Discipleship: Life on Life Gospel Intentionality

II Timothy 3: 10 - 17

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SPEAKER_01 0:19

Would you now stand for the reading of God's Word? Our passage this morning is 2 Timothy chapter 3, beginning at verse 10. That's page 1059 in your Red Pew Bibles. If you didn't bring a Bible of your own, should be one that looks like this. If you want to hunt one of those up and turn to page 1059, we'd like for everyone to be able to see the passage as it's being preached. Again, 2 Timothy chapter 3, beginning of verse 10.

SPEAKER_04 0:52

You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, my faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings, what kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra, the persecutions I endured. Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil evildoers and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. This is the word of the Lord.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Thanks be to God. May be seated. Thank you, Abigail. Would you pray with me once more as we come now to God's word? Let's pray together. Father, we still and pause and quiet our hearts before you this morning. Lord, having offered up our prayers to you, having brought our offerings to you, having sung praises to you, Lord, we now open our hearts and ask that you would speak through the preaching of your word. Because Lord, we need to hear from you. We need your breathed out word to come into our hearts and into our lives that we would be changed, that we would come to see the glory of Jesus. That we would be changed. Come and be our teacher in Christ's name. We pray. Amen. So just a question to get us started this morning, and um really for all of us, because I think all of us tend to see this. Have you ever noticed about little children how they imitate their parents from like the youngest age? I see some parents nodding their heads here, from the earliest age. It's it was wild. I remember whenever I first became a parent, and I had these little boys, and literally from the moment they could walk, the moment they could talk, I saw them doing the things that I do. It's crazy. Like, you know, certain mannerisms I would have, certain things, you know, if I was doing something or working on something, they wanted to be right underneath me, they wanted to be doing it, they wanted to dress like me, they wanted to look like me. And it's an amazing thing as a parent, whenever you begin to see that, you're like, oh my gosh, this little person wants to be like me. And, you know, if you're a parent of those older children, you know, as they get older, you begin to notice that they start imitating people other than you, right? It's a hard thing, is it when your children become a teenager and you notice something in them, maybe something that they say or something, uh some way that they're behaving, and you you want to say to them, where'd you get that? Who have you been with? Who you've been listening to, right? But it's not just children, it's really for all of us. There is something just innate in us as human beings that we are created and born to be imitators. We imitate. We see something, particularly people in our life of great weight. We all have those people in our life, people that we look up to, people that have had an influence on our life. There's something about these people that come into our life that we see as carrying great weight and value, and we we want to become like them. We want to sound like them, we want to look like them, we want to behave like them. It never stops this desire to imitate and become like those in our life that have great weight. Now, why do I we share this? What do we, where are we going with this? Well, we've been in a sermon series, our vision series as a church, where we're talking about our vision for the year and our initiative for this year where we are focusing on discipleship. Now, discipleship is really at the heart of what the church is called to. We are called to be disciple makers. That's that's the command of Jesus to the church. We are to be making disciples. Now, what is a disciple? A disciple is someone who is with Jesus and becoming like Jesus. Often this happens through relationships with others. God has created it this way. That a part of how we become like Jesus, a part of how we change, is in the context of relationship with other believers. And we've been seeing that as we're looking at the book of 2 Timothy. We're seeing this picture of what it means to disciple someone, to pour your life with intentionality into someone else's life in order that they may grow as a disciple of Jesus. But I noticed that something often holds us back from investing our lives in others in this way. Something tends to hold us back from discipling others, from pouring ourselves out, from being intentional with someone else in our life. And I think it's oftentimes a sense of inadequacy. I think for many of us, we cannot imagine that we could be used in that way. We cannot imagine that me investing my life into another person can be used by God to bring about change and growth and transformation in that person's life. I think for many of us we think, I'm not, I'm not good enough. I don't know enough. I don't know my Bible enough. I'm not righteous enough. I don't know how to do this. There's so many things that we believe that make us inadequate to pour our life into someone else in this way. Well, here's what we're gonna see in our passage this morning. The power of discipleship is found not in our righteousness. It's huge. It's not found in our righteousness, but rather in the grace of the gospel flowing through our lives. So let's jump into our passage here, and we are in chapter three. And again, just to orient us to the context here, 2 Timothy is written by the Apostle Paul, and he is writing to Timothy, a disciple of his. And we learn through the two letters that Paul writes here to Timothy, we learn that they had a very close relationship. Paul likely met Timothy on his first missionary journey, and Paul has invested his life in Timothy. And Timothy has grown in Christ and grown as a disciple and has become a pastor in Ephesus. So when Paul is writing here, Paul is sitting in a Roman prison facing execution, and Timothy is serving the church in Ephesus, a town that Paul had planted a church, a number of churches in. So here what we see is a picture, it's kind of a window into this discipleship relationship where Paul has poured his life into Timothy. And he's writing this letter to remind and call Timothy to pass it on. We saw that last week, this chain of discipleship, that a part of how the gospel spreads is as one disciple intentionally pours their life into another disciple. And Paul literally lays that model out for Timothy. He says, I want you to find reliable people that you can then invest what I've entrusted to you and their life that they might go and invest it in others. It's a calling to be disciples who make disciples who make disciples. That's the picture of what Paul is calling Timothy to. So as we come to this passage, what we see is again a picture of what is really at the heart of discipleship. What does it involve? What does it mean to disciple another person? Now I want to look first at verse 14 that is kind of like a summary for all that Paul wants to say here. And in verse 14, we see Paul returning to this really what's at the heart of discipleship, which is the gospel word and gospel relationships. Look again at verse 14. Here's what Paul says. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of. Paul says to Timothy, continue in what I've invested in your life. Now, what is that thing? What is it that Timothy has learned from Paul at its heart? What is it that Timothy has become convinced of that has driven his ministry, that has driven his life? And what that thing is, is what Paul keeps on going back to throughout this letter, which is the gospel. He's rooted Timothy in the gospel. That is this message of rescue in Jesus. This incredible message that God does not treat us as we deserve, that though we deserve wrath because of our sin, God in Christ has come and has borne our judgment and borne our sin so that through union with Him we might be brought into the Father's embrace. That message is something that Paul keeps rooting Timothy in. Because for Paul, it is the power of God for salvation. It is our continual deepening in the truth of the gospel that changes us. I know that. That's old news. That's our understanding that. You would only say guard it if you knew that there was an incredible tendency in you and in your ministry to move on beyond it. Guard and continue in the truth of the gospel because it is God's power. And the gospel comes to us in God's word. That's where we encounter the gospel. That's where we see the gospel. That's where the power of the gospel meets our hearts. So Paul is rooting Timothy here in the gospel word. Look at what he says in verse 16. Now, this, by the way, is a very important verse for understanding the nature of Scripture. This is one of those proof texts. This is one of those, you know, if you're wondering, you know, why do we make such a big deal out of the Bible? Why is it so important that I read the Bible on a regular basis, that I take it into my life? What is it such a big deal that every time we come together to worship, we're coming around the preaching of God's word? Well, this is why in verse 16. Just see how Paul describes the nature of this right here that we hold in our hands. Verse 16. All scripture is God breathed. That's an enormous kind of statement there. All scripture, the whole thing, Genesis to Revelation, Old Testament, New Testament, the entirety of the scriptures is God's word that has been breathed out to us. It's not merely the words of men. It is not like books that we read and that we enjoy. Books are very helpful, they're very important as we grow in our faith, but nothing has the power that God's word has. Because it's breathed out by God. Think about that statement. When we speak, our words are carried on our breath. You put your hand up in front of your mouth while you're talking, you feel your breath. It carries our words. It's a way of Paul describing scripture, helping us to understand that this word is literally God speaking to us. And we know as we come to Scripture that God's word is how he moves, it's how he works, it's how he creates. How did God create all things? He spoke it into his existence. How does God save us? Well, also through speaking life into us. It's all by the power of his word. And so Paul wants to root Timothy in his word because he knows that is the power of discipleship. You know, if we want to grow in our faith, if we want to disciple another person and help them to grow more like Jesus, to grow in their faith, there must be a prominent place for the gospel word in our ministry. Because that's the power. Discipleship is not just mentoring someone, it's not just giving someone advice, it's not just hanging out with someone. Those have their place. But the power in discipleship comes in and through the gospel word. And Paul wants to call Timothy to that over and over and over. So we see that discipleship is rooted ultimately in gospel word, but not just the gospel word, it's also rooted in gospel relationships. Again, look at verse 14. Starting again from the beginning. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, again, that's the gospel. Now look what he says right after that. Because you know those from whom you have learned it. See calls him not only to this reminding him of the gospel word, but also to those through which he learned the gospel. It's this incredible reality that God has ordained it so. The way that we learn and grow in God's word, the way that we learn and grow in the gospel is through a relationship with another believer. Just how he's granted it. It is so rare that someone is going to experience any kind of growth in their life apart from community, apart from someone else in my life, another believer, investing and pouring into my life. And that's what Paul wants to remind Timothy of here. You know, this gospel word that was implanted into you, you didn't just read it, you didn't just get it on your own. It wasn't just you and your personal quiet time, which are wonderful, by the way. I encourage them. But Paul wants to remind him this came through relationships of people that were intentional with the gospel in your life. Now, who's he wanting to remind them of here? Well, look at verse 15. And how from infancy you have known the holy scriptures. Now, wait a minute. How could Timothy know the scriptures from an infancy, from his childhood? You know, because a child can't learn scripture on their own, right? He's reminding him of the influence of his mother and grandmother. If you remember in verse in chapter one, he he talks about that. He talks about the faith that's in Timothy that first lived in Eunice and Lois, his mother and his grandmother. He's like, I it was in them and they passed it on to you. Verse 15 here is reminding Timothy of the influence of his mother and his grandmother in his life. Timothy likely did not have a believing father if he had a father in his life. But yet, Paul here points out the impact and the influence of his mother and grandmother. This is a it's an incredible, I think, encouragement to those of us this morning who are parents and grandparents. And it's also a reminder that our fundamental function as parents is to disciple our children. It could be so easy in our culture to think that our job primarily as parents is to give them every experience and give them every opportunity and work ourselves to the bone to make them a success and curate their life and to make them happy. I mean, all those messages are all around us because people want to sell us things. But it's easy to breathe that in and to think if there's something we can't provide for our children, or if they're uh uncomfortable, or or they're upset, or they're, you know, there's something that we're not coming through in their life, it's easy to believe the lie. I'm not a good parent. I'm not coming through. There's such clarity right here in reminding us that our job is not to come through and provide every experience and opportunity they have. Those aren't bad, but it's not our ultimate job. Our ultimate job is to be our children's teacher, discipler, to pour our faith into their life. It's numero uno, the most important thing that we do as parents. So he calls him to remember the influence of his mother and grandmother and how they were the first disciplers in Timothy's life. But also, he wants to remind Timothy of his influence in his life, the Apostle Paul, because Timothy did life with him. We saw that in chapter one that that Paul didn't just teach some things to Timothy. He opened his heart to him, he opened his life. They had a deep, close relationship with each other. They did life together. And now look at what Paul says in verse 10. You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance, my persecutions, my sufferings, what happened to me in Aconium, Lystra, Antioch. You've seen it. You did life with me. I brought you in. I opened myself to you. You've seen me. You've heard me. You've saw that not only did I preach the truth of the gospel, I lived the gospel in my life. You see, Paul wants to remind Timothy, it was the power of my life that rooted the gospel in your heart. Because it's through relationship where the message of the gospel gets tangible in our life. Where when you hear the message of God's grace and love, when it's embodied in a relationship, it hits home in your heart in a much deeper way. Way. It's when I experience the love, especially in my vulnerability, especially whenever I've blown it or I've sinned or I've fallen in some way. When I experience the grace of a brother or sister in my life, I tangibly experience the grace of God in my life. It is inseparable. When we think about discipleship, we must see the importance of gospel relationships in our life. You know, I think back, you know, this week as I was, you know, in this passage and in studying for this sermon, I just I had an opportunity to think back on my life and the people, the men that God brought into my life to disciple me. And I was just, I was blown away. I don't think of that often enough. But I went through and I was just making a list of these men that God brought into my life just over the years, ever since I came to Christ, you know, ever since the very beginning, you know, in college, whenever God just rescued me out of just utter brokenness and emptiness and deadness. And just throughout my life, God has brought men into my life to pour into me and disciple me. And it's amazing how I can look at who I am today and even how I go about ministry, and I see them in it. I imitate them. I think about it, they're all different. The way that they went about discipleship, it was different in my life. But in every case, there was gospel word and there was gospel relationship. And they were intentional in my life. You know, I remember the first man that came into my life that discipled me. And here's what we'd do we'd meet each week, we'd hang out. He cared about my life. We'd usually talk about football. We both love football and we'd talk about it and we'd laugh about football and everything. But he would always begin to turn it into an intentional way. And he would say, Hey, tell me what are you learning from God? How are you doing? What are you struggling with? What's happening in your life? And I'd open up and I'd share my life. He'd share his life. And then without fail, every time, you know what he'd do? He'd pull this out. That awkward thing, you know, where you're like, let's go to God's word. You know, the it's the reason it can be awkward for us is our problem because it's life. And he would bring out the word, and you know what he would do? He didn't he didn't have a prepared devotion. He just shared what God was teaching him. Many times it was that morning. You know, he'd say, Hey, you know, I was in Mark 3 this morning, and and I was just, I was just blown away by this. Let's look at this together. That's all he did. Gospel word, gospel relationship, and the power of it changed my life. And I could go through and say that for everyone that God brought into my life to disciple me. So here's a question I want you to really wrestle with this morning. Do you feel like you could do this? Do you feel like you could do this? That you could invest in someone else. That you could disciple someone else. That do you feel like God can use you in someone else's life through gospel intentionality? Do you feel like that's possible? Imagine for many of us, there's a lot of doubt as we consider that question. And we think, I'm not adequate for that. I don't know enough. I'm not righteous enough. Look at my life. I don't have it all together. You know, we imagine that we can be someone who disciples other people or leads other people when we get our act together. Well, news flash, you're never gonna disciple somebody if you're doing that. Because we ain't getting our act together, right? And that's the point. Right? So often it's our inadequacy thinking. Discipleship is about bringing my strength to bear on someone else's life. But that's not what discipleship is. And it wasn't for Paul. You know, when when Paul here says to Timothy, you, however, verse 10, you know all about my teaching and my way of life, my purpose, faith, love, endurance, persecutions. Paul is not saying, Timothy, you saw how great I did it. That's what I want to remind you of. You saw how much I had it together. You saw how strong and determined I was. That's not what Paul's teaching was. Do you know the real heart of how he discipled Timothy? You actually see it at the beginning of 1 Timothy, the first letter. In 1 Timothy chapter 1, you know what Paul says to Timothy? And I'm sure he is repeating something he drilled into Timothy. He says, Timothy, let me give you a statement that is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance. And he goes, What does he do? He goes back to the gospel. Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the worst. That was Paul's discipleship. He didn't lead with his strength. He didn't lead with like, I got it all together. Act like me. He led with his brokenness. He led with his need. He led with how incredible the grace of God for him had been. He says right after this, the reason for this, this grace was given to me so that in me, the worst of sinners, some of our translations say, the chief of sinners, Christ might display his unlimited patience for those who would believe upon him and inherit eternal life. Paul says, you know, it's it is my brokenness and the experience of God's grace in my life that he wants to shine. Because you see, it's not about me, it's about Jesus. If discipleship is about my goodness and what I've achieved and what I've done and what I've figured out, then discipleship is about me. But if the heart of discipleship is, let me show you how deeply Jesus is meeting me with his grace. Let me boast in my weakness. That was Paul's discipleship. I will boast in my weakness. I will boast in my need that nobody needs Jesus more than me. No one struggles deeply in their heart with the roots of sin more than me. I'm the chief of sinners. But the grace of Jesus is on display in my life. That is the power of discipleship. That's what we share. That's gospel intentionality. It's sharing with another person. Let me share my brokenness with you. Let me share my need. And let me share how I'm clinging to Jesus. That is gospel intentionality. God wants to use your life, nobody else's life, your life, and your weakness and your brokenness to put on display the grace of Jesus for others. That's his mission in your life. So just a question, just to wrestle with here. What would it look like for you to pursue someone else with gospel and intentionality? Is there a Timothy that God would put in your life? They might already be there. Some of you might say, hey, I'm just a kid. This doesn't apply to me, right? Some of you young people have incredible influence on your teams, in your classes, in your school, among your friends. Incredible influence. You can pour into others with gospel intentionality and experience the joy of God working in another person's life. There's almost no joy like it. Some of us are like, I'm a college student, man. I'm broke. All I can do is study, right? What can I do? My life, I when I was a college student, I thought my life was going to start later, right? I'm not this in real life. This is actually real life. You can pour into others' lives. Now some of us might be thinking, I think the hardest of all of us would be moms. You might be a mom here and you might be like, I don't have a spare moment to think. I don't even feed myself half the time, right? You just keep pouring yourself out. Do you know that you could bring someone into your chaos? A younger woman, a younger mom, maybe? Just bring them right up into your chaos and just say, I'm broken. I need Jesus. Because this parenting thing, like, it's the hardest thing you'll ever do. Right? Share that with someone. Do you believe you can do this? So let's take a few moments to interact over this and wrestle with it. Where are you as you think about this calling, this invitation to disciple another person, to pour your life into someone else with gospel intentionality? Let's talk about that for a moment. What's happening in you? If you're new here, uh we do this many weeks where we, as a way of applying the sermon, we just we discuss it together of how it's challenging us, how God's word is impacting us. So let's hear from each other what's happening in you as you look at Paul and Timothy and this call upon our life.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

Hacha, I was struck by your opening example and then applying that. We are discipling people with our life 100% of the time, 24-7. Yeah. Our children are being discipled by us, whether we approach it in that way or not.

SPEAKER_00 33:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:13

They they are what are we discipling them in? That's right. And of course, you see pretty clearly what you're discipling them in. Yes. For the most part by, you know, observing. I'm not trying to draw a rigid line there, but you can basically see in the lives of those around you what you're discipling people in your life in. Yes. And and the that's a sobering question that you know you're you're causing me to look at. Yeah. In terms of is that with intentionality, vulnerability, and genuineness, yeah, uh, or something else entirely.

SPEAKER_01 33:57

Well, that's a little too convicting, John. Um you're absolutely right. We are all discipling people, and we are being discipled. Every one of us here. And the only question is, is there gospel intentionality in it? You know, as a parent, I often fear that I've discipled my children more in sports than I have in Jesus. And I that just it chills me to the bone. And it drives me to Jesus. Like, gosh, I need grace. And you know, as parents, you really can fall into that struggle of thinking, I've got to bring my expertise to this thing, which is just silly, right? There is no expertise in parenting. It's your brokenness. So, what if that was a part of your parenting? Have you ever repented to your children? I think one of the most powerful things, moments I've seen in parenting is times where I've sinned against my children and I've repented to them. You talk about gospel intentionality, you talk about the gospel getting real, it's real at that place. When you repent, gospel gets real. But you know, I think another question is how am I being discipled? You know, what are the influences in my life that are leading me to imitate them? It's a great question. We are all discipling and being discipled. The question is, is there gospel intentionality? It's a great point.

SPEAKER_03 35:32

I feel like a lot of what I have to say kind of mimics what John just said, but differently, so I apologize. Um, I just started back at college this week in in mythology of all places, we were going over one of the readings, and one of the people that it was in the reading was talking about how like different myths can be used as like you look at it as a toolkit. What is this being used for? Well, I kind of picked that up from here. Like, we're all just different tools in a toolbox. We don't like I'm good for some, I'm good to solve some problems for other things, and some people are good for different ones. We have different gifts, right? And to kind of like really hit home on what you say about like the age part, like there's so many times in sermons that I've heard from you where you're like, have a childlike heart. So I guess kind of where my thought process went with all this is it's a little bit unfair of us to think that a child can't do something to make us think, or that we can't do something, you know, like we're all tools. It's unfair to our creator to sit there and think just because we're broken we can't be used. This is just kind of where my brain was going to all this.

SPEAKER_01 36:39

Or even that our brokenness is the tool.

SPEAKER_00 36:44

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Here comes Gene will come to you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 36:56

Um I think that one uh we've been not saying you better never do this again. That's not how we first find it. And our friends that we know it's like this, and you're meeting the grace of Jesus. And I think we do that not just for our children, but for our friends and for other people. Uh it doesn't just have to be hopeful.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

Yeah, yeah. I it's just, I hope you could hear that, but it's it's a great uh, I think, illustration of what it means to really apply and live out the gospel in our life. You know, it it means that, well, one, you don't take yourself as seriously. It it means that you're a safe person for people to bring their sin to because they actually feel like you're someone who understands. You know, it's it's like becoming like a priest for people. A safe place for broken people. You can only be that if you are deeply experiencing the grace of the gospel yourself. It's no other way. And so when we talk about being rooted in the gospel and guarding the gospel and continuing the gospel, that's what we're talking about. Like working the acceptance of Jesus so deeply into your heart that it just starts to grace is oozing out of you, patience is oozing out of you. Like you cannot be patient unless you've experienced God's patience for you. And I mean, impatience is like an epidemic among us, right? And and the more that I'm under the law to be righteous in and of myself, the less patient I am with other people, which is the point you're making about being a parent. You know, I feel like some of the hardest times for us as a family were at family devotionals, where we're sitting down, you know, we're gonna study God's word, and you know, their resistance, because we're all allergic to God, their resistance would go like way up, you know, so they're resisting, and I'm getting more and more angry, and I'm getting more and more afraid of like, oh no, they're never gonna love Jesus, and like I'm a failure as a parent, and it was just a big total broken mess. And I would walk away from family devotional, just feeling so defeated. And the more that you grow in this, though, the more that you're like, it's not about me getting it right, it's about us internalizing as a family the gospel. And the same is true for all of our relationships. How do we just work the gospel into all of our relationships, into all of our life?

SPEAKER_05 41:36

Hey, Hutch.

SPEAKER_01 41:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:38

Um, I am both really encouraged by this sermon, but also pretty discouraged at the same time because I just have been thinking about a few different relationships where I kind of tried to disciple, not like an official discipleship, but it felt like the Lord opened a door and put someone like a younger believer in my life. Um and just looking back on that and being like, did it make a difference? Um, did I do more harm than good? You know? And part of it is, you know, feeling my own inadequacies and just like, I don't even know what to do with that. But I think I'm mostly past that. I think it took years, but I think I'm over. I'm like, I know that I and it's not about me being perfect, but I think in this moment I'm feeling more frustrated of like, Lord, when are you gonna show up in their lives?

SPEAKER_00 42:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 42:24

Um, and for some of them, you know, it was like months that I've known the person, some it's been years, you know. And so yeah, I think I'm feeling more frustrated with like you're just talking about patience. So maybe I don't have enough patience. And I know that it takes, it can take years and years and years of of multiple different people discipling someone. Um, but I think now I'm just like, okay, Lord, you've you've it feels like you've opened a door that feels like I'm seeing you put different people in different people's lives, but where's the fruit? Um and when are you gonna show up in those people's lives?

SPEAKER_01 42:57

Yeah. I I'm I'm really glad that you shared that, Lydia, because probably a lot of us are feeling that. It it would be easy to kind of have the picture as we look at this of like, oh, here's what it looks like. I'm gonna go find that person in my life, and you know, would you like for me to disciple you? And they'll be like, Yes, you know, I'm so happy to do that, and like we'll say, okay, we're gonna meet at this time, and you know, here's the homework you're gonna do before that time, and then you meet together and they've done their homework and they're they show up on time, and you know, they're there every week, and like that doesn't happen. That doesn't happen very often at all, right? It's messy. And some I've I've had so many of those experiences that you described where I'm so discouraged, and I'm like, Well, you know, I invested all that time, I don't even know if it was worth it at all. Or I feel like I'm putting more into this than they are. That's a very common experience in this, you know. So it is messy, and I found that oftentimes God wants to do just as much in me as the discipler as he wants to be in the person being discipled. So we get to ask those great questions of like, why am I so troubled by this? Why am I so frustrated with this person? If I find myself getting frustrated with somebody I'm trying to minister to, it's a good opportunity to say, wait, what's in my heart here? You know. But I share that experience, and that's often what it's gonna be like. And um and I would just say, never never stop going after it. Trying again. Because you're actually gonna find some times where even if you had a relationship and you're like, man, I don't feel like this went anywhere. I well, I can think of one person right now where they'll they'll they have come back to me and said, Thank you for pouring into my life. And I'm like, I that was that went awful, I thought, you know. But God was doing something beyond what I could see there, and that's the encouraging part about it. So let me close this in prayers. We go to worship now. Father, we we want to be used by you. We want we want to have the experience of being those one who we're poured into, but also that we can invest and pursue others. Would you give us a vision for that? I'm sure that many of us are all over the place on this. Some of us feel like I can never do this. Some of us feel like I'm I'm not ready. We we're in all kinds of different places, but would you inspire us and give us this confidence in the gospel that as we step out and invest our life into someone else that God, you're gonna do abundantly more than all we can ask or imagine. Lord, would you do that in us that we would be disciples making disciples? In Christ's name we pray. Amen.