Church is Messy

Church Is Messy, 03-11-2026 Ep136
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Svea: good morning, Rick. We're back. It was like spring Beauty yesterday.

Rick: It was amazing. It was amazing. I went home and the sun was shining after after coming to work and after going to the gym. And I went to the gym in the afternoon yesterday. 'cause I slept in on Monday morning. I just could not get up

Svea: that Monday morning Does come early,

Rick: but you are excited.

About just the weather yesterday.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: , I am excited about something else. I feel like this should be on your radar. Yesterday, uh, was basically opening day of free agency. There were billions.

Svea: A free agent. I have no idea what you're talking about.

Rick: The NFL's

Svea: faia. Oh, oh oh, oh. I should have guessed.

Rick: Players, players moving from one team to another.

Svea: We just finished,

Rick: there's like $2 billion worth of contracts signed yesterday. Two.

Svea: Billion dollars.

Rick: Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy.

Svea: Whoa.

Rick: The salary cap for each team, I think is over. Oh, it's, it's triple digits. I think it's like over 300 million a year. Uh, so

Svea: how, how does one celebrate free agency day?

Rick: Someone could fact check me on that. Not everyone celebrates some people. Are experiencing weeping and gnashing of teeth. Other people are joyful. There's all kinds of crazy things going on. I feel pretty good about my team. Um, we picked up a good tight end, picked up a good running back, picked up a good offensive lineman.

These are things that we need as we are struggling, franchise, trying to make our way into relevancy. Other teams lost. Their favorite player or their star player. Mm. And other teams got really exciting players, so, yeah. So anyway. Well, uh, for all the NFL fans out there, yesterday was a big day for you, even maybe more exciting than spring weather.

Finally,

Svea: I'm sorry if I've alienated our NFL fans here, but,

Rick: and who maybe I've alienated the non NFL fans.

Svea: Well, between the two of us.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: Maybe there's something for everyone. We, there's so alienated,

Rick: so there's something for everybody here. Yeah.

Svea: Yeah. Well, no, I was not, uh, keeping up on that yesterday. I was, uh, I, I At the risk after your sermon with the whole story about the employee mm-hmm.

That skips work and, you know, overhears the wrong thing. Yeah. I didn't. Skip work yesterday, but I did work from home yesterday, which is totally fine. And uh, and it was a glorious morning of, of good scripture study. I'm excited to preach in a couple weeks and

Rick: such a good opportunity. If I live, I'd probably work from home more too.

You know, it's just, uh, I've taken advantage many times of your property and just how, how beautiful it is. It's super, I. I've spent many hours in prayer sitting in a tree in

Svea: here. Oh, I do love being in God's creation. So that's a blessing.

Rick: 3, 2, 1.

So let me ask you a question, since you brought up the, the opening story and I was, you just put that together, just kind of a, to make it fun, to lean into. This passage is yet another like challenging, get in your face kind of passage. And we're not preaching it because it's a specific issue about our church.

We're just making our way through through the book of First Corinthians ex. I'm excited. The next couple of weeks should be pretty positive, but they're fun thing

Svea: regardless. Controversial topics,

Rick: not controversial. Good stuff. It's so, yeah. Take a breather, but, alright. This opening story.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: If you were there.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: And just, Ima imagine it's not, it's not, you know, like you're working for Autumn Rich. Imagine you're just, imagine you're working for another company. A company. Oh, I'm

Svea: totally eavesdropping on

Rick: my boss in that moment. You're dropping you're staying there, you're risking it.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: Because he could turn without

Svea: a doubt.

Rick: He or she could turn around at any moment.

Svea: Yeah. But I need to know what's being said at that point.

Rick: Wow. I think I'm doing it too.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: I think I'm leaning into,

Svea: yeah. Well, and it sounded like in the story, the, the employee. Needed to hear some hard feedback.

Rick: Maybe.

Svea: Yeah,

Rick: maybe. Or maybe the boss is a jerk. I don't know.

Svea: Okay. But embed that in the context of the passage. Okay. So there are some really kind of eye-opening verses in First Corinthians in the second half of chapter 11 with this idea that God was so displeased at what was going on, that he would, essentially be like the boss firing the employee and take people back to heaven.

Get 'em outta there.

Rick: Your, your meetings. Do more harm than good.

Svea: Oof.

Rick: And some people are sick because of God is disciplining them. And like you just said, God snatched some people. Just like you're done. Your time on earth is done. You're coming into heaven, which is a great thing, but it's also their life ending early as a sad thing.

So it's, it's bittersweet. There's a lot going on. So

Svea: as you reflect on that, what does that suggest to you about how seriously God takes unity within our church? How does that rank on his priority scale over maybe our own individual lives?

Rick: I think for us to try to comprehend. Just how high of a value, how important it's to God would be like ant trying to contemplate Mount Everest.

It is so beyond our comprehension and we treat it like such a petty and casual thing.

The unity, the God intends. Isn't just an ideal. It's not just aspirational. It's not just a really good idea. Wouldn't it be nice if it flows out of who he is?

That God is a unified being and. One in being three in persons existing that way for all eternity.

Father, son, and Holy Spirit. And we are invited into that. And so we are made one with Christ. We are some people throughout history have described the unity that's experienced by the Trinity as, as a dance. It's just a, it's just been a way to try to understand the relationship. Not a metaphor for the Trinity, not that, but it's just a way to think about this.

This divine choreography of mutual submission to one another, delight in one another, exaltation of one another, collaboration with one another, three separate persons, yet one being, and we are invited into that dance by being in Christ.

Svea: Mm.

Rick: It is profound and. It is a mockery of who God is. It is a mockery of what Jesus has done if we treat it like a petty casual thing, or if we go even further and contradict it by our behaviors.

Mm-hmm. And so when you look at it in that regard, is it really all that crazy to discover that God would've s said to an individual who is just egregiously. Egregiously cultivating disharmony and division and the kind of nationalist we talked about. I mean, could you imagine someone eating until they are just bloated and just feasting and gluttony eating till they puked and they're.

There's someone who's huddled in the corner with their kids just waiting for, just waiting for something to eat and they get nothing.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: And they're going back into their poverty and this rich person's going back to their home of, um. Plenty. That's disgusting.

Svea: Yeah. Disgusting was

Rick: the word that came to mind.

It says, you're done. You're done. I'm not allowing this anymore. And I imagine what it would be like to be that person to wake up in heaven. Right. Can we go there for a second? Sure. That person wakes up and is looking around. He's like, this is amazing. I mean, I'm in heaven. And you know, maybe an angel comes up and is like, welcome.

And, uh, this guy will just call him Bob and Bob's like, I, you know, I, I. I'm so glad I'm here. I'm kind of surprised I'm here. Really? I feel like I felt I, I took care of myself. I ate well and angel's like Yeah, you did.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: You ate really well. And that's part of the problem. That's why you're here. And, and could you imagine, could you imagine dawning on that person?

Svea: Hmm.

Rick: This is why this is, I'm blessed to have this, but it's also divine discipline to take me out for the good of the church because my presence. Was so damaging and so toxic,

Svea: whoa,

Rick: to the church. And then for the angel to turn and point to the table where there's a giant feast in heaven and say, here, everyone always has plenty.

Svea: Whoa,

Rick: come and enjoy. Come and enjoy what your savior has provided for you.

I mean, it's just,

Svea: there's, that's a thought experiment. There's, that makes me squirm in healthy ways.

Rick: Okay. Tell me more.

Svea: Yeah. I mean, just the incredible grace, mercy and simultaneous justice of God Yeah. Depicted in that story

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: Is kind of overwhelming.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: And, uh, oof

Rick: it, if you, if we let ourselves think about that and, and certainly there's some details and, and how I portray that and aren't true, but what would be true is that person. Is in heaven with God, the unhindered filling of the spirit and feasting at the table.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: Right. All of those things are true, which demonstrates to us in a way that I think is really irrefutable, that divine discipline is not condemnation, it is not condemnation.

It's important, it's serious, it's accountability, but it's not condemnation.

Svea: I think that's a good point. 'cause oftentimes we interpret discipline that way.

Rick: Mm-hmm.

Svea: As a, okay, now it's time for you to get what you deserve.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: In a retributive kind of way, rather than, no, this is something that is for the greater good, yours and other people's.

Rick: Ultimately, justice is about making things right and it's about realigning people with life as it, as it should be.

And there, there is. And especially we think about criminal justice. Criminal justice, there's an aspect of of, of punishment in that. But that's not what we are, that's not what we're about. It's if we're holding someone accountable, if there is discipline horizontally or if there's divine discipline, it is about restoring someone to the way that it's supposed to be.

And this church was, this church was outta whack. Could you imagine being told it would just be. That, like think about it, of Ham Rich, like this isn't true of us. But imagine if this was said to us, it would be better if you guys just didn't meet.

It'd be better if you didn't get together.

And this isn't the first time you see something like this in the New Testament. Mm-hmm. Fast forward to Revelation. Yeah. And the letter that goes to the Church of Ephesus, uh, you are, you are unloving. And essentially if you read that letter, what you discover is it's better to have no church than an unloving church.

Yeah.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: It's basically what's happening here in first, first Corinthians.

Svea: Well, I, this concept really helped to unlock this passage for me. Hmm. Um, specifically that whole line about, you know, someone should not take communion in an unworthy manner.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: I don't know. That I have ever had clarity on exactly what that means before.

Hmm. And I'm sure I have heard it said before in the just preparation for the table that, uh, you know, if you have any unconfessed sin, be sure that you Oh yeah. Take a moment now to confess your sins before you take the Lord's Supper, because you don't wanna take it in an unworthy manner. Mm-hmm. And I'm, I've just internalized.

That without reading this passage in context. Mm-hmm. To think that's the most important thing. And I think what's happened then is it has turned the experience of taking the Lord's Supper into a very personal and an individual experience.

Rick: Yeah. That approach. I think cultivates scrupulosity, right? I just rigorously evaluate myself in an unhealthy manner, but that's not what it's about.

Svea: Mm.

Rick: Now we do need to be honest with ourselves, but it's, yeah. It's not what you, you described what's fascinating is what you described is the same way that, that I was raised the kind of things that I heard. I kid you not every pastor and every scholar that I read, they all said the same thing.

This is what it means to take it in an unworthy manner. It's to pretend that you're uni, you're unified while actually practicing division. Mm-hmm. And they, they all said it with, you know, different vocabulary, but they're all saying the exact same thing. And so there's. Kinda this universal consensus among people who, who rigorously study this and yet for some reason that clarity has not made its way down into the seats.

And

Svea: yeah,

Rick: hopefully this weekend helped. Helped with that.

Svea: Yeah. Well it did help for me 'cause I think both in the sense of recognizing what the passage is actually conveying. Mm-hmm. But then also bringing to context that when we do take. Communion. It isn't meant to be just this personal experience of personal confession.

Yeah. And receiving, yeah. Um, the grace of Jesus' body and his and his blood, but also in this more corporate experience mm-hmm. Of this is a demonstration of something that we are all doing together as brothers and sisters.

Rick: You know, someone could ask, why don't we do it the way that they did it? Because I like the way they did it better.

Mm-hmm. And I'd say I agree. I like the way they did it better too. I think that would be awesome. We're talking about size dynamics. I mean, you get to a point to where you can't pull that off. At least not every, not every week.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: It'd be pretty rare that we could pull off, uh, a potluck with everybody from the congregation together all at once.

And, uh. Do that

Svea: every once in a while. I have small church fantasies. Oh, like, oh, wouldn't it be fun to be in a tiny church where you could do things like that?

Rick: But you know what? There's no reason you can't do this in your small group.

Svea: Sure.

Rick: There's no reason that your small group cannot get together and share a meal.

And at some point in the meal, every time that you're together, just say, Hey, let's pause and remember, this bread represents, the body of Christ that was given for us and, and eat and solemn gratitude and joy. And do the same thing with a cup. And you don't have to drink actual wine. Um, that's totally okay.

But to say, Hey, this, we're just gonna let this represent, what Jesus has, has done for us and the new covenant that we have, this unbreakable relationship we have. Because of what he did, not what we do.

Now, um, I did get a, uh, a question in the lobby, which I appreciate it. I love it when people ask me questions.

It doesn't, it didn't deflate me, but it just reminded me that clarity is, feels like a false summit. Every time you think that you're clear enough, there's more clarity. Together. And somebody was asking me like, I get the fact we're supposed to embrace people. So like, does this mean that it's just like I have to like embrace like people who are like radical Islamist or like militant wanting to harm me from other, other religious expressions.

Like, no, that's not what it's about. You gotta remember that this is about this. We are embracing one another in Unity in Christ, right? Mm-hmm. And so you, you gotta understand the context. But for those who are not in Christ, who aren't, who aren't following Christ, remember Jesus said, love your enemy. You know, and then there is no, uh, there is no boundary on love your neighbor as your, as yourself.

We are to love all other people, even the people who would see themselves as an enemy towards us, but we would never see ourselves as an enemy towards someone else. And so for anyone who feels confused, this is not a backdoor way of saying you have to agree with and affirm all viewpoints and all lifestyles and, and all expressions.

What this is saying with all people who are followers of Christ. You are united with him in Christ, so you might as well live like it. And number two, with all people, regardless of how easy or difficult they are to love, love 'em in the same way that you love you. This didn't make it into the sermon. We could have talked about this, but Jesus said, what good is it? If you love people who love you, even sinners do that.

Svea: Mm.

Rick: And basically what you're saying in this context is the people the, the people who you despise, who you think are morally inferior to you, they do that. So why are you using that as a badge of honor? Mm-hmm. And some of my favorite ways to like.

When I talk about that verse is to put up pictures of like gang members. Guess what? Guess who loves people? Who are like them? These people do. And then I love to put up pictures from like, the convention for the Republican party and the convention from the Democratic party. Guess who's great at loving people who are like them?

These people throw up pictures of the Taliban, these people, and then just like throw up a picture of our church. These people are great at loving people who like it, but what's the Jesus Way, which is so much better, is the loving people who are even. Different from you.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: And distinct from you.

Svea: So I thought, you know, one of the lines that that landed very powerfully for me was this idea that unity isn't diverse people around each other, but bound to each other.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: And, and that is taking that progression you gave us, the progression of kind of tolerate,

Rick: celebrate, elevate. Yeah.

Svea: Um, and you can see that Yeah, there's a minimum threshold mm-hmm. Of what we kind of expect for. For baseline behavior, but that's not where we wanna land. We wanna be moving through that progression.

You wanna talk a little bit more about that?

Rick: Yeah. Why don't you, why don't you kinda set me up or point me in the right direction and I'll just go.

Svea: Well, where do

Rick: you want me to start?

Svea: I think I ultimately, what I'd like to hear you say is, what is it about the. The way that we could elevate other people mm-hmm.

That you see as being buried. Jesus. Like,

Rick: yeah. Uh, Philippians chapter two, uh, this is what Jesus did. He, he did not consider, uh, equality with God, something to be used for his own advantage. But instead he made himself a servant. He took on humanity and he took it to the extreme, to the point of sacrificing his own body and life on the cross.

Throughout the and Paul tells us, and, and Philippians too. And remember, there's a couple of people in the church, a couple of a couple of folks who are who are specifically named, who are in conflict. Just take on the mind of Christ. This is the mindset you should have and how you see yourself and how you see one another all throughout the New Testament.

Now, these letters that are written to churches, we, we read things like, consider the needs of others as more important than your, than yourselves. And Ephesians, uh, chapter five says, submit to one another.

Out of reverence for Christ. It is not about authority. The submission in the New Testament is about something other.

Than authority. And yes, there, there are appropriate times to, to submit to authority. I, I, I don't wanna, I don't wanna confuse that. But we submit to one another because we value and honor one another.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: And we love one another, and we want to do for each other what Jesus has done for us.

And if you do that. You'll end up submitting yourselves to what is in the best interest of someone else, even if it costs you. And so that's the, that's the New Testament relational dynamic,

Svea: Uhhuh. So how do you see that playing out in, in our congregation? What would it look like to have a church full of people who are ready?

Elevate, um, people who are maybe different than themselves.

Rick: Couple things. I'll start with some low hanging fruit.

Svea: Okay.

Rick: And then maybe you, instead of listening to me, you pretend to listen to me and think about other things other envi, other arenas in which we could apply this.

Svea: All right.

Rick: How does that sound? Um, one is, okay, you should come into worship service. You don't have to have all the songs. Be like the songs you like, you don't even need any of 'em to be the songs you like. What you need is for them to be songs that authentically praise God and are songs that are helpful for those around you.

You know, if everybody had that, everybody had. That mindset, or if at least a few more people had that mindset than don't. We're, we are well on our way to breaking up with a consumeristic approach

Svea: mm-hmm.

Rick: To worship. Mm-hmm. And it's a, it's a, it's an approach to our gathering together with where you know, what, what you need and what's helpful to you is more important.

Than me. We gather together in a small group that e every small group is an affinity group. Even if you don't like set up small groups, so we have, we have groups for people who love to run on Thursdays. So, you know, we have people, we have small groups for people who love to work on old cars.

There are churches who do that. That's not our approach. But every collection and gathering people at some level is a, is an affinity group. We have an affinity for one another, but really to take on this mindset is. I'm gonna welcome people in the group, and it's gonna mean a great deal to me to have people in the group who are in a totally different stage of life than me, ahead of me or behind me.

People who are in a totally different socioeconomic bracket than me, above me or below me. People who are from a different ethnicity than me. People who are from a different culture than me. And by the way, people from the same ethnicity can have different cultures. Yeah. You know? Mm-hmm. Um, somebody who grew up in the who's.

Over 60 is the same ethnicity as someone who's in their twenties. They grew up in different worlds. Mm-hmm. In totally different cultures even if they're in the same family. And so, and it's, you don't have to be an easy person to love for me to love you. I'm gonna love you because Jesus loved me and I was not easy for him to love me.

And so I don't need you to be easy. Like we don't have necessarily have to have chemistry with your deepest, closest friends. You're probably gonna need to have some chemistry. But in when we gather together, that's not a prerequisite. You just need to exist. That's all.

Svea: I think that's a really important thing that you said because I think sometimes we have this idealized dream of the relationships within our small groups, and we hope that those people will become our closest, dearest, best friends.

And sometimes that happens and it's beautiful. Mm-hmm. And it's a gift. Mm-hmm. Um, but it doesn't always happen. Mm-hmm. And it's okay if you have some really deep, sincere, beautiful friendships mm-hmm. To treasure those. Mm-hmm. And to have other groups of people where you see it as this is my opportunity to be like Jesus with these people.

Rick: And I get it. What we're talking about is hard and everything in American culture is perfectly designed. To make it harder for you to experience this. Mm-hmm. And everything in American culture is perfectly designed to set you up, to crave it like you've never craved anything before.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: In every place that I go every different kinda demographic that I'm engaging with, people are lonely.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: People are lonely. Oh my goodness. And, uh. Married people are lonely. Single people are lonely. Rich people are lonely, poor people are lonely. Everybody's lonely. It's so, this is a big deal, and I think it breaks the heart of God for anybody to be lonely.

That's death. It's death is a profound metaphor that's pervasive throughout the old, a New Testament that fundamentally means to be cut off.

And we were not made to be cut off. We were made for relationship.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: We were made to be together. And there are all kinds of broken things in the world that fractures and phrase our ability to be together. But in the church. In the church. It should be different. And it doesn't mean it's gonna be easy, but it's possible because of what Jesus has done on the Holy Spirit who is with us and in us.

And if we just settle now, breathe a little bit. Remember, you know what? I can love you the way that Jesus loved me, and I can, I can make what's most important to you, what you need. A little bit more important than what I need. And when we discover that, when we experience that, I don't think we're ever gonna wanna go back.

Svea: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Rick: It truly is. It's not just a different way, it truly is a better way.

Svea: Well said. Um, can I shift gears, uh, just a little bit and let's go back to talking about culture for a minute. I found it fascinating. I was going through some old records and I had taught through First Corinthians with our women's Bible study teaching team about 10 years ago.

Rick: Mm-hmm.

Svea: And our theme for the book was Unity and Diversity.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: And, uh, you know, you see it just woven throughout this whole, whole letter of Paul's of the importance of unity in diversity. But the thing that struck me is as I was reading through these notes from just 10 years ago

Rick: mm-hmm.

Svea: There was not at any point did I feel that there was like a, a political overtone to it, or that the word diversity was, a hot or a loaded term. It just seemed like a biblical

Rick: mm-hmm.

Svea: Standard that of course, this is what we're looking for. We wanna be united the way that Jesus has called us to be united, and we want diversity to represent the diversity that we will one day be in heaven before the throne worshiping God together in so it's just fascinating how much our culture has shifted.

Mm-hmm. Over the last 10 years. Do you wanna just riff a little bit on what that's like to take the same book in scripture Yeah. And see it through a different cultural lens.

Rick: Yeah. There's, there's a lot of things that have happened, uh, in the past decade or so that has made this harder to talk about and people feel.

Uneasy with the term and it went from something that was almost a given to something that's become suspect. I read a social media post from a congressman who said some things that I found surprising and said that pluralism is a lie. And, christian history is full of folks who advocated for pluralism.

Not that all viewpoints are equally valid and true. But it is important to embrace all kinds of different people and allow people to believe what they believe without compulsion. Because if compulsion is present, you'll never get authentic. Faith.

And you'll never get authentic. Um.

Expressions of faith. And so that's, that's pretty sad. Uh, there, I mean, there's, some of these things are, are beyond my intelligence and above my pay grade. Uh, but I mean, we, I briefly mentioned this, there's, there's been wrangling and maneuvering about, uh, how to think about diversity, equity, and inclusion.

And depending on who you're talking about, you're gonna get, you're gonna get different different definitions and different understanding of that. But what's interesting is that you'll see. Rapid changes in policies and behaviors depending on, um, how it affects an institution economically.

Svea: Hmm.

Rick: And so maybe it's that our relationship towards unity and diversity is a bit more fragile than some of us, some of us wanna believe. Um, I know that just things that have happened in immigration policy and enforcement over the past year or so has, um. Has animated various viewpoints and feelings.

You know, I mentioned this, you, Faye, have you heard about those? That in the mainstream we're just seeing more people, even high ranking politicians talking about heritage Americans. Mm-hmm. And heritage Americans basically should have a little bit more safe, it feels like. Reading Animal Farm. Do you read Animal Farm?

Svea: Yeah. Back

Rick: in nice school as a kid. Uhhuh, you know, four legg's good, two legs bad. Four legg's good, two legs better. It's amazing how it just. Changes. And if you read Animal Farm, you know exactly what I'm talking about. And it's just, it just feel like if you are looking to what's happening in the world around us, it is, is shifting sand.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: And there are folks who want. Unity and diversity, and they believe that it's good, but they don't necessarily have a moral or religious framework in which to ground it. It's kinda like feet planted firmly in midair. Mm-hmm. Um, and what I want to commend to people to think about is it is the Christian faith that gives us a grounding for this.

It gives us a, a firm foundation that makes sense of this. And really unity and diversity in this regard is, is a. Is a product of the Christian faith taking hold, um, around the world throughout history and where the Christian faith really didn't take hold. You don't see this? Mm-hmm. And so I don't wanna take it for granted.

I'm babbling here. I'm rambling. I'm gonna need you to, I'm gonna need you to. All right. To

Svea: tore in.

Rick: I'm, I'm ready. I know, I know. We talked about things have changed over the past 10 years. Yeah. So I guess all that to say maybe with clarity or muddied Waters is our thinking and our approach to unity and diversity has changed.

Over the past decade and it just feels weird. But for those of us who are followers of Christ we gotta, we have an ancient foundation for this. Yeah. We have a foundation that's ancient of days, and so we should be the last people around who are wafting and wobbly. We should just be standing firm on this.

Of course, unity a university, this is what you get in Christ.

Svea: Mm-hmm.

Rick: And while everybody else is animated and agitated and doing what they do, we should be boringly consistent.

Svea: Yeah. Like it, all right, let me help you land the plane here. Okay. So another cultural shift that's happened is just the way that we're approaching mm-hmm.

Looking for answers to topics. Yeah. And, uh, where maybe a generation ago people were looking for truth. It does seem that we've shifted now to people are looking for beauty and goodness.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: So rather than. Just we can stay grounded on the truth of scripture.

Can you speak a little bit to the beauty and the goodness of unity?

I feel

Rick: like you should talk about it.

Svea: Oh I,

Rick: can I flip that around on you?

Svea: Sure. Sure.

Rick: Because I know you've thought about this,

Svea: When you were preaching and talked about how it should look in the groups that we gather in. The first thing that came to mind when you said that was some of our practicing the way classes that we've had.

Mm-hmm. When there can be a room of 40, close to 50 people.

And you will see 20 year olds. You will see 80 year olds.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: And you'll see people who have been followers of Jesus for decades. Mm-hmm. And you'll see people who are in the excited face of just discovering him for the first time. Yeah.

And people from every walk of life.

Rick: Mm-hmm.

Svea: And it is absolutely exquisitely gorgeous to see a table of six people. Who are drastically different from each other with different lived experiences, different cultural backgrounds. Mm-hmm. All talking about the same ideas of what it looks like to follow Jesus.

Yeah. And uh, and I just get chills when I watch something like that. It's pretty great and it's fun to watch them teach each other. I'll just call out like I, I got to watch my son and now his wife, but they were just engaged at the time who were in college, having a great conversation with an older couple from our church, and I watched a.

My kids learning from them. And then the humility of this older couple, they turned it around and, and asked, you know, so tell us how you experienced this. What's it like for you? And it was like they were learning Yeah. From my kids.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: And it was just this beautiful moment of there's richness there.

Rick: Yeah.

Svea: When we can, uh, not just, and it, to me that's the picture of not just tolerating the differences amongst each other, but actually elevating it to a place of like. There's more to be gained from what we can learn from each other than, uh, than just proximity.

Rick: So, great.

Svea: Yeah.

Rick: So great. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm glad you talked about it.

That's way better than me talking about it. And I'm just like, yeah. I want more of that.

Svea: Well, I'm excited as we move forward this next, uh, next weekend, you get to talk to us a little bit about spiritual gifts from chapter 12 and, uh, and the unity in the body that this chapter has, this incredible, uh, picture of, of the body of Christ, and how we all need each other.

We're different parts, and I'm excited to see where you're gonna go with that.