The Worship Leader: Good morning and great to see you all here at North North East Bible Church! If this is your first time here today a special welcome goes out to you, and we ask that you fill out a visitor information card found in the foyer. During the time of giving please do not feel any obligation to participate. This is a time for regular members of the church to show their support. There are a couple announcements today: --Hold on, just once second. I had my paper upside down The monthly ladies fellowship potluck will be held in the sanctuary this Wednesday at noon. If you’re interested, and you’re a lady, then you can let Gertrude know what dish you’ll be bringing. Secondly, the pastoral search committee has invited a promising candidate to deliver a sermon and meet the congregation. Dr. G. Don. Dickey, with his wife and two children will be joining us the first Sunday of April. Now let’s open our time of worship with prayer: Father-God, we come before you with humble hearts And we just want to thank you for your awesome goodness to us. We are so unworthy. And we just come before you this morning in a spirit of worship, glorifying you with our voices, our hearts, our minds and our bodies. People of the Blessing If it is you And if it is me And if it is thee The spirit dwells among us Gathered in three The remnant shall be The nations will see The spirit dwells within us We are the people of the blessing We are the called ones of the herd Look to the skies for the trumpeting We are the people of the blessing

THREE YEARS LATER Dr. G. Don Dickey: We continue our exegetical walk through the book of Matthew this morning with Matthew, chapter 16, verses 24-26. So I’ll give you a moment to find that passage in your bibles, though I know many of you have it bookmarked for this series. Ok, here we go. Matthew 16:24-26: Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?” How many of you are forfeiting your souls? How many of you have been trying to save yourselves? You got an idea about this in the church and an opinion about that in the church. But God says deny yourselves, take up your cross. Now, before we move forward, I want to know if we can get real here in the house of God. Okay, I’ll take that as a yes, so I’m gonna talk to my pastoral intern for a moment Where are you out there? Ah, now I see you. If I call you up cause we got a funeral at the church and we need somebody in the parkin lot directin traffic, than you put on your holy smile and you come out here and serve the lord. I might of framed it as a question boy, but it wasn’t meant as an option, and you hurt your lord and saviour and let down your community. You tarnished the reputation of this church when the lady from the bagel shop next door phoned in the police to deal with everybody parking in her parking lot. And he’s just one person, but everybody else, all of you sitting here with your smug smiles—you’re just as guilty. You’ve all been refusing to take up your crosses just as much. I have committees in this church organization without committee members. In some cases I have committees without committee heads. We have a volunteering epidemic in this church. And that’s not for absolutely all of you. I get it. Some of you have the spiritual gift of giving, of financial giving. You work like a dog all week long and give over and above your ten percent tithe. But I’m not talking to that small portion of our church. I’m talking to all of you who give ten percent or less, and then think you’re a productive member of the body of Christ. Well, I’m sorry, but that doesn’t cut it. And I fear for your soul. I fear for you on the judgment day. Because when you walk up to those pearly gates and Gabriel flips through his golden book, your pastor won’t be there. That’ll be between you and God. Oh, by the way. Anybody seen Silvia and Sonny Salinger? They haven’t been in church for quite some time have they? They used to be a big part of this operation before I got here. And when I got here I thought we had a nice fellowship together. I thought they were getting behind me. I thought they were getting behind the call of God placed upon us to expand. To reach out into the forgotten neighbourhoods of this city: the suburbs with no bible church. I thought they were getting behind the plan to hire a youth pastor and an assistant pastor and double the size of this building. Well, I haven’t seen Silvia and Sonny Salinger since the day they walked into my office, like the antichrist and the false prophet, and told me they were leaving, they were taken their tithe elsewhere. And I tell you what. I pray for their souls constantly. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and the spirit has placed Silvia and Sonny Salinger on my mind. And I throw off ma blanket, quick as a whip, and I kneel at my bed, wresting with God in prayer on their behalf. Sometimes I pray until the crack of dawn, with sweat and tears running down my face. Cause I am not tryin to save myself. I deny myself. I am prepared even up to the point of losing my own life for the cause of Christ. So let me end this sermon by asking you one more time: Are you forfeiting your soul? Are you trying to save yourself? Or are you denying yourself and taking up the cross? Let’s pray.

ANOTHER THREE YEARS LATER The Worship Leader: Good morning and great to see you all here at North North East Bible Church! If this is your first time here today a special welcome goes out to you, and we ask that you fill out a visitor information card found in the foyer. During the time of giving please do not feel any obligation to participate. This is a time for regular members of the church to show their support. Here are todays’ announcements, well we really only have one announcement: Almost all personal items in the church have been claimed, however there is still a rocking chair in the nursery. If it belongs to you or if you know who’s it is please talk to a member of the facilities team. We would usually enter into a time of worship next, but on this last Sunday it seems more appropriate to end our service with worship, so Dr. G. Don Dickey will now deliver his sermon. Dr. Dickey: Dr. G. Don Dickey: Good morning everyone. And a fine morning it is. I hope you don’t mind if I stray from the pulpit and roam around a little bit so I can see you all up close. I’m gonna go right out and say it. This is no regular sermon. Not exegetical or topical or otherwise. This is an altar call sermon. Following my brief words, we will have a time of confession, conviction and a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Let’s pray: Father-God, Speak to us. You are all-knowing and all-encompassing. Nothing is hidden from your omniscience and your omnipresence. Convict our hearts of the darkness within them, the sin that has led to the closing of these sacred doors here at North North East Bible Church. Let us see our wickedness. Let us mourn our depraved actions that have lead to the destruction of a transformative community of God. In the loving name of Jesus Christ, Amen Why are you all sitting so still? My oh my. Even the young ones, usually squirreling around in their seats, aren’t moving an inch. By the way, why aren’t they in Sunday School? Oh, that’s right, the Sunday School coordinator left us six months ago. That prideful woman would not follow my new program. Yes, that’s right. Well, Hello Gerturde! How’s your walk with the Lord goin? Well, the devil thanks you for your service, for all the lies you’ve been spewing on the telephone prayer chain. You didn’t think it was going get back to me that you were spouting off on sensitive matters told to you by your loose lipped husband, a former member of my elder’s board? You think it was your God-given right to kick my son when he was already down? Sure, he was getting a little too comfortable with some of those girls from the youth group, but there’s no proof or forward comers. And yes, he got married, got divorced a year later and a year after that had a baby out of wedlock with one of our young adults? But who are we to throw the first stone? When he was in need and made a confidential withdrawal of $1,000 from the church offering plate contributions god forgave him, just as we all do—except for maybe you Gerturde! When God forgives our sins, he makes us white as snow. They are covered over, never to be spoken of again. Do you doubt the all-forgiving atoning sacrifice of Christ on the tree? Now, Did my son sing up here on stage waving his hands in the air, under the influence? Yes, under the influence of the holy spirit. And did his ex-wife dress like a hooker up here on stage? Let us not forget that Jesus himself associated with the prostitutes! And I see all of you averting your eyes when I look over—and you should. I could walk right up to any of you right now and say just as much about you as I have about Gertrude here. But, I won’t, because God is not cruel. He is a God of love. Now we’re gonna enter into a time of worship, the last time of worship here at North North East Bible Church. And I’m gonna go back up there to the pulpit and wait for the Holy Spirit to convict your hearts. As promised, it’s time for the altar call. When you’re ready, and while everybody else is still singing, I will accept your confession, as it says in James 5:16 “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.” Nobody will hear it except for your pastor and the Lord—and if you care an inch for your eternal soul, you won’t walk out of those doors into the foyer until you’ve made your personal confession. You all got one to make. Before we start, could somebody go out and get the coffee ladies in here. There won’t be nobody drinking coffee for a while and I wanna see my church, the object of my deepest love, together all in one place, one last time. People of the Blessing If it is you And if it is me And if it is thee The spirit dwells among us Gathered in three The remnant shall be The nations will see The spirit dwells within us We are the people of the blessing We are the called ones of the herd Look to the skies for the trumpeting We are the people of the blessing