[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:08] Speaker B: Welcome to the collective table where we celebrate the intersections of Jesus, justice and joy.
This podcast is brought to you by Oceanside Sanctuary Church. Each week we bring our listeners a recording of our weekly Sunday teaching at Oceanside Sanctuary, which ties scripture into the larger conversations happening in our community, congregation and even the podcast. So we're glad your here and thanks for listening.
[00:00:44] Speaker C: Thank you so much.
[00:00:45] Speaker A: Thank you for being here.
[00:00:46] Speaker C: Thank you. Thank you, Reverend Janelle, for that wonderful introduction.
[00:00:49] Speaker A: Good morning, Oceanside.
Good morning. I like this. I'm from a call and response tradition. We'll answer you back. And we talk back. I get so much in that tradition till I talk back to the tv. My daughter said, mom, who you talking to? Don't do that, don't do that.
[00:01:05] Speaker C: I said, you forget I have a call and response tradition.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: Well, I want to greet you this.
[00:01:09] Speaker C: Morning first of all, in the name of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and bring you greetings from McCarty Memorial.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Christian Church, where my senior pastor is, Pastor Eddie L. Anderson.
[00:01:19] Speaker C: You probably have seen Pastor Eddie on the TV marching and praying in Los Angeles. We are Social Justice Church because we believe that's what Jesus has called us to be.
Amen.
[00:01:33] Speaker A: And I'm just so greatly honored.
Want to honor your pastors, your co.
[00:01:37] Speaker C: Pastors, Reverend Janelle and Pastor Jason.
[00:01:40] Speaker A: Put your hands together for them.
They are fantastic leaders.
[00:01:48] Speaker C: You know you can. The word of God said, you know, a tree by the fruit. I went online and checked you all out. By the way, you're doing some awesome stuff here. I was telling Reverend Janell I was so blessed and touched by the love of God that I saw in everything online that you guys are doing. And so thank you. I'm honored to be here this morning. Would you pray with me for a few moments? Father God, in the name of Jesus, I come to you asking you to speak through me this morning.
I pray that your people will hear you, will see you and experience you. And Lord, speak to all of us in these moments of sacred, sacred reflection. I pray God that you would be lifted up. I pray for lives to not only be informed, but to be transformed by the power of your precious spirit.
Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on us.
Spirit of the living God, fall fresh on me. Melt me, mold me, fill me and use me. I thank you in Jesus name for this word. Amen.
Well, our topic for today, Pastor Jason said, is the spirit of the Lord is on me.
And so I'm going to be reading different translations. Would you bear with me? I think you should say things In a different way. I worked in the Los Angeles Unified School District as a speech pathologist. And so I had to learn different ways of saying things and to teach people, to teach the children how to talk. So sometimes you have to repeat it different ways in order to get understanding.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:03:21] Speaker C: Amen.
[00:03:22] Speaker A: So I shall be reading. And this translation is from the Passion.
[00:03:26] Speaker C: Translation, Luke, the fourth chapter, verses 16 through 21.
When he came to Nazareth, where he had grown up, he went into the synagogue as he always did on the Sabbath.
[00:03:40] Speaker A: And when Jesus came to the front.
[00:03:42] Speaker C: To read the scriptures, he was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah.
He unrolled the scroll and found where it is written.
[00:03:52] Speaker A: The Spirit of the Lord is upon.
[00:03:54] Speaker C: Me, and he has anointed me to be hope for the poor, healing for the brokenhearted and new eyes for the.
[00:04:02] Speaker A: Blind, and to preach to prisoners. You are set free.
I have come to share the message.
[00:04:09] Speaker C: Of jubilee for the time of God's great acceptance has begun.
Verse 20.
[00:04:15] Speaker A: After he read this, he rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the.
[00:04:20] Speaker C: Attendant, and sat down.
Everyone stared at Jesus, wondering what he was about to say.
Then he added, today, friends say, today.
[00:04:36] Speaker A: These scriptures.
[00:04:39] Speaker C: Came true in front of you.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: In the early 1960s, I was a.
[00:04:45] Speaker C: Little girl growing up in the coal fields of West Virginia, southern West Virginia.
[00:04:50] Speaker A: Where my parents worked as teachers.
My parents and I often drove to Virginia to visit my grandmother and to Nashville, Tennessee to see my brother, who at that time was a student at Fisk University.
Several times on those trips, we had to pull over on the side of.
[00:05:09] Speaker C: The road and use the restroom in the woods because, you see, the pristine.
[00:05:15] Speaker A: Woods were actually more sanitary than the disgustingly filthy restrooms designated for colors only that were provided by those gas stations.
My mother often packed delicious meals for us to enjoy because we could not eat at the local restaurants. We couldn't even eat at the local drive ins, even though we were seated in our own cars during our travels. And if we were famished, you were just famished. And you had to make your way back home because if we dare go to those drive ins, I remember to this day the waitress would come out.
[00:05:50] Speaker C: And say, we don't serve coloreds here.
Can you imagine being hungry and told that you can't be served coloreds because you're colored because of the color of your skin?
[00:06:01] Speaker A: My mother, who was a very outspoken.
[00:06:03] Speaker C: Woman, by the third drive in we got to on one trip, the waitress said that. And she said, well, honey, this is a good thing, because I didn't Come to order colors. I came to order a hamburger.
[00:06:13] Speaker A: I need you to get in there and give me a hamburger.
If we went to the movies, we.
[00:06:22] Speaker C: Were forced to sit in the balcony instead of the main floor of the theater. Because, you see, if we sat with our colored selves, black selves, on the.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: Main floor, we would be a distraction.
[00:06:33] Speaker C: To the white people sitting there. So we had to sit up in the balcony.
[00:06:36] Speaker A: If we wanted to go swimming at.
[00:06:38] Speaker C: The local pool, we were made to go in the morning to swim so that the pool could be thoroughly chlorinated before the white children swam in the afternoon.
[00:06:50] Speaker A: These are some of the examples of.
[00:06:52] Speaker C: The indignities that I experienced before Martin Luther King marched and before civil rights acts were enacted and passed.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: And so, my friends, you have to understand that when Kamala Harris lost that.
[00:07:05] Speaker C: 2024 election, I was extremely traumatized.
[00:07:09] Speaker A: I was inconsolable.
[00:07:11] Speaker C: For weeks.
[00:07:13] Speaker A: There was individual and collective lament in our community.
Because, you see, because of my life experiences that I had, it stirred up ptsd.
[00:07:25] Speaker C: It stirred up for me, and it.
[00:07:27] Speaker A: Caused me to play the tape over and over again. And in my mind, those indignities that I had suffered because I started remembering, brother Joy, my experiences growing up in.
[00:07:39] Speaker C: The apartheid south, in that Jim Crow.
[00:07:42] Speaker A: South, and Reverend Janelle, Just as I.
[00:07:45] Speaker C: Had feared, just as our collective community had feared, the consequences of that election manifested.
[00:07:55] Speaker A: January 20, 2025, began the reign of.
[00:07:59] Speaker C: Government sanctioned domestic terror.
[00:08:03] Speaker A: We were given a preview of what was going to come. We were given a preview. Four years before that, on January 6.
[00:08:09] Speaker C: 2020, we were given a preview.
[00:08:12] Speaker A: And yet people chose to embrace apathetic amnesia and voted this regime back into power.
We have a reign of terror that's happening today. And instead of being dressed in white robes and hoods, these folks, these thugs, are dressed in ski masks and fatigues, are paid $50,000 to sign up with our taxpayer money.
Somebody help me understand. And so I need you to understand that in 19, I mean, in 2025, war was declared upon the United States of America, not by a foreign power, but by our own governing systems.
California became the frontline of a federal playbook for militarized immigration enforcement. And we saw a wave of warrantless. And we are still seeing it, though not as much because they're doing it under the radar, warrantless traffic stops that are spreading throughout our state and across this nation.
And what is so bad? The Supreme Court has upheld these unlawful practices.
We have watched and felt helpless as we watched the castration of Congress.
Congress is doing nothing but signing off on these unconstitutional acts of terror, Somebody help me understand.
I try not to, Pastor Jason, to watch too much news because I listen.
[00:09:43] Speaker C: To it all the time.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: I'm listening to the progress station, to the urban station. I'm looking at TV. I'm all on YouTube. And one day I had to come to myself. God had to deal with me. He said, daughter, you better calm yourself down. I said, well, I'm good.
[00:09:57] Speaker C: Went to see my doctor, my brother.
[00:10:00] Speaker A: I got up in the doctor's office.
[00:10:01] Speaker C: I thought it was just, you know, an innocent listen to the news because I like to stay updated.
[00:10:06] Speaker A: I got up there and my blood.
[00:10:07] Speaker C: Pressure had jumped 20 points.
[00:10:10] Speaker A: I said, oh, my God. I said, what? What?
[00:10:13] Speaker C: And the nurse said, ma', am, it's okay. Let me just give you a few minutes.
[00:10:16] Speaker A: But I realized this domestic terror is.
[00:10:21] Speaker C: Slowly trying to kill us because we.
[00:10:25] Speaker A: Are internalizing the anger, the terror, and it's all designed to destroy our communities.
It's all designed to cause us to fear so much that we become paralyzed and. And we acquiesce to this violence, but.
[00:10:43] Speaker C: We will not acquiesce.
[00:10:45] Speaker A: God has called us to come together.
And I think the blessing of this is that we are going to start living out. Saints say living out.
We're going to live out this gospel of Jesus Christ.
We have been inundated every day with.
[00:11:01] Speaker C: Images and reports of brutal ICE raids first justified as the removal of criminal immigrants only for the truth to be revealed.
[00:11:14] Speaker A: Brown brothers and sisters incarcerated illegally in.
[00:11:17] Speaker C: Inhumane conditions, human rights stripped away, education, food and health programs defunded.
[00:11:23] Speaker A: The lust for power and money has led to dehumanization and unconstitutional seizures of authority, centralization of executive power and executive.
[00:11:35] Speaker C: Orders from hell, and the normalization of.
[00:11:39] Speaker A: Hatred, cruelty, sexism, xenophobia, racism, and militarized violence.
I don't know about you, my friends, but when I see a young mother of three murdered by government sanctioned masked.
[00:11:52] Speaker C: Men, it makes me angry, it makes.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: Me cry and it makes me want to cuss.
When I see innocent people dragged from their cars, when I see them being beaten on the sidewalk like they were worse than animals, it makes me angry. It makes me cry and it makes.
[00:12:11] Speaker C: Me want to cuss.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: When millions face losing their health care.
[00:12:16] Speaker C: When millions have nowhere to live, it.
[00:12:19] Speaker A: Makes me angry, it makes me cry.
[00:12:22] Speaker C: And it makes me want to cuss.
What hope do we have?
[00:12:27] Speaker A: What response do we have to the atrocities that are occurring?
And I started praying one day because I had gotten myself so worked up. I said, God, I'm sorry. You know, I know I'm a minister of Jesus Christ and I walk in your power. But Lord, I'm upset, I'm angry.
[00:12:48] Speaker C: I'm sad, and I want to cuss.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: But God said, daughter, there's a better way. I've given you a response. I've given you a template on how to respond in times like these.
[00:13:01] Speaker C: What, my dear friends, is the God response during these times?
Jesus said, it's found in Luke 4.
The spirit of the Lord is upon me, and he has anointed me to be hope for the poor, healing for the brokenhearted, and new eyes for the blind to preach to prisoners.
[00:13:26] Speaker A: You are set free.
[00:13:27] Speaker C: I've come to share the message of jubilee for the acceptance of the Lord is here.
[00:13:34] Speaker A: Jesus enters the synagogue in Nazareth. He opens the scroll of Isaiah and.
[00:13:37] Speaker C: He reads these words.
[00:13:38] Speaker A: He does not explain them, he doesn't soften them, he does not spiritualize them away.
He sits down, as a matter of fact, after he reads it, drops the mic and he says, today these scriptures.
[00:13:51] Speaker C: Came true in front of you.
[00:13:53] Speaker A: Not tomorrow, not someday, but today.
Jesus announces that God's liberating work has arrived in real time, embodied in real.
[00:14:04] Speaker C: Flesh, confronting real systems.
[00:14:07] Speaker A: You see, Luke tells us a little.
[00:14:08] Speaker C: Bit earlier in this chapter four, that Jesus was armed with the Holy Spirit's power.
[00:14:17] Speaker A: Say power.
[00:14:19] Speaker C: He had been going throughout the synagogues all throughout Galilee, teaching the Word with power.
[00:14:26] Speaker A: And so he was quite aware that.
[00:14:28] Speaker C: His fame had spread throughout the region.
[00:14:30] Speaker A: So he said, I guess I better.
[00:14:31] Speaker C: Go home and explain to the hometown folk what's going on, what's happening with me. And so he went to that synagogue. And when he reads this, reading this citation from the prophet Isaiah, Jesus was claiming to be a royal figure and to have a prophetic mission. He tells us what his ministry is really about.
He said, I am bringing the gospel, the good news. Say good news, the good news to the poor.
[00:15:01] Speaker A: I'm healing the brokenhearted, those who are.
[00:15:04] Speaker C: Discouraged because of their plight in life.
[00:15:06] Speaker A: Jesus proclaimed liberty to the captives, those captive to sin.
He came to give knowledge of salvation.
[00:15:14] Speaker C: To his people by the remission of their sins.
[00:15:17] Speaker A: Jesus gave sight to the blind.
[00:15:20] Speaker C: He set at liberty the oppressed. This, my friends, was originally the call of Israel.
[00:15:28] Speaker A: Folk who use the Bible, that's another.
[00:15:30] Speaker C: Thing that infuriates me. They use God to justify their hatred.
[00:15:35] Speaker A: They use God to justify their ugly acts. And then they want to stay in the Old Testament, just like the Old Testament is going to give them covering for ugliness and hatred. But let's go in that Old Testament, why won't we A God had told Israel in Isaiah through the 58th chapter.
[00:15:54] Speaker C: He told the children of Israel what.
[00:15:56] Speaker A: Their assignment was and is. He said in Isaiah 58, 6 and 7, he said, I will tell you the kind of fast that I want.
Free the people you've put in prison.
[00:16:08] Speaker C: Unfairly and undo their chains.
[00:16:11] Speaker A: Free those to whom you are unfair and stop their hard labor. Share your food with the hungry and bring poor homeless people into your own homes. When you see someone who has no clothes, give them yours.
[00:16:26] Speaker C: And don't refuse to help your own relatives.
What Israel had failed to do, Jesus does.
Jesus is addressing both physical and spiritual realities.
[00:16:39] Speaker A: Jesus came to proclaim the message of Jubilee, the acceptable year of the Lord. Well, you might ask this morning, well, what is the Jubilee? Every 50th year old, all debt was.
[00:16:51] Speaker C: Forgiven, slaves were given their freedom and.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Ancestral lands were given back to the original family.
[00:16:58] Speaker C: The year of jubilee allowed for a new start.
[00:17:04] Speaker A: Jesus offers a total cancellation of spiritual.
[00:17:07] Speaker C: Debt and a new beginning to those who respond to his message.
This is not only Jesus ministry mission statement.
This is our assignment.
This is our mission statement.
It's the mission statement for Oceanside Sanctuary.
[00:17:27] Speaker A: It's the mission statement for all of us who believe in Jesus.
[00:17:32] Speaker C: Jesus gave a ministry manifesto of freedom, healing and jubilee church. Jesus defines his ministry and our assignment as holistic liberation.
Hope for the poor, the spiritually poor and the financially poor. Healing for the brokenhearted Sight for the blind, not just physically blind, but the spiritually blind.
Those who are blinded by pride, by.
[00:18:03] Speaker A: An insatiable need to abuse and exercise.
[00:18:07] Speaker C: Control over other human beings. Freedom for prisoners opening doors they cannot open for themselves. Breaking bars they did not create but are trapped behind.
[00:18:19] Speaker A: Breaking the bars of poverty. Breaking the bars of homelessness.
[00:18:24] Speaker C: Homelessness.
[00:18:25] Speaker A: Breaking the bars of an inability to.
[00:18:28] Speaker C: Affordable health care, liberty and emancipation for the oppressed.
[00:18:33] Speaker A: This salvation, yes, is absolutely spiritual and touches not only the soul, but also.
[00:18:38] Speaker C: This salvation touches bodies, minds, communities and systems.
[00:18:46] Speaker A: What we are dealing with is systemic.
Racism is systemic.
Sexism is systemic.
Hating other people, sowing seeds of hatred is systemic.
You're talking about, oh, we're in the Old Testament and we have license to do this. But, you know, I was going through the Bible the other day and I.
[00:19:11] Speaker C: Said, wait a minute, God hates some things.
[00:19:14] Speaker A: Did you know that? God is God of love, but there are some things he hates. And In Proverbs, the sixth chapter, verses 16 and 17, tells us about six things. Yes, seven things God hates.
God hates a lying Tongue.
He hates hands that shed innocent blood. He hates those who sow seeds of discord and dissension amongst families.
He's talked about and cited two things. He hates false accusations against other people.
[00:19:45] Speaker C: God hates those things.
So why are you, dear Christian, supporting people who do the things that God hates?
Jesus has nothing to do with hatred.
And they try to tap into the fears.
[00:20:10] Speaker A: And it's not really fears. I really think it's the insecurities of other people.
[00:20:14] Speaker C: Please tell me how a transgender child is threatening you.
[00:20:21] Speaker A: I'm really trying to understand it. But you see, all of this is about to deflect from where the real attention should be about the pedophiles.
Let's talk about the wealthy who had Rape island going on. I'm gonna leave, so I'm just gonna be dropping this bomb. I'm gonna get on up, say, I'm gonna go on back to la.
Yeah, I'm gonna go on back to la. You know, I'll be good. But I just have to speak the truth because. Cause I've really been trying to understand that thing.
Why aren't more people outraged about children who were raped?
Not just girls, boys were raped.
And I understand by some reports they were having sexual acts with animals.
[00:21:06] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:21:07] Speaker A: And that person occupying a certain office in Washington, D.C. was all up in.
[00:21:12] Speaker C: The middle of it.
Pictures.
Pictures don't lie.
Then why in the name of God are you supporting this?
[00:21:22] Speaker A: Please tell me how a brown brother, a brown sister, a person of color, is keeping you from living your best life.
They're working hard.
Black folks working hard, trying to live their lives.
[00:21:38] Speaker C: I'm just trying to live my life.
[00:21:41] Speaker A: So why are people who are just.
[00:21:42] Speaker C: Trying to live their lives such a threat to your existence?
I think we need a lot of group therapy.
[00:21:55] Speaker A: Because I shudder when I'm so embarrassed. I'm so embarrassed when they talk about.
[00:22:00] Speaker C: The United States on the world stage.
[00:22:03] Speaker A: And I said, lord, it seems like we have this powerful government and somebody let the monkeys and the giraffes out of the zoo. And they are wreaking havoc up in that White House.
They're doing. It's like they're sitting around thinking, what.
[00:22:21] Speaker C: Evil thing can we do today?
[00:22:23] Speaker A: I'm going, oh, my God, What?
And churches are supporting this or being.
[00:22:29] Speaker C: Complicit by doing nothing.
[00:22:31] Speaker A: But we don't have that option.
[00:22:32] Speaker C: This morning.
[00:22:33] Speaker A: You know this message that Jesus preached in Luke 4?
[00:22:36] Speaker C: He was preaching a very dangerous message. There was no Constitution, no First Amendment right for freedom of speech back then.
Palestine was under Roman Imperial control.
You had Pontius Pilate in Judea, you had Herod Antipas in Galilee, the Sanhedrin and the high priest, which was supposed to be the supreme court.
Help me Jesus, not to say what I'm going to say.
[00:23:01] Speaker A: All right. They had six members of the supreme court who were really selling out Caiaphas. Maintaining the order for Rome to proclaim the kingdom of God.
[00:23:12] Speaker C: You see though, was a challenge to Caesar's authority.
[00:23:17] Speaker A: Giving this message and living out this.
[00:23:19] Speaker C: Message was a challenge to Caesar's authority.
[00:23:21] Speaker A: The people were living under the weight of unfair taxes. This is during the time Jesus brought this message. Tariffs that deprived them of the basic necessities of life.
[00:23:31] Speaker C: Food security, homes and monetary means to have a good quality of life. Jesus message was deeply political, but it wasn't partisan.
Because you see, it's not about left or right.
It's about doing the right thing.
It's about living in righteousness.
Jesus gave us a prophetic message because you see God's justice versus empire's domination, liberation versus exploitation.
[00:24:00] Speaker A: That is why when the poor heard.
[00:24:02] Speaker C: This message, they received hope.
But when those who were powerful heard this message, they heard threat.
That is why Jesus was ultimately crucified.
The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he appointed me to tell the good news to the poor. He has sent me to tell the captives they are free and tell the blind that they can see again. God sent me to free those who have been treated unfairly. By reading Isaiah 61, Jesus delivers his ministry manifesto. The Kingdom of God centers the marginalized and restores what society discards.
[00:24:38] Speaker A: This is a call for all believers.
[00:24:41] Speaker C: To step into God given purpose, bringing hope, healing and freedom to a hurting world.
The spirit of the Lord is upon us.
The spirit of the Lord is upon you.
The spirit of the Lord is upon me.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: And the same spirit that rested on.
[00:25:00] Speaker C: Jesus is resting upon us this morning.
We, my friends, are empowered to act with compassion.
Resist unjust incarceration, challenge systems obsessed with with wealth and power, heal the physically and spiritually afflicted, restore dignity stolen by heartless systems.
[00:25:23] Speaker A: This is not optional.
[00:25:26] Speaker C: This is spirit filled obedience.
Dr. Martin Luther King recognized that the spirit of the Lord was upon him.
[00:25:36] Speaker A: He was indeed a prophet. And as Pastor Jason said, he not only was the drum major of justice to address racial inequality, but he addressed poverty.
He had the anointing upon him to do that. What was unpopular, he spoke out against that Vietnam War. And it did turn out we found out was a lie. Just like most wars we entered in recently have been based upon lies to mislead the people. And it's all about elimination and annihilation of people who are different, not just. And you know, this thing now has.
[00:26:17] Speaker C: Taken an ugly turn.
[00:26:19] Speaker A: It's not just color based.
This is about anybody who's different from them.
Because see, if I could categorize you, I can dehumanize you.
I can reduce your humanity and that.
[00:26:33] Speaker C: Can justify me treating you cruelly. But Martin Luther King, according to the late theologian James H. Cone, said King believed that God's reconciling love empowers resistance.
Through Christ's love, people are free to struggle together against evil, whatever the cost.
This is how the beloved community is built.
Purposeful prayer, prophetic speech, strategic, courageous work.
And as I close today, I just want to remind us that we need one another.
We need one another.
The spirit of the Lord is upon me and he has anointed me to be hope for the poor, healing for the brokenhearted, and new eyes for the blind, and to preach to prisoners. You are set free. I have come to share the message of jubilee for the time of God's great acceptance has begun.
Then he added, today these scriptures came true in front of you church. Today is still today.
The Holy Spirit is still moving.
The mission still stands. But we cannot live nor execute this word by ourselves.
We need the power of God and we need one another.
We need the power of God and.
[00:28:06] Speaker A: We need to stand on that word that Jesus spoke in Acts 1:8. But when the Holy Spirit comes to.
[00:28:12] Speaker C: You, you will receive power.
[00:28:14] Speaker A: Say power.
[00:28:17] Speaker C: And he says, you will be my witnesses.
And all of Judea, Samaria, Samaria, and every part of the world, the Holy Spirit is upon you to be witnesses for Jesus.
All throughout Oceanside, San Diego County, California.
[00:28:34] Speaker A: Wherever you go, God is sending you. You might think you're going for one reason, but God is sending you for another. Because God is resting. His spirit is resting not only upon.
[00:28:45] Speaker C: You, but he's moving in you.
[00:28:48] Speaker A: And when you move into spaces, the presence of the most high God, the presence of God in you changes the atmosphere.
And when you are filled with prayer, church God is calling us to some serious prayer.
Because we are reminded that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty unto God. To the pulling down of strongholds. This helps. This happens to be prayer.
Every chance you get and every opportunity.
[00:29:19] Speaker C: When you come together, you need to pray.
[00:29:22] Speaker A: Whether it's two people, three people, the whole church, we need to pray because.
[00:29:27] Speaker C: That'S where we tap into our power.
[00:29:29] Speaker A: We need the spirit of The Lord.
[00:29:31] Speaker C: To help us pray also.
[00:29:34] Speaker A: The Spirit helps us with our weaknesses. We do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit himself.
[00:29:38] Speaker C: Speaks to God for us, even begs God for us, with deep feelings that cannot be explained.
We need one another.
We must pray together, hope together, work together, and unconditionally love one another.
Just like Jesus, the kingdom of God is not built by isolated believers, but by a connected body, by a beloved community.
We need one another.
There's an African proverb says, if you want to go fast, go alone.
But if you want to go far, go together.
The gospel artist Hezekiah Walker wrote a song that declares, I need you, you need me.
We're all a part of God's body. Stand with me, agree with me.
We're all a part of God's body.
[00:30:38] Speaker A: I need you, you need me.
We're all a part of God's body.
[00:30:50] Speaker C: Oh my friends, in a world bent on division, the Spirit of the Lord is calling us to unity.
In a culture of disposability, the sp Spirit of the Lord declares that every life is sacred.
You are important to me.
[00:31:05] Speaker A: Until hope rises, until chains fall, until jubilee is visible.
[00:31:10] Speaker C: The Spirit of the Lord is upon us together.
[00:31:14] Speaker A: The Lord has put his spirit in us because he has appointed us to tell the good news to the poor.
[00:31:21] Speaker C: To tell the captives they are free and tell the blind that they can see again.
God is sending us to free those who have been treated unfairly and to announce that this is the time when the Lord will show his kindness. God bless you and the Lord.
[00:31:45] Speaker B: Thank you for joining us for this Sunday teaching. No matter when or where you're tuning in in.
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