All right, church family, let's open our Bibles together. The book of Ephesians, if you're just joining us. Uh, this is our book study that we're taking our time going through. Uh, so we're still in chapter one. If it's your first time, you're not too late. Uh, and as we open God's Word together, uh, I hope that the disposition of our hearts is to be welcoming to the encouragement, the promises, and also the challenges that we see in God's Word because we know it's for our good. So we're going to be, uh, coming towards the end of chapter one, uh, where we get a prayer from Paul that we're going to look at when we talk about prayer. Uh, it's important just to remember that God is not a genie, uh, some all powerful being that's just exists to serve us and grant us our wishes nor our prayer requests. Uh, just wishes we give to God. However, we are called to make our requests known to God. We have not because we ask not. So if you had one prayer request you would want answered, what would it be? Now, let me let me narrow it in a little bit. Not not for yourself, but if you were praying for someone else, some other prayer, like a prayer request for someone else, what would it be? And not who? Not who are you praying for? But what are you praying for? Now you might be like, well, that depends what my prayer request depends on who I'm praying for. If I'm praying for this person, it's going to be this. If I'm praying for this person, it's going to be that. Well, should that be the case? We're going to look at this prayer. And it's really you see, Paul, throughout Ephesians, it's like this doctrine and then prayer, and he gets into this doctrine, and then he goes into prayer, and he just kind of slides right into prayer, doctrine, prayer, doctrine, prayer, and good doctrine should drive us relationally to prayer towards God. Um, so let's, let's look at this a little bit. Uh, verses fifteen through twenty three. You guys ready? I'm going to read all of it. And then we'll, we'll back up. Here we go. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints. I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you. What are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the age to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is the body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. Now we're going to spend three weeks in this prayer. So we're just going to look at the first part of this prayer today. Um, and it's a prayer. Paul prays for other people. Now, do you pray for other people? Just ask that a few of you in here to do that. I know we can kind of fall into this, uh, self-centered disposition. I don't mean self-centered, maybe a bit unfair, but but naturally, it's like we know our weaknesses. We know the sins we need to be forgiven. We know what we're struggling with. We know our problems. Like can be that we pray often for ourselves and thank God that we can go to the throne with our troubles. But. But we're called to pray for other people. So. So you do you pray for other people? If that's not a practice, I would challenge you to, to make that a practice. But when you do pray for other people, what do you tend to pray for them about? And again, that's maybe where you push back and be like, well, it depends. Who am I praying for? What's going on in their life? But I'm saying, what's our most urgent prayer request for others? No matter the circumstance, no matter the situation, no matter the person that we should be praying for them. What's the thing? We should be praying for each other. The most urgent thing in our prayers. That should show up now. Here's a little hot take for you and hear me out. I think we put too much stock in prayer requests, like getting prayer requests from other people. Um, like what's going on in your life? Because sometimes not all the time, but sometimes the how can I pray for you is really, can you just tell me more what's going on in your life? Like it's a dig for information, like, how can I pray for your marriage? It's like that was specific or how can I pray for your kids? Like, is it just seems like this grass formation and often not, not always, but often prayer requests can tend to focus on secondary issues or reactive things. Who's having surgery, who's sick, who lost a job, who needs help? Like things that kind of come up that we react to. But what if we let the Word of God direct how we pray for others more than we let others direct how we pray for others. Right? You. If you ask your toddler, if you're a parent and you ask your toddler, how can I pray for you? I'm going to guess you're not going to get great requests. You might get some stuff like, I'm not praying for that, right? But you as a parent, you're like, I know how to pray for you. Like I know what's going on in your heart. I know what you need. Now, yes, share prayer requests with one another, like cast your your cares to the Lord because he cares for us. What a blessing. What a blessing it is to have a community of people. When you're going through something, you can shoot out text, pray for this and they're praying for that. That is a wonderful blessing. But listen, we don't need information from others to know the most important way we can pray for them. What I'm trying to get across is praying for each other. We need to stop being primarily reactive. Like when this comes up. I'll pray for it. When this happens, I'll pray for you. And when this happens, I'll pray for you. But but more proactive in how. We pray for others. And we know, according to scripture how we ought to be praying for others. We see in Paul's prayer the most urgent, pressing, important prayer we can offer to God for others. And we need to be praying this for each other. So what is it? Let's look at this first part. Go back to verse fifteen. You guys still with me? All right. Verse fifteen for this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints. I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord. This is his request that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of glory. He says, glory a lot in this it'll come up, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope he has called you. Paul wants us to know God like that's his prayer request. I want you, the eyes of your heart, to be enlightened. So you get it. I want you to have the spirit of wisdom, of revelation so that you know him. Like this is the most pressing, urgent prayer request. I want you to know God. In fact, he picks up in this in his next prayer. I don't think it's on the screen, but let me just read it to you. This is towards the end of chapter three, same kind of language. It says, for this reason, I bow my knees before the father, from whom every family in heaven and earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory, there's that again, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend, to know with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. This is Paul's prayer request. I want you to be filled up to the fullness of knowing God. I want you to get all of God that you can. I want you to be strengthened, that you can comprehend it, that you can get it. That God would give you a spirit of wisdom, of revelation, so that you would know him, that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened, so that that you would know, that you would see. That's his prayer request. But I got a question now before my question. This is important because everything hinges on it. In fact, at the end of chapter three, you start chapter four and he's saying that we would walk in a manner worthy of the gospel, and then he gets really practical in life what that looks like. But walking in a manner worthy of the gospel comes from having our hearts or the eyes of our hearts enlightened that we get what he's talking about, that we know God like it flows out of that. So his main prayer request is that we would know God. Here's my question. Why pray for people who already know God to know God? Why is he doing that? It's like I've heard of your faith. I've heard of your love to all the saints like you seem to be doing great. So why is Paul praying for people who already know God to know God? We pray for people who don't know God to know God. That seems to make sense. And we pray for hurting people like people in need. That seems to make sense. But often the hurting get our attention, especially when it comes to prayer. Like where are the needs? And that's where my prayers are going to go. You know, are they sick and they need to get better. Are they going through a hard time? And they need to, you know, are they doing a difficult marriage and they need to have reconciliation? Do they lose a job? They need to get a job. And sometimes based on our prayer requests, it could seem like our greatest ambition is other people's comfort. Like if you're sick, I want you better. If you're unemployed, I want you employed. If you're going through a hard time, I want you out of a hard time. But isn't there more to it than that? And listen, I'm not I'm not saying that's wrong. Yes, we do pray for each other when we're sick and we're going through hard times. Yes. But it is limited. Perhaps a bit short sighted And definitely just reactive. Reactive to circumstances and needs that come our way. Not very proactive. And here we see. Excuse me. Here we see Paul praying for people who are doing well to do better. Do you pray very often for people who are doing really well to do better? I mean, do you think people that are doing well still need to be prayed for? We don't tend to think this way. I mean, if I ask that question, it's like, oh yeah, we all need prayer prayed for. But the kind of the default is prayer is for people that are hurting. Prayer is for people that are struggling. Prayer is people who are sick. Prayer people are not doing well. But here, Paul's praying for people who are doing well to do better. People who do know God to continue to know God. I mean, if prayer is an investment and it's not, my will be done, but your will be done. I might be saying, well, where is your will playing out? That might put my prayer energy toward those things. We don't tend to think that way, though. Prayer is not an investment. It's not an either or. It's not like you pray for hurting people, or you pray for people who are doing well. You pray for both. It's just we don't tend to think that way. We default to thinking prayer is just for people who are having a hard time. But what we need to understand is none of us can do well apart from the help of God. All of us are always in need of God. Isn't it interesting in this prayer that he thanks God for their faith and their love? Why doesn't he thank them? Right? Thank you for your faith. Hey, thank you for how you love other people. He didn't do that. He thanks God for their faith and their love. Because what have we learned in chapter one? That's all the work of God. God's been at work in you. He's opening your eyes. He's he's moving among you. He's kind of before the foundations of the world has chosen to adopt you and make you his own, like he's given you His Spirit as a guarantee for an inheritance to come. Like this is all the work of God. So Paul's giving credit to God for their activity, for their faith, for their love. I just think it's interesting that Paul's saying, I've heard how well you are doing, and I'm praying for you. And it's not a one time prayer request. You might think, oh, you're doing great. Yeah, I'll throw one up. But but I got to put more energy and more time in people who are not doing great. But that's not what he says. He's like, I'm consistently praying. I don't stop praying for you. You're doing well. And I continue to pray for you. Why? Why is he doing that? Why is he doing that for them? And why do we need to do that for each other? Let me ask you this question. Maybe we have a little internal reflection here. Do you ever feel like you used to be a better Christian than you are now like when you look back at your life and it's like, maybe it was in college where it's just like, man, I was eating everything up. I was in God's Word all the time. I just had this passion and zeal or, or maybe it was like when you first became a Christian and like the lights came on and it made sense. And it was just like, this is you're seeing out of new lenses for the first time. And there's just a zeal of like knowing God more and pursuing God more. But just life happened, right? You had kids and kids got, you know, sports practices and dance rehearsals, and you got this work function and you got to go here. And it's just like life happens and you just kind of feel like, I don't know if I'm as good of a Christian now than I used to be. It can just feel like we just get busy, we get distracted. I mean, I'm speaking for myself. I feel like Netflix or whatever the streaming service is for you. Like, I feel like Netflix is the lotus flower of our day. Do you know what I mean by that? Does anybody read like, Greek literature? That's with me. What was the movie that just came out? The Odyssey. Who's the main character in that? Anybody? Odysseus. Yeah. Odysseus is like gone for years, not even know where he's at because he's just chowing on lotus flowers. It just kind of makes you forget, like you don't even know anymore. It's just like we're just distracted all the time. You watch your Netflix show and then like one episodes over and you're like, you know, are we going to watch another one? But it already kind of started the clock and you got like five seconds to decide. And it's like, oh, it started, I guess we're watching another one and you just kind of, okay, we're going to watch another one or scrolling like it just never ends. Like there's always something beneath it or reels. You just go to the next one. It's like, oh man, an hour went by like, what happened to that? And you're just kind of consumed by it. Or let me give you, since not too many of you read old Greek literature, let's bring it into more modern day here. Um, again, before all you were born. But, um, Pinocchio, is that a better one? Are you with me? Like you saw the movie. You know the gist of the story. Give me a nod. Something. Okay. So Pinocchio sets out on this adventure and a very noble adventure that he wants to become a real boy. He wants real life. But where does he end up? At Pleasure Island. There's all kinds of activities and fun, and they get distracted from this mission with so much fun. But what happens to all these boys that stay in Pleasure Island? They turn into donkeys. Or you can fill in another word and they get sold into slavery. They're enslaved by entertainment. Just a distraction from what? The mission that we're called to. And you start to wonder, like, do we even know what life's really about anymore? Have we just become enslaved with entertainment? Have we have we forgot what's really important and consumed with lesser things? I mean, we don't have time. Like, when that happens, we're like, I don't have time to really know God. I don't have time to do that. But yet we have time to scroll. We have time to binge. We have time to travel. We have time for other things. And that's what's like, maybe we've forgotten. Maybe we've forgotten what's most important. Maybe we've forgotten what's really going to matter a million years from now. But think with me. Why is Paul praying for people who know God to know God? It's important that we answer that question. Why is Paul praying for people who know God to know God? He's just got done dropping this good news bomb on us from verses one through fourteen. Do you know that before the foundations of the world that God has known you and loved you and called you and adopted you into his family, and that through the blood of Jesus, he's not counting your trespasses against you. He's rich in grace that he's lavishing upon you, and he's giving you his spirit as a guarantee of your inheritance. Like, are you kidding me? Like he's just telling us again and again and again how awesome God is. And then he prays. He just goes right into a prayer. What's the connection between all this good news that he's talking about and his prayer? Like, why does he say that and then go into a prayer? And what is the prayer telling us? And how is that connected to what he just got done telling us? Well, Paul's trying to help us understand all that God has done, his incredible goodness and kindness and grace that he has lavished upon us. And why is he telling us this? He repeats his motive three times. You guys know this. To the praise of his glory, right? To the praise of his glorious grace. To the praise of his glory, to the praise of his glory. So he is calling us to worship, right? He starts out in verse three, blessed be the God like this is a call to worship. And he continues to repeat to the praise of his glory, to the praise of his glory, to the praise of his glory. So he's calling us to worship, and he's calling us to worship by reminding us or telling us all the wonderful things our God has done for us, how he saved us, how he's forgiven us, how he's given us his Spirit, how he's adopted us into his family. And what's driving or excuse me, the concern that is driving his prayer is that we won't we won't worship. We won't live to the praise of his glory. We won't respond that way. The concern is, will we actually see the glory that leads to praise? Or let me put it this way, the concern is I don't know if you'll get it Like I just got done telling you everything that God has done to the praise of his glory. But I don't know if it'll actually lead to you praising Him and His glory, that you might miss it. And according to this prayer, we. We will, unless God gives us a spirit of wisdom, of revelation for knowing him and enlightens the eyes of our hearts. So Paul's praying, do that, do that. It's like, well, I thought that they already know that. I mean, they already have displayed their faith and they already are loving the saints. He's like, yes, do it more. Don't stop doing that. Continue to do that. Don't, don't let them slip. Because here's the threat. Remember, we're talking to people who have a reputation, according to Paul, of their faith and good works and their love for all the saints. So here's the threat to them complacency. It's not that they stop believing. It's they stop prioritizing. It's like, yeah, I still believe in God. I still believe in Jesus. It's just, you know, try to worship him as much as I can. Squeeze it into my busy schedule. I still believe in God. It's just I got a lot going on right now. It's complacency. You've heard of Faith Without Works is dead. James says that Paul's talking about faith without worship, that you may profess Christ, but it's. You have a life that's not to the praise of his glory. In fact, in revelation two, when you read the letter written to the church in Ephesus, a concern that is brought up is they have abandoned the love they had at first. You lost that loving feeling. You no longer have this zeal and passion for God. Now, do you think complacency is a real threat for you? Like if you're not careful, five years from now, ten years from now, fifteen years from now, you could be somebody who used to be really devoted to Christ and His church. And it's not that you don't or no longer believe in him. You just display now a life that is more passionate about other things. You're more devoted to other things. You're more committed to other things like, is that possible? Is complacency a threat to you? And maybe you're like a threat. I'm already its victim. Like I'm already at the bottom of that slippery slope where I profess Christ. But there's, there's not a life that displays the praise of his glory. It's like being a spiritual zombie. There's an appearance of life. There's a profession of faith, but it doesn't seem like you get it It doesn't seem like all the good news that Paul has just unpacked has led to you praising his glory. You know what that word glory means? Weightiness. Like it doesn't correspond to a life that gets how important God is, how precious God is, how worthy God is. Like, yes, the proclamation is there, but the praise of his glory is not. And what are you going to do for that not to be your story? Or if it is your story, how do you recapture that zeal? Well, Paul's prayer points us in the right direction. Let's look at verses sixteen and seventeen. It says, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him. So Paul is praying that they and. And we would have Holy Spirit informed wisdom and knowledge that comes through revelation. Now, he's used this language before or he will use it. Uh, in chapter three, we looked at it, but let's, let's go and look at how chapter three starts. He says, for this reason, I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles, assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, how the mystery was made known to me, by what revelation. As I have written briefly, when you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ. This mystery of Christ is the gospel. I mean, ultimately, how Jews and Gentiles have been brought together. But under the blood of Jesus, God is not counting our trespasses against us and making us one family adopted in him. That's what he's saying. So basically Paul is saying God has revealed stuff to me. And by stuff I mean the greatest news in world history of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But he's revealed this to me and I've shared it with you. I wrote it down and I wrote it down that when you read it, that you would perceive it, that you would comprehend it, that you would have a spirit of wisdom and knowledge to understand this revelation. And with it God would enlighten the eyes of your heart, that you would see that you would grasp it. And that's what I'm praying for. I'm praying that you get it. So. So listen to fight complacency or or to recapture zeal. Put effort into understanding revelation, the things that God has revealed to us, the things that he's told us that he uses to enlighten our hearts. We can be so devoted to a lot of lesser things. I'm saying be devoted to knowing God. Make knowing God the ambition of your life. Put effort towards it. Read books, read the Bible, listen to sermons, study, talk with people. Make this the ambition of your life. It's what he prays for. In his prayer in chapter three that you may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge. How do you know something that surpasses knowledge? It's like, listen, a million years in heaven. Nobody in here is going to be like, I figured God out. What he's saying? Get in it. Swim. Test the depths, the lengths, the heights. Consume yourself with it. Let me be clear. We want to help you grow your knowledge of God through sermons, books, podcasts, articles, pointing you places. We want to help you grow your knowledge of God. I think knowledge has gotten a bad rap in the church. I don't know if driven by laziness or just a crafty scheme of the devil. There's this twisting of truth that has leaked into church people's thinking like, you don't need to know that. Just be a nice person. You don't need to know what justification and sanctification. Just forget all those big words and just be a kind person. That's garbage. You do need to know it. It's revealed to us on purpose. And there's not a disconnect from knowing and doing. They're not. There shouldn't be. Listen, knowledge of God is the conduit for the power of God to shape the people of God. Knowledge has gotten this bad rap, and often people look at the Pharisees and like, well, they were really smart people and they were enemies of God. It's like, well, Jesus critiques their knowledge. He's like, have you never read? That's an insult to the smartest people around. Have you not heard? He's not against their knowledge. He's critiquing their lack of understanding. Knowledge of God is the conduit for the power of God to shape the people of God. Romans one sixteen. We know this one from unashamed of the gospel, for it is the. What. Power of God for salvation for everyone who believes. To the Jew first, and also to the Greek. Well, what's the gospel? It's news. It's information. And when I know this information, I see God work his power through this information that I proclaim. So let's look at some others. There's still some doubters in the back. This is Titus one, Paul, a servant of God, an apostle of Jesus Christ. For the sake of the faith of God's elect and their. What. Knowledge of the truth which accords with godliness. There is a connection between knowledge of the truth and our godliness. That the knowledge shapes godliness. They're not opposed to each other. Here's another one in second Peter, his divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life. And what godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellency. Here's another one second, Peter, you therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the air of lawless people and lose your own stability. Nobody wants that. Okay, then what do we do but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ? To him be the glory, both now and to the day in eternity. Amen. Let's go one more. Alright, this is in Ephesians. Ephesians four. To equip the saints for the work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. So that Paul used that language in the prayer, so that we may no longer be children or people that don't have knowledge. And what happens to people that don't have knowledge? They're tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. If you don't have knowledge, you're gullible. And if you're gullible, you're open to deceit. And if you're open to deceit, you get pulled away. The knowledge of God is the conduit for the power of God to shape the people of God. Now here's what we don't want. Look at Romans chapter one. For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creepy things. So he's talking about they knew God, but they did not honor him as God. And notice this is the opposite of what Paul is praying for. Their hearts were darkened. But Paul's praying for our hearts are the eyes of our hearts. To be enlightened and to be darkened is like you don't. You don't get it. You know it, but you don't get it. Like you have knowledge, but you don't have worship. The a darkened heart is knowledge that does not lead to worship. And this is the full effect of complacency. Do you not know that before the foundations of the world that God has chosen you to adopt you, to forgive you by the blood of Christ, and give you His Spirit as a guarantee for an inheritance forever? Do you not know that? And they're like, yeah, I know that. Do you see the game last night? That's like a full display of complacency. That's like gospel truth that doesn't land gospel truth that doesn't impact. Like you hear good news and it's like, so and you make this foolish Exchange its its knowledge with idolatry, its knowledge with idolatry. I know God, I'm just going to worship other stuff. I'm going to be more devoted to other stuff. Be more committed to other stuff. Be more passionate about other stuff. Despite my knowledge of God. Because in Romans one, when it says they suppress the truth, they weren't atheists. They didn't say that God no longer existed. So what truth were they suppressing? That God is worthy of their praise? I'm going to take my praise and I'm going to put it elsewhere. I'm going to put it into birds and animals and creepy things and volleyball tournaments and money and lake houses and all these other things. And it's not wrong to have a dog. Don't worship it. It's not wrong to be involved in sports, but don't be more devoted to that than you are God. It's not wrong to have a lake house, but don't give more passion to that than God. Paul says that's making an exchange, a foolish exchange. It's stupid. It's. A little girl came up to me after the service and flicked me. She said, you said stupid. And I was like, I took my flick. It was like, good on you. But that's a fitting word. It's foolish to make that exchange. And he's talking about knowledge with idolatry. And that's what Paul is praying against. He just got done on laying this beautiful truth of God. And then he goes right into this prayer. And his prayer is, I hope they get it. Like I hope it actually lands. I hope that leads to a life of praise of his glory. Let's look at his prayer. Because look at verse seventeen, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ and the father of glory may give you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him. Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, the eyes of our hearts enlightened. We see with our eyes, but he's talking about the eyes of our hearts. So it's a type of seeing, a type of understanding. Now, when the Bible talks about someone who lacks heart, often it can mean a lack of compassion or a lack of courage. Similar to the way we would use it. It's like, man, you got no heart. It was like you were me. Like you didn't show any care or compassion or you got no heart. Like you backed down. You didn't show any bravery or courage. But just as often in Scripture, someone who lacks heart, it means that they lack understanding. But it's a type of understanding that they lack. It's like you don't get it. I mean, you get it, but you don't get it. You get it. You with me? It's like you understand it, but it doesn't lead to any praise in your life. You get the right answer if I call you and ask you a question. But when you come to church, you never worship. You can tell me that God is more important, but you always choose something else. You can tell me that Christ is King. You don't act like it. You can tell me all the right answers, but it has not led to the praise of his glory in your life. And that's what Paul is praying against. It's like I want him to get it, to actually get it, to have the eyes of their heart enlightened. In fact, this is a use of scripture. We put this on the screen before we read Holy, holy, Holy. But if you would keep reading, Isaiah is like, I'll go. Because if I'm impacted by your holiness, and this is what happens. And he said, go and say to this people, keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull. Have a dull heart. Okay. What does that look like? And their eyes, heavy and blind. Are their ears heavy and blind? Their eyes lest they see with their eyes. And hear with their hearts. And or hear with their ears. And understand with their what? Hearts? Okay. If you understand with your heart what would happen and turn and be healed. So an understanding at a heart level leads to life change. And understanding at a heart level leads to turning away from sin and turning to God. And that's what Paul's praying for. I pray that you actually get it. I pray that you live a life to the praise of his glory, to the praise of his glory. Glory means weightiness. I hope you live a life that shows. I know how important God is. I know how precious God is. I know how worthy God is. That's what he's praying for. And there's people in this room. You don't get it. And you need to hear these words like as a pastor pleading like, don't just be settle for the right answers when you don't have the right heart. Don't think you're okay when you can, you know, get the test question right, but you don't have a life that shows the preciousness of God in your priorities. Teenagers, let me speak to you. You are old enough to know, but when you you come from a good Christian home and you know all the questions and you come here and you're. Disposition to the gospel of Jesus Christ. So whatever you know better, you ought to know better. Like we're pleading with you not to have empty believism. We've heard of like, easy believism empty believism. It's like you believe, but it makes no impact. You profess, but it doesn't show in your life. It doesn't lead to the praise of his glory. And according to Romans one, to have a darkened heart is to be foolish, leading you to exchange. Make these. I'll double down, make these stupid exchanges. It's like, really, after all of that, after verses one through fourteen, you still want to be more devoted to that than God. That's your answer. After all of that, you still want to make this exchange where you're going to be more passionate about that than Christ in his church. Is that the exchange you want to make? But to have an enlightened heart is to be wise, leading you to treasure the glory of God over the things of this world. To give praise to his glory. And that's the prayer request. That's Paul's prayer request. That's our prayer request. So are you in the dark or are you in the light? And I don't mean do you believe in Jesus or do you not believe in Jesus? I mean, do you worship or do you not worship? Do you prioritize or do you not prioritize? Do you get how God is worthy of it all or do you not get it? Church, the eyes of our hearts need to be enlightened. And you get the imagery. Maybe you've talked to somebody and you're trying to explain something and you're just like, the lights are not on, right? You just see like, you just don't get it. When it comes to the gospel, are the lights on? I don't mean can you articulate it back. I mean, has it made the impact that it should make? That it leads to a life, to the praise of his glory? I get how important he is. I get the priority that he is. I get how precious he is. I get how worthy he is. This is what Paul prays for. Second Corinthians. We've been here a few times, he says, and even if our gospel is veiled, it's veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory, the weightiness, the importance of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus sake. For God said For God, who said, let light shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give us the light of the. What knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ? Has the light of the gospel shown in your heart? Do you get how holy God is? How precious God is, how important God is? Do you have a life that supports that to the praise of his glory? Guys, make this make knowing God in this way a constant prayer request for you and other people, no matter how well they're doing. This is what we need to pray more than physical health or employment or anything. It all comes down to having our eyes of our hearts enlightened that we would know the hope to which we're called. Everything flows from that, and that's how we need to be praying for each other. So here's how I want to end before we start singing. I want to give you time to pray this prayer. Pray for the people around you. Pray for the people in this room. Pray for the people in your family. Pray for the leaders in this church that this would be true of us. We wouldn't just get it here. We would get it here. Do you remember, uh, there was a time when Jesus looked out at the fields and was like, so much work to do, and he said, pray to the Lord of the harvest that he would send laborers into the field. Like that's his prayer request. Do you know what he says right after that? Go into the field. It's like that was a quick answer. Here's what I want us to do. Pray that the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened, and then stand and answer that prayer request by singing like people who the eyes of our hearts have been enlightened and we get how awesome our God is. Amen. Amen. Let's pray.