How Jesus Lived: Jesus Prayed

Pastor Fletcher preaches about how Jesus prayed in Mark 1:35 & 14:32–42. Discussion points: Jesus prioritized prayer even though there were many needs around him, we need to minimize distractions to our prayer life, we get to benefit from and enjoy the same fellowship that Jesus has with the Father because Jesus has lived and died for us.

• See Transcript

  Scripture reader: [Mark 1:35 & 14:32–42] And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. And they went to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, "Sit here while I pray." And he took with him Peter and James and John, and began to be greatly distressed and troubled. And he said to them, "My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch." And going a little farther, he fell on the ground and prayed that if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. And he said, "Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will."

  And he came and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, "Simon, are you asleep? Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." And again he went away and prayed, saying the same words. And again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were very heavy, and they did not know what to answer him. And he came the third time and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and taking your rest? It is enough. The hour has come. The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going. See, my betrayer is at hand."

  This is the word of the Lord.

  Preacher: All right, good morning everybody. It's good to see you all this morning. My name's Fletcher. I'm the lead pastor of the church here. we're doing a series called How Jesus Lived, and this week we're talking about the fact that Jesus prayed. Which feels like a very obvious thing until you think about it a little bit more and you're like, wait a second, wasn't Jesus God? Well, who, why was he praying? Didn't he spend eternity past with God? All these things go go together with how Jesus prayed. But as you see, we'll have a a special way that we twist and and we think about the way that Jesus prayed and how we should pray also.

  Most sermons on prayer, in fact, I would say 99% of sermons on prayer go a little like this. Y'all know you should be praying, right? Yeah, you know, you should be praying. All right, I'm gonna talk about it for the next 30 minutes. Until we have adequate guilt levels, OK? To where you'll wake up early for the next 3 mornings before falling back into your previous habits. That's 99% of sermons on prayer. go something like that. And of course there's a lot more to share. Hopefully there's some positive things that you've learned from sermons on prayer. But I am here. To not give you the exact same sermon you've heard a lot of times. My goal today is not actually guilt.

  My goal today is to inspire you. And to comfort you and to help you with your prayer, because this is something that I believe very strongly, that prayer in 2025. It's probably harder than any other year since Jesus was resurrected. Amen. I think some of you feel that a little bit. And why is that? At least you want to think that, you know, I actually do believe that. I don't think that you just need to be guilted into praying more. I think that this room is full of people who want to pray, but it's hard. It's hard. It's very hard to pray. And I'll just very simply, for one reason, and it's very obvious, but we all have a distraction device right here. And so our prayer lives have suffered because of the distraction device. It has become something that has taken our attention. Prayer requires attention, and we don't have much of it left to give.

  It is a difficult thing to pray. You know, back when I was growing up in the late 1900s, we didn't have these distraction devices, and we knew this thing called boredom. Anybody remember that thing called boredom? We would go on road trips, and we would just look out the window. For hours at a time, with nothing to look at. I grew up in a very boring area of the country. Here, at least you get some hills. We didn't even have hills where I'm from. You know, it's just cornfields after rice fields after cotton fields, and the occasional tractor where I grew up. Yet we knew what it meant to be bored. Prayer requires attention. So I, I actually believe that many of you probably sit down to pray. And then you start to feel this kind of buzz in your soul that closely resembles the buzz that a smoker feels when they're ready for another cigarette. I'm not even kidding. It is very much the same sensation that you feel to pull out your phone, maybe even right now, you're feeling it. You are addicted. If you have a smartphone, the chances are, you are addicted.

  There's a social psychologist that talks about this a whole lot. His name is Jonathan Haidt, and he's at NYU. He's a, a wonderful prolific author, wrote one of my favorite books that I believe every Christian should read, and it's the probably the only book I can think of that was written by a secular atheist Jewish person, that I think every Christian should read. It's called The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Disagree about Religion and Politics. Absolutely wonderful book. I think he says it better than most. He wrote another book that that book kind of changed the narrative for a lot of people, and very few people have done what he's done. He's written another one, a follow-up, that has really affected the, the cultural discourse of an entire generation, and it's called The Anxious Generation.

  And it's about how Gen Z went through an epidemic of mental health issues. That starting in 2012, we started to see anxiety and depression. It not continue on an upward trend that it was on, but skyrocket, like a hockey stick, just straight up into the air. And so he is trying to study why is this? Why is Gen Z so anxious? Why? Are we suffering so much depression? And what he found, you know, his thesis is really complicated actually. He, he has kind of two parts. He's like, today's parents don't give their children enough freedom in the real world, and they give them way too much freedom online. That's the basic gist of the book. But he basically says that your phones, the unrestricted access to your phones is changing the way that you think. And I could go into study after study from the book, but I'm just gonna give you this quote. I think this is a wonderful quote.

  He, he, he, though Haidt is an atheist, he quotes the French theologian Blaise Pascal, and he says something that many of us who grew up in churches have heard before. He says, there is a God-shaped hole in every human heart. There's a God-shaped hole in every human heart, but he continues to say this. He says, there is a hole, and emptiness in us all that we strive to fill. If it doesn't get filled with something noble and elevated, modern society will quickly pump it full of garbage. That has been true since the beginning of the age of mass media, but the garbage pump got 100 times more powerful in the 2010s. Do you feel that garbage pump? Is it pumping garbage in? Of course it is. Me too. Me too. I'm struggling with it. Even this morning, I'm thinking about this. How, how do I need to make more steps here?

  And so my goal isn't simply to guilt you into praying more today. Guilt is a very bad motivator, honestly. It, it only lasts a few days. That's why, that you go back to your previous habits after that. I want to help you today to have the courage to turn the garbage pump off. Turn the garbage pump off. At least make some serious restrictions on the garbage pump. Limit your garbage, OK? And I want to help you to see how Jesus prayed, and maybe give you some tools to enjoy a similar type of communion with God. So Going into this, we're looking at these two passages, and I think that as we look at these passages here, we're going to be seeing what empowered Jesus to pray, but also why prayer is so hard for us and what we can do about it.

  Let's start with this first story from Matthew 1 from Mark 1, excuse me. Before the verse that we read just a moment ago, let me catch you up with what's happening there. Mark 1. We're looking at two different parts of Jesus' ministry. We're looking at the very beginning of Jesus' ministry and the very end of Jesus' ministry. And at both times we see him praying. And these are the two major times that we see him praying, especially in the book of Mark. These are the main times that we see. Jesus praying. At the very beginning, this is what's happening.

  Mark, Mark records that Jesus is calling his first disciples to himself. And so he's calling Peter and James and and not Peter, excuse me. yes, Peter, Simon, Andrew, Peter, Simon, Peter, and his brother Andrew, James and John, and many other disciples. He's calling to himself. And as he's calling them, they're coming to Christ, they're following him. But then Simon Peter, at one point he says, you know, Jesus, my mother-in-law is sick. Can I bring you home? So at least it looks like I'm trying to heal her, you know, he may not have actually wonder. It is his mother-in-law after all. But he brings Jesus home to heal his mother-in-law. And Jesus takes his mother-in-law by the hand. And she gets up and she starts serving him. It's a really wonderful moment at the beginning of his ministry, where the disciples are just all amazed, all of a sudden amazed at what Christ can do. And then they just start bringing more people to Jesus, person after person. You have those who are sick, those who are oppressed, they're all coming to Jesus, and Jesus is getting it done. He's healing person after person.

  And so after a long night, everyone finally finds themselves back in bed. And then what the next verse says, it should be shocking to us because Jesus had this glorious evening of healing many people, and what does he do? But it says Mark chapter 1 verse 35, and rising very early in the morning. While it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed. I just want to observe a few practices of Jesus here, a few things about Jesus that stand out as we look at this one little verse.

  First, Jesus prioritized prayer. Jesus prioritized prayer. We get this impression that Jesus, he had to sneak out of the house, right? Why else would he be waking up so early? Surely Jesus is his own man. He's self-employed at this point. He can pray whenever he wants to, but he feels the need that he needs to get up and leave the house before anyone else is awake. He prioritized prayer. When they eventually find Jesus, they're like, Jesus, where have you been? Why did you leave? We've got so much work for you to be doing. You don't you know you're helping people? They seem really annoyed. They might be saying, Jesus, haven't you spent eternity talking to God your Father? Why do you need to talk to him right now? It's like you just got off the phone with him. Why do you keep on talking to him? And Jesus, he prioritized prayer, even though he's very needed by those around him.

  So let's reframe this just a little bit. We often think about prayer as something that we do when we're not very busy. But friends, if Jesus can prioritize prayer, even in a moment like this, then certainly those of us with important jobs and young children can find a time to pray. It might not look the same, it will probably look different from season to season, but we can prioritize and find prayer. There's this old Luther quote where he says, I have too much to get done today to not spend a few hours in prayer first. And I think that's a good reminder for us that our prayer life is not going to take away from what we're able to achieve throughout the day.

  Second thing that we can observe here is that Jesus got alone and prayed very early in the morning. It says that Jesus rose very early, got out of the house. For us, the application's really obvious, and the main one is that if you want to pray like Jesus, you have to eliminate distractions like Jesus. That means that some of you might have to get out of the house if you want to have a flourishing prayer life. This is something that I was convicted as I was writing the sermon. I should give my wife permission to say, hey, why don't you leave so that you can pray and have a moment. it's not like we're very much partners in our, in our parenting, but I feel like sometimes that encouragement might be helpful for her. If I, if I say I would like for you to go and let me handle this. Because I don't, I, I'm just the type of guy, I'm like, I'm gonna go in here and pray in this room back here and see you guys later, and we'll just ignore what else is happening in the house. but she's not like that, because she's probably a little bit more courteous than I am.

  I find it fascinating that out of all the examples of Jesus praying. You never see him sitting with a cup of coffee on the couch. My preferred place to pray with a cup of coffee on the couch, but not where Jesus was praying. Jesus was oftentimes going outside, finding a desolate place and talking with his Father. One 21st century application of this could be, if you want to commune with God, you have to build boundaries with your phone. OK, let me just give you a few practical boundaries with your phone. As people in the 21st century who want to pray.

  A few months ago, I did the drastic thing and moved my phone charger away from my bed. I know, it's amazing. It, it's really radical to think about it. I took it and put it in a totally different room. For years, and I'm saying years, probably since the early 2010s, the last thing I looked at before I went to bed was my screen. And the first thing I woke up when I opened my eyes was my phone. Have to see what the notifications are, have to know what's going on around me. But it is a change that I do not plan on going back to. I once I cut it off, it, I didn't miss it. And it's made the mornings easier for me. And so may I just suggest that could be a real life change that you make. Because it's only feeding the addiction. And if you look at your phone before you read your Bible, before you try to pray, you will get distracted. You will see, even if you look at it just to see what time it is. This is what I've realized is that I need to put a clock in the room where I pray, so I can know what time it is. Cause otherwise I'm gonna get my phone, I'm gonna see a notification. And then I'm gonna follow that notification, I'm gonna get distracted. And then before you know it, I'm scrolling short garbage videos on Instagram, you know. We need to find some boundaries. We need to find some boundaries with our phone.

  May I suggest, just to be super practical, this is what I did. I have a Kindle. I sleep with the Kindle next to my bed. It's not the same thing. I'm reading fiction. I sometimes in the morning when I'm not ready to get up out of bed, I'll read a few pages. And then I'll get up, so much better.

  And the third is that the third implication from what we can observe from Jesus here is that prayer kept Jesus laser focused on his true goals. You know, after a night of healing, powerful healing and experiment experience such as this, you might think that Jesus might be high on himself, and I would tell you that there is probably a reason why he is going off to pray. And he might be feeling a temptation toward pride. Towards self-aggrandizement. He might be feeling a a temptation to make this his main thing. What something that he's good at? And he needs to go back to prayer, so that he can remember his true goals and why God has him here. Prayer refocuses and reminds our hearts of our true goals, that God wants to live in fellowship with us, and he wants us to share this fellowship with others. If Jesus needed to pray, to be reminded of these goals, surely we do also.

  Now, I'm going to skip to the next passage, the one at the end of Mark, OK? Mark chapter, excuse me, 14, and this is a prayer at the very end of Jesus' life as he is on his way to the cross very soon. And he goes into the garden of Gethsemane. And Mark chapter 14 verse 32 says this, and they went to a place called Gethsemane. Now in Luke, he calls it the, the Mount of Olives, and Gethsemane seems to be a place in the Mount of Olives. but one thing that Luke says that I love is that he says, as was his custom. As was his custom, he went to a desolate place in the Mount of at the Mount of Olives, and he prayed. Reminds us that Jesus had this prayer of praying, this habit of praying alone. And he said to his disciples, sit here while I pray. And he took with him Peter and James and John, and began to be greatly distressed and troubled, and he said to them, My soul is sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.

  It's, there's something just very human about this passage, where in Jesus' moment of desperation, of, of hurt. That he just wants his friends to be near. He just wants them to come close to him, to be around, but not necessarily with them. And then he goes a little farther, verse 35, and he fell on the ground and he prayed, if it were possible that the hour might pass for him. And he said, Abba, Father, All things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me, yet not what I will, but what you will.

  Several things to point out here. First, in the ancient custom, the the normal way to pray would be to stand and raise up your hands to heaven and to pray. But here, it's noteworthy that Jesus lays prostrate, that he gets down on the ground to pray to God. And he cries out to God and he calls him Abba Father. Now Abba is not a word that you would hear any of the the dignified Pharisees or rabbis using to describe God. It is a child's word. It is a word that means father, but it is only a word that a child would utter, much like daddy, and he is crawling out daddy. Now, quick disclaimer here, OK? Though it is the equivalent of daddy. There's something about calling God, Daddy God, that is so cringe that I just completely lose my focus, OK? So, if you wanna call God Daddy, be my guest. OK, that's wonderful. Just don't do it with me, OK? Because I will, I'll be distracted, and you don't want that. You don't want me to be distracted, OK? You can call him daddy though, as, as Jesus did.

  Jesus doesn't relate with God like most of us. And we often go to God like he's our boss. And his default posture towards us is one of disappointment. He's not a loving father, he's a judgmental boss. But Jesus felt so secure in his relationship with God, so secure in his relationship that he asked for a way out. He says, Abba Father. I know what you have for me, but please, if there's any other way, I mean, that's not how you relate with the boss. He's calling out to his father and saying, if there's any other way, would you make it? But yet he trusts the Father, because he says, yet not my will be done, but yours.

  And even Jesus doesn't get all of his prayers answered, which for some reason, I find a lot of solace in that even Jesus didn't get all of his prayers answered the way he wanted them to be. And so he's off praying by himself, and then he goes back to check on his friends, and what are they doing? If you know the story, what are they doing? They're sleeping, that's right. And he came and found them and he said to Peter, Simon, are you asleep? Could you not watch one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak, which is what I say every time I fall asleep while I'm praying. I just say, spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, and I just lean my head back and go to sleep. Or I might say, and he gives to his beloved sleep, I'm borderline narcoleptic, OK? I have a sleep debt that even Christ couldn't afford, and I could curl up right here and fall asleep right now. OK. Three young children, that's what did it to me. That's also why I lost all my hair. Continue.

  And the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Isn't that just an apt way to describe our, our prayer lives? Do you feel that? The spirit is willing, I want to pray, but the flesh is weak. But the flesh is weak, we're too distracted, too addicted. And so Jesus goes back to pray, and he comes to check on them again, and what are they doing again? Sleeping again, and then he goes back to pray again, and you would think that after being chastised twice by the Lord of the universe, that you might straighten up, especially in one evening, but no, they're asleep again. Three times they fall asleep.

  And if you're like me, you probably can point out the easy application here, which is. Don't be like the disciples, OK? Just very easy, like, don't be like the disciples, don't fall asleep. But actually I do not think that that's the application here. I think that this story is placed in the Bible, because the author knows that we are all too much like the disciples. That everyone here should resonate way more with the prayer life of the disciples than they resonate with the prayer life of Jesus. Often in the garden seeking his Father time and time again, while everybody else is like. We all resonate more with the disciples. And if the disciples cannot stay awake for a prayer, while they listen to one member of the Trinity speak to another member of the Trinity, you better believe it would be difficult for us.

  You probably can't shake this feeling, like you're just not good enough at prayer. In fact, I've never met anyone that says, you know what? I got that one. Like that one I'm good at. I can do that. No, we all feel this need to grow. And here's what I think this passage is teaching us. That Jesus had an intimacy with God that we could never accomplish on our own. That Jesus had and has an intimacy with God that we could never accomplish on our own. There's no amount of guilt that I could give you today. To where it could make you muster up the energy to pray like Jesus prayed. You don't enjoy the same type of intimacy that Christ enjoyed.

  But that's the exact point. Jesus didn't come to show you how to get intimacy with God. He didn't come to just set an example of prayer. Jesus came to give you intimacy with God. This is the gospel. That he did not come to just show you the way to live, but Jesus came to live the life for you, to live in perfect harmony with God, day in and day out. But yet, God saw it fit for our sins to be placed on him, and for him to die the death that we deserve, and then on the third day he's resurrected. And why did this all happen? But so that you might know God and enjoy the fellowship that Jesus has enjoyed throughout all of eternity.

  So let me just break this down to you like this. You don't get close to God simply by mustering up the energy to pray. You get close to God because of what Christ has done for you, that he is a faithful prayer on your behalf, that he has enjoyed fellowship with God on your behalf. But yet he took your your penalty. And so because of what he has done. You can lean in his relationship with God. You get to taste of the way that the Father loves the Son. You get to participate. When you join in prayer, you're coming as someone who is hidden in Christ, who is loved by the Father in the same way that the Father loves the son. And so because you do that, you get just a taste. One day you will know in full. That is the gospel, that one day you will enjoy the fellowship with God as Jesus has enjoyed it in full in the new heavens and the new earth when when God comes and restores the world, or when we get to enjoy Him in heaven.

  But for now, we are struggling. And the more we lean in to what Jesus has done for us, the more we get to experience. You can definitely have more or less of this intimacy with God. You can feel it more or less, though you are hidden completely with him. And that's why prayer is so important. As we lean into it, we experience what Jesus prayed for us. You know, in his high priestly prayer, Jesus says, I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word. That they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they may also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. This is the goal. This is why Jesus is doing this thing. He longs for you to be near to the Father, for you to love him as he as he loves him. He longs for you to enjoy him as Abba Father. Jesus lived in communion with God on your behalf, and wants to share it with you, and he wants you to stretch those prayer muscles, and as you stretch those muscles, you do get better at it. You do, but it will always feel like a struggle.

  Been a pastor for nearly 20 years. Two years ago, I had kind of a, a change in the way I think about prayer, almost completely. there is a former member at our church who gets a dis a disproportionate amount of shout outs, from our church. I don't understand why, it just keeps on coming up in sermons. His name's Jeff, and he lives in New York and is a part of a church called Church of the City in New York. And I've known about this church for a long time. I recommended that he go visit the church. and I had heard about their prayer gathering. They have this prayer gathering that happens all the time. They, they do prayer meetings. They're not a huge church, they're a big church, but they're not huge, OK? I think less than 1000 people, right around that number.

  They do prayer gatherings like four times a day, every day of the week, Monday through Friday, where they do 6:00 a.m., 7:00 a.m., noon, and 7:00 p.m. And people show up And I was just like, what would make people show up to a prayer meeting? Because in my 20 years of ministry. That's not something easy to get people to show up to. I mean, if you really twist the guilt, the the the guilt stick there, you might get some people that like grew up in a tradition where they were supposed to be at prayer meeting every morning, any Koreans in the house. That's like very, very typical in that background. You might get some to show up, OK? But only if you twist it really hard.

  But this, it seems like people want to be there. And so I was like, wow, this is, I mean I need to see it. And so one day Femi, who did the announcements a few moments ago, he wanted to start a prayer meeting. And so I was like, hey, let's go check out this prayer meeting, because I wanna see what's going on. And so we did, and we showed up for the 6 a.m. prayer meeting without coffee and they didn't have coffee there, which I was like, what is happening? And, They didn't have music, but yet the, the tone was super worshipful, and you could tell that they kept on saying things like, if you have 10 minutes to pray, spend 8 in worship. And I was like, I don't know if I agree with that. I think I do now, but at that time, I was just like, I've never heard that before. And that prayer and worship are two sides of the same coin, which makes sense if prayers about fellowship with God, that they would be.

  And so then we stayed for the 7 and they had the 7 a.m. and they had music. And we were singing the song. We sang one at the beginning and one at the end, and it just kind of kept going. It was like one of those songs, and I was like, I dislike this. But then I just let myself go into it. And said, I'm just gonna be here. And I didn't like the song, I didn't like how long it was, but by the end of it, and I'm a pastor, and by the end of it. I had a sense of the father's heart for me. And it changed the way I think about prayer. And we came back and we're like, let's try to do it. And we did, and the prayer meeting's still going with, with moderate success. You know, every prayer meeting is successful, but we're looking forward to breathing new life into it, in the months to come. I think Jared coming and maybe getting some, some better music going and everything, where we're not singing to YouTube, when we do it. I think it would be good.

  But God's heart is for us to enjoy fellowship with Him. And so as you leave today, here's what I hope you take from this message. First, you cannot strong arm or muscle yourself into greater intimacy with God. That it's a gift. But the joyful thing is, it's a gift that you probably already have, and it's not, it's available to you. If you would receive Christ, you can have the gift. Jesus came to share intimacy with God, with you, and that intimacy is available through prayer. And so as we close, I wanna take a moment to pray. And it feels ironic, sometimes I feel like I teach on prayer more than I actually pray. And so it feels ironic to close the service without giving you an opportunity to pray. I'm gonna invite Jonathan to come play keys as we just kind of go into like kind of a meditative prayer here. So we'll wait on communion for just a moment. I'll introduce that in a, in a minute.

  But I just wanna guide us through a prayer and allow you to get into the position where you can pray. So we're not gonna do this very long, maybe 3 or 4 minutes, 5 minutes if we're lucky. But I really think that the Lord wants to hear from you this morning, and you have an opportunity. So if you would just assume whatever posture you would like to assume. You can kneel, you can stand, you can, you can bow your head, close your eyes, whatever you would like to do this morning. As I guide us simply in the Lord's Prayer. So would you pray with me?

  Our Father in heaven. Would you call on him as Father this morning? Would you hear from him as Father this morning? Would you talk to God as your father? Maybe you need to say, here I am, God. Here I am, Dad. Hallowed be your name. Would you ponder something great that God's done for you? We're done in the world How great is he How good is he? How kind is he? Your kingdom come. Lay down your own kingdom. What have you been pursuing apart from? You seek his kingdom.

  Your will be done. Whatever you have questions about for your future, give it to God right now. And say not my will, but yours be done. On earth. As it is in heaven Maybe you need to pray for that friend who doesn't know Christ so that the kingdom might come in their life. Give us this day our daily bread. In a room this large, there's certainly some people who don't know where. Next week's money's coming from. Would you just depend upon him today? And if he's been faithful to you, would you not neglect to see that life is a gift?

  Forgive us our debts. this one feels big, does it not? Would you ask God to forgive you? Of whatever you feel conviction for. Or that you should feel conviction. For the, not just for the time wasted, but for the thoughts, for the deeds, for the unkind things. For the selfishness His way is better. Amen. His way is better. Would you just say that your way is better, go? As we also have forgiven our debtors. Who do you need to forgive today, church? Maybe it's a business partner, a friend, a child, a parent. A spouse How can you live in a state of constant forgiveness? Letting go of your grudges before they take root.

  And lead us not into temptation. Would you boldly come before God and declare where you feel tempted? And ask him. To help. His way is better. Deliver me from evil. Amen.

  You know, we do this communion moment each week. The name of it is communion, though, which is something you do with another person. And when we participate in communion, what we're doing is taking a physical reminder, but also enjoying the presence of Christ. And maybe you felt Christ here this morning as you prayed. And in this communion moment, allow him to fill your hearts with his sufficiency on your behalf. And if you would like someone to pray with you, we'll have some some prayer leaders, counselors in the back that would love to pray with you this morning. But if you're a Christian here today, we encourage you to come and receive the sacred meal that Jesus instituted on the night that he was betrayed, he took a loaf of bread and he tore it, and he said, this is my body. And he took a cup and he said, this is my blood shed for you. Do this in remembrance of me. But would you join me as we prepare to respond to God, to worship him, to enjoy his presence? Would you stand as we prepare our hearts for communion, the communion leaders and band can come make their way. I'll pray for us one more time.

  Father, as we come to you at this moment of communion. We pray that you would that you would embrace us. That you would give us intimacy with you. That we might feel more of a desire to pray. Help us to turn off the garbage pumps, help us to lean into your presence and your joy. Help us to be light to our neighbors. We ask all of this in Christ's name, Amen.