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Mariners Church Weekend Messages
March 22 - Agony in a Garden: The King Who Sweats Blood - Eric Geiger
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Welcome to Mariners Church Weekend Message Podcast, inspiring people to follow Jesus and fearlessly change the world. Discover your purpose and get connected by visiting MarinersChurch.org or click the link in the show notes.
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So glad that you're with us today. If we haven't met, my name is Eric. I'm the senior pastor here. About 10 days ago, I woke up in the middle of the night with this really intense pain in my toe. I never had pain in my toe like this. I had a hard time going to sleep the rest of the night, and then the next day, the pain spread from my toe to my foot. It felt like my foot was about to explode. I actually hoped it would explode because I thought that would be less painful than what I was experiencing. Got in touch with the doctor, and he says, what have you been eating? Cause I think this is gout. And I said, well, we did what we have done lots of weekends. We go to the Mexican market over the weekend. We get these big cups of ceviche. He said, that's it. That is high in purine. Your uric acid is high. You have gout, which was so painful. I'm old now. If you haven't had gout before, just. I'm warning you, it's gonna be painful when it happens. He got me on a steroid, and the pain quickly went away. But I. I can't believe, like, two weeks ago, I would never imagine saying this, but I'm never gonna have ceviche again ever, in my entire life. And so some of this has happened to you before, where you have had a dish or you drank something that got you so sick in such pain that there's no way you're gonna have that again. The cup of ceviche, I'm appalled by it now, repulsed by it, because of the pain that it brought into my life, the physical pain. But the same is true when it comes to emotional and psychological pain. And actually, it's even deeper when you have emotional pain and psychological pain and you figure out what has caused that pain, you will do whatever you can to avoid what brought that pain into your life. When we lived in Nashville, Kay, my wife, and our two daughters, Eden and Nevi, we lived on a street that had a lot of other young families our age and a lot of kids our daughter's age that used to play together in the cul de sac. It was awesome. This one family, several houses down from us, had two daughters that were similar ages to Eden and Evie. They went to the same school. They played in our cul De sac in our backyard all the time. Eden and Evie enjoyed playing with these. These two girls. And we became friends with the parents. And as we started talking to the parents, over time, they became transparent with us about their struggles in their life and their past. They had been addicts, and they still wrestled with drug abuse and alcohol abuse. And we prayed with them. We were there for them. And then one day, they came to us and said that they needed to check themselves into a rehab center. And they asked if we would watch their daughters. And of course, absolutely. And so their daughters lived with us for a brief season, and then they came home from the rehab center. I remember walking the daughters back to their house with their suitcases and bringing the daughters back home. And at this point, Eden and Evie are hearing all of the stories from their friends, the daughters, and they're aware now of alcohol abuse and drug abuse. And we brought the. The daughters back to the house, and then they relapsed again. At this point, the authorities got involved. We happened to be outside. Kay and Dean and Nevi and I were outside in our front yard. It's crazy that we happened to be there with the moment this took place, but Department of Children and Family Services drove up and pulled into the driveway of our neighbors, and we saw their little girls leave with suitcases into these cars. And I remember Evie, she's in first grade at the time. She just starts CR holding her. And then we prayed that the family would be reunited and the children were able to come back home. And for months, everything seemed to be going well. And then one day we got a phone call that the husband and the father had checked himself into a hotel and drank himself to death, that he died. I remember sharing that with Eden and Evie. And for the next several years, when I would tuck Evie in at night. This is in first grade, but this was in second grade and third grade as well. It seemed like every night I would tuck her in and pray with her, have the Bible story with her. That as I was leaving her room, she would ask, dad, daddy, did you drink today? Did you have alcohol today? She was so appalled by what had happened to that family that she was just scared that that instability would be in our family now. We are not, our church is not, nor am I against drinking. We don't believe that the scripture gives a prohibition against alcohol. There is a prohibition against drunkenness, but not a prohibition against having a drink or enjoying a drink. I enjoy at times when I'm out with k a cocktail. I love having an old fashioned with A good steak. But it's for Evie's sake that we don't have alcohol in our house. We don't keep alcohol in our home because for her, she's so repulsed by that cup because she saw how it destroyed a family friend. The cup of ceviche. I'm so repulsed by what it did physically. Ceviche. I said it wrong. Ceviche. And Abby's so repulsed by the cup of alcohol. But what about the cup that Jesus just prayed about? In the passage that we read, Jesus prayed three times. Please let this cup pass from me. There's a cup that Jesus is repulsed by. What is this cup, and what does this mean for us? We are walking through the events leading up to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus from the dead. We're in a teaching series called the Week that Changed the World. We've been looking at the days leading up to his crucifixion and then his resurrection. The passage that we read today is on Thursday. It's on Thursday night. On Friday are the events of the crucifixion. That's what we'll look at next weekend. So this weekend we're looking at Thursday. Next weekend we will look at the events of Friday. Two weeks from now, we'll look at the events of Sunday, but which is Easter weekend as we celebrate that Jesus is alive. And then three weeks from today, I start walking us through a teaching series in the book of Ecclesiastes. I've been praying about this and preparing this for months. If you've ever had a question about what is life all about? Does this matter at all? What's the meaning? What's the purpose? For me, the book of Ecclesiastes is a book for you. We're gonna start teaching that in three weeks. The week after Easter, I'm gonna open that series. I'm real excited about it. But this weekend, Thursday, Thursday, Jesus is in the garden of Gethsemane. I've been there. It's a very small garden. It's in Jerusalem. In fact, if you go, you'll be surprised at how small the garden is. And you'll also be surprised at how short of a distance it is from there to the place where Jesus is kept after he's arrested, and from there, a short walk to where he's crucified, and then a short walk to where he is buried and resurrected from the dead. It's all really compact. Jesus prays from the garden of Gethsemane. On this Thursday night, Gethsemane means oil press. So the garden means pressing. So as Jesus is in the garden, he's in the garden of pressing. This is emotional and spiritual and psychological pressing before Friday, the next day, which we'll look at next weekend, which is where he's physically pressed. But this garden is severe agony. Internally, you know, some of you know this pain currently. In fact, there are brain sensors in your brain that experience physical pain and emotional pain. The same research says that the brain sensors that you have, they fire very similarly when. Similarly kind of the same when you have physical pain and emotional pain. So if you are beat up or if you have some injury, you're sensors in your brain will fire. But if you were betrayed by someone or you experience disappointment or emotional pain, those same sensors are fired. Several years ago, you may remember, I had severe back pain, 8 millimeter herniated disc in the L5S1. And I. It was eight months of pain. Eight months of really having a hard time going to sleep at night. And the pain was with me all the time throughout the day. I've also experienced emotional pain, pain of betrayal. And I've had a hard time sleeping at night. And the pain is with me throughout the day. In the garden, Jesus is experiencing emotional agony. And the reason is he is abandoned by his disciples. And he believes he's even abandoned by his heavenly father. Notice in the passage that we read that he experiences being let down, disappointed in, abandoned by his own closest friends. He tells them, I'm deeply grieved to the point of death. Remain here and stay awake with me. So they're in the garden. Jesus says those words to, according to the scripture, Peter and the sons of Zebedee. Sons of Zebedee are James and John. So those are his three closest friends. When you read the Gospels, you see Jesus spending extra time with Peter, James and John. This is the lowest moment in his life. The very next day, he's gonna be crucified on a cross. He knows what's coming. He pulls his three closest friends together and he says, I'm about to die inside. This is the worst day of my life. This is the most painful thing I've ever experienced. I'm just asking, can you please stay awake and watch? Why go over here and pray. He goes and prays and they fall asleep. He goes back and wakes them up. He goes up three times, three times. In the lowest, most painful moment of his life, his closest friends are sleeping. Some of you know that pain. You've been betrayed or abandoned. People that promise you, I've Got your back, man. I'm with you no matter what. People have broken their promises to you. You know that emotional pain. And Jesus, the God that you sing to in worship, he gets you and he understands you. He knows that pain as well. He also believes in this moment, or he feels in this moment at least that he's abandoned by the Heavenly Father. Notice what he prays. My Father, if it's possible, let this cup pass from me. He is appalled by the cup that he's about to drink, so much so that he's asking if there's any other way. Let this cup pass from me. And he asked the Father three times. He prays three times. And what the answer from heaven is nothing but silence. Jesus does what you have heard to do, what I have heard to do. People have said, if you want your prayer answered, all you have to do is go to the Father humbly. Jesus does that. He falls face down before the Father. According to the passage, all you have to do is pray. Specifically. Jesus does that. Will you please remove this cup from me? All you have to do is pray in faith. Does anyone have more faith in Jesus? He prays humbly. He prays specifically. He prays in faith, and the prayer is not answered. Some of you feel this way right now. You have been praying for a spouse or for a promotion or for a wayward child for years. And you have asked, where is he? Is he absent? Is he hearing me? If you feel that way, Jesus knows your pain in the Garden of pressing. He feels as if he's abandoned by the Father. Now, those of us who are Christians for a long time, we know as we study the scripture, that oftentimes God doesn't answer our prayers for our good. There's times that he doesn't answer because it's actually for our good that he doesn't answer. Or that he answers no. I know this, being the dog dad of Roscoe, my golden doodle, Roscoe wants chocolate really badly, but I've never answered his request the way that he would like. I walk by the pantry and I keep telling myself every week, this is the week that I'm gonna stop reaching in and grabbing chocolate morsels and mixing with peanuts. I know I shouldn't do it, but I do it anyway. It's not great for me, but I do it. And when Roscoe sees me open the pantry, reach in and grab some chocolate morsels, he'll run from wherever he is, and he'll lay down before me humbly, asking for the chocolate morsels. But I don't answer. Yes. I don't answer how he wants because it's not good for him for me to answer what the way he wants me to answer. But this is Jesus. We wrestle with this a bit. This is Jesus. God the Son. Why does God the Father not answer? God the Son? It's actually good for the joy of Jesus that the cup doesn't pass. That Jesus goes to the cross because he's going to rescue us through his death for us on the cross. And that is for the joy of Jesus that he gets us as his sons and daughters. And it's for your joy that the cup doesn't pass. We see in this account in the garden of Gethsemane, the Garden of Pressing. Some of you were in a garden of pressing. We see the example of Jesus that he endures in the midst of agony. Three times he goes and he prays. Some of you are in agony. And you can see the example of Jesus in your garden of pressing to keep pressing towards the Father. Keep pressing towards him. Jesus passes his test in the garden. There's others in the garden that failed their test. The disciples fail the test. Jesus passes his. The disciples fail theirs. In a couple of hours, as Jesus is arrested, the disciples will all scatter. All but one. The disciple John is with Jesus as he's crucified. John is before Jesus. And Jesus looks at John and is next to Mary and says, behold your mother. So John is there at the cross. All the others are gone. They all flee from him. In fact, Peter one who said, I'm with you to the very end, Peter. When people find out that Jesus has been arrested, they look at Peter and they say, hey, weren't you one of his? Don't you belong to Jesus? I don't even. I don't even know that man. I don't even know him. The disciples fail their test. Jesus passes his. What's the difference? The disciples slept and Jesus prayed. If you want to pass your test, you have to pray and seek the Father. If you sleep, you'll fail the test. Some of you are asleep. I don't mean physically. I hope you're awake. Hope the message is good enough to keep you awake. But you're asleep spiritually. How do you know if you're asleep spiritually? You know you're asleep spiritually by where you run when the pressing comes. And when the pressing comes, if you go to the Father, you're awake spiritually. When the pressing comes, the challenges of life come. The squishing of life gets at you. Where do you run shows if you're awake or if you're asleep? Do you run to something other than the Father? Some of you run and you just pick up a phone and you just scroll so your mind can go somewhere else from the pain. Some of you will run to a substance or to a relationship or a new relationship or a, or hobby or more work or destructive behavior, anything to numb you from the, the pain of the agony. But that is spiritually asleep and you won't be prepared for the test of life. Jesus is spiritually awake and he prays in the garden of pressing. He seeks the Father. Now, if that is the end of this message, if that's all we learn from this passage, we will actually be crushed from this passage. Because if all you see is the example of Jesus, let's be honest, we haven't been able to live up to the example of Jesus. If all I learned from this passage is, wow, I have to do a better job of praying when I impress, then I'm going to be crushed by this passage. Because so many times in my life I've been more like the disciples than I've been like Jesus. So many times I've been asleep, so many times I've sought things other than him. What I need in this passage is more than just the example of Jesus, though. The example of Jesus is in the passage. I also need Jesus to embrace the cup for me. He endured through the agony, but he also embraced the agony. What is this cup? He prays three times father, let this cup, if there's any way, let this cup pass from me. What is the cup that he's so repulsed by? This cup, more repulsive than the cup that repulsed Evie or the cup that repulses me? This is the most repulsive cup there is. What is the cup? Anytime you read in the Bible something that you're not sure what this phrase means, it's always wise to look back at the rest of the Bible and see if this phrase is used before. And it is many times in the Old Testament to show you the cup of. Well, let me see if you can see. The prophet Isaiah says to God's people in Isaiah 51, this is what your Lord says, the Lord, even your God, who defends his people. Look, I've removed from your hand the cup that causes staggering, that goblet, the cup of my fury. You will never drink it again. So God says to his people, listen, I'm not going to pour out my cup of anger, my cup of wrath on you. I've Removed it. But God also says to another prophet, the prophet Jeremiah. This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, said to me. Take this cup of the wine of wrath. So the cup of wrath from my hand and make all the nations to whom I'm sending you drink from it. They will drink, stagger, and go out of their minds because of the sword I am sending among them. That God, who is holy, is going to pour out his wrath on sin. And the cup symbolizes his holy anger. His holy wrath poured out on sin. Okay, what does this mean? If you are new to the Christian faith, so honored you're here, I want you to understand what us Christians believe. We believe that God is holy and righteous. He's otherworldly. He's different from us. He's pure and perfect. He loved us, created us in his own image. But all of us have gone our own way. All of us have been asleep spiritually. God loves us, but he's angered at sin. He's angered at sin that violates his character. And sin is going to be judged and punished. Yet because he loves us, God, the son, Jesus, the Christ enters this world, and he's willing to drink all of the wrath upon himself. So there'll be no more wrath left for you. Is there any other way for me not to have this cup? I would love there to be a plan B, but if there's not a plan B, I. I'll drink every last drop of the cup of God's wrath. So there's no wrath left for the sons and daughters of God. That's what he prays. Jesus, in this moment, is so repulsed by the cup. Why is he so repulsed? In fact, he's so repulsed that if you read the Gospel of Luke, here's what you see. In the Gospel of Luke, Luke records that as he's praying, his sweat becomes as drops of blood. Now, some scholars believe that Luke is saying that, metaphorically, that it's such an intense moment in the garden as he's praying for the cup to pass, that he's praying so intensely that his sweat is like drops of blood. Other scholars say, no, this is actually, according to doctors, a medical condition where you can become so agonized, you can become so overwhelmed with what's in front of you, that capillaries and blood vessels in your forehead can burst and you can actually sweat blood, and that this is the most intense, tense moment in all of human history. As Jesus, the pure and holy one, knows what's in front of him, and he's willing to drink the full cup of God's wrath against sin. We have to understand who this is. This is Jesus. This is God, the Son. He is holy. He's never one time had an impure thought. He's never had a faultless or an action with fault. He's always lived perfectly and without fault. He's always been blameless. No reaction, no word, no thought, no action has been wrong. And everything has been pure. And in the moment, he knows this is in the Garden of Gethsemane, in the Garden of Agony, that he's going to go to the cross and all of our sin and shame is going to be poured out on him. The Holy One of God, the pure One of God, is going to taste all of my pride and my anger and my worry and my doubts and my selfishness and my foolishness, all poured on him. All of your sin and shame poured on Him. And because our sin is on him, he's going to be punished in our place. He's going to experience the wrath the cup of wrath poured out. This is Jesus, the one who's enjoyed complete intimacy with God the Father. And in the moment, as he goes to the cross, he will yell out from the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? The one who's been completely wondering with the Father is going to feel as if he's abandoned. The one who's faultless is going to have all sin poured out on him. The one who's only known the pleasure of the Father is going to experience the punishment of the Father. Jesus drank the cup of God's wrath so you could drink the cup of God's blessing. All of the wrath against sin. And Jesus is appalled by it. He knows what he's going to taste, but he's going to drink all of it so that the only thing left for you is the cup of blessing. Jesus drank every last drop of the cup of God's wrath. There's not one drop of wrath left for you. There's not one drop left in that cup. The only thing left for you, if you've believed in Jesus, the only thing left for you is the cup of blessing he pours out on you. All of his grace, his mercy and forgiveness. And there's no wrath left in the cup for you, no anger left in the cup for you, only mercy left for you. That's all that's left for the sons and daughters of God. Which means if you really get what happened on that night in the Garden of Gethsemane, if you really understand it you will really believe, some of you, for the first time, you'll really understand that you are forgiven, that there's no sin left on you, that Jesus took it all from you. Carl Jung, the famous psychiatrist, he said, I could dismiss half my patients tomorrow if I could just convince them that they're forgiven. That so much of our life is about us striving and trying to earn people's acceptance and trying to justify ourself before God and trying to prove ourselves to ourselves. We're trying to strive and fight. We're trying to earn something. And if you will just know that you are at rest with this great God who loves you so your life would be filled with his peace and with his joy. Do you really know that you're forgiven? You. You will. If you understand that in the garden, Jesus said, I will drink every last drop of that cup so that my sons and daughters will only drink the cup of blessing. You know, as you search on Google, that Google will auto fill. As you type in a search will auto complete what you're searching for based on what other people have searched for. I find it fascinating that when you start to type in does God. That the second most searched is does God forgive all sins? People have typed, does God exist a lot. And second to that, people have typed, does God forgive everything I did? If this God exists, does he forgive all the secret struggles that I carry, that no one knows about, things that I did way back then that I haven't told anyone about my constant struggle? Does he forgive that when you look at Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, in the garden of Agony, and he says to the Father, I'll drink the cup to the very last drop. You have to understand that that means you are fully forgiven, that there's nothing left of the cup for you at all. He drank the cup so that all is left for the sons and daughters of God is the cup of his blessing. The writer of Hebrews, looking backward to the moment when Jesus is willing to go to the cross, wrote this. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross. This is a fascinating passage that here's Jesus on Thursday on this side of the cross. And there's some joy that is before him on the other side of the cross. But to get to the joy on the other side of the cross, he must endure the cross. So for the joy before him, he endures the cross. So the question is, what's on the other side of the cross that he doesn't have on this side of the cross that he gets that brings joy to him that he doesn't have on this side of the cross. So there's something on the other side of the cross if he endures that he receives that brings him joy that he doesn't have on this side of the cross. So what does he not have on this side of the cross that he gets on that side of the cross that brings him joy? It can't be more power and authority. He's God, the Son, who has all power and authority. It's not as if he gets more power and authority on the other side of the cross. It can't be riches, as if there's more riches for Jesus on the other side of the cross if he endures, there's more joy and riches on the other side. No, this is the God who owns everything. He looks at the world and says, it's all mine. Everything in it is mine. What's on the other side of the cross that brings him joy that on Thursday he's willing to say, I'll drink the cup and I'll endure the shame and the scorn of the cross because there's joy on the other side. What's on the other side of the cross before him that he receives if he endures the cross, what's on the other side of the cross for Jesus that brings him joy? It's you. It's you. It's you. He wanted you. He wanted you. An everlasting relationship with you. He goes through the pain and the scorn and the shame of the cross. Because on the other side of the cross is the joy of knowing you, the joy of being your Father, the joy of you being His. He wanted you. He wanted you. And all the things that you think he wouldn't love you for. He wanted you. This changes the entire conversation that people sometimes have on Are there other ways to get to God? You've heard people say, maybe you've said yourself, hey, listen, Jesus is for me. But if something else is for you, that's cool, because I believe there's God and there's different ways to get to Him. My way just happens to be Jesus. Be cautious when you say that. When you look in light of this text, imagine how different this passage would read if when Jesus is praying to the Father and he prays, if there's any other way, let this cup pass for me. I don't want to drink the the punishment against sin. I don't want to experience the cross. If there's any other way, let this cup pass for me. What if the passage read. If the Father said, well, actually, there's lots of other ways, but I want you to endure this anyway. There aren't other ways. Jesus is the way. And the way for him to forgive you and make you his own is to drink the full cup of the wrath. So there's only blessing left for you. Lord Jesus, we are thankful for what you've done. Prepare our hearts as we take communion to remember that we now drink from the cup of blessing of your forgiveness and your salvation. We take this meal with a grateful heart for what you've accomplished for us. In your name I pray. Amen. We're going to take communion together. You were handed a communion cup. If you will peel the first layer, you'll get to the bread. The second layer, you'll get to the juice, the cup which represents his blood. We're taking communion together on the day that we're reading the passage about Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. This was on Thursday. And the reason they're in the Garden of Gethsemane is they've gone there from the upper room where they took communion together. And so the passage we read, the disciples have just taken the Lord's Supper, Communion. I want you to understand the meal that they're taking, and it will help this meal mean more to you. Jesus and his disciples were Jewish, so they took annually the Passover. And so if you were there 2000 years ago at this meal, it was an annual celebration, the Passover. Why? Perhaps you've heard of the Passover? It's the second book in the Bible, the book of Exodus, the 12th chapter. Exodus, chapter 12. God's people are in Egyptian captivity and slavery. And God's going to liberate them, and he's going to free them. He sends a series of people plagues. The 10th plague is the most severe. And he sends this plague because the Egyptian captors, those who enslaved God's people, they. Their hearts are hard. And they're not listening to God through any of the other plagues. So the 10th is going to grab their attention the most and cause them to say, you can leave. Please leave. Leave Egypt. The 10th plague is when the firstborn in every home is going to be slaughtered because the angel of death is going to pass through all of Egypt. But God's people, through their leader Moses, heard this. If you will put blood on the doorpost of your home, that blood will be a signifying mark that you belong to Yahweh. And he will pass over your home. So on the tenth day of the month, according to Exodus chapter 12, Moses told, all of God's people, get a lamb. That lamb stays with you to the 14th day of the month. You kill the lamb on the 14th day of the month, and you take the blood and you put it on the doorpost. And God's people were liberated. And from that point forward, to where Jesus is with his disciples, they took the Passover meal. Jesus is having this Passover meal with his disciples, and he changes the meaning. And so the meal that we take as Christians for the last 2000 years is a Passover. The meaning changes because Jesus is not a lamb whose blood is on the doorpost of our homes. Jesus is the lamb, the once and for all sacrifice who takes away the sins of those of us who believe in him. So Jesus with his disciples says, from now on, this cup is going to represent not the blood of lambs, it's going to represent me, My blood offered for you. From now on, this bread is going to represent my body which is given for you. So we join a long line of Christians for 2000 years who look at the cup and look at the bread and. And with. With grateful hearts, we take this to remember what he did for us. So before I lead us in taking, will you take a moment and pray and thank him for his blood and for his body? Jesus said, this is my body. Take in remembrance of me. Well done, brother. Well done. Jesus said, this is the cup. My blood is poured out for the forgiveness of sins. Take and drink. According to the scripture, the disciples sang after they took communion. And we're going to sing with gratitude to the one who's rescued us. But I also want us to pray for some of you who are in a garden of pressing right now. You see that when Jesus was in his garden of pressing, he went to the Father. And I want you to be able to pray, and I want us to be able to pray over you. Some of you, the pressing has been a medical prognosis. Some of you, a wayward child. Some of you, someone's abandoned you, and you are in just deep, agonizing pain right now. For some of you, there's such uncertainty. There's so many decisions that are happening all at once. It's so overwhelming. You're in a garden of agony. He knows you. He gets you. We have amazing elders from our church who are ready to pray over you. And so I'm going to ask the shepherd elders from our church to come stand down front as we sing. We've carved out time. Listen, we haven't even been here an hour yet. We got lots of time for you to sing and be with him, but for you also to come and receive prayer. You're in a garden of agony. Don't be in that garden alone. We have people who want to pray with you and over you. And so right when we start to sing, if you want to receive prayer, you come forward, let's stand, let's sing to our God. All right, Extend your hands, please, and let me pray a prayer of blessing over you as we go. Jesus, I pray you'd bless your sons and daughters this week, that you would remind them that you were gentle and approachable and that you love them. Cause your face to shine on them. I pray they will experience your mercy and your joy this new week. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Go in peace. Have a great week.
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Thanks for tuning in to the Mariners Weekend Message Podcast to support the ministry of Mariners Church. You can click the link in the show notes or download the Mariners App at your favorite app store. If you've been navigating God's wisdom with us through this year's annual read and would like to hear personal reflections from pastors in your community, check out the Gospel Every Day podcast. Imagine feeding your heart, mind and soul with the kind of practical wisdom that will change your life. If you haven't picked up the annual read yet, visit MarinersChurch.org or download the Mariners app for more information on where to find it.