Let me tell you, I'm really excited to be with you tonight, not just because you've fasted,

not just because you're seeking the face of God, although those things are, they help my heart celebrate being among you.

It's an easy thing to step in and just open up the Word of God to people who really want to see God work and move among them.

But, man, I love being here.

We have worked at trying to get me here for four or five

years now, it feels like. And so that it all kind of lined up when we got here, I couldn't be more

excited. And one of the reasons that I love being here is that whether you know it or not,

like, you're my kind of people. And here's what I mean. What I mean when I say that without knowing you, because I know something like, you don't know, okay, I don't even know who you are.

Here's what I do know.

Like, I'm the kind of Christian who loves the Word of God, loves big God theology, loves the thick, transcendent,

omnipicent power of God and let it humble me, but it's never made me

crusty. And so, man, I like to laugh and play. And so, like, this might sound crazy to you

because you're in the middle of something that's a God thing. And when that happens, you tend to

start thinking that what you're in is normal. And when that happens, you tend to start thinking

that what you're in is normal. And I'm just trying to help you understand that what you've got

going on here, it's not normal. I mean, I am the president of a church planning network with

700-something churches globally. And what God has done at 1122 is not normative. And so you're in the

middle of something right now. And it's marked by a real seriousness

about the things of God that has not led you to be haughty and arrogant and crusty,

but alive by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And so, man, if I can kind of just come in and be with you in

the midst of what God is up to, man, I want to do that. And so it's a pleasure for me to be here.

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