Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church

Guest (Male): You are now listening to an inspirational message from Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, where Dr. Michael W. Wesley Sr. is the pastor. Please join the service in progress.

Dr. Michael W. Wesley Sr.: No greater love than the love that God has for us. He demonstrated that love for us by giving his life on Calvary's cross. My question this morning is going to be different than his love for us. My question is going to be, "What about our love for him?"

Pray with me now as we ready our hearts. Father, thank you for loving us and showing us how much you love us by going to the cross, paying for our sin debt, being raised the third day, giving us life physically, life eternal, giving us the provisions that we need. We pray now that you would open as we open the word, that you would help us to examine our own hearts, that you would speak to us and through us in this moment of sharing. Bless now the words in our mouth and the meditations on our heart, that they may be acceptable in your sight. Oh Lord, our strength and our redeemer. Speak, Lord, your servants are listening. With you there is a word; without you there is no word. Guide us and direct us in the truth. In Jesus' name, amen.

I love worship. I do. I love the prolonged worship, but I also be looking at that clock. I know that we got Sunday school to follow and other things to do, so I have to move the service along. So forgive me for the felt rush. Open your Bibles this morning with me to the gospel as it relates to John, the 21st chapter. John's Gospel, chapter 21. That would be the last chapter of the Gospel of John. I want to pick up the reading at verse 15 and going through verse 23. I think you know the text, know the place, but I want us to hear what the Word of God says.

So when they had dined, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?" He said unto him, "Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee." He said unto him, "Feed my lambs." He said unto him again the second time, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?" He said unto him, "Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee." He said unto him, "Feed my sheep."

He said unto him the third time, "Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?" Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, "Lovest thou me?" And he said unto him, "Lord, thou knowest all things. Thou knowest that I love thee." Jesus said unto him, "Feed my sheep. Verily, verily, I say unto you, when thou wast young, thou girdest thyself and walkedst whither thou wouldest. But when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldest not." This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he said unto him, "Follow me."

Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following, which also leaned on his breast at supper and said, "Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee?" Peter, seeing him, saith to Jesus, "Lord, what shall this man do?" And Jesus said unto him, "If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me." Then went this saying abroad among the brethren that that disciple should not die. Yet Jesus said not unto him, "He shall not die," but, "If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?" This is the word of God for the people of God.

I want to preach from the question today, "Do you love me?" Do you love me? And in particular, I want to put your name there. I'm going to put Peter's name there. Do you love me, Peter? Do you love me, Michael? Do you love me, whatever your name is? That's a great question, isn't it? And I'm sure yesterday being what it was, Valentine's Day, that question came up. Or if not the question, the thought of it. Do you love me? Somebody asked that question. Somebody felt it. Somebody may have even discussed it.

People can say a lot of things. How many know that words can be empty? People can bring candy, they can bring flowers, they can bring gifts, and they can say, "Don't you see this? I love you." But those things can be very empty. A lot of poetry was read, a lot of poems were written, a lot of songs were sung. I remember back in the day when they were singing songs. You go to a party, they put the right song on, you could get a girlfriend. They put another song on, you could lose one too.

So I'm just talking about empty words. How can you tell even today, ladies and gentlemen, that words can be empty? I'll tell you a few things. One, people say things, but then they don't do anything. That's just a talker. There are people who show you a lot, shower you with a lot of affection in public, but then one on one, they got nothing to say. Or people who have empty words, they disappear when you need some support. Somebody knows what I'm saying. Or when you want to discuss something that's serious, then they deflect the serious discussion and make it light, make jokes out of it. Or people who over-promise and yet under-deliver.

Then there are people who pull away when you set boundaries, when you say, "This is what this needs to look like and this is what this needs to be." Then folks start putting up that Baptist finger and getting out of there. Those are examples of people who just speak words. They can say, "I love you." But when it comes time, they don't do anything. The words are just empty.

So what then is the opposite of that? What are the actions that necessarily show you in a relationship that someone is serious and do have love? First and foremost, they create safety. Every relationship needs safety. What does safety look like? It's those periodic check-ins just to touch bases, to make sure that you're alright, that I know that you're alright, that I'm thinking about you, whatever it might be. Those check-ins help people to feel safe and secure.

Mutual respect. I can't tell you enough how today's society gets torn up and how relationships get torn up because people don't want to demonstrate respect. Respect needs to go both sides now because it's no fun if you're giving all the respect and no one is respecting you back. It's got to be both and. And if the relationship is going to last a long time, then there needs to be some levels of curiosity where we are always willing to discover new things about one another.

When you first in a relationship, people always put on their best front. And there are some hidden things that you don't know. Over time, you begin to discover what's really there and who they really are. Let me just tell you, seasons in life change. If you're the same person at 50 that you were at 16, you're in trouble. You should have grown maturely in some kind of way. And so there are new discoveries that need to be made all the time. And in long-term relationships, that curiosity is what keeps relationships fresh.

I'm coming your way in a minute. I'm talking about the question, "Do you love me?" And the answer is yes when you have number four, shared values. It's going to be hard. We were talking last night about this. The Bible says don't be unequally yoked. And that means you have to be on an equal plane. You have to have something that we share. I was laughing, talking about how it's an agricultural, from the agrarian world, this particular illustration. They put ox together under a yoke with the expectation of plowing a field. Now, when the ox are equally yoked, then the work can get done. But you're going to have a problem if you put an ox on one side and a donkey on the other side. Because the ox is going to be ready to go to work, but the donkey is going to pause. He won't want to do nothing. So you need to be equally yoked, shared values, shared understandings for long-term relationships.

And then there needs to be growth. There needs to be a commitment to growth, should I say. Relationships may start here, but it's not where it ultimately will be. So you always got to be growing. And in the relationship, there has to be a commitment to growth in the relationship. And not only growth in the relationship, but you have to be committed to the growth of each individual partner. I got married at 21, 22 years old. That wasn't the same as I am today. And over these years, growth has had to take place. And we have to be committed not only just to my growth, but we also have to be committed to the other person's growth and development.

Because none of us are where we want to be yet. Don't you know life is not a destination where you finally arrive? It's a journey where you're always becoming. So we're always moving towards something. And while all of these are truths in our physical relationships, these are also true in our relationship with the Lord. And so Jesus wants to know, "Do you love me?" Just like you want to know from whoever he or she may be, Jesus wants to know, "Do you love me?" Are you going to give me empty words, or are you going to demonstrate the actions that show me that you love me?

And here in our scripture passage for the morning, we see that Jesus wanted to know that from Peter. Peter was Jesus's boy. He was a bad boy. But Peter had slipped in the relationship. He had overestimated himself. And how many know that's what messes relationships up? Sometimes people get too cocky or too comfortable and they overestimate themselves and undervalue or underestimate you. And Peter had done that. You remember when they were in the upper room, John's Gospel chapter 13, and Jesus was telling them that "I'm going to the cross, I'm going to be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and they're going to kill me, but I'll be raised the third day"? Peter said, "No, Lord, never." Jesus said, "Shut up." He said, "Before the rooster crow, you're going to deny knowing me three times."

And Peter just could not imagine himself in that way because he had this high, lofty feeling about himself. He was so overconfident and he overestimated his love for the Lord. He overestimated his ability to be able to demonstrate that love. He overestimated everything, and he underestimated temptation. He didn't know that in the hour of trial, his knees would get weak and he would end up denying the very thing that he said he would never do.

I know this is uncomfortable for you because you know it's the truth. But here it is, here's a broken man. Jesus told him in the aftermath of Jesus being arrested and carried through the kangaroo style courts and Peter trying to follow, you know what he did? He did deny knowing Jesus. They said, "Aren't you one of his disciples?" Peter says, "No, I don't know what you're talking about." On another occasion, somebody said, "You are one of his disciples. Your speech betrays you." Peter said, "I told you I don't know him." And he wasn't stomping his foot; he was saying those words. And then one of the girls came in, she said, "You are one of his disciples. I saw you with him." And Peter said, "Girl, I told you I don't know him."

And as soon as he said that, the rooster crowed. "Cock-a-doodle-doo." And it broke Peter. It broke his heart. I mean, we've all been there. If you've been in any kind of relationship, you have been there where you've not been able to live up to what you wanted to live up to. You don't even got to admit it. I ain't asking you to raise your hand. I ain't asking you to be a witness and put the camera on you. That's not what we're asking you to do. But you know in your own heart that we've not always been all that we wanted to be when we wanted to be it.

And so Peter was broken. And he went away. So when Jesus was raised from the dead, he told the woman, he said, "Go tell my disciples and Peter to meet me in Galilee." And so when Jesus showed himself to Peter and to the disciples, he told them after he revealed to them, yeah, they saw his hands, they put their hand in his side, they knew it was him. And he said, "Now I want you boys to go in the Galilee and wait on the mountain until I come."

And Peter decided he was going to quit the ministry. He went and he waited. Let me go inside of his head: "I'm a failure. I've not been able to live up to the expectations that God has for me. I've not been able to do what I felt I overestimated myself, and so I don't see any future in this." And so instead of waiting in Galilee on the mountain that Jesus told him, Peter said, "Shoot, I'm going fishing."

And because he was the leader of the apostolic band, seven others said, "We're going too." And see, that's what influence can do. You can influence people in wrong ways. So Peter goes fishing and the other boys went fishing too. They hadn't been fishing in a long time because that day when Jesus came walking by the seashore, he said, "Come follow me and I will make you to become fishers of men." And they dropped their nets, hook, stock, and followed him.

But now Peter has decided, "I'm going back to my old life. This new thing, this new ministry is not quite working out, so I'm going back to my old life." And they went and they went fishing and they fished all night long and caught nothing. And the next morning, when they're there on the shore, they're not far from the shore, they see a figure in the distance. And he hollers out to them, "Boys, have you caught anything?" They said, "We haven't caught nothing." Jesus was the one standing there. He said, "Well, cast your net on the other side of the boat." They caught so many fish, weren't even able to drag them all to the shore.

And when one of them knew that it was Jesus, John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, said to Peter, "It's the Lord." Peter took his fisherman's coat and put it on because they were out there naked. That's what the scripture says. So he put on his coat and he jumped in the water and came on up to the shore. And Jesus said, "Bring some of those fish." But he had already had coals and breakfast ready on the seashore.

And so when they finished eating, Jesus turned right to Peter. And he asked him this question: "Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me?" Oh man. He said, "Listen, I don't want empty words. I want action. Feed my lambs. I got children, I got young, undeveloped people who need to know who I am. Feed my lambs. I want the action that demonstrates that you do love me. Don't just tell me."

Then he asked him a second time. He said, "Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me more than these? Not more than the other disciples, but do you love me more than the old life? Do you love me more than the old nets and the waters and the fishing rods and all the other things? Because you have abandoned what I've given you to do and you've gone back into what I called you from." Oh man, I wish we could take inventory this morning because the truth is there are a whole lot of people who started out, but they've abandoned the Lord. They've gone back because it's not comfortable, it's not always popular, because people have said things or done things, or even because we're changing things. And so people are saying, "Well, I'm quitting. I'm going back, going back fishing, going back to what I used to be, going back to my old church."

You wasn't getting fed there. Notice that they fish all night long. They went back, but they caught nothing. So going back does not necessarily a guarantee of success. You got to stay in the place where the Lord is giving the instructions. "Put your net on the other side. I know where the fish are. I know where success is."

He says to him a third time, "Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me? Feed my sheep." Man, listen. Now see, we don't see it in English, but there's a play on words here in the Greek. Jesus is using the strongest term for love. He is saying, "Simon, son of John, do you agape me? Agapeo," which is the strongest, divine form of love. But Peter is now aware of his weakness, so he does not want to brag about having that kind of strong love for God. So he uses a different Greek word. When Jesus says, "Do you love me?" he says, "Yes, Lord, I phileo you," which means, "I like you. I have a brotherly love for you, but I can't say that I have this super strong, uncompromising love for you."

And when Jesus asks him a third time, "Simon, son of John, do you..." Now watch Jesus. He plays on the words and he doesn't use the agapeo word now or agape now; he uses the same word that Peter used and he says, "Do you phileo me? Do you have that strong brotherly love for me?" And Peter was grieved. He was grieved not because the Lord asked him three times, but the Lord did a spiritual biopsy on this boy. The Lord cut him to the core and revealed to him where the cancer was.

And he said to him, he said, "Look, I'm going to put it on your terms. Do you love me even at the level that you think you can be successful at demonstrating your love for me?" Then Peter said, "Lord, you know all things. You know the strength and the weakness of my love." And Jesus says to him, "Follow me."

Now look at this, what I want you to hear. First and foremost, I want you to understand that when Jesus is asking these questions, it's not that he really needed to know the answer. He already knew the answer. And he knew that Peter's love for him was not that strong. But what he did know was that that love for him was real. Oh man. Can I help you this morning? Help you understand that you might not have the strongest love for Jesus, but it at least ought to be a real love. At whatever level it is, it ought to be sincere. It ought to be the truth.

Faith may not be as strong as Job's, but my little bit is my little bit. So here is what is necessary to demonstrate that we're not just speaking words. There are three actions that are implied, pulled out of this text to help you and I examine our love for the Lord. First, he wants to know, "Do you love me?" And that's the question, isn't it? And he doesn't want empty words, does he? So what is the motivating factor for serving God? God wants us to serve him. That's why he calls us. He wants Peter to serve him. And that's why he calls him. And the only motivating factor that's strong enough to keep you in Christian service is a real love for God.

So your love for God's got to be real. You don't sing because this is my Sunday. You don't sing because this is the time I want to be on the front street. You sing because I have a real love for God. I don't preach because of the size of the congregation. It doesn't matter if somebody's in here, if nobody's in here. If God has called me to preach, then I preach because I have a love for him. Love might not be what you think, but it's got to be the one motivating thing that drives me to action.

When you as a woman or a man, you ask your partner in life, "Do you love me?" then what is it that you're expecting from them? If they are going to serve you, if they're going to be with you, you want the motivation for their being with you is not your money, not your honey, but their love for you. A real love. Nobody wants to be played with. And how many know the older you get, the more difficult it is for you to recover from the game? Now when I was a young kid, we'd go to church and we'd put on the note, "Do you love me? Check yes, check no." And it didn't matter. If you said no, that's alright. Pass it to somebody else.

But as you get older and you have made the commitment that you love someone, then you don't want that someone to be playing with you. So God has made the commitment that he loves us, but he wants to know: Peter, Michael, James, Julie, whoever you are, do you love me? And if you're going to say yes, then he's calling you to service.

The feeding of the lambs, the feeding of the sheep is a call to serve. And the only motive that's going to keep you in the service is genuine love. See, if you don't have real love for God, people will send you back. Because when you're trying to feed and they decide, "I don't want this," or they reject it, then you'll say, "Okay, you don't want what I got? Forget it."

But that's not what the Lord... that's not the way the Lord is. The Lord wants you to continue. You keep working, you keep doing, you keep teaching, you keep preaching, you keep praying, you keep sharing. And the only thing that would keep you doing that is that genuine motive of love that you have for God in your heart.

Young man, I want you to hear me today. I want all of you to hear that if you have love for God, it's not based on external things. It's not based on who's here. It's not based on what they say. It's not based on how they feel. It's based on how I respond to God. If I love God, then he's going to keep me where I need to be. God minus you is still God, but you minus God is nothing or nobody. So you need the Lord.

But the second thing I want you to understand that propels us to service is sacrifice. Not only does love for God cause us to serve God, but love for God causes us to sacrifice for him. Jesus put it like this: "If any man comes after me, let him first deny himself." So you've got to be willing to deny you, put you on the back burner, put him first. Then the second is the sacrifice: "Take up your cross."

And this is what Jesus is saying after he's asked him three times and he's cut him to the core and Peter realizes the weakness of his own love for God but yet the reality of his love for God. Jesus tells him, "Man, when you were young, you walked where you wanted to go. You did what you wanted to do. But when you get to be old, somebody else is going to lead you where you don't want to go. They're going to bind your hands." He was telling Peter how he was going to die.

And for Peter now, you might think that this would have been a sentence that caused him to buckle under, but no. Peter is actually happy. Because this is Jesus's way of restoring him to the ministry. That what did I just tell you? Peter had quit. He had walked away. "I'm going back to my old life. I'm going back fishing again." And why? Because I had failed in ministry before. But now Jesus is saying, "This time, Peter, when I put you in, you're going to be in it until you're an old man. And even when you're an old man, people are going to bind your hands and they're going to take you where you don't want to go." And Peter is saying in himself, "Thank you, Lord. It means that this time I won't fail. This time, if I have to give my life for you, it won't be because I said it, but it'll be because I'll do it. I'll make the sacrifice. I'll take up the cross."

Ministry is about sacrifice. Relationships are about sacrifice. Anybody been in a long-term relationship know it's about sacrifice. If you got a family, if you got children, you've had to make sacrifices. You've had to deny yourself. You've had to put yourself on the back burner and put other people in front of you. And if you're going to serve God, you're going to have to put him first and you're going to have to put other people first and you're going to have to put you last.

And in order to do that, you got to have genuine, real love. So the question again: "Do you love me, Peter? Do you love me, Michael? Do you love me, you, whatever, put your name there." Is your love real enough to feed, to teach, to provide in spite of when no one has an appetite for what you want to serve?

God told Jeremiah, "Preach the word and don't be afraid of their faces." Paul told Timothy, "Preach the word in season and out of season, when they want to hear it, when they don't want to hear it." And what keeps you coming back? Look at the Apostle Paul. Apostle Paul went to every Jewish town he could find, and the first thing he would do would be to go into the Jewish synagogue and he would preach and teach the Word of God. Now, was he always welcome? "Oh, great Apostle Paul, come on." No, they beat his butt. They ran him out of town. They left him for dead. They stoned him. But he'd get right back up and go to the next town and go right to the Jewish synagogue and present Christ all over again. What makes a man act like that? The genuine, real love of God, for God. What makes a man or a woman continually go back into that same situation repeatedly and share over and over and over again? Has to be real love. Because when the words are there and the action is not there, then it's so easily clear to everybody that this is not what it needs to be. And consequently, it's so easy for breakups and things like that to take place.

So if we love God, then we have to have real love that causes us to serve. We have to be willing to sacrifice, no matter what it cost. And when you sacrifice for God, it will cost you your life. See, that's one of the reasons I'm struggling today. Not struggling in the sense of what God is doing, because I know what God is doing. But I'm struggling to let this thing go because it's so real and it's been my life. You understand? It has cost me everything. Every waking moment, I'm thinking about you, the church. When I'm sleep, I'm thinking about the church. When I walk in, I'm thinking about the church. When I'm driving, I'm thinking about what needs to happen. You can't serve God half-heartedly.

It's going to cost you. Oh, could have made much more money doing other things. Had the best of education. Could have worked anywhere. Colleges, universities, other corporations have all tried to recruit. But because of Christ, sacrifice. So I'm just telling you. And people laugh, man. I remember when I told my colleagues that I was going to retire from a job that at that time was making six figures. And they said, "You're going to retire from this job paying you six figures to go to church with Black people? You're going to starve to death." I said, "No, that's not what I'm doing. I'm going to serve God."

And I want you to know I ain't look back. I have not looked back and I have not missed a beat. Matter of fact, I'm in better shape than I ever could have been. Because let me just tell you, God is not going to let you out-bless him. How many know the more you give, the more he gives you? The more you sacrifice, the more he sacrifices for you. He will bless you. David came to God one day and he told Nathan, "Hey, listen, I'm going to build the Lord a house." And Nathan bowed his head and said, "Yeah, go ahead, do what's in your heart." But then Nathan left, and before he could get out of the court, God spoke to him and said, "Go back and tell David that he's not the blesser. He don't bless me. I'm the one who bless him." May I help you understand? I don't care what you give up; you cannot out-give God.

But I need to give you one more thing. So if Jesus is asking the question, "Do you love me, Peter, Michael, whoever you are?" and you say, "Yes, Lord, I love you," then not just words. What are your actions? Got to be real love to serve. It's got to be real love to sacrifice, no matter what it cost. And when you sacrifice for God, it will cost you your life.

And it's got to be real love to follow in obedience. When Jesus said to Peter, he said, "You're going to go where you don't want to go when you get to be old." In other words, he told Peter how he was going to die. He was going to die crucified. And the legend says, the life of Peter says that when his crucifixion came, he told the people, "Listen, I'm not worthy to die upright because I denied my Lord. Turn me upside down." And Peter was crucified upside down.

But that day when Jesus told him to follow me, Peter turned around. See, this is where we mess up. Peter turned around and he saw John. John is not called by John; he's called the disciple whom Jesus loved. Why would you call yourself John when you can call yourself the disciple whom Jesus loved? And he wanted to know, "Well, what about this man?"

See, that's always our problem. God calls us to a particular task, but we be so concerned about everybody else. "What about him? What about her? Am I going to be the only one have to sacrifice? Am I going to be the only one that have to give? Am I going to be the only one that have to love?" God said, "Don't worry about it. If I want this man to live until I come back, that's none of your business what God has in mind for someone else."

What he's calling you to do, Peter, is to follow him obediently. Follow him through the valley. Follow him on the mountain top. Follow him in deep water. Follow him in storm territory. Follow him through cemeteries. Follow him to church. Follow him when you have to walk by yourself. Follow him when the crowd is with you. Peter was getting ready for Pentecost. On the day of Pentecost, when God was ready to open the church, he had Peter ready to be the inaugural speaker because he was obedient at last to follow Jesus.

And I don't know what somebody else think about, but I made up my mind that I will follow the Lord. I will follow him up mountains. I will follow him around corners. I will follow him when you're with me. I'll follow him when I'm by myself. I'll follow him with tears in my eyes. I'll follow him when my pocket is running over. I'll follow him when nothing but dust is there. "Follow me," Jesus said.

And you have to make up your mind to do that. That's the action that God wants to demonstrate that these are not empty words. And guess what you're going to get in return, Peter? You're going to get safety. They'll arrest you, but I'll send an angel to get you out of jail. Are you hearing me? If you follow me, Peter, you won't have to worry because I'll show mutual respect. I'll make your enemies your footstool and I'll show you how much I love you because I'll provide what nobody else can provide for you.

Peter, I'll show you curiosity. There's always more about me that you can learn. You can never learn everything that there is to know about me. We drink from an inexhaustible fountain. Peter, if you follow me, we'll have shared values, brother. You'll know that I care about lost people and about hurting people. And if you care about the same people I care about, then I'll make sure that your crown is waiting on you in glory.

And Peter, I'm committed to your growth. I know you're a cussing, fussing, fighting fisherman today, but I'm not going to leave you, nor am I going to forsake you. When you fall down, I'll pick you up. I'll brush you off. I'll fix your mouth. I'll fix your mind. I'll fix your heart. I'll make sure that you are able and ready to do whatever I've given you to do.

I just want to know, "Do you love me?" Isn't that the question today? Is that the question for you today? Do you love God? Why you here? Are you here just because it's Sunday? I'm here because I love God. And I love God more than anything. I'm standing yes, retired several months ago, but I'm still standing why? Because I love God. And I love him more than anything.

People can laugh, people can talk about me, people can say, "Why you hanging around?" because I still love God. And I love him more than anything. What about you today? What about you? Do you love God more than anything? Do you love God enough to put him first, to sacrifice your life? Do you love God enough to follow him unconditionally? I know that if he lead me in trouble, he know how to get me out of it.

So I just want to simply give you an opportunity this morning. Doors of church open. Anybody, somebody might be here today. You might want to give God a try. You might want to tell the Lord you love him. Doors open. This can be your moment. Nobody else go, I'll go because of you. I can sing to you this song. I just want to say that I love you more than anything.

I don't have to preach you into a frenzy because that only pumps up a superficial response. But the true love that you've got to have for God has got to come from the depth of your own heart. It's not what somebody else think, not what someone else say, but what do you experience? What is the expression of your heart? And my personal, pure, true, honest expression is God, that I love you more than anything.

And Father, we thank you for this time in your presence today. We thank you for this service of worship. We thank you for the truth that you have spoken to us. Help us not to just speak empty words, to talk a talk and not have any action. Help us to be motivated by the true, real love, even if it's weak, even if it's not as strong as we would want it to be. You know how deep and how true and how real our love for you is.

So commission us now afresh to go and feed lambs, to go and feed sheep, to bless people wherever we go, to tell people of the wonderful story of the love of God through Jesus. Help us to be willing to make the sacrifices that are necessary. Putting others first, putting you first. Giving our whole self to you, our whole life for your glory and for your purposes.

And then help us to follow you obediently, regardless of what anybody else do, regardless of whether anybody else want to go. Help us to go and do the things that you would give us to do. Bless us now as we go up from here. Dismiss us from this place but never from your holy presence. As we ask now that the grace of God, the sweet communion of the Holy Spirit, that he will rest, rule, and abide with each one of us, your children, now henceforth and forevermore. And all of God's people said, amen. Amen. Amen.

Guest (Male): Hope you enjoyed the broadcast. You have been listening to a message from the Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, where we are reaching the world for Christ. Located at 2135 Jefferson Avenue Southwest, Birmingham, Alabama, 35211. For a copy of this message, you can reach us at 205-925-9750 or 9751, or visit us on the web at www.greatershiloh.org. For another uplifting message, we invite you to join us for our next broadcast.