Okay, I wanna say hello to those of you who are in overflow in the hub at Fenton Mid Rivers Grants Trail here watching us online. Uh, Google will let you know what the top queries are, what the top questions are each year. And so a little bit of an update that like, uh, we're already deep into 2025. Here is the, like, what do you think? I want you to just turn to each other. What do you think the top question that is faith related, that gets typed into Google? Like, what's the top faith related question that Google has, has heard since 2025 again? So just turn to each other real quickly. Give a quick answer. We'll come back in just a second. Okay. Alright. So, Uh, what do you think? Here, let's just do this. What do you think the number one question was? Here it is. You ready? Is there a God? And you're like, oh man, that, that, that was that. That was it. Yeah, I was, now, if you keep reading what the other questions are, it's really interesting. One, uh, article talked about, if you just kind of start to look at this, it isn't that people are believing less. In fact, what we're seeing is that nationwide, at least here in the US there, younger people are, are believing that there is a God. There. There's an underlying thing though, and it's this, it really is like, does any of this matter? Like does, here's a new splash for you. The world is a little unsettling and chaotic and unpredictable, and what people are saying is like, I need, I need some, I listen. I'm gonna need more than the feels and the vibes and the memes and the empty promises. I'm gonna need something solid, something I can stand on, or better yet, someone I can trust in. You see, someone who notices me, someone who cares about me. Is there a God interesting way to say it, who remembers me, who like sees what I'm going through? This is the fundamental question. It's not, you don't have to to ask, uh, Google or YouTube or your favorite AI tool that it is the fundamental question of humanity. And you see it all through the scriptures. I mean, really, one of the ways that, that you could talk about it is it's like, do I matter to God? I mean, in the scriptures, it really does come back to this word. Remember, sometimes it's interesting in the Hebrew scriptures, you'll hear like Hannah in her grief, remember me? Oh God. You'll hear Moses say, remember your promise. God remember us. Remember, remember, it's, it's, it's a God, please. And then you get to a guy like David. And when David looks at creation and the, the, the, the, the suggestion that there is a creator who did all of this. When I look and see that all, all that you have done, David puts it like this in, uh, in Psalm eight. He says, what is mankind? That you are mindful of them and human beings that you care for them. The Hebrew word, therefore mindful is an interesting word. Uh, it's the word Zaha. Let me hear you. In fact, turn to your neighbor and say, Zaha, you didn't do it. Go ahead, give it a little, okay? Now turn back to your neighbor and apologize. Zaha zhe, it means to be mindful. It means to have someone in your thoughts. It also means to remember, you see, what David is asking is God, like I look at all of this. Like, who, who am I that you would remember me, that you would pay attention to me, that you would care for me? It's the fundamental question of humanity. God. Like if you're real, do I matter to you? And of course, the answer around here is, yes. Yes. Thank you, David. It's yes, yes, a thousand times. Yes, the scriptures tell us that we matter to God. For God so loved the world that he actually gives his one and only son to walk among us as one of us to make a way for a sinful people to come back home. That's the gospel in a nutshell, right there. That's it. You see one John three, one puts it this way, behold, behold, uh, let me translate that for you. It means pay attention. Y'all. Behold what matter of love the Father has given to us that we may be called the children of God. It all points back to a person you wanna know whether we matter to God, pay attention to Jesus. Now, let's pray and we're gonna jump in. Father, we come before you. Our thoughts are stirred. Some of us already have questions. Some of us, uh, Lord, we're excited about this season. Uh, some of us are going through personal things right now that are making it difficult for us to even hear your word. But Lord, speak loudly, softly, Lord, whatever it takes for us to hear you today, as we open your word, we ask this now in Jesus' name, amen. Luke 22 is where we're gonna pick this thing up. If you've been with us, you know, but if you haven't been, we're going through that week called Holy week or Passion Week, and we're taking it a day at a time. Well, today is Thursday. We're getting there, folks. But let's now look at this and, and this is a pretty long passage of scripture, but I want you to see if you don't notice some things here, uh, just see if you don't notice some things here. Then came the day of unleavened bread, which is how we know that it's Thursday when you put all the details together on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed, this would happen at the temple in Jerusalem. Jesus sent Peter and John, those are disciples saying, go and make preparations for us to eat the Passover. Where do you want us to prepare for it? They asked. He replied, as you enter the city, a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Now, this already starts to sound kind of like, you know, cloak and dagger. Jesus is kind of making some, some plans here. And this, this man carrying a jar of water. I just will tell you, in the ancient world as it is in many parts of the world today, you just don't see men carrying jars of water. This is what you see women doing. So he's already gonna stand out from the crowd and Jesus says, uh, follow him to the house that he enters and say to the owner of the house, the teacher asks, where is the guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples? He will show you a large room upstairs, all furnished, make preparations there. They left and found things just as Jesus had told them. So they prepared the Passover. You see, one of the things that I notice here is that it seems as if Jesus is preparing this and kind of doing it secretly. Do you feel that He's not telling the rest of the disciples? He's telling these two. Why would he do that? Why all the clandestine stuff? Well, Matthew tells us that Judas has already made arrangements to betray Jesus. So it's quite possible that part of what he's doing is keeping the disciples in the dark until it's too late for Judas to realize where they're meeting so that he can tell the authorities why. Because Jesus wants time with these disciples on Thursday. Now they get to this upper room, upper room. What does that mean? This would've been a guest room on top of a flat roofed home there in Jerusalem. More than likely, this is a little bit of a larger home. This begins to suggest someone who has some means. We don't know who this is, we don't know who this is. There are some who love to kind of connect the dots. And like one of them, for instance, in Acts 12, you see that the early church met in what appears to be a, a large enough place for people to be in a guest room together. This is Mary, the mother of John Mark. He's the guy who writes the Gospel of Mark. And there are some people who think, ah, this might be where they are, but we don't know. But when the disciples get there, they see that everything's already been laid out. The furnishings are there, the couches, the tables, the food, it's all there. They had to have been surprised when they walk into this room. But you see, Jesus is going out of his way to to, to, uh, to prepare these people for something. He's going out of his way to communicate some things to them because they're gonna share the Passover meal now. And against that, that historic meal, he's gonna explain to them even more of the outrageous plan of God. They are now going to experience what we call the Last Supper. And every time I say Last Supper, an image drops into your head, right? Everybody's like, oh yeah, I know what that looks like. But let me tell you, there were so many different paintings throughout the centuries of the last Supper depicting it. So just take a look at, at some of these. And what I'd love for you to do is to just lean over to your friends and, uh, tell 'em what you notice about these. So go ahead, we're gonna show the first one. Tell some folks around you. Now, I don't know about you, but there are a couple of things that I'm noticing here. This guy looks like he's passed out. And then remember, this is a Jewish meal. Why are they serving a roast pig? See, I don't understand that. All right, look at the next one. See if you notice anything on this one. Go ahead, talk to each other. What are you noticing? There's some very interesting things there. Do you see anything? Yeah. So the eyebrows, right? How about this? Did anyone else know that five of the disciples were a set of quintuplets? Now, you know, here's another one. I love this one. This is just a beautiful, beautiful etching. It really is. But I don't know that this is the last supper as much as it's the last fast. 'cause I don't see any food on that table. Okay? And then this one, this one I love for so many different reasons. Uh, this is, uh, uh, the, uh, um, let's see. I'm not getting that one, so I'll just show it to you. Uh, so when you're looking at this, it's, it's the outdoor, uh, it last supper. It's in the backyard. They're on a picnic table. Uh, they're under a gazebo. Do y'all see the, the halo thingies? Do you see those? Do you know what that's called? A nimbus. A nimbus. That's what it's called. Anybody notice anything about these halos? The guys on this side of the table did not assemble their nimbus correctly. I feel so bad for this guy right here. It's like, oh man, I'm not gonna be able to see anybody. I can't talk to anybody. Okay, how about this one? How about this one? Uh, when you look at this next one, uh, part of what I'm noticing here is that, uh, uh, the last supper consists of donuts and iced tea. So it's just, okay, all right. And you guys are going, man, you're being silly. This is a really important meal, Greg. I know what the last supper looked like. It looked like this. And so you begin to go, oh yeah, that's the one, right? That's the one. That's what the last supper looked like. Not exactly, even this one has problems with it. So I showed you all of these images to now tell you put those images out of your head, okay? And you're like, well, then why did you show them to me? I don't know. But just put those images out of your head. We don't know fully what it looked like, but we're gonna use the scriptures now in just a touch of history and see if we can begin to imagine just a little bit of this. So it's an upper room, it's a guest room. More than likely there's a, a low lying table, maybe some pillows for them to kind of lean against. The meal is now assembled. They're there together. But I want you to understand that we'll go back to the scriptures because Jesus is constantly connecting himself to the Hebrew scriptures. In the Sermon on the Mount, he says in Matthew five, I didn't come to blow the scriptures up. I didn't come to abolish the law and the prophets. That's his way of talking about the, what we would call the Old Testament, the Hebrew scriptures. I came to fulfill them. I came to make them live. I came to make them sing. I'm the completion of the scriptures. If you think about the story that we see from Genesis all the way through to Malachi, it is, man, it's a ride. And it's kind of hard to where are we in the story and all of that. Philip Yancy, an author, says, uh, what did God have in mind through this convoluted story of the Hebrew people that we call the Old Testament? And then he answers his own question. He says, Jesus is what God had in mind. You see, I want you to understand that the scriptures always point to Jesus, always. And this story of the Last Supper is cemented to the story of the Exodus because we're gonna talk about the Passover. Now, there'll be a couple of things here today that will come up that we will celebrate in full next week when we talk about the bread and the cup. I want you to know we are going to celebrate communion next week. Listen to me next week is going to be such an important week for us to prepare for Easter. I cannot overstate how poignantly, how powerfully we will experience communion together. You know how we've been saying, come to church, invite a friend, take the next step. Next week is a perfect example. There are people in your life who need to remember what we're going to experience next week. But this week, this week, let's at least look at a couple of things. So we know that Jesus is going to lead them through this meal. And it begins at sundown. Now, in Jerusalem, in that day, there would've been a couple of ways that you knew that it was sundown. Nobody had an iPhone. Nobody had like a, you know, a watch. The ancient historians tell us that you knew that night had come when you saw the first three stars in the nighttime sky. So just imagine an ancient way of doing this if you're in the city. Josephus, a historian of that day, said that trumpets were blown, not the shofar that some of us are thinking of, but these trumpets that are described. So I want you to imagine now maybe in the upper part of the city, in an undisclosed location, Jesus has gathered with his disciples. Night is beginning to fall someplace. Often the distance you hear these trumpets blowing, signifying that the sacrifices are complete. And we are now moving into Passover. Jesus looks around the table at these men. Just imagine this. Jesus looks around the table and he says, I have longed, I have eagerly desired to share this meal, the Passover with you before I suffer. Did you hear it? I have eagerly I I've been looking forward to this moment before I suffer in the rest of their time together in the upper room. Jesus is going to feel both of these things. I'm so thrilled to be with you. And I know what's coming. John says in his gospel, Jesus knew the hour had come. Jesus knew it was time. And then he completes that verse by saying, and he loved them to the end. Now, when you look at it in the Greek, people will say, well, to the end means that he loved them fully. And other people will say no. It means that he loved them to the end of his life. I think it's both, don't you? When you are saying goodbye to someone now, it could be when you're saying goodbye to someone, uh, and they're, they're going on a long trip. It could be, uh, it's, it's, it's somebody that you haven't seen in a while and they're going back home. It could be that it's someone that honestly, you don't know if you'll see 'em again 'cause you just don't know. Or maybe you do know. 'cause some of you have been at that place beside that bed in that moment, and you're saying goodbye. Out of all of the things that you want to tell them, out of all of the ways that you want to thank them, out of all of the ways that you wanna reminisce and connect dots, what's the one thing you want them to hear? I love you. I love you. I want you to remember now in this meal, in this place above everything else that Jesus is saying, he keeps saying, y'all, don't forget how much I love you. I love you. And I'm now gonna show you something that's about to happen, that's gonna bring, it's gonna bring hope. It's gonna bring, uh, relief. It's gonna bring forgiveness. It's gonna bring freedom. There. It is freedom. That's what connects to the Passover. You see the story of the Passover in quick review is that moment when the children of Israel are in slavery in Egypt, they've been there for centuries, and it says that they cried out to God. And God remembered Zaire. God remembered his promise to them. And God sends this fellow named Moses to the most powerful man on the planet, the Pharaoh of Egypt, and says, let my people go. We all know this part of the story. And there is a back and forth, and there is this cataclysmic battle and these plagues, we call them, that keep descending on Egypt because the of their horrendous and evil treatment of the Israelites. But Pharaoh won't budge. And then the final, final horrible, terrible plague that we can't even imagine that will be now experienced by those who keep rebelling against God. And he says to his people through Moses, to not experience that you select a spotless lamb on the 10th day of the month, and on the 14th day of the month, you're gonna sacrifice it and you're gonna roast the lamb. You're going to eat it whole. You're gonna eat all of it. You're gonna take the blood that resulted from that sacrifice, and you're gonna put it on the doorposts and the top of your door. And on that night, when judgment descends on those who repel against me, judgment will pass over you. That's where we get the term. You see, this is what happened on that night that is different from all other nights. But make no mistake, a lamb died and this is what they celebrate. And in fact, God said after this happened and the people are free, God says, you can never forget this. He says, remember, each year, each year from generation to generation, you must celebrate this as a special feast to the Lord. And then there are these items at the meal in the first century, it would've been, uh, bitter herbs and unleavened bread and wine. And it would've been a, a lamb, a, a, a select lamb spotless, lamb roasted whole, because there was still a temple where this lamb could have been sacrificed. Now, you need to know things have changed in modern Passovers because there is no longer a temple. You don't have a, a whole roasted lamb at the meal. You have a shank bone of a lamb or sometimes another animal bone that sits there on the, on the symbolic plate. You'll have a few other things that have been added in there. But they all point to this story, this dramatic rescue. I want you to remember that this is the story that Jesus is leading them through in the, in the, in this moment. And it all sounds very vivid. And, and, and you, you can just imagine the whole thing. You're like, man, that's cool, except for the blood. Can we just say that for those of you who are early in your spiritual journey, this is gonna trip you up. It's gonna sound barbaric. It's gonna sound primitive. For those of you who have been around this for a while, you're like, yeah, this is the part that I'm uncomfortable with. Like, why did God need blood on a door anyway? Well, let me help you with this. I don't think God needed blood on a door. He's God, right? He knows who's inside each of those homes. He knows who trusts him and who doesn't trust him. Go back to Exodus 12, and I think it could help us. It says, the blood will be a sign for who for you on the houses where you are. You see, this is for the people. It's a way for them to tangibly express something that is going on inside of them, their trust, their belief. It's teaching these people these rough around the edges. People, by the way, are we any different? But he's teaching them about sacrifice. He's teaching them how much this is going to cost them, how much it's gonna cost him to ultimately make things right. You see, from the very beginning, God, God wasn't interested in religion or mere rituals. God was always interested on the heart. You see this in the Hebrew scriptures. You see it at the end of the New Testament when the writer of Hebrews says, you know, it's, it's, it's not about the blood of bulls and goats. It's impossible for that to take away sins. That has never been the suggestion of the Bible. It's about trusting him. It's about trusting what he's going to do. It's about trusting what he says about holiness and about this thing we call sin that destroys the relationship between us. You go all the way back, the rebellion and every rebellion since then, it, it, it, it, it tears apart this relationship, it destroys our relationships with each other. It destroys us. And God said, there is coming a day when I'm gonna make it right. I'm gonna make it right, because you can't afford to pay this price. This is all pointing to the day when God says, I will step in and I will atone for sin, and I will pay the consequence. I will pay the price. Because if you stand before me one day and have to give an account for your life on your own, it's too much for you. This is where it is all heading. And Jesus is beginning to try to connect these dots and they're about to miss it. Like they're about you Ever missed? Like, has greatness, beauty something really, really good? Has it ever been like in your midst, sitting right in front of you and you missed it? Like it could have just been something really beautiful happening, uh, with a friend. It could have been something that was happening in the life of, of, of your family. It could have been something that you just saw. It's like, oh, wow, that's so, and you missed it. What is it that keeps us from noticing greatness, beauty, uh, goodness. That's like right in front of us. I want you to talk to each other real quickly. What is it that keeps us from noticing greatness in our midst? Go ahead. Talk to each other. What is it that distracts us? Go ahead. Okay, just real quickly here, I know you guys at the sites are gonna have very similar answers. Like anybody, what, what keeps us from noticing greatness in our midst? Pride. Pride. Okay. Who said that? I mean, just where, okay. I thought it was coming from some, yeah. All right. Pride. So, so it's a little bit of, and I don't want to put in your answer, but somebody last night was, it was almost like a little bit of an insecurity of I don't, I don't like that. You're great. And maybe I'm not. Yeah. Okay. All right. I'm getting a nod up there. So I think we're connecting anybody here. Like, what is it? Say it again. Busyness. Busyness. I'm just going, and I don't even take the time to, to to pay attention. Anybody over here in this section? Te Ooh, technology. I heard that one. Say more or just text me. No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Say more. I, I don't know where you were. Someplace up there. Well, hang on. I wanna hear just a teen, a teeny bit more about, about technology. Okay, that's a great answer. And then, and then ego. So that probably connects to this pride business, right? Okay, so yes sir. I'm Not worried. I was raising five kids and I was so concerned about getting them to the end of the journey. I Missed a lot of the, oh wow. Well, way to get real. How about worry? I was so busy raising a house full of kids and trying to get them further on their journey that I probably missed some moments myself. So if we start to put all of this together, what we get is minus the technology part, okay? So that's a 21st century struggle. But some of this I'll bet we can put to a, to a first century sort of a context. There is worry, there's agenda, there's me, ego, pride that's gonna come up. Busyness, I got all of these things. Alright, so, so, uh, Joshua Bell is one of the world's foremost violinists, okay? Now, he did an experiment almost 20 years ago, long before Jimmy Fallon and everybody else did their version of it. This was kind of one of the original versions of this, okay? Which explains the quality or lack thereof of the video I'm about to show you. It almost looks like a, a security camp, but you'll get the point. He's one of the foremost violinists in the world. He puts a cap on, doesn't look anything like he does when he's in these concerts. Takes his very expensive Stradivari violin sets up in a subway station in Washington dc He starts at 7:51 AM we're told that some of the pieces that he played were some of the most difficult pieces any violinist could ever play. So again, you can see he's off here to the left playing. People are walking in. Now, we're just gonna speed up the, the the people. We're not gonna speed up what he's playing, he's playing this in real time. But I want you to just get a sense of the people that are now coming through and notice what their reaction to him is. You got one guy that paid attention for a minute. This experiment. What lasted 45 minutes? I think it was over a thousand people were counted going through the station in that moment. Now, watch what happens. Finally, finally, one person, no matter what everybody else was doing, one person by the way, he picked up $32. I think it was in his, uh, very expensive violin case. Now, listen to what she says. She knew who he was. Out over a thousand people, one person recognized the greatness. Now you're going, well, I don't like classical music. I wouldn't have done that. I, I don't, I wouldn't be able to pick a virtuoso outta the crowd ever. No. But if you were walking through, do you think you could have ease? Maybe just slowed down for a second, maybe just taken a little bit of your agenda away and just go, oh, I don't know, classical music, but that's good. What is it that gets in the way of us noticing greatness in our midst? Let's make it more specific. What is it that gets in the way of us noticing the greatness of Jesus in our midst? You see, there's a, there's a thing that's happening with these disciples as Jesus is trying to, to, to teach them. And he, and he's, and he's trying to, to help them. And they're just not listening. They're just not paying attention. They're in the middle of this meal and they have an argument about pride, ego. They have an argument about who's the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. They've had this argument before, but they're having it now. Now, nobody's paying attention to the look on Jesus' face. Nobody hears the heartache in his voice. Nobody is one author says, notices the deepening layers of sadness that are crushing his soul. Nobody even cares about that. They're having an argument about who's best. And Jesus in this part of the meal gets up from the table. You know this story, I just want you to have the context. Jesus gets up and the middle of this thing, and Jesus puts a towel around him and Jesus pours water. And Jesus begins to kneel down and to wash the feet of every one of those arguing disciples. Gang, they should have already taken care of this, but there was no one there to serve them. And the task was beneath them. They weren't gonna wash their own feet, much less another disciple's feet. And Jesus, the king of glory, the one that we sing about, the one that we worship, the one whose name is above all other names, Jesus gets on his knees and washes their feet. It's an objectless in humility, in in true leadership. There's a spiritual lesson here about how Jesus wants to cleanse all of us if we are willing. But I also think it is a bold act of love. I think Jesus, even in this moment, is saying, I love y'all now. You gotta love each other this way. That's exactly what he says right after this is over. But now let's keep it all in context. John and his gospel says, when Jesus is washing their feet, Judas is still at the table. How much does my king love? He's not just washing the feet of a couple of difficult disciples. He's washing the feet of the betrayer. He knows who he is. The meal now reconvenes. And here Jesus says, uh, there's a traitor at the table. Kicks off a whole conversation. Wait, who is it? Me? All of those things. Jesus kind of subtly to one of the disciples says, you'll know who it is. He dips bread into the, into, into the bowl and hands it to Judas and essentially says, now you gotta go do whatever it is that you're gonna do. I can't even, I can't even hardly imagine what that looked like when Jesus looked at Judas. It's a look that had to have broken the heart of heaven, even if it did nothing for this betrayer who we're told had already given into the evil one. But now he's gone. He's he, he leaves the table. Some of them think it's one thing. Some of 'em think it's another. They're all kind of unsettled and still, you know, a little confused. And Jesus knows that now, and you've heard me say this before, they're now on the clock. You see, it's only a matter of time. Jesus knows that Judas will find them again later that evening, and he'll bring the mob and it will all begin to unravel. Jesus knows it's only a matter of time, but he's got things he needs to say to them. So they continue the meal together, they continue this story of a Passover lamb. And let's remember the lamb died. That's the point of Passover. But Jesus wants them to know something else. You see, it's at this point in the meal where Jesus begins to tell them, there will be no more lambs that die. Jesus says, soon there will be no more sacrifices made. There will be no more blood that is shed. Why? Because this time God is going to provide the lamb and that'll be it. That's essentially what he's trying to teach them here. He pours meaning into the unleavened bread. He says, this is my body, which is for you, fellas. I'm doing this for you. And then after the meal, he pours the cup and, and connects it symbolically to his blood. He said, this is my life, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sin. Do you know what he's doing here? He's connecting himself to the Passover lamb. He's saying to these men who are trying to keep up guys, it's me. It has always pointed to me. I am now about to, to lay down my life. I am now about to be the sacrifice that changes everything. It has all pointed to me. And even if they were only beginning to understand it in the coming hours and days and weeks looking back, it all begins to make sense. He did this for me. He did this for my forgiveness. He did this for my life. He did this to change my standing before a holy God. You see on that first Passover, people weren't, uh, protected from judgment because they were worthy of anything. It's because they trusted God. But make no mistake, a lamb died. A spotless lamb died. And I know again, that's difficult, but it's nothing in comparison to what happened on that Friday. I want you to understand on that Friday justice, because God will not be mocked. If, if life's gonna have any meaning at all, then God's gonna have to deal with what's happened in this world. But justice intersects with God's love at the cross. And God says in that moment, I will pay the price so that you don't have to. And it all comes back to this lamb. Now, if you go back through the story of scripture, part of what you will see is that all the way back to the exodus, there is this lamb. And then centuries later, there's a prophet named Isaiah. And Isaiah sees things even more clearly, uh, than, than perhaps Moses did because he, he predicts that there is one who will be crushed and bruised and pierced for our sins. His punishment will bring us peace. His wounds will bring us healing. God will lay on him the sin of us all. And here it is, he will be led like a lamb to the slaughter. Isaiah saw it, and then centuries after that, there's a fellow named John the Baptist, and he sees Jesus walking among them and says, here's that word again. Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. And then later looking back, a fellow named Paul says, he is our Passover lamb. And then we get all the way to the end of the Bible where we read what we started with today in the Book of Revelation where John says, there is a worship service going on and people are saying singing, crying out worthy is the lamb who was slain. You see, I just want you to understand that all the way through scriptures, there is a thread that is woven, and it often comes back to this idea of a lamb. And just so we're clear that lamb is Jesus, the son of God. See, it's all gonna become clear on this fateful Friday. God is gonna provide the lamb and that'll be it. And this lamb is like no other. He's blameless. He's fully God. He's fully man, and he can pay the price. But that's Friday. And this is Thursday. So let me ask you just as a little bit of a quiz, what is the Hebrew word for remember? Yeah, that's what I thought. What is the funny thing that in the painting that's called the Halo? Yeah, a few of us might have forgotten it. Gang, we're not very good at remembering things. Even when somebody says, Hey, y'all remember this. Hey, y'all, remember this. If you want to know what Thursday was about, Jesus, above everything else is saying, I want you to remember I love you. Now, I promise you, Thursday's not even over. We don't even have time to go over it. If you wanna read John 14 through 17, those chapters, you will see what Jesus packs into this moment before everything falls apart. And if you read those chapters, you will see and hear words that are so familiar to you. And you're gonna go, wait. He said all of that in that period of time, when the clock is ticking, he, this is where he says, listen, there's gonna be trouble, but take heart. 'cause I've overcome the world. This is where he says, I'm not gonna leave you as orphans. I'm sending the Holy Spirit. This is where he says, I love you as a friend and I'm gonna lay down my life for you. This is where he said it's gonna get really bad, but after that, there will be joy. This is where he tells people, you're gonna fall apart as the world falls apart around you. But I'm not gonna leave you alone over and over and over. Abide in me, believe in me. I am the way, the truth and the life. It's all there. But you know what the theme is? You could pick up on the urgency. You could pick up on the sadness. You could pick up on the truth that he's dropping on them. But the big theme is this, gang, I love you. Please, as everything now falls apart, please remember I love you. So one more time, do we matter to God? Yes. A thousand times, yes. Will you now let this settle into the, to the broken places of your life? Will you let this settle into the tired parts of your heart? Will you let this bring joy and energy and purpose and hope because you are loved with an everlasting love? I want us, as we go into these next couple of weeks, let's just be a people who love boldly. Let's love generously and graciously and courageously, not because we feel like it. 'cause you know what? Sometimes we're not gonna feel like it. Let's not do it because we've been forced into it because that isn't love. Let's do it because we begin to actually believe that we are the beloved. And if you don't know what that is and you want to experience Jesus for yourself, then come talk to us now. And if you're online, then let us know and let these pastors know, because this is when everything changes. I hope that you all, and I hope that you all will come back next week, but in the meantime, let's remind each other. Let's remind the world. Let's remind ourselves that we are the beloved. Amen. Amen.