Craig Groeschel: Hey, everybody. Welcome to Life.Church this weekend.

I am so thankful for all

of our Open Network search partners. We love partnering with you. We love
your pastors, all of you at Church Online all over the world. You're not on the
other side of a computer screen by accident. We believe that God brought you
here, especially for this community.

Let me tell you what I'm excited that we're launching into a new four part
message series called The Vow. I don't know if any of you have noticed, but
there are marriages struggling all over the place. Has anybody seen this going on
maybe in your own life or in other lives? I believe that this is not acceptable to
God. I believe that he has something so much better for us and so, for the next
four weeks, what we want to do as a church is invest in the lives of those who
one day will be married so that years later, you don't say, "I wish I'd have known
that back then", but right now, you'll be equipped with spiritual truth that will
help prepare you for a relationship that would honor God and we want to speak
directly into marriages to strengthen them to become everything that God
would want them to become.

If I can get a little bit of help from all of our churches, I'm curious. Ladies, let's
start with you. Ladies go first. How many of you when you were a little girl, you
fantasized one day about having the perfect wedding with the perfect guy, living
in the perfect house, and you even named your perfect children before you ever
had them. Ladies, if you had something close to that, would you raise your
hands right now. Raise them up. Hands up all over the place. Men, let's talk to
you. You probably had a little different fantasy when you were a teenager.
Pretty simple. How many of you dreamed about getting married and having sex
twice a day? Raise your hands. Now, I want to talk to everybody. How many of
you are still dreaming to this day? It's kind of the way it is, right? Just kind of the
way it is.

It's interesting how sometimes our expectations of what we hope marriage will
be seems to fall way short of what it actually is and when you look around
today, you have to admit that so many marriages are just not working. In fact,
it's really, really scary when you start to read about the statistics. Depending on
what article you read or what survey or study you read, somewhere in the
neighborhood of 50% of marriages don't make it. That is horrifying. Think about
it. In any other area of your life, if there was something important that you
could lose and there was a 50% chance that you would lose it, don't you think
you would seriously approach it, be dramatic in your preparation, and do
everything possible to eliminate that potential danger.

In other words, if you have children and there's a 50% chance they're gonna get
killed in a car wreck today, don't you think you're gonna put a helmet on them
before they get in a car or make sure you know the driver or do something
different. If there's a 50% chance you're gonna get attacked by a bear when you
 go to the mailbox, I know that wouldn't probably never happen, but where I
live, it could. If you gotta get the mail, you're probably going out in full armor,
you got a gun if you're from my home state. If you're from some other state,
you might have a knife, I don't know what it is. But you're ready for this.

With the odds being what they are, with so many people going to marriage
today, I would argue the reason that marriages are struggling is because so
often people are not actually spiritually prepared to live a marriage that honors
God. If you ask me is a God-honoring great marriage possible, I would tell you
emphatically, absolutely and completely yes, it is. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. It is.
But, but, it's not likely if you follow the path that so many people follow today.
And that's why for four weeks in our church, we're going to invest into the lives
of the people that God loves so much to help prepare them for a marriage that
would honor God and go the distance. We're calling this message series The
Vow and what we're gonna do is look at four different vows. I want to give
credit to Jimmy Evans, who in 1994 first published a book called Marriage on the
Rock and in it, he had some different vows. I've edited them and made them my
own, but we're gonna look at four vows over the next four weeks.

Today, if you're taking notes, we're going to look at the vow of priority. Keeping
the priorities in the proper place in our relationships. Next week, gonna be crazy
fun. You do not want to miss next week. We're gonna talk about the vow of
pursuit. How do we continue to pursue our spouses after we already have
them? Week number three could get a little bit tricky. We're gonna talk about
the vow of partnership. We're gonna look at what is a covenant different than a
contract. We're gonna look at leadership and submission, oh scary, scary word.
We're gonna look at leadership and submission and see how God plays this out
in the vow of partnership. And then week number four is incredibly important.
We're gonna talk about the vow of purity. Wherever secrecy lives in a marriage,
intimacy dies. And we're gonna look at how do we live a pure life in a very, very
impure world in a way that would prepare us for marriage.

Today, we're talking about the vow of priority. I want to start with a very
common belief in our world today. Your little kids are taught this from Disney
princess movies or fairytales or love stories, but it's the common idea that to
really be fulfilled in life, you have to meet the one, to really, really be happy, to
really, really have a life that has meaning, you have to meet that one perfect
person that gives you goose bumps, that when you smell them, the hair on the
back of your neck kind of curls up, that every song on the radio makes sense.
You want to buy every card at the drug store for the lovey dovey dove ... You
have to find the one. To really be fulfilled in life, you have to find the one. To
really be happy in life, you have to find the one.

What I'm hoping, after this message, that there will be some of you who are
very, very different. Instead of saying to really be fulfilled in life, I just met the
one, I just met the one, he's so adorable, he's so cute, he's got a job. Last three
guys, didn't even have a job. They're addicted to their PS4. But he doesn't even
know what a video game is. She's amazing. I love when she worships. She's so

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 cute. ... I think I just met the one. I'm hoping that some of you, instead of saying,
"I think I just met the one", instead you're gonna say, "I think I just met the
two." "I think I just met the two." He's so amazing. He has a job. She's so
amazing. She loves God. I think I just met the two. Why will you be excited
about meeting the two, if you're taking notes, because God is your one and your
spouse is your two. God is your one and your spouse is your two.

Even Jesus said this very clearly when someone said, "What's the most
important command?" He said, "Above anything else, make God number one".
He said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.".
God is first, then people come next. "Love the Lord your God and love your
neighbor as yourself." This is priority. To really have a marriage that honors God,
we put God first in our relationship and then our spouse is number two.

Now, I'd like to talk to those of you that are not married. If you're not married,
all of our church, raise your hands right now. Raise them up. Okay, leave them
up for a minute, just look around. Just look around. I'll give you a second. Just
scan the aisles. If your eyes meet, and you hear a love song, you just go with it.
Start a life group, whoever finds God, finds life. Whoever finds God, finds life.
Just go with it. If you want to. Just sometimes it just happens.

I want to say to those of you that one day hope to be married, this would be
kind of your vow. You can just jot this down in your notes if you want to. Your
vow will be this. I'll seek the one while preparing for my two. I will seek the one
while preparing for my two. It's a little bit like this one girl who was a Christian
growing up and then in college, she walked away from Jesus and got into every
kind of party thing she could get into, drugs and everything that went with it.
And one day, at a sorority party, she met the most amazing Christian guy. She
called her mom and said, "Mom, this is the guy. I mean, he's perfect. He's godly.
He's a leader. I think he's amazing." And the mom just said, very tenderly, but
very truthfully, said, "Sweetheart, you need to understand. If he's everything
you're saying, a guy like that's not looking for a girl like you." And that's just the
way it is.

This is why what my friend Andy Stanley says, I believe is absolutely so

important, you may just jot this down in your notes, he said, "Become the
person you're looking for is looking for." I love that. "Become the person that
you're looking is looking for." In other words, I'm going to seek the one, I'm
going to live for God, my whole life is gonna be devoted to him, he is king, he is
first in my life, he is preparing me for someone that I can serve him with, but
he's always my one. I'll seek the one while he prepares me for my two.

For those of you that are married, this is your vow. If you're taking notes, write
this down. This is your vow if you are married. I promise God will be my first
priority and my spouse will be my second. Let's all say it aloud. I promise God
will be my first priority and my spouse will be my second. This comes from
Genesis chapter 2, the context is Adam was living and there was no suitable

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 helper for him. God said, "This isn't good." He put him into a deep sleep, took
out his rib, formed Eve and Adam saw her and he said, "Whoa man." Thus her
name was woman. [inaudible 00:10:51] Wo-man.

Genesis 2:24, sorry it gets worse. Just hang with me. Genesis 2:24 says this,
"This is why a man does" what? Somebody help me out. "This is why a man
leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife. This is why he leaves his
father and mother and united to his wife. They become one flesh." The word
leaves come from the root Hebrew word [inaudible 00:11:18]. It's also the same
word that guys use sometimes when they see other guys. [What's up? 00:11:24]
I told you it got worse. What's up? Anyway, that's as bad as it gets. From here
on out, we're on the [inaudible 00:11:35] This word means to loosen or
relinquish. In other words, when you're growing up, your priority relationship is
mom and dad. You always honor mom and dad, but your priority shifts from
that being your primary relationship to now it's your spouse. Your God is your
one and your spouse becomes your primary human relationship after God.

The problem is so often when we believe you have to meet the one to be just
happy. That you have to meet the one to be fulfilled. When you believe that
your spouse is your one, eventually, you will idolize somebody and then one
day, you demonize them. You idolize them. You're amazing. You're perfect.
You're everything. You're everything I've wanted. Ladies, he's so laid back. He's
so relaxed. Then you get married, you demonize them. He's a lazy bum. He
won't mow the yard. You idolize, you demonize. She's so organized. She's so
driven. She's amazing. You get married, demonize. She's gonna drive me crazy. I
need to be set free from her in the name of Jesus. You idolize them, demonize,
and the problem is you're asking your spouse to meet a need they were not
designed to meet because God is designed to meet your number one need of
priority and not your spouse. Together, you serve God, but that person is not
designed to meet the need that only God can meet.

This is kind of what tends to happen when you're early on. You make your
girlfriend your priority. Your boyfriend's your priority. Maybe when you get
married, you're still the priority and then kids come along, and suddenly, instead
of the marriage relationship being the priority under God, suddenly the kids are
the priority and then sometimes, the husband may get a little jealous, like, "Well
I gotta go." And he pours himself into work and maybe the wife drops them off
for daycare and pours herself into work or pours herself into the kids. And
suddenly, the marriage relationship gets put on the shelf.

Fast forward to your deathbed. To your deathbed. If you can imagine, if you are
blessed enough to have weeks maybe to prepare for eternity, that's where the
priority become incredibly clear. I've been with, as a pastor, too many people to
count and there's two things that matter. God and family. [inaudible 00:13:47]
may not believe in God your whole life. They're on their deathbed, oh if there's
a God, I wonder where I stand. God becomes priority. Where do I stand with
God? Is my family nearby? It becomes incredibly clear God and family. God is my
number one priority. My spouse is my number two. Whenever anything takes

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 the place of God or takes the place of the priority of the marriage relationship,
even something good, when those priorities are out of order, your marriage can
never be what God intended it to be because you're not living according to the
God-ordained priorities.

If I can be really, really honest, it was when my priorities were out of order that
Amy and I first struggled in our marriage. What I'm gonna tell you is so
embarrassing and Amy can sit over there and nod and say, "It's so true." and
don't judge me. I only made this mistake once. I learned. But when we had our
first child, Katie was born on a Thursday in 1994, I was in full-time ministry and
full-time seminary. And I had a class that I had to take in order to graduate in
that semester or I would've had to go a whole extra semester. The class
happened to be an all-day class on Friday and an all-day class on Saturday and I
had a preaching responsibility on Friday and on Sunday.

So, Amy gave birth on a Thursday. Happiest moment ever. Friday, dumb-dumb
went to class. I preached Friday night. I went to class on Saturday. I preached
Sunday. And in my mind, honestly, and I know this is stupid, but this is the man
for you. Ladies, this is a man. I was doing the right thing for my family to prepare
us for the future. I had no idea that when I allowed one of Amy's friends, sorry,
to drive her home from the hospital, that I ... I told you not to judge me. Hey,
I'm not up in your business and I got the mic, I can get all up in your business in
a moment. Thank you. I thought my church would at least have some grace. I
had no idea, no idea, no idea what an inconsiderate thing that I'd done. That's
why we had six kids. I had five times to make it up. I had a lot of ground to make
up for that. I think you can at least say I never, ever, ever did that again.

If we can take it a little bit more, Amy went so into our baby that I started to feel
a little bit neglected. Like okay, you're into that baby, what about your big baby
over here? What about this baby? And so, I poured myself into work and she
poured herself into the first child, and it was the first time that we ever had any
tension in our marriage. And it wasn't because something bad got in the way
because so often, it's not something bad that ruins a marriage. So often, it's
something good that is not in the right priority. God is my one, my spouse is
always my two. And we have to live according to these priorities if we want to
really honor God.

What I didn't understand is Amy had a real legitimate jealousy about me being
away. I always thought jealousy wrong. There is such a thing as legitimate
jealousy. In fact, one of God's [inaudible 00:17:16] is jealous. God is a jealous
God. There is a sinful jealousy and there's a legitimate jealousy. Any time we put
anything ahead of God, he is legitimately and righteously jealous. It's called an
idol. If you put anything ahead of God, he has the right, because of who he is, a
holy and a righteous God, to be legitimately jealous. And that's why every now
and then, you may find yourself in your marriage go, "I'm a little bit jealous of
your time with the kids because truthfully, yes, we should have time with the
kids, but our marriage relationship should be a priority to keep it strong so we
can be a blessing to the kids."

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 "Well I'm jealous of your time with your friends." "I'm jealous of your time with
your friends." There are psycho people who think you should never have a
friend. I'm not talking about that, but I'm talking about if you're always out
doing something else and not making your marriage a priority, that's a
legitimate jealousy. I know some people that are jealous over their spouse's
phone. Right next to each other in bed. That's all you can come up with to do.
I've literally heard of people throwing their phones across ... That's a legitimate
jealousy because your phone is in the wrong place in the priorities.

That's why I want to give you one big thought, one simple thought. And I want
to introduce it with this. Again, it's not always the bad things that destroy
marriages. It's often good things that are out of place in the relationship. One
big thought, and the big thought is this. Protect the priorities. Protect the
priorities. If you will recognize ... Listen, if you're gonna get married later on in
the future, embrace it today. God will always be your number one and your
spouse will always be your number two. My God is my first priority and my
spouse is my second. If you're married today, and you are struggling in any way,
I can almost guarantee you you can trace it to this root issue that you're not
putting God first, you're not putting God first. We're not seeking him first. You
want your marriage to grow? Serve him in the church together. Seek him first
every single day. Pray together. Be centered around God's word. Seek Jesus
together. Put him first and then make sure you come together and your
relationship with each other is number two.

I want to get just real practical. Let's just get real practical. One of the ways that
we did this, after I overcame my baby fiasco, okay, is when we started producing
kids all the time, every time I would look at Amy, she would get pregnant. Oop,
you're pregnant. Oop, you're pregnant. You're pregnant. For a while, we
thought that's what was causing it. Later on, we figured it out. But anyway, what
I would do whenever I'd come home is I'd have four or five, six little kids coming
up to me and I'll always say, "No, no, no." And they'd be hanging on me and I'd
drag them through the house and I always say, "Mama gets the first kiss. Mama
gets the first kiss." And I would go up there and give Mama a kiss. Mama would
actually get a little extra special kiss that nobody else did, right? You know what
I'm talking about. Mama'd get the first kiss. Mama'd get the first kiss. And then,
I'd go and kiss the rest of the kids. What I wanted them to understand is mom
actually comes before you in the relationship.

Since you kinda were booing at me earlier on, I want to get up into your
business a little bit and tell you some things that are gonna make some of you
mad, but it's only because I love you and this is so true. Do not be child-centered
in your marriage. Don't be child-centered. Children are important. Children are a
gift from God. But if you want to love your kids, prioritize your marriage. One of
the best ways you can be a blessing to your children is to strengthen your
marriage and you all know, you've all seen it. Some of you, unfortunately,
you've lived it. Your whole life revolves around the kids. Ah, the kids, the kids,
the kids, and that's the common interest that keeps you together. One day, as
the kids grow up, and you look at each other and go, "Who are you? And what'd

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 you do with that person I married 20 years ago?" And suddenly, you don't have
any intimacy because your whole life has revolved around your children.

Here's what you need to understand and remember. Children are a temporary
assignment. They're a temporary assignment. You will have them for 18, 19
years, unless you have a millennial. They may be there for 30 years or whatever.
I'm just saying. I'm just saying. I'm just ... I told you I'll poke back at you. You
poked at me, I'll poke back at you, right? You may have them for 30 years, but at
some point, it's healthy to push them out and say, "You go serve Jesus and you
live on your own." They're a temporary assignment. Your marriage is 'til death
do us part. It's 'til death do us part. It's not until we're not happy anymore. It's
not until you're not meeting my needs anymore. It's not until something better
comes along. It's not "Ah I'm gonna trade you in for a different model." It's 'til
death do us part. Your marriage is a permanent God-honoring commitment and
that's why we have to continue to prioritize it even above the children. That
doesn't mean we don't feed them and don't give them baths and don't put
clothes on them, especially the boys who would be naked if you didn't, but you
honor the marriage in all that you do. If you want your children to succeed in
marriage, show them what a God-honoring marriage looks like. Show them
what a God-honoring marriage looks like.

I thought that this whole message would be very incomplete unless I had a little
bit of help. And so, we had people present some questions around this topic and
I wanted to give Amy a chance to respond to some of the most common
questions.

Amy Groeschel: Well, I want to be a great wife, right? And I really can't do that unless I first am a
great follower of Christ. That, to me, is the key. I can't love Craig the way I need
to love him, I can't be patient the way I need to be patient, if my relationship
with God isn't strong. My pride, my stubborn heart can so easily get in the way
of helping me to be a good, excellent wife that I need to be. And so, nothing is
gonna deal with my heart more than me prioritizing that time with God.

And what that looks like practically, oh gosh, it's just time with him. It's set apart
time in the mornings, but it's just walking with him throughout the day,
independence, just continually acknowledging his presence with me and my
need for him. Just try to be slow to speak and listen for his promptings. It's not
easy and I don't always get it right, but I do get it right when I'm depending on
Christ.

Keeping Christ first doesn't really work together unless we have it individually
first. What works so well is that we both have real authentic individual
relationships with Christ and so, it just makes it so much more natural that,
when we're together, that Christ is our life and it becomes our marriage and it
becomes our conversation and when we're struggling, we share those struggles
together and we go to God in prayer about those things. He's just one with us in
all that we do in our conversations and how we lead our family, how we want to

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 prioritize our marriage. It's just not something that can be separated from who
we are as a couple.

This is a really tough one because I am crazy about my kids. I'm crazy about kids.
But they didn't come first and my marriage did. And my kids can't be the
wonderful people, thriving children of God that I want them to be without my
marriage being strong. It's not just that I want my marriage to be good so my
kids are good, but the children are an expression of us and our love. But to be
very practical, you've got to do some things. You've got to make marriage the
priority in the family and the ways that that looks like, for us, is having date
night, and that may be that we don't even go anywhere, but the kids are in a
separate room and we have our room and we're off-limits. It may mean that
lock on the bedroom door. It may mean a lot of different things. It may mean
that you just have couch time and they're not there with you. But the kids
cannot be first or else the marriage won't last.

Craig Groeschel: Let's give a little bit of thank you to some good wisdom. I just need to publicly
say how much I love you and how honored I am to be your man, how thankful I
am that you are my girl. What I want to acknowledge for a moment is that there
are so many hurting relationships right now and I hurt with you. Our hearts
break. What we're talking about today, what I want you to understand, it really
is simple, but it's not easy. Okay? It's really simple, meaning what we do is we
put God first, not just we say that, we do it. We do it. We do it. God is first. We
pray together. We're people of his word. We're involved in his church. We're
seeking to live out his word. We're letting the Holy Spirit live through us. He's
first. And then we work hard to protect the priority of the marriage. You have to
work hard. You have to work hard. We work harder today at it because there's
so many obstacles. Everything in society pulls us away from each other.

What I want to do is just talk to the men because I feel a little bit more freedom
to talk to the guys. I'll let Amy get up in the girls' business more. But the guys,
what I want to tell you is, if I can just charge you, take responsibility to protect
the priorities because you're protectors. Gentlemen, if someone breaks in your
house and attempts to attack your family, how many of you will fight back?
Hands down, no doubt about it. You can be in your tighty wightey underwear
and you turn into a fierce tiger. I got nun chucks, baseball bats. I got weapons all
over the house. Any room in the house, I'll take you out. You mess with my
family, you may have to kill me, but you'll have to kill me to stop me. Okay? I'll
protect my family. That's easy to do because we're wired to do it. We will die for
those that we love.

God calls you to live for those you love. To live for them. Every single day. In
fact, gentlemen, what I hope you'll understand is you are charged by God,
essentially, to live or to give your best for two things, for Christ and to lay down
your life for your wife. That's what you're called to do. Protect those priorities.
In fact, I love just the teaching of Paul in Ephesians 5:25. Husbands, here's your
calling, "Love your wives." That's your calling. Love them, serve them, honor
them, love your wives. Just as Christ loved the church and did what? Gave

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 himself up for her. Protect the priorities at all cost. What does that mean?
Gentlemen, we keep God first. We are people of the church. We bring our
families to church. We serve in church. We are people of the word. We are daily
in God's word. We're modeling this for our kids.

Community is a part of who we are. We're in a life group doing life together
with other believers. God is our priority. We make time for each other. When
everything pulls us away, we make guarded time to talk. If you don't talk, you
can't have any intimacy. I mean, as practical as it is, we're gonna have a date
night. We're gonna have a little get-away night. Some of you, you're gonna tell
me you can't afford it. You don't have time. Listen, if you're lazy, you'll make an
excuse. If you love, you'll make a way. Let me say it again. If you're lazy, you'll
make an excuse. If you love your spouse, you will make a way. You will make a
way. You'll make a way.

You'll put on a video in the other room, put on Netflix, lock the door. Give your
kids some Benadryl, put on some romantic music, go lock the door, go in the
other room, and dance the night away, whatever it is. Don't tell me you can't
afford to get away. If you're a life group, you got a free babysitter. Drop them off
at their house this weekend. Next week, the party is at your house. Get a tent.
Put it up in the backyard. Light a fire. Put a candle in there. Make sure you got
water to put the fire out if things get crazy and you knock it over. You can do
this. When Amy and I were first married, we didn't have any money, but I said,
"We're gonna go out of town." We used to go to hotels so cheap, honest to
goodness, for 25 cents you could make the bed vibrate. One time, the bed got
stuck. Vibrated all night long. Wow, that was a lot of vibrating for a quarter.
Listen, true story. True story. And all the people said Amen.

Love makes a way. Love makes a way. Love makes a way. So what are we gonna
do? We protect the priority at all costs. We protect the priority. Why? Because
you never can be fulfilled in life until you finally meet the one. You can never be
fulfilled in life until you know the Lord God, he's your one. God is your one and
your spouse is your two. I will always honor God as my first priority and my wife
will always be my second. And I'll protect those priorities with everything in me
and if I start there, the foundation will be laid to have a marriage that can truly
honor God and that is worth building a life on.

All of our churches, let's take a moment and pray. Father, thank you so much
that you're gonna equip and empower us to honor you. God, I know there are
many relationships that are hurting and struggling today. We pray, God, that we
could put you first. Re-prioritize our life around that which matters most and
find healing through your son Jesus. All of our churches, those who are not
married and want to seek the one while God prepares you for your two, would
you lift up your hands right now. Just lift it up. Those who are married and say,
no matter what's going on in my marriage right now, it may be great, it may be
the lowest point ever, with God's help, we will make him our one and make our
spouse our number two. Would you lift up your hands? I want to pray for you.

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 Father, today, I pray for those who would one day be married, God, that you
would give them a foundation of righteousness to build upon that they would
seek you with all their hearts today and God, as they seek you, they'd be
conformed to the image of your son Jesus, becoming more like him as you are
preparing them to serve you with their number two. God, I pray for those who
are married today. I pray for those marriages that are strong that they would be
strengthened and protected from the attacks of the evil one. God, I pray for
those who are just floating along and those that are struggling in a significant
way.

I pray, God, today that you would rattle them with deep conviction that you are
to be their number one, that we don't go to church whenever we can or
whatever, your house is our priority. We don't read the Bible every now and
then, your word is the bread of life. We don't do life outside of the strength of a
Christ-filled community and a life group, we need your people, God, to
strengthen us. Help us, God, in our marriage to learn to make you number one.
Then, God, lead us, empower us. I pray especially for the men, God, that you
would empower them to protect the priorities.

God, for the conversations that may take place today and the week to come,
may they be productive and full of grace, looking to ways that you can improve
our marriage, not throwing accusations, but, God, seeking you to change us to
become who you want us to be, to serve you better with our two. Bring healing,
bring intimacy, bring strength, and restoration, as we keep praying today at all
of our different churches. Some of you right now, you should feel the weight of
what you don't have. God wants to be your number one. He wants to be
number one not in name only, but in the way that you love. And I hope you'll
understand our God is a jealous God. When you put anything else ahead of him,
that is an idol. That is a misplaced priority and our God is a jealous God. He is
the righteous king of kings and lord of lords. He is the supreme creator of the
universe. The holy righteous God sitting on the throne and he wants to be first
in your life.

The problem is by nature we're all sinners. We all step away from God. We all
do things that are wrong and we need to recognize that, call it what it is. It's not
a mistake, it's sin. When you recognize that you're a sinner, then you'll
recognize you need a savior. And this is why God is so amazing because he loves
you so much that he became a person like you in his son Jesus. God became
flesh. Jesus, perfect in every way, died on a cross on the third day. He rose from
the dead, he defeated death, hell, and the grave. Why? So that anyone, and this
includes you, no matter how dark your life is, no matter how many sinful
mistakes you've made, anyone who calls on his name, would be saved, sins
forgiven, made completely brand new, and all of our churches there, those of
you, you recognize you need his grace. You need his salvation. You need his
mercy.

And all of our churches, those who say, "Yes. Today, I trust him. Yes. Today, I
give my life to him." When you call on him, he'll forgive your sins and make you

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 new. All of our churches, you say, "Yes. I make him my one. I give my life to
him." That's your prayer. Lift your hands high right now, all of our churches, and
say, "Yes. I surrender my life to him." I see your hands going up at all of our
churches. Church Online, you click right below me and would you join your voice
with people all around you coming to faith in Christ and pray aloud.

Pray Heavenly Father

Audience: Heavenly Father

Craig Groeschel: I give you my life.

Audience: I give you my life.

Craig Groeschel: Save me from my sins.

Audience: Save me from my sins.

Craig Groeschel: Be my Lord.

Audience: Be my Lord.

Craig Groeschel: And first in my life.

Audience: And first in my life.

Craig Groeschel: Jesus, save me.

Audience: Jesus, save me.

Craig Groeschel: Fill me with your spirit.

Audience: Fill me with your spirit.

Craig Groeschel: So I could follow you.

Audience: So I could follow you.

Craig Groeschel: You are my one.

Audience: You are my one.

Craig Groeschel: Thank you for new life.

Audience: Thank you for new life.

Craig Groeschel: Today, I give you mine.

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Audience: Today, I give you mine.

Craig Groeschel: In Jesus' name, I pray.

Audience: In Jesus' name, I pray.

Craig Groeschel: Life.Church, would you worship big, worship loud today? Welcome those born
into God's family.

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