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August 3 – Shaped for Service · The Daily Ripples Podcast

• 0:00
  Well,
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  welcome back everybody to the Daily Ripples podcast.
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  I'm Pastor Mike and we have with us Corey.
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  And Corey has already told me that he's not going to be the host or
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  the co-host today. He said he's just going to be here. So with all that
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  being said, we're going to jump right in to August 3rd, Shaped for Service.
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  And our devotional starts with the stone. God's work in my
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  life is not only for my benefit but for the good of those around
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  me. Ripple 1 is practical. Today, I will look for
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  opportunities to be useful rather than noticed. I will serve where I can,
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  remembering that even small acts of kindness can reflect God's love
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  to others. Ripple 2, spiritual. The Father calls me into a life
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  of love and service. Jesus shows me that greatness is found
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  in serving others. The Holy Spirit equips me to love people
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  well and to be useful wherever God places me.
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  And as always, we'll save our prayer for the end
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  of our episode. Now, I'll start today,
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  Corey, with a Bible passage. We'll jump into that
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  right off the wham because this part about being of service,
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  and especially in the spiritual ripple about greatness found in serving
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  others, I mean, that comes straight out of the Gospel of Mark
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  in the 10th chapter, and it's verses 43
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  through 45. And essentially what it says is the passage about whoever
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  wants to be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven must become the least and
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  must be a servant to all. Right. And so, I mean, the Bible affirms
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  that whether we're talking about our life of faith,
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  whether we're talking about our work in recovery, just life in general,
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  I mean, God is calling us to be of service to other people.
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  Right. And, you know, as it kind of talks about, I mean,
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  it, it, The title itself is Shaped for Service, but for me,
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  I think about the fact of my experience, right?
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  And my experience in the program and my experience in my life of faith has
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  been that whenever I just go
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  wherever God calls me and serve whoever God
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  puts in front of me, because I think you say this all the time,
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  we're all God's kids, right? Which means that everybody's my brother and
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  sister, no matter what they look like, no matter what they talk about, no matter
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  if they share the same faith that I do. If somebody's in need
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  and I have the ability to meet that need in any way,
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  then I need to be willing to do that. And that when I do,
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  and this is where the experience comes in, I find my soul strengthened.
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  I found my spirits uplifted even. You know, it's hard
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  to describe the joy, you know, that we experience by just
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  sitting down and talking to another dude about this stuff. You know, you've talked about
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  that many times. What do you got for us? Well, you know,
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  in here it says, you know, and this is one of the things,
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  like, I think when we word things, we want
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  it to be appealing to others versus what it really is. And that's like
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  the paradox, right? That's kind of like what a paradox is anyways. Like, it's almost
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  a lighter form. So like when you put in here, God's work in my life
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  is not only for my benefit. Well,
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  I think we're talking about the exact
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  thing we're talking about, but when I think about it like that, it's almost like
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  I'm trying to convince you to convince somebody, hey, go help somebody,
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  right? Because that's what we're— in these recovery
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  rooms, for some reason, it's turned in from people walking
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  in and let's try to convince them, hey, you want to try to
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  convince them this way of life rather than them being hopeless and saying,
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  hey, this is what I do. And there's
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  no wiggle room. This is just what I do, and if you want what I
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  have and are willing to go to any length to get it,
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  you'll just do this. That's the thing that's always said. If you want what we
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  have, do what we do. Right. So it's like, and I think we've been accustomed
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  to say things like this. So first,
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  it's complimenting me, right? God's work in my life is
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  not only for my benefit. So it's complimenting me first, right?
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  But for the good of those around me. And I think, you know, I try
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  to— the way I talk to dudes, I'm always talking like
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  that, right? Trying to do this convincing. And, you know,
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  and this is going to probably sound a little convincing too, but, you know,
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  the only place in the literature of Alcoholics Anonymous
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  that I have found so far where it talks about emotional
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  sobriety, is in the first page of the 12-step.
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  And that's interesting, right? The only place in all the literature— in the 12-step,
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  in the 12 and 12? In the 12 and 12. It doesn't say those words
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  in the— right, right. Big book at all. It's definitely more of a modern concept.
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  Yeah, I know that. But so like, you know, but it stands
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  true. Like, you know, to benefit— when I give of
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  myself, I do benefit. But you know, my significant
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  other said it last night, and you know, I've been thinking about this today.
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  Where, you know, when I call you, I'm not just calling you,
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  I'm calling to seek God. Yeah. When I'm helping somebody, I'm not
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  helping someone for anything else but to seek God. And if I can
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  keep that more in my peripherals, like, you know, I guess
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  like in my sight versus— I was talking to a dude today about this,
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  like, man, like if I'm in the results business,
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  I'm not gonna get the results I want. But if I'm in the God business,
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  and I want to just seek God through going to these meetings,
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  helping people, calling someone, helping someone on the side
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  of the road versus what it looks like as a man versus,
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  hey, I'm just doing this for God. I'm just trying to seek God
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  through this, trying to grow my relationship closer with God versus,
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  hey, I want to look cool. Hey, I want to make
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  sure people see me on the side of the road changing this old lady's tire.
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  Yeah. Right? And if they don't, I'm going to take a photo and put it
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  on Facebook. I'm going to make sure to tell somebody about it right after it.
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  And I'm gonna say, hey, you know, I'm gonna make it sound very humble
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  too. Yeah. Not like— that's a weird way to say that,
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  but no, it made perfect sense. Um, so I was
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  thinking about what, you know, she was talking about last night. And she, you know,
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  she was talking about on page 46 of the Big Book. And she
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  was talking about, we found that God does not make too hard turns
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  with those who seek him. And I've been
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  thinking about that all day today, actually, because like,
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  I'm looking at it from a completely different view today because what
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  is seek? I could have used to tell you that seeking would've meant
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  seeking out literature, seeking out knowledge.
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  And when me and this dude were talking today,
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  he was like, I don't want to waste my time. And I told him,
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  I said, hey man, do you think you're wasting your time on your knees praying?
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  Do you think you're wasting your time with a pen and paper or reading?
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  Because it's the same concept. And I'm seeing that today as one.
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  And I've kind of always seen it as one, but I'm seeing it completely as
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  one today, a little bit better. And I don't know, that's what I was thinking
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  about. Well, I think it gets into the
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  root of, and you were talking kind of all around this,
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  what are our motivations when it comes to service
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  work or working with others or what have you? What is motivating me? If I'm
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  working with a newcomer or somebody who's trying to get
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  sober from alcohol or drugs, right?
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  And if I'm doing it because I want to accomplish
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  their sobriety, you know what I mean? Like, I want a
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  success story, right? So that I can feel like I'm
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  a good sponsor, right? That's the wrong motivation.
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  But that's the motivation I think that you were kind of speaking to or around.
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  And, but if I'm saying I want to be a good sponsor for
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  this person, because I find God when I do
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  that. That's a totally different set of motivations. And the problem is,
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  and the reason why it's so natural to slip into, even when I wrote
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  The Stone that way about not only being for my benefit, for the good of
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  those around me, because yeah, I mean, there are, we're built
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  as human beings to not put forth any effort
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  unless we can see a benefit. And if I don't see a benefit,
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  to it, you know, in my own life and my own spirit, then I
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  don't even want to start on it. But the thing is,
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  if I stay in that place, I'm never going to do anything.
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  Right. You know, I'm— and if I didn't do anything,
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  then I wouldn't receive that benefit. You know, I wouldn't receive that
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  connection with my higher power because, you know, you brought up about,
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  you know, seeking God. And usually when I think about seeking God,
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  I think about, you know, going to church or spending time in prayer and meditation.
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  But the thing is, I mean, and you rightly pointed it out
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  again, you were kind of dancing around it, right? In Matthew 25
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  is when Jesus, you know, and we talked just last week,
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  I think last Thursday on our podcast, you know, I think I read
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  the whole parable of the talents, you know, out of the Message translation.
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  And right after that is when Jesus talks about, you know,
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  in the kingdom come, the sheep will be separated from the goats. And that's when
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  he gives one of the most famous passages in the Bible, which is that anytime
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  you fed the hungry and clothed the
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  naked and served those in need, basically all these things
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  you have done for the least of these, you have done for me.
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  And so it is about seeking God,
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  really is about being of service. It's not about—
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  yes, you can seek God in prayer and in worship, but you also need to
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  be seeking God in service to others. You know,
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  on page 130 of the Big Book, it says, and this
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  is one of my favorite paragraphs in this book because it
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  kind of summarizes what we're doing. It says, those of us who have spent much
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  time in the world of spiritual make-believe have eventually seen
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  the childishness of it. This dream world has
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  been replaced by a great sense of purpose, accompanied by a growing consciousness
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  of the power of God in our lives. We have come to
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  believe he would like us to keep our heads in the clouds with
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  him, but that our feet ought to be firmly planted on earth.
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  That is where our fellow travelers are, and that is where our work must be
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  done. Absolutely. And like, you know, so that, you know, that if
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  I look, the way I look at that is so, it's just spot on,
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  right? And I can't explain it any better than that.
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  Well, and the book also tells us, and again, I know you
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  got to be proud anytime that I bring out a passage of the book,
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  and especially if I list a page number, right? So on page
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  77, and you probably already know where I'm going with this, the Big Book
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  tells us that our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service
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  to God and the people about us, to God and the
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  people about us, which is just another way of saying back in 1939,
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  or when this was published, of love God and
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  love your neighbor as you love yourself. Yeah. And that's what the whole thing is
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  all about. I think that's— I don't think we could say anything else
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  on it. You know, sometimes it's just one of those times when, when you're done,
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  you're done. Yeah. And it's just time to pray, right? So let's pray,
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  and everyone can enjoy some music for the rest of their drive-in this morning.
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  Father God, make me useful to you and the people around
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  me. Through your Holy Spirit, help me serve with humility and love.
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  Shape my life through the example of Jesus. Amen.