Latest / Pillar Church | Holland, MI | Sermon Podcast / October 25, 2026 | Jon Brown

Transcript

October 25, 2026 | Jon Brown · Pillar Church | Holland, MI | Sermon Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord be with you.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you very much.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: What a phenomenally beautiful fall day.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: And all of October.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: Has basically been gorgeous.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: There's a bunch of people sitting on the lawn.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to hear a shout from the lawn.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's great.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: There's also a ton of people sitting in the gathering space.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: I don't normally do this, but let's see if they've got the same sort of energy.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: Any shout from the gathering space?
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: Not bad.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: This is my friend John.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: John Kuper.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: John is a junior at Hope College.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: He's a bit of a renaissance man, if you know what I mean.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: He likes to ride his bike.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: I like to ride my bike too.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: He rides his bike so fast that one time he actually got pulled over.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: Just kidding.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's not true.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: But he does ride very fast.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: He also is a virtuoso violin player, which is pretty incredible.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: You see what I'm talking about?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Renaissance man?
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like, how can And you have the hair?
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like that.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: So the I asked him if he'd help me out this morning with the sermon because the sermon needs help.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: We'll get to that in a minute.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: First, I thought I'd like, I thought I'd let, you know, I had a Zoom call this week with Fig.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: You know our friend Fig?
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: This is the seventh install.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, here's a picture of Fig.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: She's the junior at Western Michigan University.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: That prolonged season of intense despair, her freshman year.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: The despair diagnosed depression, became an unhealthy relationship with food, found herself on the floor of a bathroom, sitting next to her own vomit, weeping.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: A church lady, I don't know if there's any church ladies here, church lady showed up next to her on that bathroom floor, put her arm around her, and just wept with her.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: A couple months later, Fig became a Christian.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: Then she ends up being a counselor at Camp Geneva.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: That's where she and I met.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: Today is her two-year, as she put it, Jesus birthday.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Which I just think is really cool.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: And she and I, we've been zooming every once in a while over the last couple of years.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: She's been reading the Bible for the first time.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: She's reading like the creation story for the first time.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like, wow.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: And and and the like the walls come tumbling down around Jericho's story for the first time.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: And the Jesus story for the first time, Christ on the cross, reading it for the first time.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: He cries out, forgive them.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: They don't know what they're doing.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: She gets to hear it for the first time, and they bury him in the grave, and he defeats sin and death.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: She gets to read it for the first time, and he rises up in resurrection so that you can have life all full, thriving, forgiven life.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: She gets to read it for the first time.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: Can you imagine?
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: She gets to read the whole Bible for the first time.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: So we get together every, you know, couple of months to talk about the things she's reading in the Bible, some of the other stories.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I'm talking about?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: We got together on Wednesday of this week.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um she had some questions about some of the other stories.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: She wanted to know why is there so much violence?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: And then and she went on to say, so much violence against women.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: She had just read 2 Samuel 13, you know, Amnon and Tamar.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: She had just read 2 Samuel 11, David and Bathsheba.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: Recently she had read Genesis 34, story of Dinah.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: Why so much violence?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: Her wide eyes of faith and her heart open to God, reading the Bible for the first time.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Why is there so much violence?
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so much violence against women.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: I said to her, You're not going to believe this, fig, but I'm preaching one of those stories this Sunday.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: She put her cheeks and her hands like this, leaned forward.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: No way.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: What are you gonna say?
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's why John's here.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: I want John to open our hearts to one of those stories.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: The time when the kings go out to battle.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: David sent Joab with his officers, and all Israel with him.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: They ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: But David remained at Jerusalem.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: It happened.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Late one afternoon, David rose from his couch and was walking about on the roof of the king's house when he saw a woman from the roof bathing.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: She was very beautiful.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: David inquired about her, and it was reported that is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah, the Hittite.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: And David sent a messenger to get Bathsheba.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: And she came to him and he lay with her.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: After her period.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: And she returned to her home and she conceived and she sent a message to David.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: I am pregnant.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: David sent word to Joab, send me Uriah the Hittite, and Joab sent Uriah to David.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uriah came, and David asked Uriah how Joab and the people fared and how the war was going.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: And he said to Uriah, Go down to your house and wash your feet.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: So Uriah went out from the king's house, and a present from the king went with him.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: But he slept in the entrance of the king's house with the servants of his lord, and he did not go down to his house.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_01: It was reported to David, Uriah did not go down to his house.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: David said to Uriah, You've come from a long journey.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Why did you not go down to your house?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: He said, The ark and Israel and Judah remain in booths.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: And my Lord Joab and the servants of my Lord are camping in open fields.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: Shall I then go down to my house to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife as you live?
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: And as your soul lives, I will not do such a thing.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: David said to Uriah, Remain here, and tomorrow I will send you back.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: He remained in Jerusalem that day.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: The next day David invited Uriah to eat and drink in his presence and made him drunk.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: And he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his Lord, but he did not go down to his house.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: The next morning, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: In it he wrote, set Uriah at the forefront of the fiercest fighting.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Then draw back so that he may be struck down and die.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: As Joab was keeping watch over the city, he placed Uriah where he knew there were valiant warriors, and the men of the city came out and fought against Joab, and some of the servants of David among the people fell, and Uriah, the Hittite, died too.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: And Joab sent word to David about the fighting.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: He said to the messenger, After you finish telling David all about the fighting, if the king's anger arises, and he says to you, Why did you go so near the city to fight?
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: Did you not know they shoot from the wall?
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Who killed Abimelech son of Zerubbabel?
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: Did not a woman throw a millstone from the wall so that he died at the best?
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Why did you go so near the wall?
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: Then you shall say, Uriah the Hittite is dead too.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: So the messenger went and came and told David all that Joab had sent him to tell.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: He said, The men of the city gained an advantage of us, and they came out into the field, but we pushed them back to the entrance of the gate, and the archer shot from the wall, and some among your servants have died, but Uriah the Hittite has died too.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: And David said, Thus you shall say to Joab, Do not let this matter trouble you.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: For the sword devours now one and now another.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: Press your attack against the city and overthrow it, and encourage him.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: When the wife of Uriah learned that her husband had died, she made lamentation for him.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought Bathsheba to his house, and she became his wife, and she bore him a son.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the Lord sent Nathan to David.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: This is the word of the Lord.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: Second Samuel eleven.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how that story lands for you.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what stirs for you.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna give us with John just a minute to collect ourselves.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: She wants to know.
• 12:49
  unknown: Why all the violence?
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Why all the violence against women?
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: She's telling me about her classmates and her friends.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: New to faith, wide-eyed to Jesus, with the cross and the grave and the resurrection, but why all the violence?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: She wanted to know, this was her question, why is this story in the Bible?
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: David.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is David's world.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: Eight times it says David sent.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: David sent.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: David sent.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: Just as one sort of window into this is David's world.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: David's in charge.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: David does what David wants to do.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: David gets away with whatever David wants to get away.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: David is in charge.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: David's calling the shots.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: Usurpation of power.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: Lust after lust.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: David sent a messenger to get Bathsheba.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: Reminds me of that moment in Genesis 3 when she took of its fruit.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: And he ate.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: And here we are again.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: Here it is again.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: The way the story starts, it's sort of, I mean, I almost think of it as like a, like I guess I studied chemistry, so I think in terms of abstracts, like the abstract to the report, like the preliminary report.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: David sent Joab and his officers and all Israel with him.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: They ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's the very thing David would do himself.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: He ravaged Bathsheba and besieged Uriah.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: What is the story doing here?
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: Don't we read the Bible to like, you know, figure out how it's supposed to go?
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like, read the Bible, like, aren't these the heroes?
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, do what David did.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: What is this doing here?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the alternative is a fair question to ask.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: What if we just took it out?
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: What if we just didn't tell the story?
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: What if we just swept it under the rug?
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: What if we just acted like it didn't happen?
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: What if what if the story of shame, pain, isolation, tragedy, trauma?
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: What if the church just never told those stories?
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: Fig actually is wondering, how come the church never talks about this?
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: The book of Chronicles, so there's like 1st and 2 Samuel, 12 Kings, 1 and 2nd Chronicles.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: Chronicles is the chronicle of Israel's history, like David's history.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Guess which story the chronicler of Israel's history leaves out.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: Just take a wild guess.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: This one.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: We're practiced in not telling the story.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe, maybe the way forward is not silence.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe the way forward isn't sweeping it under the rug.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe pretending it didn't happen isn't the way forward.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's how it's, that's what it says.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: It happened.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: That literally, like read your Bible, find it.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: 2 Samuel 11, verse 2, it happened.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: And it happens.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: It happened and it happens.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: Why is it?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a dad of four daughters, so forgive me.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: Why is it that when my kid goes to college, I tell her, if you're gonna go to a party, bring your own alcohol.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: Why would I do that?
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: Why would I have to do that?
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: It happened and it happens.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: Fifty percent of women in the United States are victims of sexual violence.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: It happened and it happens.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: And we live, I just read these things, we live in what's been called a bully culture.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: It happened and it happens.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe not talking about it, maybe pretending it didn't happen or sweeping it under the road, maybe that's not the faithful way forward.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's Fig wanted to know, why is this even in the Bible?
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, what if it wasn't?
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: Here's a second question she asked.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: What are we supposed to do with it?
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: What are we supposed to do with this?
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: David pushing things around, getting what he wants, doing what he does.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: He's got all the power, so like, well, what you gonna do?
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh really interesting, you know.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: The story ends.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David did displeased the Lord.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: Which conjures in my mind that moment in Genesis 6, you know, just before the flood story, you know, uh God saw the wickedness of humankind was great on the earth and it grieved God's heart.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David did displeased the Lord.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Or that moment in Genesis 4 when when Cain kills Abel and Abel's blood, it says, your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground, and here now Uriah is Uriah's on the ground, your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David had done displeased the Lord.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: It reminds me of that moment in Genesis 3 when God shows up to the first man and the first woman.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: What is this that you've done?
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David had done displeased the Lord.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: So don't do it! That's what I'm trying to say.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: Don't do it.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: It displeased the Lord, so don't do it.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I am completely aware of how utterly futile it sounds to say on a Sunday morning, hey, just don't do it.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: But still don't do it.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: David, David goes on, you know, this is one of our famous prayers.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: Nathan calls out David.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: David wakes up to the travesty of it all, and he he writes that prayer, Psalm 51, you know.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: For I know my transgressions and my sins ever before me, against you, you alone have I sinned.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: He pins this prayer, Psalm 51, and the church has been praying it now for forever, for a long, long time, maybe inviting us to pray it before we go do it.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: To open our hearts to our own capacities, to brokenness and hurt and violence of whatever version it might be.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe, maybe that's what maybe we hear this story, we get on our knees, and we open our hearts to who we are and what we're capable of.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: Fig wanted to know, why is this here?
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: What are we supposed to do with it?
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Here's another question she asked.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Where's God in this story?
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: Where's God in this story?
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: Why didn't why didn't God, you know, send a flood before the torrential rains poured on Bathsheba's life?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: Why didn't God show up in a pillar of cloud and fire before Uriah was cut down?
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: Where was the ram caught in a thicket for Bathsheba?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: Where is God?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, she's asking really an emotional question.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: But it's theologically, biblically sophisticated too.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: In 2 Samuel 11, the word God the Lord does not show up until the very end.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: Very end of the story.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Almost merging into chapter 12, if you you know the way the Bible's laid out, but the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: A couple things stand out to me.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe God's seeming absence isn't the actual absence of God.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David had done displeased the Lord.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe God attentive, God aware, God cares.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe, maybe this story, with all of its ache and tragedy and all of the heartache it leaves us with, maybe, maybe it's pointing to the one who would take on the seeming absence of God, Jesus Christ.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: The victim himself, who went like a lamb led to the slaughter, silent before his shearers, hung on the cross, where he cries out, My God, my God, why?
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: Have you forsaken me?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: Why have you left me?
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: Why have you abandoned me?
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe, maybe this story points us to the one who won't leave us abandoned in our ache and agony and sadness.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe this, maybe Jesus is the one with in abandonment, presence in isolation.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe this one opens our hearts to Christ who takes on the violence of the whole world, takes it on himself, dies so that you're not alone, and rises up in resurrection, so you'll know redemption.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: The thing David had done displeased the Lord.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: And the Lord sent Nathan to David.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord, maybe the seeming absence of God in 2 Samuel 11 isn't the actual absence of God, but is an invitation to the rest of us, a Nathan-like people to stand up and to be with those who hurt, be with those alone, be with those in isolation, a compassionate witness to the stories of that are too often swept under the rug and ignored or even sanctified.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: A compassionate witness and a voice for those who aren't allowed to speak.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: A presence for those who've been sidelined.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe we're supposed to be Nathan in the story.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: We text each other a fair amount, and oftentimes we'll text each other after our morning devotions.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: Just like little things that sort of kind of opened our hearts to God each day.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be honest, he texts me more than I text him.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: He was reading a book by a Roman Catholic priest who lives in Gaza.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: The book is titled The Priest Who Stayed in Gaza.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: And he texted me this paragraph.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: As a priest, I'm convinced that our Lord Jesus Christ is truly present with us.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: This profound mystery is the principal reason, though not the only one, why I believe it is necessary for us to remain in Gaza.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: Each day during worship, we renew the presence of Christ in the very heart of this abyss.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: And it's this little great light that we are given to make shine.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: This little great light, the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: This little great light.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: This little great light until that great day when there will be no need for sun or moon, for the glory of God will be its light.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: This little great light until finally the lion and the lamb lie down together and there's peace on earth.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: Swords become plowshares, spears become pruning hooks.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: This little great light until that great day when all things are made new and all things are made right, because Jesus Christ takes it all on himself.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: He suffers the victim's death and he rises up in resurrection for redemption.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: So John's gonna play for us David's prayer, our invitation to be on our knees too, and then we'll come to the table.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: You took on the violence, you took on the pain, you took on the stories of all those who suffered.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: So that suffering wouldn't have the last word, and suffering wouldn't be the end of the story.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: We remember in this supper the perfect sacrifice offered once on the cross by our Lord Jesus Christ for the sin of the whole world.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: In the joy of his resurrection and an expectation of his coming again, we offer ourselves to you as holy and living sacrifices.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: Send your Holy Spirit upon us, we pray, that the bread we break and the cup we bless may be to us communion.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: Meet us here, Christ, be with us here, Christ.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: Any of us who know isolation, who know what it's like to be set aside and to be swept under the rug.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: Meet us here, Christ.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: And empower us here, Christ, to be the kind of people your world desperately needs.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name we pray.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.