A City That Shapes the World
Pastor Fletcher preaches from Acts 17:16-34. Discussion points: We want to have a gospel witness strong enough to shape our very influential city, Paul preached the gospel to the Athenians with passion and perseverance, we ask God to work in our church to make us a city on a hill.
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Preacher: [Acts 17:16-34] Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him, and some said, "What does this babbler wish to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities," because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is that you're presenting, for you bring some strange things to our ears. We wish to know, therefore, what these things mean."
Now, all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new. So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said, "Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: To the unknown God. What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it being Lord of heaven and earth does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.
"And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods in the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for in him we live and move and have our being. As even some of our own poets have said, for we are indeed his offspring.
"Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone and an image formed by the art and imagination of man. The times of ignorance God overlooked. But now he commands all people everywhere to repent because he has fixed the day on which he will judge the world and righteousness by a man whom he has appointed and of this. He has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead."
Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, but others said, "We will hear you again about this." So Paul went out from their midst, but some men joined him and believed, among whom were Dionysus, the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris and others with them.
This is the word of the Lord.
Nearly 400 years ago in 1630, a group of pilgrims boarded a ship in England called the Arbella, and they set sail for the New World. And in their journey across the Atlantic, the future first governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, a man named by the name of John Winthrop, delivered a sermon, and the sermon was called A Model of Christian charity. The sermon has been better known as the city on a Hill sermon. This sermon has entered the national psyche of what it means to be an American. It's been quoted by almost every single American president. Everyone since Kennedy has quoted this sermon at length at some point during a speech.
In the sermon, Winthrop argued that they must form a different kind of society in the city that would become known as Boston. A society that models the virtues of charity that are found in Christianity. He argued that they must found the city upon the ideas of mercy and justice, and that when one person in our society suffers, everyone suffers. Drawing from Jesus's famous sermon on the Mount, John Winthrop proclaimed that we must be a people that can be a beacon of hope, shining the light of Christ back to what he called the heathens in England. Sorry, English, those of you who are with us today, we, we don't feel so poorly about you.
This is what he said. He said, for we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are watching, are upon us. This is where the nickname for the Boston, city has become City on a hill. To this day, Boston is still known as the city on a hill. if you were around a few years ago, there were buses with an advertisement on every bus in the city that said A City on a hill starring Kevin Bacon, because there was a Showtime television show called City on a Hill. It was like a crime mystery. I never watched it, but it had Kevin Bacon in it and it was set in Boston. So you see, before Boston was a city, it was actually a sermon.
Boston area is a far cry from this vision that we shall be a city set upon a hill. Boston is still a world leader in many different areas. We're still leading the world in education. We're leading the world in healthcare, and biotech. We're even leading the world in drunk sports fans. Well, maybe 2 to Philadelphia. But we are leading the world in many different ways. The opportunity in Boston is amazing. Boston is disproportionately influential. The Boston area currently ranks as the 8th most influential city on the global index, so the global cities index. So, every year, these people put together a list of, a ranking of cities based upon global influence, and Boston ranks number 8. Which is surprising given how small we are. While every other city on this global index is this huge megalopolis, you know, you've got your New York's, your LA's, your London's, your Paris. Boston, relatively a small area.
The reality is that Boston does not just produce graduates, it produces the people who run the world, the policies, the research, the institutions, the ideas that travel everywhere and shape how the world works. And so, just to give you, just to pose a question for you today as. Many of you are believers in the greater Boston area. What do you think would happen if a fresh movement of the Holy Spirit swept through our city and caused thousands of people to become followers of Christ? Think about the potential that you could see not only in this city where our ideas could shape and honor Christ by the way that we live our lives and the way that the society that we formed, but globally. As people take these ideas into their home cultures as they go throughout all the world as leaders, as people who have been equipped to lead throughout different cities and nations. Businesses would be changed from merely seeking a profit to seeking God's kingdom.
As a City on a Hill network of churches, we exist to recapture this vision for our city. We exist to shine the light of Christ into a spiritually dark city, one neighborhood at a time, so that the world might see Jesus as he truly is, the redeemer and King. Over the past 6 months, the leaders of each City on a Hill Church have been dreaming together about what God has called us to be. And so I'm happy to present that that vision to you today, that today is a vision Sunday. It comes with all kinds of exciting things. We've been, we're each church is presenting the same vision in very different form. We didn't work on our sermons together this week of all weeks. we didn't work on them together this week, but we're presenting the vision that we have come together to form for what it means to be a city on a hill church and what we're seeking to accomplish together.
And as we have crystallized that vision of what it means to be a City on a Hill church, it has come with a fresh, like a vision. It's come with a fresh logo, fresh branding, a fresh look for the, the church as we've crystallized. Our values, we've wanted to see those reflected in our visuals as well. So I'll be able to share that with you, later on. Our central belief as churches, as a network of churches in our city is this, that a city that shapes the world demands a gospel witness strong enough to shape the city.
When I was presenting this, it was actually to AB, a few months ago. I was kind of showing him some of the stuff, getting him ready for, for how we're gonna present it and everything, and he said, I, I think I get what you're saying. It sounds like you wanna be an Acts 17 type of church. And I said, that's a good idea. And so today we're basing the passage out of our, our scripture from Acts 17 to show you what it means to be a faithful witness in a city that is like Boston. because the closest similar city that we have in scripture to what we have in Boston is the city of Athens.
Athens was this historic traditional city, well known the world over as being a leader in intellect, philosophy. It's being an education leader. It was a city that was filled with historic, intellectual and cultural leaders. It was a city filled with artists, philosophers, intellectuals, and tourists, and it was a city where the gospel had not taken root. And so in many ways, when we look at the city of Athens, we see a paradigm for what it means to be a faithful Christian in the city of Boston. And so I wanna walk through this passage together, and then I'll present more of our vision as we, as we do that.
Verse 16. Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. So Paul was waiting. Who was he waiting for? He was waiting for Silas and Timothy, because this is a great story. I just have to include it. It's not actually in the passage. It just happened earlier in Philippians 17. Paul, Timothy, and Silas, they were traveling from city to city on a missionary journey to tell people about Jesus. They get to a city named Thessalonica. We did a series on Thessalonians not too long ago. They get to the city of Thessalonica. They're there for like a couple of weeks. And then people get really angry because they're there and proclaiming the good news of Jesus, and an angry mob collects and chases them out of the city.
So they have to get out of Thessalonica very quickly, but the damage is already done. The church is established. He has to write them a letter later on. And so they run to Berea. They get to Berea, and they're there trying to start another church, and they succeed there as well, but they're working in the in Berea, and what do you know? The mob is crazy enough from Thessal Thessalonica to chase them all the way to Berea, to chase them out of Berea. So what happens is Paul gets on a boat, he, he sets sail for Athens, and he waits on Paul, and he waits on Timothy and Silas there. He leaves Timothy and Silas in undercover back in Berea so that they can start the church while he moves on to Athens.
So Paul is solo at this point, he's walking around Athens, and when you're walking around Athens, what do you notice? If we go to Athens today, what would you be seeing? You'd be seeing altars, you'd be seeing places of worship, you'd be seeing statues dedicated to the Greek gods. If you've seen, the Odyssey, if you've Seen Percy Jackson, you know what I'm talking about. We got, we got Zeus and the boys, we got Athena, we've got all the different, gods of the ancient Greek, culture. And so he's walking around, he's noticing all of these statues, these idols, and he says that he saw the city was full of idols.
Verse 17. So he ran, so he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who happen to be there. And so Paul is doing this thing where he's going to the religious center and he's making an argument for who Jesus is there, and then he's going to. The marketplace, and the marketplace isn't the grocery. The marketplace is a, a place where people came together to share ideas and they would argue about things. They might buy things also there, but it was this place where ideas were shared, where he shared with more of the secular people of Athens.
And I want you to notice just one thing that that happens here. What does he not say? He doesn't say, woah, the city's too far gone. There's not enough to start with here. No, he goes in there, he engages, he listens, he goes into the intellectual center of the city, and he preaches Christ. And verse 18, it says this, some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also converse with them, and some said, What does this babbler wish to say? Others said, And he seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities, because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.
Now, the original readers of Acts, many of them may have known who the Epicureans and the Stoics were, but most of us, unless maybe we have a degree in philosophy, don't know who the Epicureans or the Stoics were. And so I had to go back and look, and I, I'll give you a basic summary. This will not do justice to all of their beliefs. That is not my goal. This is not a philosophy lecture. But let me give you just a little bit about who the Epicureans and the Stoics were. Pretty much everyone in the ancient world believed in God or the gods. There was no one who was just purely secular. That was very rare.
The Epicureans, they believed in the deities, but the thing is they just believed that the gods were completely uninterested with human life. And so what the Epicureans more focused on was the fact that all of us are made up of atoms or particles, and that what's real in life is what you can feel, what you can taste, and what you can touch. And when you die, you just die, that there's nothing else there. In other words, there was no divine purpose governing your life and no meaningful existence beyond death. They believe that what you can touch or observe is all there is, and when you die, that's all there is. Now what does that sound like? A bit like Somerville. OK, let's continue.
The Stoics, on the other hand, believed in all kinds of gods. They were pantheists, believing that God was found in everything. The Stoics believed in the underlying principle of the logos or the Lagos, and with the Lagos, we have this idea of a rational principle that bound together the entire cosmic order. And so we actually see many of the writers of scripture engaging with this idea of the Logos, especially John. He engages with the Stoic idea of the Logos. And what you see with the Stoics is they might not be quite religious, but they're very spiritual. They believe in a spiritual purpose behind all things, that all things are kinda bound together, and what does that sound like? The other half of Somerville, right?
That we have the, we have the materialist on one hand, and we have the spiritual, not religious on the other hand. You've got the Epicurean saying, I believe what I can see, measure, and prove, and the Stoics saying I'm spiritual, but I'm not really interested in organized religion. So, while the Epicureans and Stoics were quite different, they found common ground though in one place, they didn't like Paul. And as Paul argued for the deity of Jesus and the resurrection, they were not compelled to believe him, and instead, they said, what does this babbler, yes, that's an insult. What does this babbler wish to say? What is he trying to prove to us today?
And so what they decide to do is take him to what they call the Areopagus. Now, Areopagus is a word that just means hill of Ares. So the ancient Greeks, they had gods. Then one of the gods was the god of war, Ares. In the Roman society, they called that same god Mars. And so many of your Bibles as you grew up, you may have learned that this was the sermon on Mars Hill. It's the same thing here, but it's just a different translation. We have the Areopagus instead of Mars. I will say Mars Hill is a lot easier to say than Areopagus.
This hill was a meeting ground for the cultural and intellectual elites of Athens. The Areopagus was a place where the civic and philosophical leaders would gather. So just imagine that you have a gathering of the Somerville and Cambridge politicians along with the, the faculty of MIT and Harvard, and you kinda have a bit of an idea of what it was like to speak with Areopagus. They were the cultural elites at the time. And so Paul is taken to them, and he does not miss a beat. I love how bold Paul is. Now he's well educated. He, he presents himself well, but listen to what he has to say, verse 22.
So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said, Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious, for I passed along and observed the objects of your worship. I found also an altar with this inscription: To an unknown God. What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. And so Paul, as he was walking through the city of Athens, he noticed all of the different altars dedicated to the different gods of the ancient Greek world. And then he came across one that really caught his eye, and it said to an unknown God. And they created this altar because it was a bit of like a spiritual insurance policy where they said, what if we're missing one of them? Wouldn't this God be angry with us? And so they made another altar and said, The one we might have forgotten about, that we didn't give an altar to, may you be appeased also.
But Paul sees this as an open door. He says, what you worship as unknown, let me tell you what I know of him. As Christians, we don't claim to have everything figured out, but we do have an announcement that God has made himself known. And here's how Paul says it. It's very different than how he would present it in the temple synagogue. The way that you would present the gospel to irreligious people or to philosophers has to be different than the way you would present it to religious people.
And here how he says it. He says the God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth does not live in temples made by man. So here he's he's contradicting what they believed already. Nor is he served by human hands as though he needed anything, since he himself gives all mankind life and breath and everything, and he made from one man every nation of. Mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined a lot of periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us.
This is interesting. Well, this is an interesting way to present the Gospel, as he's declaring this to folks who believe all kinds of things, like we might believe. And maybe you found yourself here this morning in a similar place to where these Athenians may have found themselves, where you might be spiritually curious. You might believe in some sort of deity. You might look at the fine tuned nature of the universe and the fact that all these things are quite coincidental that we would have a planet where we can be habit where we can live and where we can. Thrive and how we can get to this place in society and be created in this way, and maybe that leaves you wondering, is there actually a God? There sure seems to feel like there is one.
And what Paul would say is that you should seek this God, and perhaps you can even feel your way to him. He is actually not far from you, currently. Maybe you've been a believer for a long time and God feels far from you at this moment. The same is true for you, that you can come near to God. Paul told the Athenians about the triune God, the one true God who has reigned eternally throughout eternity past and into eternity future, and who so loved the world, he sent his very own Son, the one who would come and who would live the life that no human could ever live. He lived an entirely perfect life free from sin.
And then he bore the death that each of us deserve to die. And as he bore that death, he took on the sins of the world, so that we might be counted righteous in the sight of God, so that our sins could be placed on him, so that we can receive His righteousness. And after he died, they took him and laid him in a tomb. And on the 3rd day, he rose from the dead. And as Paul continues to describe this, when he gets to that part. And he says, and he rose from the dead. That's always the part that catches everyone. Because while that might sound common in our ears, if you listen to that, like it's the first time you've heard it, it sounds crazy.
And not only did Jesus rise from the dead, but he promised resurrection to all those who would believe in him. And so the invitation today to you is just the same as the invitation was in Athens 2000 years ago. You can receive the resurrection from the dead. By placing your hope, trust and faith in Jesus, that he's called men to repent, that now is your opportunity to turn from the things that you live for today and to live for Christ. And if you have not done that for the first time today, I would encourage you to do that. I would love to walk through that with you. Undoubtedly there is someone here who has not made that step, and the invitation is so open. But for those of us who do follow Christ, the invitation is still so open that he still calls all men to repent, that we can experience more of His grace and his power and his truth through belief and repentance as we continue to live those things out.
So how did the people respond in Athens? As he proclaimed these truths to them. How did the people of Athens respond? Usually as pastors, we like to think about Paul being this hero. We think about the, the sermons from the Book of Acts. We think about the time that Peter preached the gospel and 3000 people got saved. And so as church leaders, we think, you know, if we could just do it right, if we could just get all the pieces just right, that people will respond and it will just be revival all the time. But as Paul preached this, what did they say? They mocked him. They mocked him. It was not revival. You can't manufacture revival. The church in Athens, it grew, but it grew slowly.
Verse 32. Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, but others said, we will hear you again about this. And so you see when you're reaching people who don't have the same framework of religious activity that you might have grown up with, it oftentimes takes more than one conversation. They said, we'll hear you again about this. That is if you talk to a friend about Jesus and they say, I'll hear you again about this. Praise the Lord like that, you've won, like as long as they're not mocking you, like keep going, basically.
And people did come to know Christ. The the scripture says that some men joined Paul and believed, among whom were Dionysus, a member of the Areopagus. That's amazing, this person that was well respected academic, and a woman named Damaris and others with them. And so just as God built his church in Athens through the slow proclamation of the good news of Jesus, he's doing the same in Boston. What does Athens teach us about Boston? If we wanna reach our city, we have to be willing to engage in thoughtful reasoning and conversation. This is our calling. We're to be a city set upon a hill within our city.
And second, we shouldn't expect this, explosive growth in a city like this. When Peter preached in Jerusalem, 3000 got saved, but in Athens, it was just a few. Boston is far more like Athens than Jerusalem. Jerusalem might be more like Atlanta. Sorry, I'm gonna throw some strays in Atlanta there. You go plant a church in Atlanta, you're gonna have a lot of people pretty quick. but nothing is impossible for God, of course, and so we pray for revival, but God brings the growth.
And so for the past 6 months, the leaders of our churches have been asking a very simple question. What would it look like for us to be faithful to do that together? This is a key moment for the life of our churches. We have 4 city on a hill churches, each one, it, it's kind of unique. It's a unique model of church. Each church is completely. Autonomous. Each church has their own budget, their own leaders, their own 501c3. Everything is individual. And so over time we've kind of been drifting in different directions as we've been led by different leaders. But right now, we haven't planted a church in about 5 years. And right now we have two churches ready to be planted in the next 2 years. We're planting a church in Lower Mills, Dorchester, and next month, and then we're planting another church next year in Newton.
And as we plant these two new churches, we decided that it's time to get on the same page about what it means to be a City on a Hill church, to get on the same page about how we can work together. And so we've been working very hard to do that. we've, we've grown over the years, and, and one of the things that we've done as we've reached maturity and as we've grown in different ways is we, each church has taken their own identity, and I'm proud of that. I don't want to look like the other churches. I'm proud of our Somervillian, identity here. If anything, we should be known for, it's our independence here in Somerville.
But that might not be great in every way because while we've adopted new core values at our church since we launched and those being that we're sound we have sound doctrine, gospel culture, and multi-ethnicity, all things we care about a lot as a church, but we're trying to shift to all get on the same page so actually everyone in the network is changing their core values today so that we can be on the same page. No one. Got to win that argument. We all are changing to something different. And so with that in mind, I'll, I'll present to you some of the language and style that we've come up with.
You've already heard the belief statement, a city that shapes the world demands a gospel witness strong enough to shape the city. And here's our, our vision of Boston where the gospel has taken root in every neighborhood, and the city that shapes the world is itself being shaped. Our core values are shifting away from sound doctrine, gospel, culture, multi-ethnicity, although we still believe those things, they're still baked into our core values, as you will see. Our new core values are gospel, family, and sent.
So first gospel, that Boston, like Athens, is a city that thinks it has all the answers. But we witness to the eternal God who is the only one who can save. And so we are all about helping people to experience the story of God in their lives. That is at the heart of everything we do.
Second, family. I wanna be very careful when I say family. Family does not mean that we are a collection of families, as I preached just two weeks ago, we very much value those of us who are single, but rather family is descriptor of what type of community that we should be. That we are not just a community, but we are a community that functions as a family. Boston produces people who are credentialed, connected, and profoundly alone. The gospel forms belonging that crosses every cultural line, in a city that's driven a community that looks like heaven is the evidence of a God who is near.
And finally sent. Boston forms people who shaped the world. We form people who who are sent back into the world. So equipped with the gospel, living visibly in our neighborhoods, vocations, and community. Our city is exceptionally transient, as many of you have experienced over the years. It's like if I have to say goodbye to one more person, don't tell me today. It's one of those days, OK? If you're leaving, it's OK, you can tell me. I don't care,. But we, we, we hate it in some ways, we mourn when we send people, and I've always seen it as a bug to our system, but I'm starting to see it as a feature instead of a bug because we get to equip people with the good news of Jesus, equip them to live life on mission, and then we get to send them out.
What, what if we recognize the great missionary potential of a city like Boston? What if Boston isn't just a city that we're trying to reach, but what if Boston is a city God is using to send missionaries into the world?
And so, while words communicate vision, we've also refreshed the visual identity of city on a hill. The goal isn't to be a different church. Hopefully you see that the things that I'm saying really just reflect who we are, and it isn't just a new, it's not a new vision, it's more just a better description of who we are. And so I'll give you the visual, representation now. So we, we start with some of these ideas that are core to who we are, but it's light being this idea that we, we are the city on a hill. The body made up of different images and different shapes and shapes and sizes, every member of the body is different. And then the city where we, we come together and we seek the good of our city, and it comes to this logo. Oohs and ahs are OK, you know, oh, thanks. Yeah, I like it too. we'll keep moving.
OK, so there's the light. You can see the light radiating from the center, and I go to the next one with the body being different shapes and sizes around the side. And you also, you can see the C, but it's a cool one where, where the H's are hidden in there. You guys see the H's yet? Yeah, that's right. That's right. And then you have the city, and so you can see the logo almost like it's looking down at the top of the city on a hill, like it's the, the top, that's kind of cool. So yeah, that's the new logo and we'll keep going. There, there's, there's our new way that it looks, yeah, we'll just keep flipping through here. we're we're just gonna embrace CoaH. I mean, people call us CoaH. CoaH feels like insider language to me, you know, but it stands for City on a Hill. We'll just live, we'll just embrace it. It's OK. Welcome, CoaH.
OK, and then here are our colors. Yeah, each congregation gets like a default color that they'll use whenever the, the congregations are distinguished differently from one another. And so our color, which one do you want? Not We're, we will be, that's rust, thank you, not orange. we will be gold, OK? They, they know what they're doing, yeah.
400 years ago, John Winthrop dreamed of a city on a hill. But there was something profoundly wrong in his vision. This no human city is ever meant to represent the kingdom of God. Rather, the Lord has placed his church to represent the Kingdom of God. And when Jesus proclaims in the Sermon on the Mount that you shall be a city set up on a hill, he's not talking about a city or a nation, but he's talking about a people who live within the city.
And so in many ways I see John Winthrop's sermon as well intended, but wrong, and that we are living out what his what the better intentions would be. God has called us to be the light of the world. He's called us to be His people, to carry that light into the darkness. And so I want you to dream with us, to dream about where God is taking us. What would happen if the gospel really took root in Boston? What would happen if our neighbors encountered Jesus? What would happen if people came to Boston, met Jesus, and then carried that gospel to new nations? And what would happen if this city that has spent centuries shaping the world was itself shaped by Jesus?
If you're new here, we're really happy that you're here, and the reality is a lot of you are new here today. We've had a lot of newer people come, and I've said this before, but if you've been here more than like 3 times, you're not new anymore, OK? so now we lean on you and invite you to join with us in these dreams and on this mission. this is a, a particularly good moment to join us because you get in on the, on the, on the first floor, you get in and, and be able to be invested in this new fresh, articulation of the vision.
It's a great time because we have a membership class next week that you can jump into. Really great first step to getting to know us better and learning about the church. We also, our community groups are launching soon, and there's lots of places for you to jump in. But more than anything, I want you to know that what we're, what we're asking you to join, we're asking you to join us in the mission of seeing Boston and the entire Boston area shaped by Jesus. May God make City on a Hill a people who shine with the light of Christ into every neighborhood until the city that shapes the world is itself shaped by Christ.
We're gonna take a moment to pray, to offer up some confession to the Lord, to ask him to forgive us and to to receive assurance of what he has done for us. As we cast this vision, this big vision, we want to give ourselves opportunities to recognize the places in our hearts where it's not true yet. And so if you would, I have the prayer on the screen and you can speak the underlying portions along with me.
Our Father, you have called us to be the light of the world, a city on a hill whose light cannot be hidden. But we confess that we have often hidden the light. Lord, forgive us. We have been afraid of what our neighbors might think of us. We've avoided difficult conversations rather than lovingly speaking the truth. We've been more concerned with our reputation than with your glory. Lord, forgive us. We've been tempted to retreat from our culture, to despise those who think differently than we do or to believe that some people are too far from you to be reached. Lord, forgive us. We confess that we have often lived as though our comfort mattered more than your mission. We have received the good news of Jesus as though it were only for us, forgetting that you have sent us into our neighborhoods, workplaces, schools and communities to make your goodness known. Lord, forgive us. And yet God, we thank you that the hope of your church does not rest on our faithfulness, but on the faithfulness of Jesus. He is the true light who came into the world. He died for our sin, rose from the grave, and has brought us near to you. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.
On the night that he was betrayed, Christ initiated a sacred meal that we partake of every week here at City on the Hill to be reminded in a physical way of what he has done for us in the spiritual realms. He took a loaf of bread and he broke it and he said, this is my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And he took a cup and he said, this is my blood shed for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And so each week we practice this sacred meal, so that we can be reminded of what Christ has done for us, that his body was broken, his blood was shed, and that we have unity with him now, today in the spiritual places.
And so if you are a believer here today, we encourage you to receive this meal, to be reminded of what Christ has done for you. So with that being said, let me invite you to stand as we prepare ourselves to respond.
God, we thank you for the vision and mission that you've given us. We thank you for a church that we get to do it with. God, we thank you for making us family. We thank you for the gospel. We thank you for sending us out. God, we thank you for those that we've been able to reach. We thank you for the newer Christians in our midst. God, we thank you for being persistent in our lives. God, we thank You for our church network that we get to work with together. God, would you bless each of these things. That we might know you, that we might experience you, and even now as we take the sacred meal, would you prepare our hearts to hear from you? And would we be able to dwell with you. Help us to respond as your people have responded. God, we pray for anyone who has not trusted in you with all of their heart, would today be the day. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.