God is Good

Well listen, if you are just joining us this weekend, if you're a guest, if you're visiting family for Thanksgiving or something, you picked a great weekend to be here because as a church, we have been in a series called "God Is" all about the attributes of God, the eternal qualities of God for about eight weeks. And today we wrap it up. And we just want to celebrate what God has done here.

You know, hundreds and hundreds of Twin Lakes people met in small groups like these all around Santa Cruz County. Here are some photographs of some of these groups that you guys emailed into me. And they studied the attributes of God together in a small group series related to this message series. And they did small group service projects together. And we also had small groups from around the world doing this study with us online, on our website. We heard from a couple of groups, for example, in London that were doing this study with us. And we even had one in Fresno, if you'll believe it or not. This right here, this is our Fresno group. Isn't that awesome? You know, I joke about Fresno, but we want them to know we love you guys. And from now on, we are referring to you as "Fres-yes" because we think it's great that we're doing a small group despite what I say about it.

If you led a small group or if you hosted a small group during this series, would you please just stand up right now? Just get to your feet. Come on, stand up. And let's thank all these people who led and hosted these small groups. Thank you so much. You guys are great.

Well grab your message notes and today let's talk about how God is good. God is good. You'll notice there's a verse on the top of your notes. I'm going to put it on screen as well. Psalm 107 starting in verse one. Would you read this verse out loud together with me? Let me hear you say this. Give thanks to the Lord for He is good. And that is what we are going to do this morning. Just give thanks to God for His goodness to us.

The Bible says, "Taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him." And in this series we have been tasting that. In fact, look at this stack of emails and letters that you guys have sent in mostly in the last two weeks to me. Every single one of these, these are not just all the emails I've gotten. These are just the emails I've gotten in response to my question to you about what the God is series has meant to you, how God has moved in you and changed your life during this series.

And I got to tell you, on Monday I'd already gotten 161 of these emails and somebody walked into my office Monday afternoon. I just decided on Monday I'm going to read every single one of those 161. So I spent most of the days reading through all those emails. And Monday afternoon somebody walked into my office and I was reading, I'd just gotten to the end of them. And I literally just had my head in my hands and I was just bawling, just weeping for joy with how God has been moving in your lives.

And I wish you could all have that experience. I wish you could all just read every single one of these emails because you would just get as choked up as I got. But this morning I just want to give you a peek. I'm going to read about a half a dozen of these to you in the message and then we are just going to take a break after we hear from a half a dozen of these people because we're just going to give thanks to God. Just in the middle of the message I'm going to invite the band back and we're just going to sing a couple of worship songs and then I'm going to come back and finish the message.

But I want this message to be not about who we are, not about who I am, but about who God is and what He has done powerfully through us. One man told me this whole series was a revelation for me in that I'd realized I'd been self-absorbed with my own sinfulness every single time I was in church. I'd been going to church but I sat there and thought about what a sinful, unfaithful person I was instead of thinking about God. What a relief to think about God and not myself. He said now finally I get why people like prayer and meditation because it's not about me, it's about Him.

Did you get that too, how fun it was to think about God? A lot of these emails people told me about specific weeks. One man talked about how he was moved by the fact that God is here now. The week we talked about the omnipresence of God. He writes I was changed forever. The week you talked about God being omnipresent. He says I'd never been taught that before but when I heard it I knew it was the truth. I mean I really knew it was the truth. The realization of it was too much for me and I broke down crying. The pure gratitude I felt caused me to lose control and I couldn't stop crying because God is here now.

Somebody else wrote this about God is love. I've never felt as close to God as I have during this study. I know for sure now that I am His beloved and He is surely mine. Now watch this, I love Him so much I wasn't always sure I was going to heaven but because He never changes at 72 years old I finally get the whole picture. God is faithful. Man I hope you and I are still teachable like this at 72 years old too but I'm so glad that she got that.

Somebody else wrote this about the same week. Some of us grew up feeling abandoned and not good enough. Angry, scared, lonely and sad. We had no choice in how we would be raised but now we're adults. We get to choose and I choose God to be my father. My father is here right now and he loves me. I'm so special to my father and that's all that matters. He knows what I need.

And speaking of God knowing one woman wrote, "I think the week of God is omniscient was key for me once I really heard that God knows exactly how I feel and understands. I felt so changed on a deep level." Now listen to this. Living alone I don't have somebody really caring how I am a lot of the time. What I learned was someone knows and someone cares and it's God. I sang love songs to God. You see the depths of my heart and you love me the same? You are amazing God. I began seeing God's majesty all around for example blasting out of the water in the shape of a whale. I felt the desire to sell something like the children who sold kites you know for the food drive. So I cleaned off bookshelves and sold books through Amazon for God's glory. Wow I feel a sense of relaxation in my shoulders and a newfound sense of peace rather than tension from striving and worrying about what others think of me.

And so many people probably the topic that got the most response through email so many people told me how much it meant to them to be reminded again that God is in control. Just one example a man wrote, "In June my wife Stella was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Within three weeks I was diagnosed with lung cancer. I had surgery partial removal of my lung with treatments to follow. On December 5th Stella and I will be celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary. So I tell my friends that Stella and I do everything together. We even get cancer together." Then he says seriously it's very easy to play the why me game. Why would God let this happen to my wife? Why would I get lung cancer? When will all these bills stop coming in etc. But sitting in the back of church last Saturday it all rang true. I do have faith in God's unchanging power, love, truth, promises. God is love. God is gracious. He is in control. And I'm just along for the ride. He has blessed me with so much joy and happiness that I am eternally grateful. And by the way he says Stella and I are both doing well and responding well to our treatments. An amazing attitude.

And about last weekend's message God is unchanging a woman wrote, "All I ever wanted as a child was to please my parents and for my parents to love me and want me." Well it never happened. My parents were divorced when I was 12. My mom sent me to live with my dad and he sent me right back to live with my mom. Later my marriage failed. Even now I sometimes think I'm going to get blindsided with an unexpected announcement that I'm no longer welcome. But not only will God never throw me away, He is holding on to me fiercely. He loves me. He wants me. He will never hurt me. I am not alone.

I got to tell you, you know what these emails all boil down to every single last one of them. You were basically saying life is sometimes tough but God is good. Even though you were talking usually about one of the other attributes that we've studied in this series and that's because every attribute we've studied is an aspect of God's goodness. I love this quote from Ray Pritchard that's in your sermon notes. God's goodness is the sum total of all of His attributes. To say it another way, there is nothing about God that is not good. Goodness may be appended to all His other attributes. Everything God does is good. There is nothing but goodness in His being.

All right that's great but how in the world is the world supposed to know that God is good? I mean we can invite them to church and we should but is there any other way to tell people God is good and God loves you? Well just before the series started we spent some time in Isaiah 58 where God says here is what I want you to do. I want you to give your food to the hungry and set the oppressed free and that's how you and they will see God. And so 10 weeks ago we set this giant goal, a God sized goal to say we love you in God's name to the whole world. Mark mentioned it during announcements.

We decided we'd set aside enough to raise one million pounds of food for our local second harvest food bank and defeat a village in the most famine stricken part of the world by far Somalia, right on the border of Somalia and Kenya for a year. Now when I first raised that 10 weeks ago a lot of people applauded, yeah let's do it a million pounds, feed an African village for a year. But not everybody loved that idea because times are tough and some people kind of dared to say you know that's great in theory but dude the economy's tough and you say everybody ought to consider prayerfully giving $100. You know some people said well I don't have $100 and I appreciated for example this woman's honesty about that.

She said recently my husband lost about half his salary. We're currently in the middle of foreclosure on our home and we've had to declare bankruptcy just so we can barely scrape by. And then you challenged us as a church to raise that one million pounds of food and I sat in church that morning and sobbed. In fact I wanted to get up and leave but my husband held me and through my tears I heard something that changed me to the core. I blogged it for the world to see and she wrote this on her blog. My anger has turned to compassion this week. I've gone from absolutely needing that cute outfit to absolutely needing to save for someone else. My focus has changed dramatically. I've become consumed with bold acts of compassion.

We thought we had nothing left when we declared bankruptcy but only found out we have so much. We don't need to keep up with the Kardashians and live, I hope not, and live beyond our means. We need to live like Jesus and while we do have days when we're filled with worry over our future and his plans we rest our hearts in him and we know we will get through. I gotta tell you I read this and wept. In fact this is the one I was reading when somebody walked in my office and I was just you know sobbing just wiping tears. Because I wept because the way that you guys have all just embraced this food drive and understanding that it's part of our identity as Christians.

It's not just something we do as charity. It's something because of our history and our identity as Christians who we believe are beloved by God with undeserved grace. That is how we want to lavishly love the world so they begin to ask us questions and we can tell them about the God who is good. And so many people have just I've been really moved with how the kids have embraced this. I was over in the venue service at the end of their service last week and a young boy named Sage walks up to me. I asked him how old he was. He said he was 10 and he hands me this envelope and it's full of money.

And I said this is amazing Sage. I said how did you how did you raise this? And he said well he said I made these little styrofoam Christmas stars because I know that the Christmas season is coming up. And he said I sold them for a suggested donation of a dollar to like my friends my friends parents and neighbors and so on. And you might think well you know that's kind of cool that a kid does something like this. But really how long can you distract your kids from like playing video games or something like for an afternoon for two hours or something. Listen how much time do you think Sage put into this. How many stars do you think he made. You know how much was in this envelope? A hundred and eighty two dollars. That's a lot of stars and that's a lot of asking people for weeks and weeks and weeks.

I got to tell you I don't know about you but but that moves me that moves me and there's so many stories like this. These kids were inspired by that little six year old Travis you know when he first went around selling kites. These are kids brothers who age range in age from about two to about seven. And I love this picture just look at their faces. Isn't this a great picture? And I don't know if you can see the sign on their box but it says caterpillars to feed the hungry all proceeds to second harvest food bank. And then they have one dollar equals four meals and so on on there. But I love this because you can tell that it's totally kid originated. Their mom sent me this and wrote me about what they did.

But think about it just this the purely the fact that that they decided to go door to door and sell fake caterpillars. Tells you they thought of this right. Because seven year old boys you can tell that they sat around and went well what could we sell to. Well what do you want. I'd like a fake caterpillar who wouldn't. When you're seven and you're a boy you wouldn't want a fake caterpillar. So they decided to sell these. It's awesome to see this happening and not just kids. We had just this week alone. We had two anonymous donations. I have no idea who gave these but one anonymous donation of ten thousand and one anonymous donation of two twenty thousand dollars toward this food drive goal. So thank you to everybody who gave this.

And today is it. This is the moment that we've all been waiting for at the end of the service. Today we're going to have the ushers come forward during a beautiful new worship song and we're going to take an offering. And if you'd like to give to the food drive you can put in your own food drive envelope or you can also use the envelope that's in the pew in front of you and indicate what you want to give to the food drive. And I'm really looking forward to that moment as a moment of worship and real true sacrifice. But right now I want to do something else. I just want to stop. I don't want to talk anymore. I'm going to ask the man to come out. I'm going to pray and then we are just going to worship God for a few minutes and just say God you are so good. Thank you for the ways that you have revealed yourself to us. The way that you have moved in our lives. You are just a great God.

So would you stand together with me for a word of prayer and then let's just worship God. God you are so great. You are wild. You are untamed. You are holy other. You are the powerful and infinite and loving God. And right now we just want to take all that we've learned and experienced and we want to think not of us or our needs or our anxieties but of your splendor and greatness. We want to forget about ourselves and lose ourselves in worship of you. Thank you for revealing yourself to us and thank you that you left your splendor to become human and save us as we'll remember during Christmas time. In Jesus Christ your perfect love and perfect power is perfectly shown. You are truly a great God. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Remain standing and let's worship him in song. The splendor of the King, clothed in majesty, that all the earth rejoices, all the earth rejoices, he wraps himself in light and darkness tries to hide and trembles at his voice, trembles at his voice. How great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Oh see how great, how great is our God. Age to which he stands. Time is in his hands beginning at the end, beginning at the end. God had three in one, Father, Spirit, and Son, the Lion and the Lamb, the Lion and the Lamb. How great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Oh see how great, how great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Sing with me how great, how great is our God. Oh see how great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Sing with me how great is our God. Oh my Savior God to thee, how great now our God. How great thou art. And when I think that God his son not spare me, sent me to die, I scarce can take it in. That on the cross my burden gladly bearing, he bled and died to take away my sin. It sings my soul, my Savior God to thee. How great thou art. It sings my soul, my Savior God to thee. How great thou art.

Heavenly Father, you are so great, and you are so good. God is great, God is good. Thank you for that truth. May we never forget it any moment of our lives. In Jesus name, amen. And you may be seated. God is so good.

Well I want to tell you what my biggest concern here is as we wrap up this series, and it's this. That you guys are going to go, okay great, we're wrapping up our God as series, our focus on God is over. Now I can focus on myself again. And all my fears and my anxieties, no, my question is how do you and I stay focused on God? Because my hope is that this series is just the start of life long habits, right? A habit of thinking about God all the time. A habit of meeting in small groups if that's new to you. A habit of giving to the poor sacrificially. Because I got a warning for you, this is not easy. In fact coming up is the time of year it can often be the toughest to be focused on God. Yes, it's the time of year known as the holidays. Some of you will be looking very much like that Santa in just a few short weeks. The holidays can take it out of you.

So let me give you three two word prayers to our good God to help you stay in the frame of mind where you were during the series where you were aware of God again. These are kind of three two word resets so that you know you don't have to work up some sort of awareness of God. You don't really, God is very close to every one of us. These are just short ways to remind yourself, oh yes, I can focus on God and not myself. And I'm going to spend most of my time this morning on the first two word prayer. It's simply this, thank you. Just thank you. Just pray this two word prayer all week long as you look around yourself. You know, as you look around when you're driving, as you look at the people you're talking to, as you look at your to-do list, just say, God, thank you for whatever it is that you notice.

The Bible says this in Psalm 92:1, it is good to give thanks to the Lord. And you know, it is. Check this out. There's so much research on this, but in one very recent study on gratitude conducted at UC Davis, participants wrote in a short journal once a week, not even every day, just once a week. Listen to this. One group briefly listed five things that they were grateful for that had occurred in the previous week. Another recorded five hassles from the previous week, and the neutral group was asked to list five events, but weren't told whether to focus on the positive or the negative. Ten weeks later, participants in the gratitude group felt better about their lives, were 25% happier, reported fewer health complaints, and exercised an average of 1.5 hours more per week. I mean, it makes a difference. It really is good to give thanks to the Lord.

You say, well, thanks for what? Well, thanks for the stuff you see all around you. And this is one of the things I love best about the effects of theology, right? Focusing on God. One man wrote me, God is, has provided a frame of reference to help me observe God's power and majesty in creation. I love that, and so many of you talked about that and didn't just talk about it. Here's, one of my favorite things about this series is that you emailed me photographs that you sent. You shared your photos with me. I'm going to show you just a few of the many photographs that I received where you said just taking pictures had become an exercise in worship for you. And I love being able to see through your eyes the God moments, the beauty of the world all around you. It really was just awesome.

Every one of these pictures taken by one of you, because thinking of God makes the whole world all around you just come alive, and that raises your gratitude level because you see more of God's gifts all around you. These are gifts that we walk right past if we are not looking. And even without a camera, you can frame the world with gratitude. For example, the whales this fall were a very special gift. I got a lot of neat pictures of whales that you guys took, but every day we get gifts. The seasons are gifts. In fact, one woman wrote some haiku's about God, Japanese-style poetry, and sent me some of them with some pictures like this one. "Seacliff Beach, witness God painting, fireball floats, softly falling. His splendor beyond measure, his ways not understood. I trust in him."

You know, it's interesting how thinking about God makes you and me more creative, because we notice God's good gifts all around us. And some of these ways that you learned gratitude just humbled me. I got an email from Christine Bakunoff, and a lot of you know Christine. Christine is the woman on this horse there in the front of the horse, kind of hunched over like that. Christine is a 37-year-old woman who attends this church. She's always over in the venue service at 10 45 on Sunday mornings. She has very severe multiple sclerosis, and she is the single mother of a 16-year-old teenage girl. So that gives you context.

She sent me this picture, and she wrote, "This is Christine. My MS has now progressed to the point that I now have to control my wheelchair with my chin. This is because she has no more control over her arms or her legs." So just picture. This is who this is. "I joined the goddess Small Group, searching for a closer relationship to God. Well, it opened my eyes, wide open, to his miracles around me every day." She says, "I realized I'm living a dream, because I get to live out my dream of riding at the Horsemanship Center. I finally understand how awesome God is and how awesome he's been to me." I don't know about you, but that's both humbling and that's a lesson that I'm learning that I hope I internalize for this week, right? For Thanksgiving week. Learn to see God's gifts all around you, no matter what your life circumstances.

A lot of you know that I love movies, film. Louis Schwartzberg is the name of a San Francisco filmmaker. His company, Blacklight Films, has made a great reputation as being a provider to blockbuster Hollywood films of what they call B-roll. He goes and he shoots scenic shots that are then spliced into Hollywood movies so that they don't have to worry about going around the world shooting those shots. Well, Louis decided he was going to do something kind of for mankind with all that B-roll that he'd shot over the last 20 years. He decided he'd make a movie about gratitude. And I want to show you just two minutes of that movie. This is narrated by an old guy that Louis knows. He is a German Benedictine monk. Watch this.

You think this is just another day in your life? It's not just another day. It's the one day that is given to you today. It's given to you. It's the only gift that you have right now. And the only appropriate response is gratefulness. If you do nothing else but to cultivate that response to the great gift that this unique day is, if you learn to respond as if it were the first day in your life and the very last day, then you will have spent this day very well. Begin by opening your eyes and be surprised that you have eyes you can open. That incredible array of colors that is constantly offered to us for pure enjoyment. Look at the sky. We so rarely look at the sky. We so rarely note how different it is from moment to moment with clouds coming and going. Look at the faces of people whom you meet. Each one has an incredible story behind their face. A story that you could never fully fathom. Not only their own story, but the story of their ancestors. We all go back so far. And in this present moment, on this day, all the people you meet, all that life from generations and from so many places all over the world, flows together and meets you here like life-giving water if you only open your heart and drink.

Isn't that beautiful? Open your eyes and see ways to say to God, "Thank you." All around you every day. You know, this is how we are able to do what a verse in the Bible tells us to do that always kind of confused me. 1 Corinthians 10:31 says, "Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." Ever wonder what that verse means? Well, you and I get to practice this on Thanksgiving, this Thursday, right? Try to do this. When you eat on Thanksgiving, when you drink on Thanksgiving, do it all to the glory of God. How do you practically do this? Well, you sit down at table and you think of what you've learned in this series. First, God is right there. All of God is right there with you and that food in front of you, that is a gift from a gracious God and a loving God.

Don't just shovel it in, you know, eat it, savor it. Don't just cram it down your throat as fast as you can so you can watch the 49ers play on Thursday afternoon and so you don't even remember what it was that you ate. Chew. And think about how good that food is and what a good God God is. That He gave this to you and then He made a planet that can produce this bounty and that there are people in the world who don't have enough. And how you and your church community got to give them some and pray for them. And then you're eating and drinking to the glory of God.

I love the way John Ortberg puts it. He says, "This is what makes a life glorious." It's not a glamorous list of achievements. This is your shot at glory. Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do can be a place of Shekinah glory when you give glory to God. I like this quote from Frank Laubach. "The most wonderful discovery that has ever come to me is that I don't have to wait for some glorious hour. This hour can be heaven. Any hour for anybody can be as rich as God." When you say, "God, thank you." One final story before I leave this point.

One of my favorite new writers is named Anne Vosskamp. Here's a picture of her. Anne is a young mom and she has cancer and it's very bad. She says when she was diagnosed and realized she was dying, she happened to see the book A Thousand Places to See Before You Die. And she realized, "I'll never make it to those places because of my health." And then she decided she'd start another list, A Thousand Gifts to Notice Before You Die. Instead of a bucket list of things she needed to do, this was a list of all the things she already has, A Thousand Gifts. Here's some of the things on her gratitude list. The leafy scent of the florist shop. The faint aroma of cattle and straw. The cry of the blue jay and the trees. The rainbow color in the soap suds. The earthy aroma of the woods. And this young mother dying of cancer decided to keep on riding all the way to 1,000. Kids at play. Fresh bread. Embracing the skin of the boy child that my body grew from a seed. And she says she sees God revealing himself all around to her all the time in ways that she'd just been walking right past before.

So stay aware by simply saying, "Thank you." And if you just want one thing, you're kind of like, "Well, what? What, what, what? Give me something practical. Do me a favor. Everybody hold up your hand like this. Spread your fingers out. And now turn around and look at it." You know, it's become almost a Hollywood cliché that when people are high on drugs, they look at their hand and they go, "Wow." Like this, right? But you know what? Look at your hand and go, "Wow." Ever do that? Not everybody can do that. If you can, say, "Wow, think of the capability that I have. Think of the creativity that's possible. Think of the creativity that caused this amazing device." I was talking to a doctor who works at Dominican after the service last night. And he's the one who came up afterwards and said, "You showed sunsets and whales and all this stuff." And he said, "As a doctor, you know what takes me into worship of God?" He says, "When I look at the human body," he says, "because I'm in surgery every day." And he says, "I realize this is a 'wow' moment." Yet we walk right past these things all the time.

So just learn to whatever's around you all the time. Kind of make yourself sensitive to who God is by saying, "God, thank you. Stay aware of that." And I'm just going to mention this next two-word prayer. Number two, "Help me." Wherever you are, wherever you're going, whatever you're doing, just pray, "Help me." This is a great prayer. Look at some of the many times this is in the Bible. Isaiah 38, "I'm in trouble, Lord. Help me." Psalm 119, "Help me abandon my shameful ways." I've prayed that prayer. This next one is my favorite. One time somebody said this to Jesus, and he thought it was great. "I do believe, but help me overcome my unbelief." Don't you love that you can be honest about that? Can I see an honest show of hands? How many of you can relate to this prayer? Because I can. Jesus, I believe, and I don't believe. So I believe, but help me overcome my unbelief. And Jesus is like, "I love that prayer." Help me is a prayer of real intimacy and honesty with God. That's why it improves our relationship with God.

But remember, you can ask this with confidence. "Yes, the Lord is for me," says Psalm 118. "He will help me." And you pray those first two prayers together. "Lord, thank you that I get to go to work today," for example, "because lots of people don't have jobs." And, "Lord, help me as I go to work today." Or, "Thank you that I have kids." And, "Help me because I have kids." Right? Every parent can relate to that. And then the final two-word prayer I want to teach you today, number three, "What's next?" What's next? What I mean by this is literally, "What is the next thing I have to do?" What is next on the list of to-do things? Like Jesus said, "So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today." In other words, don't worry about all the things you have to do. Just say, "God, what's the next thing?" And then you do that thing.

This prayer's been helping me so much with my own anxieties. For example, just this week I prayed, "Oh Lord, I am freaking out today. What is next?" And honestly, it was as if I sensed God saying, "Well, René, what's next for you is, you're driving to work right now, so please try to stay aware of that. I'd appreciate that. Okay, Lord, okay, I will." Right? That's instructive. Or, "Lord, I'm stressed thinking about everything I've got to do. Lord, what is next?" Well, René, it's 11 p.m. So sleep is what's next for you. Don't worry about those other things. And then I pray the other two prayers. Thank you. Thank you that I get to sleep. Thank you that I get a bed to sleep in. And help me. Help me sleep.

In fact, all these three two-word prayers go together. These are ways to continue practicing the presence of God in your life. These are ways, as we leave this series, as you go into the busy holiday series, you can refocus and readjust almost instantly. In fact, let's say these two-word prayers together, so they really sink in. Thank you. Help me. And what's next? Don't just say, "What a cool sunset." Say, "God, thank you for that sunset." Don't just say, "I'm stressed." Say, "God, help me, because I'm stressed." Don't just say, "Well, I got so many things on my plate." Say, "God, what's the next thing on my plate?" And by the way, speaking of what's next, Mark talked about all the Christmas events coming up. Please be in prayer for those things, because it's the best time of the holidays.

The holidays are the best time to reach out to others. But also, many of you have asked me, "Well, what's the next study we're doing together as a church?" Starting January 1st, for the next 30 days in January, we're going to be taking you through Just Like Jesus. It's a best-selling book that was put out by Max Lucado, and we're going to order enough daily devotions, 30-day daily devotions, that version of Just Like Jesus, for you guys to pick up at Christmas, and then on January 1st, we start a 30-day journey in this. Why? Because during the new year, often we go, "Well, I need to improve myself. I'm going to make some resolutions." Better than just making random resolutions is thinking, "How can I be more like Jesus?" And then focusing on that. So we're going to start that 30-day series, if you want to continue with this, starting on January 1.

But let me close this whole God Is series with this. A writer that I love to read, David Needham, talks about a place in the Sierra Nevada mountains called V.O. Grade. You know, like we have Empire Grade Road around here, Felton Grade Road. He says there's a place that this guy's family refers to as V.O. Grade, and I bet you guys have seen V.O. Grade without ever knowing that you have seen it. Quick show of hands, how many of you have ever driven up Highway 50 to Lake Tahoe? Anybody ever taken that trip? Then you've seen the O. Grade. Here's how David Needham first saw it. He was driving up with this friend, and this friend who was driving the car said, "Wait 'til you see what my family calls the O. Grade." And David says, "Why do you call it the O. Grade? Just wait, you'll see. Why do you call it the O. Grade? Just wait, you'll see." And they climbed up and up, but if you know what that's like going up Highway 50, you're alongside the American River, and so the grade is very gradual.

And you don't realize that you're getting up over 7,000 feet high until you crest the summit and turn the corridor, and you see this all the way down to Tahoe Paradise, all the way down the cliff to the lake in the distance, and they turn this corner, and David goes, "Ohhhh." And his friend says, "That's why they call it the O. Grade." Well, listen. God has a limitless supply of O. Grade moments for you, moments when you round some corner and you see something that causes you to well up in gratitude toward your awesome and majestic and infinite and omnipotent and loving and faithful and unchanging God. You are aware if you get rid of your ingrown eyeballs and turn them around and remember to look for God's presence, God's power, God's grace all around you, many O. Grade moments await.

That's really my prayer for you guys, and the big idea as we wrap up this series is that you keep enjoying God. The Westminster Catechism says, "The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever." And that's my prayer, that this church would be known as a place where people glorify God and enjoy Him. Let's pray toward that end right now. Would you bow your heads in a word of prayer with me? Heavenly Father, may this series not end our theological thoughts. God, thank you for all the things that we have learned. You are so good. You are so great. You are so loving. And we just want to thank you for what you have done in us, not just during this series, but what you have done in us since we have opened our hearts to you.

We were blind and you keep opening our eyes. We were blind and you keep helping us to see. We were lost and you keep helping us get found, and we give you glory for that. And God, right now, if there's anybody in this room who has been a part of this church during this series and has enjoyed watching us and thinking about God, but maybe has not yet stepped over the line where they have placed their trust in Christ and self-identified as a Christian, a follower of Christ, I pray that they do it even now. Why wait? What better time of year could there be than Thanksgiving week to say, "God, I don't understand it all, but my belief now is nobody understands it all, but I understand that through Christ, you, the infinite God, became finite, became one of us, because we were lost and you came to find us. And so, God, now I place my trust in that. God, I want to follow you. I want to follow the great I am. Jesus Christ during the rest of my life.

If that was your prayer in this moment today, God says you've been born anew. Your life of having your eyes open to His wonders, it will take on a new quality. Lord, thank you for those who prayed that prayer this morning and last night. May their lives continue to grow and flourish in their understanding of you, those of us who were lost and have been found. Never forget that moment we stepped over the line to. May we never be lax in our gratitude to you for how we have changed. We pray this in Thanksgiving. In Jesus' name, amen.