led as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before it's shearers of silence, so he opened not his mouth, that he was buried with the rich." Isaiah 53, 9. And they made his grave with the wicked, but with the rich at his death, because he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. And then rising from the dead, Psalm 16, 10. For you will not leave My soul and shield, nor will you allow your Holy One to see corruption. See, although when Jesus stopped at Jewish towns and synagogues, most people chose not to believe Him.

See, in His hometown, He had to be really careful. Their leaders, their zealots would want to kill him. He could not expose who he was. He could not pull that veil back and reveal, even though they would ask, he could not do that where he was. Because they were too learned.

They were too high and mighty. They would not receive it. They would want to kill Him. So, He had to keep it underwrapped. However, in Samaria, he could reveal that, and that's why he did.

And so Jesus spoke with her individually because he could. And so the second point today is the expected Messiah revealed in in verse 26 the expected Messiah being being revealed and verse 26 reads Jesus said to her I who speak to you am he. And the English language kind of butchered that because it's not supposed to have the word he in it. Jesus answered her, I am. And anybody that knew anything of Scripture back then knew who that is.

I am. That's what He answered. And so, that is just a revelation of that. And at that, the theologian William Barclay says of this incident, they're an open before the Samaritan woman, a vista which bewildered and staggered her. Could you imagine how this would affect this woman?

What change would come into her heart and life when she met the Christ, the Messiah face to face? All of this prophecy coming forth. See, this prophecy isn't just for them to be able to identify Jesus when He came. This prophecy is there so that we can look back and know that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and that knowing this, we can believe and have life in His name. Okay, this is the purpose of this prophecy being pulled from the Old Testament, Christ fulfilling it in the New Testament.

And so, this is the revelation of Christ to her soul. To an outcast without any hope. This is the revelation of Christ to her. And this has to be the correct response to any soul who has Christ revealed to them. This isn't the only time that Jesus revealed.

He revealed Himself to a blind man in John 9.37. And Jesus said to him, you have both seen Him, and it is He who is talking with you. Talking of the Savior, of the Christ. And so Jesus revealed Himself to blind men in this incident, but seldom did He. Not to the Jews, like I said, it was a dangerous proposition.

They were the ones that were supposed to see it. They were the ones that were supposed to see it. They were the ones that were supposed to know that this is happening. But Christ puts an honor, He lays an honor upon this wretched, adulterous Samaritan woman that he doesn't give to many people who likely never had a chance to see his miracles, never met him in person, never saw him based on where she lived. This woman seemed that she was prepared to receive him and having big expectations of the Messiah.

See, and this has got to be, we got to be able to take this text and lay it on top of us. We can't miss this. We can't get past this because this is who Jesus came to save. And so, We can't be the Jews that are disinterested. We have to be able to see ourselves in this, because Christ at one time revealed Himself to each and every person that is truly born again.

This has happened. Now, did He walk up to you and tell you this? No. But you know the work of the Word and the power of the Holy Spirit that took you when Jesus came for you. This has happened to me.

It happens to those who are born again. I didn't hear a voice coming from heaven. No. I didn't fall on the ground. I didn't fly in the air.

No, I wept. I wept over my sin. And it's a gift from God. 1 Timothy 1, 15 and 16. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief, the Apostle Paul.

However, for this reason, I obtained mercy that in me first, Jesus Christ might show all long-suffering as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life. People, if you do not know Jesus This morning, this is Him. A pattern to those might show all longsuffering. We have a patient Savior, a loving God. Christ will manifest Himself to those that show, that have an honest, humble heart.

See how near Jesus was to this woman and she didn't know who He was, right? She didn't know until He said. We see this example in another book where the disciples are walking and Jesus is with them and they didn't know. He had to reveal Himself to them. But she is so near And she doesn't know that it's him.

It's that anyone here this morning? That he is so near? And yet, you don't know. We're looking right past him. Matthew Henry says, many are lamenting Christ's absence and longing for His presence when at the same time He is speaking to them." Did that ever happen to you?

I'm going to read that again. Many are lamenting Christ's absence and longing for his presence, when at the same time he is speaking to them." See, it reminds me of that text in Luke 16.31, where the rich man in Lazarus and the rich man is in hell. And he asked for someone to be sent to tell. And he said, No, we're not going to. If they're not listening to Moses and the prophet, they won't hear, though a dead man should come to life.

And so does this sound familiar? I'm just asking. All too often we see and we hear who Jesus is and what His will is. And we've got the Word and we've got the Holy Spirit tricking our hearts and our consciences. But then we refuse to submit to it.

We refuse to walk in it. This woman just heard the greatest news of her life. But the question is what would she do about it? Could she really ignore what Jesus revealed to her that He is the Savior and Lord, could she grab her water pot and head back to her hut and keep living in sin? No.

You know why? Because she met Jesus! She met Jesus Christ. When a person meets Jesus Christ, they don't want themselves anymore. They just want Jesus.

They don't want what they were. They want what He is. So this is the right response. And so she heard it and she wanted everything. And so that begs the question of each of us.

What will we do with Christ Jesus? Jesus came and talked to you, right? He owns you. What do we do with that? It looks like it looks like this sometimes.

We already have our will in our minds, right? We already have what we want to do in our minds. We have our own agenda and so Christ's agenda, it doesn't quite fit. Now I'm talking about not our front mind, our subconscious, okay? Christ's agenda just doesn't quite fit our narrative, our life pattern, our style.

And so have we already made ourselves believe that we made His will our will? And so then when He speaks to us, we Don't hear it all. We turn it off or tune it out as not relevant to his true will for our lives because we're already in it, right? In our mind we are. What about in our heart and the Holy Spirit in the book?

Are we in it? Which is, I'm gonna back up. So then when he speaks to us, we shut it off as not relevant to his true will for our lives. Which is really still our own will, even though his word, his Holy Spirit, and his people, God speaks to us through people, tell us otherwise. Is that us?

When we choose to believe ourselves over the Lord, when we can take our will and manipulate God's will to fit our lives and our will, we are changing who God is and it's not God at all. We have made ourselves God. And so when we choose to believe ourselves over the Lord, this is dangerous. This is damning doctrine is what it is. To the Samaritan woman, Jesus reveals that her expectations are to be filled in Him, right?

He's the living water. You got two things, you got the living water or you got nothing. And so this living water is what He offers. He is the Messiah. He is the Christ.

He is the living water. And Jesus is telling her that, your expectations need to be fulfilled in me. That's what Jesus is saying. And this morning, Are all of our expectations fulfilled in Christ? Or are we leaning on something or someone else to have our expectations fulfilled?

And so, although this woman may not have known Christ before this. He had begun a ministry to the lost in various ways according to prophecies in scripture, proving that he is the Messiah. A bunch more prophetic verses in Isaiah 9, 2. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined.

Okay, this is us. We've got to see this. We can't miss this. We can't sleep through this. We can't skip over this.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. I walked in darkness. I'm getting worked up here. I'm sorry. I've walked in darkness.

He pulled me from the darkness. He shined me with light. Those who dwelt In the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined. Jesus Christ came. We have Christ.

Psalm 78, 2. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old. His performance of miracles. Isaiah 35, 5, and 6.

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing, for waters shall burst forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert." He does talk about water again. This is the work of Christ, His promised resurrection of all the dead. Isaiah 26, 19. Your dead shall live.

Together with My dead body, they shall arise. Awake and sing. You who dwell in dust, for your dew is like the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead." Praise the Lord, right? That's our resurrection. Because He lives, we live.

This is just the greatest news. And this is what this woman has now. So now this woman was faced with the truth. She just had revealed to her What would she do with it now? What would she believe that Jesus is Messiah?

And I already kind of gave that away, but the third point is the expected Messiah believed. Verse 27, she says, "...And at this point, his disciples came and they marveled that he talked with the woman, yet no one said to her, what do you seek or why are you talking to her? The woman then left her water pot, went her way into the city and said to the man, come see a man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ? See, following up this quick discourse with His disciples and their disbelief that Jesus is speaking to a Samaritan woman.

They only marveled at this scene. You notice they only marveled. They didn't say, hey kids, get away from Him. He's busy. They didn't cut in and push her away at this scene.

They only marveled at that scene, but it didn't occur to them to question him. They did not question Him. They were beginning to know Him better and concluded that no matter how surprising His actions were, that they were not to question Him. That no matter what He did, that He was the Christ. And they could not question that.

You know where I'm going with that, don't you? Boy, could we learn from that, right? We could really learn from that. And so, this trust that they had in Christ, it just came because they spent time with Him. Because they knew Him.

They were intimate with Jesus Christ. And they knew this. And so, again, with us, do we spend time with Jesus? Do we know Christ? Can we say that we do?

Where are we with this? Do we spend enough time with Jesus that when something happens in our life, we go, you're up to something, thank you Lord. I'll just believe and trust in you. Romans 8.28, right? Do we do this?

Can we say that we do? See, we've taken a great step to real discipleship when we can say, when we can learn to say, it's not for me to question Jesus. It's not for me to question Jesus. It's not for me to question His will, His demands on my life, His revelations to me, but to trust Him and to obey Him. This is an example we're giving in here.

And this is a nice little reality check for us, I believe. In verses 28 and 29, she went out and she told right away. Matthew Henry says in here, he says, she who went for a specimen of impurity returns a teacher of evangelical truth. She went out of the town a specimen of filth and of ill repute, and she comes back to the town on fire. Why?

She met Jesus. She met Jesus. See, this is the right response of one who meets Jesus. You meet Him, you go back on fire. Everybody wants to know.

And so as the Samaritan woman goes, she leaves her water pot. She leaves the water pot. And it goes on to say that. She left her water pot. Well, who cares?

You know what? This is relevant too. This is relevant too. Maybe out of excitement. She just ran.

I've done that. Just forget things out of excitement. Maybe she left the water pot for Christ so he could have a drink while he ate the food that the disciples brought back. And maybe she knows that she'll be right back. And this is what I think it is.

I think she knew that she'd be right back there. And she didn't want to carry a water pot to slow her down on her mission to go and tell those men what just happened to her. She did not want anything to slow her down. When we go and give the name of the Gospel of Christ, we can't ill afford to entangle ourselves with the cares of this world, with the desires of ourselves, with the things that are going on around us. The first thing's first.

We go and we take care of business. We don't carry a water pot around. It would slow her down. She could not afford that. And that's the same thing with us.

John 6.29, Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God that you believe in Him who He sent. This is what believing looks like. You could say, I believe, but if it doesn't look like this, you don't believe. Even when the disciples were made fishers of man, remember, hey, follow me. Okay, drop the nets, drop the hook, drop the fish and pull.

It's what you got, bye bye. They followed him, They left everything and they followed Him. They forsook all. People brought to the knowledge of Christ that trust in Him will have an urgency to tell other people. And it just looks different than what this world.

They need to tell other people about Him and also show it by a holy hatred or a holy contempt of their sin and the things that are of this world, any of this stuff that separates them from the Christ of their salvation. They can't handle it. Colossians 3, 1-3. If then you are raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth, For you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God." See, your life is hidden with Christ in God.

It doesn't look like it used to. It looks drastically different. See, this woman's actions in forsaking everything else, even what she originally came to do at the well was proof of her belief in Christ. It was proof that she was changed. And that she believed that Christ was who he claimed to be.

See, if you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, it will change your life. This is what it looks like. And her going back to the same town, where she had a horrible reputation as a woman boldly spoke to the men about Jesus testifying of him as the Christ. And my first question was, who did she talk to? Because it just says The men, the men.

And the last time that in this text that it was talked about, the men would have to refer to her former husbands, five of them, and the one that she's living with. That's six people, right? But she knew that her testimony, that her life had to talk to them first. She knew that she needed to make that right first. She goes back to town.

I believe she talked with these men and said, I did it wrong. I sinned. I met the Christ. He told me everything that I've ever done. Come and meet Jesus." Her first priority was the lives that she affected.

Now probably a good portion of the town of Sychar came out to see Jesus. But this is an interesting situation here. So when we go to give the name of the Gospel of Christ, it is to those who I believe we've affected the most in the past. When I got saved, I went to my family and I told them about it. They thought I was on drugs or something.

They thought I was crazy. I said, I met Jesus. You need to meet Jesus. They couldn't believe the change. But It was what Christ did in me, and I couldn't keep it back.

This woman's actions just speak for themselves. So the old us would hide our past. So I spent years hiding my past and things that I'd done in a way that denies it for the sake of shame, right? The redeemed person, one who has had Christ revealed to them, have immediately lost the care for their personal image. For their personal image.

And they can see nothing but the immediate need to share this good news for the glory of God, unto His glory, and not our glory. And so 2 Corinthians 5 17 talks about us being a new creation. And these Christian life is built on twin pillars, right? We don't stand alone, but Christian life is built on twin pillars. And that is to know Christ and to make Him known.

That's the simple way to say it. To discover Christ and to communicate Him with other people. This is the twin pillars of Christian faith. First, to find life in His love and the forgiveness and in the grace and in the mercy of Jesus, and then to tell other people about it. To share His Gospel so that many more can have eternal life.

So these are the two great steps of the Christian life. And so, it reminds me of a man who found a treasure in a field and he went and he sold everything that he had. And he went and he bought that field because it was worth it. That's the Christian who finds Christ. You get rid of everything else.

You found what you want. That's the very definition of the Christian faith. You find it, you share it. And this very desire to share with others what Christ has done in us will kill. It'll get rid of all those feelings of shame.

It'll kill that shyness that you have for witnessing to other people. And this Samaritan woman had avoided her neighbors. They avoided her. And now there she is back in town in their faces. I have met the Christ!

He's out here! Come and see Him! The town goes out to see Him and we'll get into that next week. But she has boldness to share her new life with other people. And so does this look like our lives when we get saved?

And the question I have in closing today is Can we be shaken up today? Can we take this Word of God and what we heard today and allow it just to shake us up? Grab you by the shoulders and just give you a good shake. Wake us up! Can we do that?

This is after all the power of Christ in us. Can we be shaken up today by the Word to see what Christ has done for us? This is the power. This is salvation in Christ. And again, we're given this time here.

We've got this brief time. Let's get this right, and if we're going to get it right, let's do it today. Let's not put this off anymore. Acts 1-8, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth." That's what it looks like. So, if this disgraceful woman of ill repute and social outcast can be Jesus' mouthpiece, If Jesus can use a donkey, all the sinners that Jesus used through the Scriptures, All the people that he used throughout history, and I stand before you as a testimony that he can use a jackass.

And If He can use that, He can use you. We have no excuse. Lord, this morning we thank You for Your Word. Father, I pray for it to work in our hearts today, Lord God. As we worship you, Lord God, that we learned about last week, help us, Father God.

Move in our hearts and our lives. Convict us, Father God, of that sin in our lives that separates us from You. We might want to walk closer to You, Lord. Nearer, nearer, blessed Lord. I just pray, Father God, that this would be the desire of our hearts this morning.

I pray in Jesus' name, Amen. Have the Lord's Supper this morning. Amen. As we begin with that, I want to share a verse with you that has been on my heart and on my mind since we've been doing the Lord's Supper. And I have mentioned it a few times.

And it is First Corinthians.