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Brew City Church
Being Christian | Keep Going
00:40:43
November 16, 2025 | Brew City Church | Randy Knie
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Welcome to the Brew City Church Podcast. We are a Christian church following in the way of Jesus and located in the heart of downtown Milwaukee. We're glad you've joined us and we hope you enjoy this week's message.
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Good morning, friends. Good to see you. Let me just put a little PS of little postscript on that last announcement, the prayer vigil that, that we're going to be hosting here. What's the date again, Montavious? Next Friday the 21st. We need you prayer warriors. But also I want to tell you if prayer is something that's become kind of a, it feels like a foreign language to you almost. I don't know if any of you have this experience, but where you've been walking with God for a long time and it just seems like your prayer life is kind of dried up. I don't know if I'm the only one every once in a while who has that experience. If that's your experience, I want to encourage you to sign up for a slot with this prayer visual because you're going to be surprised. I think I'm always surprised when I engage prayerfully in this kind of set aside time in a space that's been curated for it. What happens even if I don't have words in that whole time, in that whole hour and I'm just sitting in the presence of Christ, that can teach me about prayer. And I think some things can open up for us. So even if prayer, if you're like that's for the prayer people, not for me, I want to encourage you to consider signing up and especially you prayer warriors sign up in the middle of the night hours 2am to 6am Those are the amazing people who sign up for those ones. So we need a few of you amazing people. Feels like it feels like Christianity has gotten a bad rap for a while now. Like it feels like we're in a moment in if you consider yourself a Christian, I consider I'm a Jesus follower. I consider myself a Christian in these last probably five years, in particular ten years. In addition, we've seen this rise of this movement of people deconstructing their faith, right? Deconstructing their faith. And some of those, the folks deconstructing. And many of you here this morning would say, yeah, that's what I've been doing, that's what I am doing, that's what I've done. And many of those, those Christians who are deconstructing their faith are keeping the faith and kind of just reconstructing it to something that Looks something more Christ like. But many of those people, we talked about this last week, many of those people who are deconstructing their faith are leaving the faith altogether. They're becoming what statisticians call religious duns or even nones. In other words, I'm done with religion. So many people in our world say, and many of the people who say that were Christians or now, I'm not even done, but I just identify. I don't have a faith tradition. If you put me in a box, I'm an atheist now. Like, this is happening a lot in our world. And in many ways, I mean, many, many people in my position are freaking out about it a little bit. I got to tell you, I think it's in some ways exciting. I don't think I'm not excited about the fact that people are leaving Christianity. That's not awesome. But what I do think is exciting is that our faith tradition is being critiqued by these folks who say, I can't do it this way anymore. Our faith tradition is being examined when. When you have people saying, I don't think I identify with this belief anymore. I don't think I identify with this community of people and the way they show up in the world. Do you know what I'm talking about? I don't think I identify with that anymore. When that phenomenon starts happening, it gets turned into a movement that means our faith tradition is being looked at through a microscope. It's where our faith traditions being thought of critically in a way that I think is very helpful because any religion, any faith tradition, any movement gets a little weird if you don't have some self critique, right? But all that being said, reflecting on how Christianity has been kind of received a bad rap for a while now, I want to just tell you. And I know, and I say this because I know especially in this last sermon series that we've been in, which is. This is the last sermon in the sermon series. In this last sermon series we've been in, I can be a little critical of the church and of Christianity itself, But I want to tell you, especially because of that, that those critiques that I give the church that I bring are because I love the church so much. Like, can I tell you just. Can I. Can I just spend five minutes telling you I love being a Christian? Like it. I love following Jesus. I bring critiques to the church all the time. If you're a part of Brew City Church, a member here, you know, that's the truth. Again, it's because I love the Church so much I love following Jesus. Being Christian has been the most transformational, life changing thing in my life. Like my faith tradition and following Jesus has formed and shaped me in ways that I don't even think I know. I'm certain I, I don't realize. I see the world differently because of my Christianity, because I follow Jesus, because I'm a Christian. Like, I see the world through lenses. I choose to see the world through lenses of hope and life and light and healing. Actually because of my faith tradition, because of my Christianity, I see the world in more beautiful ways. And man, I need something that compels me and invites me into seeing the world in more beautiful ways. I don't know about you, my family, I can't think about it too much because it'll make me emotional. But my family has been profoundly changed and transformed and shaped by this faith tradition that we've been talking about that we're a part of. Like, I don't know where my kids faith journey is going to lead them. I don't know what's going to happen in life to my kids. But I think about it all the time and I pray for their future all the time. And it gives me such great comfort and hope to know that these seeds of this faith tradition, these seeds of this Jesus movement has been planted inside of them so that when life does get crazy, when, when life does get intense, when life does get painful and it feels like it's ripping your heart off, some of you are walking through times exactly like I'm talking about. It gives me great comfort to know that these seeds of faith in Christ, of this faith tradition have been deposited in my kids in such a way that maybe they can lean into this foundation of faith. Maybe in the future when their lives do spin out of control, they have this foundation of steadiness and solidness and goodness drawing them in and giving them hope. Called Jesus, called this faith tradition of Christianity. I love being Christian. I'm so grateful that I've been born and raised into a family that's pointed me to Jesus over and over and over again. I love being part of a faith community with you, like you and this thing that we do, this shared project called the church, it gives me something I wouldn't have without you. Like, do you remember during COVID when it felt like a lot of this got taken away when we were meeting in our homes and zooming church? It didn't feel right in many ways. It was this gift of a reminder. And I'm not saying Covid was a gift, but there was gifts within it that reminded me how much I love this shared project that we get to partake in called to church Being Christian, and not in an isolated way, but together figuring this stuff out together. I love it. And so what we've been doing in the last. Well, since February 28th, that was the first Sunday that we were in the sermon series called Being Christian. And if you remember, this sermon series was born out of your questions. As I meet with some of you and engage with you guys in pastoral ways, I've been hearing some questions from many of you, questions that are really, really wonderful questions to ask. Like, are there in specific questions? Basically asking a number of questions asking the same thing, which is, are the rules the same as when I grew up in the church? Do you know what I'm talking about when I say that, like, many of us have grown up in the church and have been kind of discipled into a way of living and a way of operating in many, many areas of our lives. And these questions you guys have given me have been asking basically, are the rules still the same? Am I still expected to live and show up and, and think and believe in these same ways that I was discipled as I was a kid, as I was coming of age in the church, as I was raising my family, maybe in the church, have things changed or they stay the same? And so we've been asking tons of major, major questions and thinking about many major topics and asking what does it mean to follow Jesus in the world that we live in today? Have things stayed the same or have. Are things changing about our faith and faith tradition? So we talked about. Let's just. Let me just rattle off some things that we've thought about since late February of this year. We first talked about the Bible and we did that for many, many a number of weeks. I think three weeks we talked about the Bible. Is if all of these topics that we're talking about, I think are rooted in the Scriptures. But the first thing that we need to talk about when we ask some major questions is how do we actually approach the scriptures? Right? And if you remember, we found that, I think the best way for approaching the scriptures and navigating some of these topics is to take a big picture view of the Bible. If you're at the PEC Post Evangelical Collective gathering in Chicago a couple of weeks ago, Dr. David Gushy kind of endorsed that we'll say viewpoint of the Bible when he said we are not to take a flat reading of the Bible. Like many of us have been taught, but we hit those high points and let those inform and be authoritative. We've talked about the Bible. We talked about, then out of talking about the Bible and how we approach the Bible, we talked about parenting. What does it look like to be a parent in this world right now? And what does it look like to tell my kids about the gospel and about Jesus and raise them as followers of Jesus in maybe ways similar to what I grew up with, but maybe in ways that are different because I didn't grow up with some of the most healthy expressions of Christianity. So what does that look like? What does it look like to be married? We talk about marriage and this reality that human beings change. And I wish that when Martin More pastors stood up there with couples officiating weddings, we would talk about the reality that people change and humans change. And this is what marriage looks like is walking together as we change together. We talked about divorce and how some of those changes happen and they lead us apart. And we heard from some friends, some sacred stories from people who have been married in those marriages dissolved over time for one reason or another. We heard some really beautiful sacred stories about God putting things back together after divorce. Maybe some of you are here this morning and you didn't know that was possible. I want to tell you it is. We talked about relationships, we talked about sex and sexual in the church world, in the church lingo, sex before marriage or sex outside of marriage. And we talked about maybe constructing a sexual ethic that is more of a values based sexual ethic than something than a rules based sexual ethic and what that could look like and getting a little bit more expansive in the way that we think about relationships and sex and all the things we talked about sexuality, if you remember, do you remember hearing three beautiful sacred stories from three queer men in our church family who were brave enough and had the courage enough to share their experiences with us and what it was like growing up being, being queer in non affirming spaces and church spaces and growing in what that looks like and thinking about how Jesus feels about me as a person because of that. And then I shared with you about why I have changed my mind about human sexuality, why I've changed my mind where I was non affirming as a, as a Christian and as a pastor. And now I'm affirming and we as a church are an affirming space in church. And if what I'm saying right now challenges you because maybe you're new around here and this is new information and all of a sudden you're uncomfortable because you're in a church that maybe you disagree with. I just want to encourage you. We shared those stories in a sermon time. And then I gave, the following week in June, I gave a a sermon about it. If what I'm saying right now is troubling to you or it sits weirdly with you, just listen to those two weeks. That's all I ask. Listen to the stories that were told first. You can go back in our website@brewcitychurch.org and listen to those stories and then listen to my sermon about the scriptures and why I changed my mind. And if you're still a little worried, we can meet. I'm happy to have a conversation with you and tell you more. Or we can just disagree about some of these things and still choose to love one another. That's still possible in the world that we live in, even though it doesn't feel like it. The next week we talked about gender in this hugely divisive topic in our world where a community, the trans and non binary community, are used as scapegoats, police, political scapegoats in our world, talking points rather than human beings. And I just asked the question, what if we could just listen to people and their stories? That doesn't seem too crazy, too outside the lines of where the church should go. It actually seems like exactly the kind of thing the church should do. Listening to people, asking questions rather than speaking at them and telling them the way they should live their lives first. Just hearing and listening to their stories, letting that sit with us before we share our opinions, maybe letting their stories inform our opinions and shape the way we think about these things. What if we could do that after that? We talked about gender. Gender in a way of talking about masculinity and what masculinity looks like in this world and what it could and should look like, maybe in light of Jesus. We talked about femininity and what that looks like in this changing world that we live in and how women are called to walk in the calling that God has given them, ignoring the noise around them, telling them what they can and can't do. We talked about Sabbath and rest and as Sabbath, as rest and Sabbath, as resistance in the chaotic world that we live in, if you remember that. And then for the last few weeks we've been talking about really light topics, topics about heaven and hell and where. How my thinking has changed about that. We talked about last week. We talked about politics in the church. Super, super weighty stuff. But as I go through all these things that we've been talking about. I'm really proud that we've had these conversations as a church because these are things that can split a church apart. But I felt you guys leaning in. Right. So I would love week. We're gonna do a Q and R where you. I want, I would love to hear all of your questions and we're gonna have a conversation. We're gonna do one of those Q and our Sundays next week. But this week, I just love. We got a little bit of time. I'd love to hear if any of you have some reflections from this sermon series. What if. No, I've come to you first. Just a moment. But what has this prompted you to think about or think differently about or felt some new freedom to think about or maybe challenged you in some ways or maybe like, I'm still sitting with this. I don't know about it. I would love to hear from a few of you. Nell, can you. You raised your hand right away.
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Yeah.
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I never thought that church could be a place where I learned more about gender.
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I never thought church could be a place Nell said, where I learned about gender. Can you just give me just a 10 seconds more? What do you mean by that?
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Yeah.
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When it comes to transgender.
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Okay.
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I knew that there was masculine and feminine, but I never thought that I could learn more about the trans, transgender experience.
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Wow. That makes me sad and also encourages me, right. That there's this, this huge conversation that's happening in our world. But for many of us, we say that's not a conversation that's allowed in church. Right. How many churches are having those conversations? And if they are, it's a very, very one sided way of telling that story. Nelson says, I didn't realize we could actually learn and have these conversations in church. Other reflections from this series. Antonio, How are you going to welcome the Holy Spirit? That's right. That's right. Thank you, Antonio. Welcoming the stranger and being about welcoming the stranger as a church, we should be used to that. Right. Antonio thinks because the Holy Spirit feels like a stranger to many of us in many churches. But what if we can can welcome the stranger? And in doing that, we welcome Jesus and the Holy Spirit into our midst. Right. Other reflections. Thank you. Antonio. Yes. I forget your name. I'm sorry. Dan. Steve. Thank you. The doctrine of theology, that really. Doctrine in theology. I forgot to even mention that. You're paying attention, Steve. As far as what politics is trying to teach you, what the Bible actually says. Thank you. Yes. Talking about doctrine and theology and what doctrines actually we should leave behind and maybe be done with. Because there are some doctrines that actually do the opposite of giving us life. They suck it from us. There's some doctrines that we should double down on, I think. And how we have that conversation matters. And having that conversation matters. Thank you, Steve. Any other reflections, Hannah?
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I feel like a lot of these conversations equipped me as a high school teacher where I teach at a local high school. A lot of my students have conversations and questions that not many teachers feel comfortable talking about, or they're just taught one way.
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Yeah.
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And so these have really equipped me to be able to provide answers and other perspectives for them that maybe they aren't getting from the theology teachers themselves.
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So my friend Hannah Goes, is a teacher at my alma mater, Milwaukee Lutheran High School. Go Red Knights. I'm not going to tell you how long ago, but Hannah is a teacher saying these conversations that we've been having in church actually has helped me engage conversationally with my students who have these very same questions. Right. I know some of you others are educators. These are conversations that people are having. But when you're at a Christian school, it's not just a given that these Christian classes are going to be talking about some of these things. Even though these kids have these questions and are wrestling with this stuff whether we address it or not. And if we don't address it, what are we doing? Because somebody else is love it. We've been having these conversations. And I want to tell you, I. I don't just think these questions and conversations are optional for the church. I think these questions and conversations are mandatory for the church. I think these questions and conversations must be had because if we don't, we're just gonna bury our head in the sand and become irrelevant and continue to see young person after young person and person after person. I know empty nesters and people in people approaching or in their retirement years who are deconstructing and leaving the faith. More of that is going to continue to happen if we don't have these conversations as a church. So I want to give you just an example as we finish this sermon series, I want to just give you an example to show you. These are not new conversations that we're having now. The stuff, the topics on the screen that Lee has up there, those are fairly new. But what I'm talking about is these kinds of conversations are as old as the church. And that's pretty old. That's 2000ish years old. And these kind of conversations have been happening even we see these conversations in the Scriptures. That's why I can be confident telling you that I want to give you. Can I just give you one example from the New Testament in the early church of a conversation that was happening much like this. That encourages me, that might encourage us, if you want to, if you like reading from a book. The bible thing, Romans 14 is where we're going to be. It's also going to be on the screens in, in front of us. This is Romans 14 starting in verse one. Now before, hold on for a second, before I go into it, there's dynamics happening in the early church, just like there's dynamics happening here in our church, in the modern American church, let's say. And there's divisive topics and things going on in the church. And one of the, not one of the most challenging thing in the church at this point that Paul's writing this to the church in Rome is this reality that there's two groups of people who hate each other, who have obsessed about separating themselves from one another in the same culture. Two people groups who have identified themselves by what they, how they are not one another. Jewish people and Gentiles, they hated one another. They never mixed company. They were never, they weren't even allowed. A Jewish person couldn't sit on a chair that a gentile sat on, much less being in the same room and having in being called a community. But see, when Jesus shows up in a community, people start coming together. And the Apostle Paul was actually called to, to minister to these marginalized people that have been excluded by his religious order, his religious tradition, he was called to reach them. How about that? By God. In one of the huge conversations and divisions that happened because of this coming together of different people groups, this is what happens, is you have to address some real life issues. There's this notion about what we eat. Now this sounds super silly and weird to us, but what they ate was a big deal in the early church, in particular, what they didn't eat. And there was all these laws in the Jewish world. In the early church's world, the people who were the early Christians, most of them grew up as Jewish people. And in that religious world, they were told over and over again, the scriptures say by the Scriptures in his Exodus and Leviticus and other places, there are certain foods you cannot eat because there are certain animals that are unclean. And if a food, if food has been sacrificed to an idol, a false idol, you definitely can't eat that. That's sinful. But now something else is happening. Something new is happening in this religious tradition. Let's jump into it then. And really. Romans 14. One except the one whose faith is weak, Paul says, without quarreling over disputable matters. Wow. One person's faith allows them to eat anything, but another whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat. Now, let me. Let me. Just as we read this. It's easy to just kind of read this stuff. And the one who eats everything must not treat content with. One person's faith allows him to eat anything. But another whose faith is weak eats only vegetables. So Paul's saying, you who are strictly following the religious rules that we all grew up with and have been told are in the scriptures. And we've seen them in the scriptures. They're clearly in the scriptures. You who adhere to those rules, your faith is kind of weak. Not my words. This is Paul bringing some challenge here. All right, I just want to make sure that we're on the same page. One person's faith allows them to eat anything, but another whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not. And the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. Who are you to judge? Can we just listen? Who are you to judge? Someone else's servants. Arrows going through my heart to their own master. Servants stand or fall, and they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand. Verse 5. One person considers one day more sacred than another. These holy religious festivals, another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. These were deep, divisive topics in the early church. Friends, we have to observe and keep all these sacred days that God told us in the scriptures that we have to keep. And some people are saying, no, we don't. Those days don't mean anything to me. Every day is sacred. Paul said, live with one another. Figure it out together. Whoever. Verse 6. Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God. And whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord. So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the living and the dead.
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You.
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Then why do you judge your brother or sister
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now?
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Why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God's judgment seat as it is written. As surely as I lived, says the Lord, every knee will bow before me, every tongue acknowledge God. So then each of us will give an account of ourselves before God. Therefore, let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in the way of a brother or sister. I'm convinced. Paul says, I'm convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing in itself is. It's is unclean in itself. I'm convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in and of itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean. If your brother is or sister is distressed because of because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ has died. Therefore do not let what you know is good be spoken of as evil. There's so much complexity in here. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and receives human approval. Now, I didn't pick this text to exegete the business out of every verse. I don't have the time for that. Anyways, it's not what we're doing here today. But I did want to highlight this whole conversation for you and I'm going to leave some things in it, but because I wanted to highlight the whole conversation because I wanted to show us. This is a beautiful example in Romans 14 of a very controversial, divisive some very controversial and divisive topics that were affecting the early church. And Paul says there's room for us all. And here's the deal. The side of these arguments, you can hear it here. The side of these arguments that say scripture is settled, friends. Like literally, you can go. I could give you the cross references in Exodus and Leviticus that says, do not eat meat sacrificed to idols. Don't do it, it's a sin. And I could show you the other verses that say don't. There are these foods are unclean and you shall not eat them, as my people God says, thus saith the Lord. Right? And this side of this argument would say it's in the Bible. The Bible is clear. It's. This has been our part of our faith tradition since the beginning of our faith tradition. How could you think that anything different than that is appropriate. And Paul says, I don't believe that anymore. I know it's in the scriptures. See, Paul was a very, very devout Jewish man. Paul says he was a Pharisee. That means he knew the scriptures inside and out better than the people who are arguing with him about what's in the scriptures. He knew it. And he said, I think, see, here's the deal, guys. I think God's doing something different now. See, Paul had his life interrupted by the person named Jesus. And because of that interruption by a person named Jesus, Paul was re evaluating everything about his faith tradition. And because of that disruption and interruption by this person named Jesus, Paul was willing to look at everything anew and say, I don't think if you just talk to people and if you just observe what Jesus is doing, I think Jesus is doing something new. And as I said a moment ago, Paul was called by God to reach this group of people who had been excluded by his faith tradition. He's called by God to bring those, these marginalized people from his faith tradition into his faith tradition. And that, friends, is bound to be a messy deal. And Paul says, look, I want you to be able to have these conversations without judging one another. And he even says, do you get what. Do you see the maturity with which Paul is talking? Where he said, you've been given freedom in Christ? Like, I know what the Bible says, but I also know what Jesus is telling me and where Jesus is leading me. And I know what these conversations have been forming and shaping me. And I know that actually no food is unclean. That's this kind of shadow that we were. That God was teaching us of what's to come. But see, there's something bigger and richer going on for us to think about and concern ourselves with and what we do or don't eat. And actually, if you are walking in this freedom of saying no food is unclean and God is allowing us to eat whatever we want in, in. In. In conversation with the Holy Spirit. That's actually, Paul says, evidence not of a faith teetering on a brink. When these folks were having questions about what was previously said settled as gospel truth, did you hear it in there? Paul said that's actually evidence of strong faith, like being willing to have these conversations and being willing to ask these questions that maybe of things that seem settled. And these conversations just so, you know, split families apart. These conversations are the kind of conversations that split churches apart, that split friend groups apart, that brought grief into the dynamic because these folks took this stuff Very personally, just like we take this stuff very personally. And Paul said, asking these questions and having these conversations and considering what if God is actually giving us freedom to walk in these choices and to establish and kind of walk in. Imagine something, a new kind of spirituality being formed and shaped by Jesus that's evidence of strong, beautiful faith. So as we wrap up the sermon series, friends, I want to tell you, this passage gives me so much encouragement and comfort because I just want to tell you, as we wrap up the sermon series, keep asking these questions. This sermon series was inspired by you and your questions. And I want to encourage you. Bruge City Church, my friends, my spiritual family, keep asking the hard questions. Keep going. We're going to be thinking and talking about some different things, but keep following the Holy Spirit into these dangerous places. Could you do that? Could we be individuals who, who follow Jesus in such a way and be a church community who follow Jesus in such a way that we're willing to go to the dangerous places and ask the dangerous questions? Maybe with people who aren't welcome in places like this so much, what if we could let their stories become authoritative for us in some ways? What if we could find Jesus in places that we were once told Jesus is nowhere to be found? I want to encourage you, keep going to those places, keep having these conversations, keep being curious about what it looks like to follow Jesus, because this isn't just kind of an optional conversation for us followers of Jesus. I think this is an essential conversation for followers of Jesus. This is what the church is supposed to look like, is thinking critically of our faith. It's being willing to be open to new information. It's being Christian doesn't mean that we just hit copy and paste on everything that's been told to us and just doing the same way over and over again, generation after generation after generation. If that's the case, Christianity will die. But see, all the way back to the beginning of our faith tradition, we're shown in these conversations. Christianity is born out of these tough conversations. Freedom and beauty and life only comes about when men and women who follow Jesus are willing to ask these questions and have these conversations. I think when we talk, I grew up hearing a lot about revival. You know what I'm talking about. I started my ministry as a pastor talking about revival. And now sometimes that word is repulsive to me because of what we mean by it. But I gotta tell you, I think if we continue to have conversations like these and ask the hard conversations like we have been, and keep being curious about what it looks like to follow Jesus in the world we live in right now. I want to tell you these are sacred conversations that will form and shape us and I think might just spark a revival like we've always been longing for. But maybe it just is going to look different than we always thought it would because the people coming through these doors are going to be people that we never dreamed of but see God does. Can we be formed and shaped by these conversations? Would you be so brave, Bruce City Church, as to keep going in these, to keep going, to keep asking, to keep being curious, just to keep leaning in, in faith in Jesus enough to ask the hard questions and to do it together in community? This is what a beautiful faith community looks like. Can we keep going in that? Let's. If you're able, friends, let's stand one more time. We're going to punctuate our morning together this time together in one more worship song that Kristen's gonna lead us in. But if you're willing. I'm just gonna. I like having a physical posture that kind of reminds me and my spirit, my body, my mind of the inward posture I want to have. So I'm holding my hands out, open. You can if you want to. I just want to ask you, Father, son and spirit to come and continue to guide this church family, just like you were guiding that church family in Rome. Bunch of homes throughout a city trying to figure out what it looks like to follow Jesus in their world. People who once hated one another coming together and finding that they love one another because of the love of Jesus. How magical and miraculous is that? And then people's worldviews colliding in such a way that they had to have tense conversations about what God's doing in their world. How magical and miraculous is that to stay part of the same church family, to stay part of the same community while wrestling with real stuff? Would you do that for us, God? Would you continue cultivating a bride, a church here that leans in, in faithfulness, that leans in in faith and asks the hard questions? Would you pull us further and deeper into your heart, Jesus? Would you protect us as we ask these questions and we go to these places that we've been told are dangerous? Would you form and shape us in and through these conversations? And would you, Jesus, be constantly calling us and drawing us and inviting us into truth, into life, into healing, into the kind of things that you dream about for us? And so now we just sing as one voice and one body one more time this morning.
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Thank you again for being with us. We would love to have you join us if you are ever in the Milwaukee area. And we hope you have a healthy place to gather wherever you are from.