Conversation - with Pastor Jared & Pastor Robby - The Altar'd Series Wrap Up

About This Episode

In this special episode of Kingdom Conversations, Pastor Jared and Pastor Robby bring the Altar’d Lenten series to a powerful close by reflecting on the ultimate altar in Scripture—the Cross of Jesus Christ.

Throughout this conversation, they revisit the biblical theme of altars as sacred places where people encounter God and are forever changed. Together, they explore what it truly means to live an “altar’d” life—not just during Lent, but every day—by surrendering our lives fully to God and embracing the freedom, peace, and transformation that follow.

With honest reflection and real-life application, this episode dives into questions we all wrestle with:

•  What are we holding back from God? 
•  Why is surrender so difficult? 
•  How do we keep from picking back up what we’ve already laid down? 

You’ll hear personal insights, meaningful takeaways from the series, and encouragement to carry these truths forward into your daily walk with Christ.

As we celebrate the risen Savior, this conversation challenges us to adopt a Kingdom mindset—living counterculturally, becoming more like Jesus, and courageously loving others.

Whether you’ve followed the entire Altar’d series or are joining for the first time, this episode will inspire you to meet God at the altar—and never leave the same.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to the Church of the Lakes podcast, where our mission is connecting all to Christ to become healthy in God and courageous in love. In 2026, we're leaning into a kingdom mindset, seeking to live more like Jesus and more camera cultural in the way we love, serve, and surrender. Today's episode brings us to the powerful conclusion of our Lenten Series Altar, a journey through the altars of scripture, where lives are surrendered and forever changed. Let's join Pastor Jared and Pastor Robbie as we step into this kingdom conversation together. Be blessed.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Welcome to another Kingdom Conversation. I'm Pastor Robbie Strock, your host today, and we are concluding our series on Alter because Lent is over. Easter has come, it is gone. He is risen, Jared. He is risen indeed. So glad to have you back as we tie up this sermon series. How are you? How was your Easter?

SPEAKER_05 1:01

It was busy, uh, like probably most pastors and their families on an Easter morning. Uh, but busy doesn't necessarily mean bad in this this time. Uh it was a joy to to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, uh, not only with my biological family, but but also with my faith family. So it was a it was a great day.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Amazing. Uh now, you know, your youngest and my oldest are the same age.

SPEAKER_04 1:25

Correct, yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

So I have a family that still goes out and does egg hunts and stuff like that. How about for you guys? You still go out and have that fun activities and stuff like that on Easter morning or anything like that? What do what do the presets do for Easter now?

SPEAKER_05 1:39

So Easter is different than Christmas, in that we we we've never made a real big deal out of the Easter bunny. No, um, and and our baskets aren't over the top.

SPEAKER_03 1:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:50

You know, there's some candy and there's maybe like a gift. Uh but something growing up, even Easter was like this, and that it was really there was a strong emphasis on the real reason of this season. Oh man. And that's the resurrection of Jesus Christ that's certainly started at at the cross on the Friday before.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Plus, can we add some levity to this? Okay, the Easter bunny terrifies me. It's it's creepy.

SPEAKER_04 2:16

Just creepy.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

When I see the people picture uh posting pictures on their Facebook, Instagram, so on and so forth when I'm doom scrolling, and I see the rabbit and their child screaming in the lap, like it's just it's a tough one.

SPEAKER_04 2:29

Something straight out of a horror movie is what it is. It's just it's creepy. The Easter bunny is creepy.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

Uh well, you know, Jared, I'm so interested in some of the Easter traditions that you've experienced. You know, if people don't know, um, your dad is a really accomplished, really well-educated, really incredible pastor, um, who's now since retired, of course. Um, but uh you grew up in a church, you've been around the church your whole life. Um, I'm just curious, like, what are some of your favorite things that you've seen at your churches over the years around celebrating the resurrection? Like, go back to Buffalo, go back to you know, uh, Virginia. Tell me some of the traditions you've seen in different churches. Because I've only known Church of Lake's traditions. I grew up here.

SPEAKER_05 3:13

Yeah. Um, you know, a lot of the traditions I'd say are are probably universal uh in all the the church contexts I've been in.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

Christ the Lord is risen today, those types of things.

SPEAKER_05 3:25

Of course, you have to have that Wesley. Yeah. But I mean, even going back to Holy Week, okay. I mean Holy Week from Palm Sunday to Holy Thursday to Good Friday to Resurrection Sunday. A lot of the traditions are pretty universal that I've encountered in all the churches I've been a part of. Uh, some I liked, like when I was the church I was in Ashland, uh that I served in Ashland, they did an Easter vigil on Saturday where it was a two-hour service that included both the sacraments, baptism and communion. Wow. Uh and that you know, it that was a late service. I don't think it ended until probably 11 o'clock at night. And I really found that to be meaningful.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Um Wow, talk about new birth and yeah, it's great. It's great.

SPEAKER_05 4:10

I I think historically speaking, the church always had an Easter vigil, the Capital C church, uh, over the generations. And for some reason, we don't really do that anymore. Uh in some of the contexts I've been a part of. What is it what does that mean? I'm sorry. What's a what does that mean? I don't know. It's just like you said, new birth. It's it's the start of the you know, as you're you're preparing for resurrection, you prepare for resurrection by doing a lot of the liturgical and sacramental um elements of being a church.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

Speaking of which, we actually read the full entire communion liturgy.

SPEAKER_05 4:44

We did on Holy Thursday. And it would have spent if anyone, you know, our listeners can go back to our churchblakes.org website and go back to the Holy Thursday service. Um, you know, we started that service out with communion as we remembered and commemorated Jesus' Last Supper with his disciples, but then we transitioned into the service of shadows, and our choir and organists were outstanding in telling the passion narrative uh through song, along with, like you said, the reading of the Passion Narrative from John's Gospel, John 18 and 19. Uh probably in all the churches I've been a part of. I I guess here's something else too. In Buffalo, we always did a crosswalk service on Good Friday.

SPEAKER_01 5:24

Oh, wow, what's that?

SPEAKER_05 5:26

Where a number of the churches within our community would gather together for an ecumenical um experience where we would literally carry a cross around town and we'd stop at different churches to uh pray, read scripture, hear a devotional word, and sing songs. Somebody else would then pick up the cross and move to the next station, carrying the cross down the road. And uh it was just a way we could, you know, reenact not only uh Jesus' walk journey to the to Golgotha the cross, but also to to really reflect and and think about and consider the depth of the love he showed for us in going to the cross and shedding his blood for our salvation, for the cleansing of our sins. So that was kind of fun growing up to do that that type of experiential worship. And then certainly, like I said, with Ashland, the Easter Vigil on Saturday. Uh what I love about Church of the Lakes, um outside of the Holy Thursday service we just mentioned, uh on Sunday, on Resurrection Sunday, the the last traditional service for that day at 11 o'clock, they end singing the Hallelujah chorus from Handel's Messiah. And that is just uh what a brilliant way to end uh Resurrection Sunday celebration, singing uh Handel's Messiah's Hallelujah chorus. And they invite everybody to come up who'd like to join the choir and sing that. They got music for them, and it's just it is uh it's spectacular. It it extends the service an extra five minutes, but nobody cares.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

And everybody's standing the whole time, everyone's standing the whole time. Yeah, yeah, it's beautiful. Yeah, it's it's beautiful and a really tough piece as someone who attempts to sing tenor in the choir discovered a couple of weeks ago uh in myself. But uh Jared, I really do enjoy these wrap-ups, and I really do enjoy our opportunity to reflect on the Lent season. Yeah. And uh Easter is certainly the culmination of that. Uh, and it's a culmination and the apex of a lot of the things that we do as Christians. Um, but I'm just so curious as we go back over these last couple of worship sermons, scripture passages, even like the music, as you so eloquently uh praised just a few seconds ago. Um, you know, I hope people are encouraged through this altered series to not just hear these words in one ear and let them go out the other, but to use them going forward. So let's so let's start there, Jared. Okay. Okay. When you hear the word altar now, after preparing all these sermons, after reading through our Lenten devotionals, after preparing an Easter message, what comes to mind about the altar compared to maybe before the series started? I mean, you put the sermon series together six months, you know, eight months ago. So you've been thinking about this for a while. What has changed about your perspective on the altar?

SPEAKER_05 8:22

Well, what I, you know, in in Susan Kent's work that we use as a supplemental text to the Bible.

SPEAKER_01 8:27

It's been great.

SPEAKER_05 8:28

I I think uh it's it's worth its weight in gold, the statement of going to the altar to be altered. I love the plan words. I I think it's something that that's um not only meaningful, but relatable and also memorable. And so as I thought of this series, you know, go to the altar to be altered. The altar is truly a place to meet the Lord. Um an altar is not just a piece of furniture in a worshiping space. Like there's an intentional, um, there's intentionality behind why it's there. And it really is truly uh a place you go to encounter the living God. It's a place you go to lay something down in order for something new to rise up. It's it's a truly a place of transformation. And I say throughout this series, uh, that has become even more meaningful to me is that reality. And in really thinking of even thinking throughout this whole series, all the different, you know, we talk about the altar, but really what we've talked about in this series are all the different offerings people have laid on the altar. And, you know, the five big altar uh excuse me, offerings from the burnt offering to the grain offering to the peace offering to the sin offering to the guilt offering, and how they were all done imperfectly in the Old Testament. And they all found their culmination, their completeness in Christ on the cross, uh, when he shed his blood. And it is the sh in the shedding of blood that we are cleansed from sin and unrighteousness. Um so maybe maybe that's the other component that that has really spoken to me uh in a more profound manner is we talk about the the cross being the symbol of our faith than it is. Yeah, absolutely. We talk about the cross having power, yes, but the reason the cross has power is because of the blood of the one who hung on it. Amen. You know, it his the power is in his blood, yeah, more than it's in the wood on which he hung. And so that's something that I really um am trying to kind of grasp and understand even more fully when it comes to our faith and really what is it uh that that has transformed and changed us? It's the power of the blood and the power of the Holy Spirit.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

Well, Jared, you know, this series has forced me to focus on the altar, as you so beautifully said, as not being a piece of furniture anymore. And uh it I don't know if I've told you this before, but it really hits home with my family specifically. If people don't know, my wife Stephanie's family has been around this church as charter members forever. The altar that sits down in May Hall currently was built by her grandfather, Bob Watts. And uh it is big, it is massive. Perhaps you remember Brian using it as a sermon illustration of as it was so big and so uh, you know, and when our chancel area was so much smaller, he actually moved it to a back room and got scolded for it uh in a in a in a in an honest moment of reflection. One of the no-nos for but I'm sitting up there chuckling about that illustration because the altar was built by Stephanie's family.

SPEAKER_05 11:34

That's funny, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:35

And and and I I joke about that because our youth used it for decades uh when we worshiped down in May Hall. Uh and Tony's grown the worship so big we're up in in uh the activity center now. Uh uh, but you know, I've always thought of the altar as just a piece of furniture, and I'm embarrassed to say so.

SPEAKER_05 11:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

And it really opened my eyes to how God and the specifically in the uh you know Leviticus scriptures, how these things were instituted so that God could transform people. How many times do we go through Leviticus and have that on our minds? You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 12:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:12

So it was really cool for me to do that. But you know, you've kind of already answered this already. Let's see if you can stay on the track here. Um, if you had to summarize the entirety of altered the series in a single sentence, what would it be?

SPEAKER_05 12:26

You already said I I'd steal Susan Kent's word there. You go to the altar to be altered.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Well, can you uh like okay, so out of the you know, six Sundays that we were doing this uh seven, if you count Resurrection Sunday, um what was what was the one week then perhaps where you thought this theme tied in so eloquently?

SPEAKER_05 12:49

Yeah. Um there's a couple. I you know, I'm going back in my head right now to Genesis 22 with Abraham and Isaac. Oh man, that's a tough um tough story. I think I don't think this is uh atypical for Jared. Uh I think this may be just part of the human condition. We like to be in control. And for for Abraham to bring his son Isaac up to the top of Mount Morana, Moriah to sacrifice him to the Lord, as a statement of his trust and faith in the Lord, uh that that's a powerful image. It it's a haunting image, it's a shocking image. Um but it also begs the question what Isaacs are in my life that the Lord is asking me to lay down on the altar and surrender the control of to him and trust that he has my best interests at heart from in my future's best interests at heart. And so that I would say the Abraham Isaac uh story from Genesis 22 really hit me hard. Um the the other one it might be it might be the Joshua 8 when he was in the middle of battling for the promised land and he pauses to worship. You know, and it uh and he offers a peace offering, an offering of gratitude, like like the Lord had not yet blink brought them completely into the promised land. They're heading in that direction. Sure. You know, they're they're they're knee deep in battle. Yeah, you know, they're I'm sure they're distracted. It's an environment that's intense. And yet Joshua says, let's call a timeout and make sure we keep the main thing, the main thing. It's like, what? And he includes everybody, and he includes everyone, the foreigner, even among them, right? The children, the women, the men. They they they they gather in between these two mountains and they worship. And I'm thinking, man, sometimes we need sometimes I drift from the main thing. And that that that is a reminder to me to keep the main thing the main thing.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Well, you know, you've kind of hit on it already, whether it's keeping the main thing the main thing, or whether it's surrendering control. Jared, do you feel like there's something God has asked you to lay on the altar during this Latin season?

SPEAKER_05 15:04

Yeah, that's uh that's a good question. That's a personal question.

SPEAKER_01 15:08

It is um and I think it's I think it's an important one to ask as a leader of our faith family.

SPEAKER_05 15:14

It is. You know, I I would say, I would have to probably say the direction of Church of the Lakes. You know, I I think so often we get in leadership roles and we think that we can we can force or we can I don't want to use the word manipulate because that's not something I ever want to be accused of doing. I never intend to manipulate. But but but but we see a direction we want to move, we want the church to move in that direction. And it's just okay, hold on a second, Jared. We're gonna move in the direction the Lord wants us to move in. I gotta get on board with that. And so, you know, there's another study that I absolutely loved when I was back in college, I did for the first time called Experiencing God uh by Henry Blackaby. And you know, that whole the whole premise of that study is discern where God is is working and moving and join God in his effort instead of Lord, this is what I want to do for you. Now join me and bless it. I think sometimes in church leadership we can try to be so focused on what we want to do with our congregation and then ask God to come along instead of saying, okay, God, let me spend time in scripture and prayer and in reflection and fast, so I can discern what your will is for Church of the Lakes, your vision for Church of the Lakes, and simply ask permission to come alongside and partner with you in that effort. But but you're the one leading the way, I'm following you, not the other way around. And so that's something that really has uh spoken to me a lot during this series. Is okay, it is that's why Isaac and Abraham was such a big, okay, Lord, you you're in control. And church likes, is this an Isaac for Jared? I don't know. You know, I I haven't put enough reflection into that. But certainly the need to follow the Lord's steps instead of the other way around.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Well, thank you for your honesty and uh honestly your integrity, because so many people who are in charge today in our countercultural world, it's so hard to watch that they look out for me rather than me. You know what I mean? And um oftentimes churches can fall the same way. We've seen, and you and I have studied, uh, thanks to Brian. Um you know, there's been a couple of instances of that in the Church of America where we've read stories about pastors who led large churches and and had what people assumed were large movements, but they were really doing it for the power of them rather than the power of God. Um yeah, it's nice to be humbled that way a little bit. But, you know, you also mentioned the story of Joshua. So, Jared, I have to ask too, um, can you share a moment where you've surrendered and then felt experienced that that peace that comes from uh being transformed at the altar? You know, you know, he laid down his Thanksgiving, Joshua did, um, of the whole entirety of people, and it was in that moment of worship that they they found freedom, they found transformation, they found peace. Have you experienced something like that in your life?

SPEAKER_05 18:18

Yeah, I so that the initial um memory I have is probably my call into vocational ministry to be a pastor. Um you know, I I was called probably at 18, but I didn't answer till I was 27. And I think I shared on this in an earlier podcast, an earlier conversation with you. But I really wrestled with answering a call to ministry um for a whole host of reasons that we don't have to go into now. Um but I know that as I continued to wrestle, the further and further I wrestled as the years went on, the more discontent my soul became. Because I wasn't where the Lord wanted me. And when I finally relinquished and surrendered and and took that step in into pursuing pastoral ministry, uh the Lord met me there and has has blessed me beyond comprehension. Um that's something I'm grateful for. And I have found myself over the past 18 years uh in a variety of ways just pausing to give thanks for what I what what I've received in being from the Lord and because I've been faithful in answering a call from the Lord. Um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Awesome. Um so altered is come and gone. It's come and gone. It's come and gone. What has been a specific Bible passage from this series that has stuck out to you? Maybe something um off the kilter, maybe something that people didn't necessarily attach to, maybe it's something from the small group study we did. Um what do you think about that?

SPEAKER_05 19:56

I think the scripture that meant uh has meant a lot to me in this series uh came in started in the it's first uh showed up in the Noah narrative, but it concreted for me in the David narrative from 1 Chronicles 21, and it's when David uh you know uh committed the sin of of idolatry by asking for a census of the army. And and why that was that a sin? Well, because he began to trust in his own might instead of in in the might of God to to lead them in victory and battle. And so he's got to offer a guilt offering for what he's done, and he's remorseful, he's repentant, not just remorseful, but repentant for what he's done. And so he goes to Ornan and says, Let me buy your threshing floor so I can offer a burnt offering to the Lord. And Ornan's like, No, let me just give it, I'll give you the fleshing floor, I'll give you the the wood, I'll give you the oxen for you to do whatever you need to do with it. And David said, Absolutely not, I will not offer God a burnt offering that costs me nothing.

SPEAKER_01 20:51

Yeah, that's humbling words.

SPEAKER_05 20:52

Very humbling words, uh, very important words. And it reminded me back from Noah because when Noah got off the the ark, the first thing he did was not construction like it, like I would have done, build a home for me and my family. The first thing he does is consecration. He builds an altar, and on the altar he lays the clean animals. And that that the scripture clean is so important because those animals would have been the most important for survival and reproduction as they were moving into this new world after the flood. And yet that's what Noah offered. And it's this idea that you know worship that costs nothing transforms nothing. We cannot bring God something that cost us nothing, as David says. And so it gets me thinking about my own life. And what I when I present a sacrifice to the Lord, is it a sacrifice that has cost me something? Or is it part of a leftover or an afterthought? And it just it needs to be something that's intentional and that costs me something. So that's something that I think really has spoken to me uh in terms of a scriptural. Reference throughout this series.

SPEAKER_01 22:02

So let's get applicable now. What does it look like to live an altered life, pun intended, after Resurrection Sunday is over? We're getting ready to turn the page. We've heard the sermons. We understand the message. What does it actually look like?

SPEAKER_05 22:25

If I could start with a Christian cliche. Absolutely. Let go and my God. We are so enamored with thinking we we have we are in control. Or we're we're maybe so enamored with our things or our financial resources. Um that that we we think maybe those things are what ultimately will save us, because not because we would say that with our mouth, but that's how we live it out practically. And that actually takes us to the Elijah altar, right? On Carmel. I mean, that that whole sermon was about not having functional saviors. There's only one savior. Jesus needs to be not only your everything but your only thing.

SPEAKER_01 23:09

And not Jesus plus.

SPEAKER_05 23:10

Not Jesus plus. So I I think part of the issue in terms of how we live this out practically is just simply relinquishing control to the Lord. And a lot of the ways you relinquish control is through offering a sacrifice that's costly. By you know, I tell people ask me in the church as a sidebar, how much do they give? You know, financially speaking. Uh you know, is is 10% mandated, you know, uh is that off gross or not? You know, all those questions people ask. And I I I the answer I like to tell people is give not to where it's comfortable, give to where it hurts a little bit. Because when you give to where it hurts a little bit, you're putting your trust in the Lord whom you're making this offering to. If you're not giving to the point where it hurts a little bit, guess what? You you have not yet relinquished the control to the Lord that you are called to relinquish. Uh, you know, Dietrich von Hafer, who we quoted a couple weeks ago, you know, he says if when the Lord calls a man, he bids him to come and die. You know, sacrifice is involved in following Jesus. It's costly. In that regard, salvation, let me let me make the clarification though. Salvation is free. Bought for us by the precious blood of Jesus Christ. Salvation is free. Discipleship is costly. But if we are going to allow the blood of Jesus to truly save us, it's going to cost us our time, treasures, and talents. It's going to cost us, you know. Jesus says, if one chooses to follow me, let him pick up a cross by himself.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

You've said throughout this whole entire series, I think on multiple occasions, if what you receive back is so much more valuable, then did you really lose anything?

SPEAKER_05 25:01

And the answer is no. We cannot outgive God. Uh the the riches of heaven are that that we are um now resourced with are worth so much more than anything we've we've ever given up. But in the moment it might feel costly. It feels like a sacrifice.

SPEAKER_01 25:22

Well, you're right.

SPEAKER_05 25:23

And looking back, it's like that's all I had to give up for this.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

Right. Well, one more application question before we get to our real question, real answer segment. But I think in our context, perhaps Jared, you're in I's context, more specifically, how do we, after preaching and setting up on this sermon series, how do we avoid uh going back and picking up what we've laid down on the altar? Like for those who are the more weathered mature Christians, you know, we laid our baggage down at the foot of the cross, the ultimate altar. And I think it's part of our human nature to want to go and pick it back up.

SPEAKER_04 26:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:09

Maybe use it as a crutch, maybe use it as a sign, a badge of honor. I don't know, but regardless, what would you what would you say to encourage us to move on from forever from touching that ever again?

SPEAKER_05 26:22

Accountability. You need we need each other. You need other other godly people in your life to keep you from doing that. Um and sometimes it'll come in the form of encouragement, sometimes it'll come in a form of rebuke, and that's okay. Uh we need to love one another enough to at times rebuke one another.

SPEAKER_01 26:43

To share hard truths.

SPEAKER_05 26:44

Yeah, to share hard truths. To say, what are you doing? Lay that there. You laid it down, leave it there. Um but you can't you can't have that level of of honesty with one another unless you're in relationship with people, yeah, with one another. And so we need we need the accountability, but you have to be intentional about bringing that accountability in your life. And that's hard because it it's you know, it costs you vulnerable, you know, it makes you vulnerable.

SPEAKER_01 27:08

Well, if people are looking for that opportunity to find that connection, I can't encourage you enough to reach out. Um, of course, you can email me at Robert at church the lakes.org, or you can email our podcast at podcast at churchlakes.org. We'd love to connect you in with a small group, whether that's online or in person. We have groups basically Sunday through Thursday, and we'll get you plugged into our next uh um small group study that way that you can chew along with us and have that accountability. It starts in small groups, doesn't it, Jerry? It sure does, yeah. Yeah, and I'm excited for what we're gonna do next as we get ready to turn the page to um a sermon series we're calling Citizens of Heaven, and we're really gonna take this journey through the epistle of uh Philippians. But before we get there, I want to stop and pause and get to our real question, real answer segment for this week. Uh Jared, are you ready for this? Let's go. All right. Can you share an altar you have created in your life to honor God?

SPEAKER_05 28:11

It's a great question. I love it. Um I'm thinking about that. I don't have a physical altar. So you're not setting up stones in your backyard. Although I wouldn't, that's not a bad idea. I don't, I'm not Joe, I'm not laughing.

SPEAKER_01 28:25

I'm serious.

SPEAKER_05 28:26

Set up stones and you look at those stones and they remind you, right? And that's uh there's a term that you know it's in church circles called sacramentals. And all a sacramental is, is um something that helps re-center you. And you stack up stones in your front yard or in your flower, but that might help re-center you and have you focus on Christ and keep the main thing the main thing. Uh for me, I honestly would say probably my altar, when my alarm goes off in the morning and I open my eyes, uh, the first thing I do is pray. The first thing I do before I get out of bed is I want to have an encounter with the Lord. Um, and so you know, some of it's gratitude for the new day. Uh other times it's Lord, give me the strength to endure another day.

unknown 29:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 29:18

Um, you know, you know, but it's always before I get out of bed, I I, you know, I just it's just become part of the fabric of who I am. I have to pray. And it's it's it's I don't even intentionally think about praying. I just start praying. And I'm almost not fully awake as I'm in the middle of a prayer. You know, it's funny. But I would say that's probably my altar. I I also think of the idea of sacramentals again. When I take a shower and the water hits my face, I'm instinctively remembering my baptism and I'm thankful. I'm thankful for the Lord uh in the relationship I have with him, and you know, his sacrifice on the cross and what it cost him to reconcile me that to himself.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

So we can find these altars in small moments throughout the day, you're saying?

SPEAKER_05 30:01

All right, yeah, I would say, I would say try to um find things that can serve as sacramentals, as reminders of the Lord, a way that you can be recentered, a way you can keep the main thing the main thing. And you can continue to allow that to transform the power of the Holy Spirit to change you, you know, using Paul's language from 2 Corinthians, from one degree of glory to the next, until you become the very image of Jesus Christ and those around you.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

Well, I'm so excited that uh the next step after this altered journey is to head towards Philippians. We were talking right before the podcast of how it's not coincidental. Um, it may be divine intervention, uh, but there is not a more direct route than to go straight into Philippians and right after this altered series. Why is that, Jared? Why is it so such a natural transition?

SPEAKER_05 30:57

Yeah, I think uh Philippians after particularly Resurrection Sunday is a perfect place to put Philippians because uh as citizens of heaven, uh our joy is not rooted in circumstance and context, it's rooted in our relationship with the Lord. And then you see that in Paul. Paul is writing this letter from inside a prison cell.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Inside a prison cell, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 31:17

And yet it's known as the letter of joy. Joy. And you're thinking, how in the world could Paul be writing a letter of joy in the midst of such adversity? The joy jumps off the page. It's all over it. It oozes, it oozes it. And it's because his joy is found in proximity to the king, to King Jesus. And as someone who has an inherited inheritor of the heavenly riches, he knows that that's where joy is found. That's where we have to find it as well.

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Well, when we return next week, we'll launch the sermon series, uh, once again, Citizens of Heaven, um, a journey through the epistle of Philippians. And I I I just I'm so excited to head into this new season at Church or Lakes. You know, it's it's not necessarily a season of doing something new or different. We've done Philippians before, certainly. And we've quoted we quoted Philippians throughout the altar series. We were just laughing about that. Um, but it is it is gonna be an intentional opportunity for us as a faith family to remind it about how our joy comes from the Lord. And I'm so excited, and there won't be a more or a better way to do that in praise and thanksgiving and worship as we meet and come together this upcoming Sunday. But uh Jared, before we go, I got to say a big thank you, of course, as always, to our director of communication, Betsy, our editor and encourager in chief, Len Brown, and to my wife, Stephanie, our social media coordinator. Uh, if you want to reach out to the podcast, submit a question, please send me an email. You can reach out to us at podcast at churchthorakes.org. We'd love to hear from you. And remember, it's our mission as followers of the one true Lord to connect all to Christ, to become helping God and courageous in love. Until next time, God bless.

SPEAKER_00 33:05

Thank you for listening to this bonus podcast from Church of the Lakes with Pastor Jared Priestett and Pastor Robbie Strack. If today's message encouraged you and helped you grow as a devoted follower of Christ, we invite you to subscribe so you never miss an episode. You can also help others discover this podcast by leaving a five-star rating or review, sharing it with your friends, family, co-workers, and others in your circle of influence. We're also very grateful for your generosity, which helps make messages like this available to more people. If you feel led to give, please check the link in the description. And if you're in the North Kenton, Ohio area, we would love to invite you to join us in person on Sunday and worship together. To learn more about Church of the Lakes, visit churchofthelakes.org or visit the website link in the description. Until next time, stay encouraged and keep walking in faith.