Greet One Another

One of my favorite presidential stories is the story of President Franklin Roosevelt who was greeting a line of visitors at some official function in the White House one evening one of those times when dignitary after dignitary just walks by and hands are shaken and empty words are passed back and forth Good to be here this evening. I'm so honored to be at the White House Good to see you Mr. President. How are you doing? You know those kinds of things and all that was going on and he was growing weary of that and so he said to an aid next to him he said listen to this and so he decided to say to the next person as he shook his hand he leaned over to him and said I shot my wife this morning Now that's not your typical greeting but he wanted to see what the response would be and one after another of those dignitaries never caught it they didn't hear it They would say something like I'm glad you're doing well Mr. President It's good to see you too. I hope you're and go right on and Finally after several people he had done that to finally one guy evidently was listening President leaned in and said I shot my wife this morning and there was a look of shocked horror on this dignitary Space and he finally gathered himself as the line is pressing to move on gathered himself enough to say well Mr. President I'm sure she deserved it Quite honestly most of our greetings are just about as empty as those in that line At the White House that evening When we greet one another do we really mean what we say When we greet one another is there any substance to our greetings or our our greetings just about as empty of any real meaning It's interesting to me that one of the one and others which we are investigating in the word of God in this series One of those one and others in the New Testament is greet one another greet one another It's in Romans chapter 16 at least that's the first place where it is found So if you have your Bibles open to Romans 16 we're going to take a look at the verse that says from Paul greet one another Paul actually has been doing that beginning in verse 3 of Romans 16 and going all the way through verse 15 He sends greetings to 29 different people a few verses later. He will also greet some folks um Send greetings actually from folks in Corinth but in in these verses he's greeting people as he writes this letter from Corinth He's greeting people that he knows in Rome people that he's ministered with people who have been special to him that Pads have crossed through the years in ministry people that had served him well and he's greeting them 29 of them and he ends those 29 greetings with these words in verse 16 greet one another with a holy kiss All the churches of Christ's in greetings and when we read that we think okay, what are we supposed to do with that greet one another with a holy kiss how do we handle that how are we to understand that Are we to take that literally some people say let's just dismiss the whole thing That's obviously just a cultural thing So really there's no nothing here for us But this is repeated several times in the New Testament in fact Five times in all This same Command is given to us Let's quickly review them on the screen first Corinthians chapter 16 verse 20 Paul is the Corinthian letter this way All the brothers and sisters here send you greetings greet one another with a holy kiss His second letter to the Corinthians chapter 13 verse 12 ends the same way greet one another with a holy kiss His first letter to the Thessalonians chapter 5 and verse 26 ends the same way Greet all gods people with a holy kiss and even Peter gets in on the action when he says in first Peter chapter 5 And verse 14 greet one another with a kiss of love Peace to all of you who are in Christ This is repeated too often for it to be just one little insignificant slip of the tongue if you were that communicates just something cultural that we shouldn't pay any attention to no This is five times. This is repeated in the New Testament and so something significant is being said to us About how to greet one another So what do we do with this how do we greet one another with a holy kiss I think the question we need to ask ourselves this morning is this how can we minister to one another in our greetings How can we use our greetings to actually do more than just Usher someone in how can we actually use our greetings to minister to one another That's the question we need to face and in order to answer that question We need to begin with the meaning of greeting one another What does Paul mean when he says greet one another with a holy kiss? In order to understand what Paul's talking about it's important that we understand a distinction the difference Between function and form the difference between function and form I think it was 1984. I was in seminary and pastoring a church in Indiana And I got a hold of a book that actually was told to read for a class it was a book by Gene Gets who by the way is written the book Called building up one another that's been an encouragement to me and this series of messages dealing with the one or others in the New Testament But this particular book was called sharpening the focus of the local church Uh whenever I'm asked what are the five best books you've ever read this always is on my top five It's not a very well-known book But it deeply impacted my view of the church. It was the first book I ever read on the the New Testament purpose of the church And what the church should be about and in that book sharpening the focus of the local church Gene gets makes a distinction of very good distinction between biblical functions of the church and cultural forms of the church If we're going to understand this command we have to understand that distinction There are functions of the church that are biblical functions We are to be involved in evangelism discipleship worship fellowship ministry Those kinds of things are biblical functions of the church But the methods that we use in doing those may take on a cultural flavor that may not fit in another time Or another part of the world And so the functions remain the same But the forms that we use to fulfill those functions we have freedom to change those depending on when we live Where we live a part of the world so forth Let me just give you a few examples The Bible teaches that we should be involved as a church and as individuals in evangelism Bible makes it clear that we are to spread the seed of the gospel so the seed of God's word We are to give out the gospel to other people But the methods we use in that are nowhere found in the Bible Some people may use a gospel track some people may use a radio program some people may use a bus ministry Some people may use a visitation program Others will simply get to know their neighbors or co-workers and look for opportunities to spread the gospel Some people give invitations at the end of a church service all of those methods are cultural forms None of them are found in the Bible Now the concept of a lifestyle approach toward evangelism is certainly biblical But the way you do that with co-workers over a cup of coffee or over the backyard fence with your neighbor is not specified in scripture So those are cultural The purpose the Bible says is to evangelize to get the gospel out the means you do that by that's completely cultural Did you know that there was no such thing as a gospel invitation at the end of a service to the 1820s That was unknown to the 1820s. It was just not the way of doing things Charles Finney an evangelist in America in the northeast began using what he called the anxious bench Where people would come to the front and sit on this bench if they were had concerns about their spiritual lives Gospel invitations have been effectively used by many people To encourage folks to respond to the gospel. They have also been misused Some by people as well to manipulate decisions But the point is it's not the method that we use it's whether or not we are getting the gospel to people That is the biblical function same thing is true with preaching The Bible talks a lot about preaching the word of God And there are lots of different words that are used for that Exorning, admonishing, warning The word preaching means to proclaim boldly to announce or herald forth the gospel There are lots of different words used for the preaching of the word of God in the New Testament But all of the things that we surround it with are cultural The Bible never talks about how you should develop your sermon There are preaching classes that you can take in Bible colleges and seminaries It will tell you exactly how to craft a sermon and put so many points together You got to have three points in a poem right No In fact, if you have to have three points, I'm 33% short this morning There's nothing in the Bible that says you've got to structure it a certain way Or even that a message must be one of the three kinds that we're always taught in in Bible college It must be either expositional, textual or topical I believe in exposition anyone who will preach through the book of Romans believes in expositional preaching But I also believe that topical preaching like I'm doing this morning is effective method of preaching As long as you're preaching the Bible The method is not the issue The Bible never says anything about the location or the furniture I remember when we started our contemporary service nine years ago And we did some surveying to find out where people were and so forth And we Changed the whole look of the platform You know, we used to have the traditional big wooden pulpit and the pulpit chairs where the preachers got to scowl at everybody from the platform before that You know you get up to preach and that kind of thing And so we had that kind of setup and when we changed that and got this thing which is Easy to pick up and move you know if the need be for different types of services I remember on some of those surveys people gave such glowing words of encouragement On those Not really we got a lot of other kind of feedback and one of the feedback that we got was you should never do away with the sacred desk I'm still not sure what the sacred desk is. I mean, I think I know what they were talking about But I've never found that in the New Testament. I've never found the term sacred desk The Bible never stipulates a particular piece of furniture that is wholly in and of itself that must be used in a worship service The Bible just doesn't talk about that So why do we make a big deal over that kind of thing the same thing with church services? There's a difference in function And form the Bible talks about church services the Bible says that we should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together The Bible says we need to assemble together. We need to come together as a church There are some things the Bible talks about doing when we are here worshiping God together The teaching and preaching of the word of God to a gathered assembly Paul said to Timothy the things that you've heard among me are from me Among many witnesses there were lots of other people there to hear the same thing You need to pass those along that there's lots lots of stuff in the Bible about about church services But nowhere in the Bible does it tell us how many per week to have What times they should be what days they should be necessarily There's nothing in the Bible that tells us where they should be Did you know there were not even any church buildings till 325 AD When Constantine the Emperor began building church buildings all over the Roman Empire until that time for the first 300 years Almost of Christianity Parish the thought they met in homes How could that be they didn't even have buildings So there are a lot of things that we hold sacred that are cultural They're not biblical Now what does that have to do with our command it has a lot to do with our command Let's let's take that very important distinction between function which is biblical and form or methods Which are cultural let's take that and apply it now to this this setting Let's talk about the greeting and the kiss Okay, the greeting in the kiss in in what Paul is saying here The biblical function is found in the words Greek one another Greek one another The form that that would be expressed in the first century would be with a kiss The greeting is the biblical function The form that greeting would take is a cultural form Because it was very common in the first century to greet people with a kiss Usually it was done male to male and female to female But whenever you would formally greet someone in the Middle East in the first century Even in the Roman world it was with a kiss And it was also done at family gatherings The reason the New Testament gives us five commands this way Is because Paul was stressing the fact that in the body of Christ we are a family where brothers and sisters And so just like family would greet each other in the first century We ought to greet one another in their culture that would be done with a kiss that may not be the same way in our culture Let me give you some verses. We'll put them on the screen that just show you how how Braw this was in in the world of the New Testament in Matthew chapter 26 Jesus is about to be arrested And here's what the text says now the betrayer that's Judas had arranged a signal with them That's the Roman guard 600 guard cohort from the temple guard The one I kiss is the man Arrest him going at once to Jesus Judas said greetings rabbi and kissed him Now the reason Judas did that was because that kind of greeting was the normally accepted greeting between two people in that day And so it did not appear to be out of the norm It didn't take long for the disciples to realize what was going on Jesus of course voluntarily gave himself to be arrested But the sign is the one to whom I show the special sign of friendship. That's the one you're to arrest There's a normal form of greeting in that day in Luke chapter 7 Jesus is in the home of a Pharisee by the name of Simon And that's the place where a woman comes and You know anoints his feet washes his feet with her tears and so forth This is what Jesus said to Simon when he protested about that He said then he turned toward the woman and said to Simon do you see this woman? I came into your house you did not give me water for my feet Another customary greeting for a person coming off of dusty streets You did not give me water for my feet But she wet my feet with her tears and wipe them with her hair now notice what he says next You did not give me a kiss But this woman from the time I entered has not stopped kissing my feet What Jesus is saying is that the normal expected official greeting when a guest comes to your house Is to receive a kiss on the cheek You didn't even give me that normal greeting But this woman has continued to greet me in a warm way So that would be expected do you remember the story of the prodigal son When the prodigal son finally comes back home. How he's father greeted him Luke chapter 15 verse 20 While he was still a long way off his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him He ran to his son Through his arms around him and kissing that's male to male probably and as the custom was on the cheek to kiss him When Paul was leaving the Ephesian pastors the pastors in Ephesus after Ephesus after he met with them on his way to Jerusalem Notice what happens They all wet as they embraced him and kissed him Okay, this was a normal type of greeting in the New Testament nothing out of the ordinary here in our culture Probably doesn't go as well. I had several people after the first service come out and say I am not gonna kiss you And I said to them that is perfectly fine with me Don't mind that at all In our culture probably a kiss is not the natural accepted way of greeting one another in our culture we do it with a handshake or a pat on the back or a hand on the arm or maybe even a hug But in in the world of the first century it was very common to greet one another with a kiss now Notice Paul says he needs to be a holy kiss He prefaces it with the word holy which indicates that kiss better be pure in its intent And it better be simply for the purpose of greeting because even then they knew that that could be mistaken Especially in the Roman world that could be mistaken and was mistaken in the Roman world The Romans at times accused the Christians of immorality Because of the way they would greet one another So Paul knew that could be misunderstood. Here's the point The point is that we are to greet each other in a way that genuinely expresses Christian love In a way that genuinely demonstrates we are brothers and sisters. We are family It should be a warm greeting not just a routine not just A howdy, but a greeting that seeks to bless and encourage And to lift up someone and to minister to someone the form of the greeting may vary from culture to culture It may be a handshake or it may just be a nod in different parts of the world people do Greet each other differently If you're to go to some parts of the world and extend your hand that's an offensive gesture In many cultures in Africa the greeting is like this Three claps. That's how you greet one another or in some countries. I think in Ghana in Africa they greet one another with Some people would have trouble greeting each other that way, but they just click their fingers and that's the way they greet each other In many Asian countries it is the folding of the hand to the chest In Japan it's a bow In some Asian cultures if you look someone in the eye when you greet them that's offensive You actually turn your face away There are lots of different ways culturally to greet people in different parts of the world The method of the holy kiss is simply a cultural form We may do it differently today, but the lesson is that we should greet one another warmly as brothers and sisters in Christ By the way, this distinction between Biblical function and cultural forms is helpful in understanding some other things the scriptures say Jesus talked about To his disciples in the upper room what you've seen me do you go do And there have been some who've said well Jesus washed their feet So he's instituting another ordinance like the Lord's Supper. We're supposed to wash each other's feet And what what those folks I believe mistake is the cultural form For the biblical function The biblical function was the function of serving others That's what Jesus was doing in the room everybody else the disciples were arguing about who was gonna be first in the kingdom Jesus shows them a selfless act of servant hood That was the lesson that was the principle But as we saw in Luke chapter 7 the way that was Exhibited in Jesus day was washing someone's feet when they came in off of a dusty street into your home So Jesus is saying serve one another He's not saying you have to use that cultural form to do it just serve one another Here's one that's hotly debated and that's first Corinthians 11 the wearing of the head covering And a woman having short hair a man having long hair being wrong There are lots of arguments over that I was just I mentioned to you last week I was in a Plymouth brethren church two weeks ago preaching in South Carolina And they still talk about the head covering in their Lord's Supper services now they don't make it mandatory And they're a little more progressive than most Plymouth brethren churches But in many movements today they still require a woman to cover her head when she's in a church service They do that in Ukraine some of you have been there know that um Does first Corinthians 11 teach that it's my understanding of first Corinthians 11 that what Paul is really dealing with there By the way, I in when I was in seminary Debated a minute night on this issue on first Corinthians 11. It was a very interesting debate I'm not sure I won, but Anyway, it was a debate there on the seminary campus um, but what I believe Paul is talking about is In Corinth in that day in a whole book by the way he's been written on this in Corinth in that day There was an uprising of what we would call today Feminism that was trying to blur the gender distinctions between men and women and the way that was happening culturally in the city of Corinth Was women cutting their hair real short and men growing their hair real long and women giving up the covering of their hair Which first Corinthians 11 talks about it being Giving up that covering as they were in worship services and even blatantly in worship services trying to The flex their muscle as far as gender distinctions was concerned And so the principle that Paul's dealing with is really male female Distinctions in the worship service and in the church and in culture The way it was culturally shown in that day was how you wore your hair By the way the verse that says does not even nature Teach you that a man should not have long hair. That's been the subject of many fundamentalist sermons through the years about men not having long hair If you if you study that passage especially the Greek word nature It's talking about the natural order of things. It's a cultural expression for the way things were happening in Corinth I mean Isn't the way that people express this in Corinth sufficient for you to realize that men should not try to be like women and women should not try to be like men By the way, those who are so been out of shape on men having long hair. I rarely hear them talk about women having short hair But they're both in the cult. They're both in the passage In Corinth a woman having short hair was just as much a sign of rebellion against God's Plan for the sexes as was a man having long hair You got to place that in the cultural context The point is God has made us distinct for a reason. Don't try to blur that How it's expressed in different cultures may vary from time to time so Sorry for the little rabbit trail, but but that principle of Function and form is helpful in understanding several things in the Bible like this It's certainly helpful in understanding the kiss It Paul is not saying in order to greet one another appropriately. You have to kiss each other If you don't kiss each other, you're not biblical. He's not saying that The principle is the function is greet one another like brothers and sisters because we're in the same family In the first century that made a kiss on the cheek In our day it may mean a warm horn shake a warm handshake or horn shake. Yeah, try shaking somebody's horns A warm handshake or Looking deeply into someone's eyes to let them know I'm I care about you. I'm thinking about you. I want to greet you warmly That's the principle Okay, if we are to greet one another with a holy kiss warmly then How does that happen? Three principles. I think that will help us to understand how to greet one another as brothers and sisters in Christ the manner of greeting one another first of all our greetings should be sincere Our greetings should be sincere They are often empty Maybe even dishonest maybe even hypocritical Our greetings to one another should be godly Honest expressions of love and concern If you look again at Paul's greetings in Romans 16 you find that what Paul does is he says for instance in verse 3 Greek Priscilla and Aquila and then he doesn't just move on He says a little something about them personally My fellow workers in Christ they risk their lives for me Greet my dear friend Epinitas and then he says something personal about him. He was my first convert The first convert to Christ in the province of Asia and most of these people he does that. We he adds a little personal touch To his greeting which indicates the greeting is sincere. It's not just howdy. Hi. How you doing? Good morning Good to see you and move on There was something sincere in his greeting because it had a little bit of a personal touch to it now I want to make a plea for some balance here Obviously there is a place for a quick greeting where there is not time to delve into your whole history And everything that's going on in your life. There's a place for that and sometimes that happens at church I love to greet folks before and after services But if I took the time to find out your personal history I'd have time for about three people And that's it So there's there's a place for a more quick greeting But even then It ought to be genuine It ought to be sincere It ought to be the kind of greeting that communicates I really do want to know how you're doing. I really do care about I really am glad you're here Really I mean that So our greetings should be sincere. Secondly our greetings should be caring They should be caring Our greetings should express concern for other people and that concern ought to be demonstrated in our voice In our eyes in our gestures In our body language I know I've been guilty of this from time to time. Have you greeted someone while you're Looking elsewhere Getting ready to talk to someone else and the whole greeting kind of gets lost with that other person. That's so easy to do A greeting should be a greeting of concern of caring that we do express in the tone of our voice In the way we talk to people and the way we we we show Through our eyes Our body language that we really do care about them You remember the movie The Wizard of Oz it's usually on about this time of year It's kind of hard to get in a form that's acceptable for for use in in the video clips now, but um And we had a short week this week and I didn't want to burden any of our secretaries with with that So I just want to tell you the story you remember the story of the greeting in Wizard of Oz Dorothy The ten man straw man The lion finally Scarecrow rather straw man Finally make it to the wizard and you remember they're led down this long dimly lit gothic hallway where they're terrified and they get into this room and there's this Explosion and green smoke that comes out and then this Bodyless head appears you remember that with the deep voice The voice that said I am Oz the great and terrible who are you If you've been greeted like that Sometimes I feel like I've been greeted that way Dorothy tries to response at to respond and the wizard interrupts her silence The great and terrible I am Oz The great and terrible I know why you are here step forward ten man Ten man steps forward and the voice says from the wizard you dare to come to me for a heart you clinking clanking clattering collection of collisionous junk You've been greeted like that Sometimes you feel like it The other travelers got just as warm Agreeing you remember Scarecrow You have the effentry to ask for a brain you billowing bail of bovine fodder You've been greeted like that Before the lion is able to do anything he's so scared he faints before he hears anything and Finally Dorothy has to clean up all the mess The way you greet someone Says an awful lot about how you feel about them as brothers and sisters in Christ Agreeing should be caring it should be an expression through your voice through your eyes through your body language Through everything you do that you do care about that person So it should be caring thirdly our greeting should be selfless This should be selfless think of others and not yourself and that will enable you to greet someone Thinking about their needs So that when you greet them you're asking about them you're seeking to find out about them Is is your greeting a representative of the fact that your really your life is all about you Or is it all about the other person? When you greet someone else are your greetings focused on you Or on others You may find out real quickly how that person's doing and then you feel their ears full with how you're doing What's happening with you because that's really the focus is you Are your greetings? selfless Is your world built around you or built around others? One of Hitler's closest associates was Albert Spear Albert Spear was the man responsible for turning German manufacturing into a war machine production machine for World War II so he served as the minister of supply He wrote a book called inside the third Reich and the book was a lot about Hitler and how things Worked in his day paints a very interesting picture of Hitler I want to read just an excerpt from that book He writes I suppose if eight-off Hitler ever had a friend I would have been that friend Hitler could fascinate He wallowed in his own charisma, but he could not respond to friendship Instinctively he repelled it The normal sympathies that normal men and women enjoy were just not in him At the core of the place where his heart should be Hitler was a hollow man He was empty We who were close to him or thought we were all came To sense this however slowly You couldn't even enjoy eating cherries with him and then listen to this next expression We all were simply projections of his gigantic ego We all were simply projections of his gigantic ego Is the way that you relate to others even the way you greet others just a projection of you And what you want who you are Or are you really thinking about that other person? Are you selfless? in your greetings So Be sensitive to others when you greet them Be sensitive to how you might minister to others Be sensitive to the needs of others so that as you greet them you're looking for an opportunity to minister some some encouragement to them Be sensitive to special needs in people's lives. I'm not just talking about physical needs I'm talking about people who've been through a rough time people who've had emotional turmoil people who've had difficulties in their families be sensitive to that so that when you greet people you do it warmly You do it in a way that encourages them that lets them know even through the look in your eyes that you really are praying for them You really do care about them You really are interested in what's happening in their lives But having said all that I will also say please be balanced Please be balanced with that Don't please don't feel the pressure because of this message um To when you greet someone today to dive deeply into their personal life with every greeting that that's not the point You you understand there are times for quick greetings just to say howdy to someone But we ought to always be open To being invited into that person's life And show them how much we love them and care for them Selflessly encourage them and think about them We ought to always be looking for that opening when we greet one another It was April the 18th 1942 Armory army corporal Jacob D'Shaezer Boarded a bomber plane with his pilot with his lieutenant William Farrow with a copilot and navigator and a rear gunner And their mission in 1942 was to bomb the city of Tokyo and the surrounding cities That was back before the time in the war when enough islands had been captured by American troops that there was enough fuel to Bomb and come back to a landing strip These men were going with just enough fuel to get there dropping their bombs and then they were told to land somewhere in enemy territory And uh will give you instructions as to what to do well they never got those instructions they dropped their bombs They landed in Enemy territory and Quickly D'Shaezer was surrounded by 10 Japanese soldiers who took him prisoner of war For over two years he was a prisoner of war in this prison camp a filthy Torturing prison camp Several times he thought he would die from starvation and from the beatings in the torture When one of his fellow prisoners died of dysentery the Japanese Decided to start giving him a little bit more food and also to uh give them something to read and one of the books they gave him the read was a bible That was only one bible for the whole prison camp and so it got passed around and each Each a prisoner of war got it for a certain period of time when it came to Shazer's time to get the bible he just devoured it You see he had grown up in a Christian home, but he had never personally committed his life to Christ So he knew the bible he knew about it. He started reading it And the day before he was to give the bible up to someone else He read again for the umpteenth time Romans chapter 10 and verse 9 that if thou shalt confess with thy heart the Lord Jesus Believe in that heart that God has raised him from the dead confess with your mouth for Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead We shall be saved He read that verse over and over and over again and then committed his life to Christ on his knees became a believer He instantly began to figure out I'm a changed person now. I've got to live differently Even if I am here until I die. I've got to live differently even here One day he'd been taken out to a brief exercise time was brought back to his solitary confinement cell And the prison guard roughly pushed him into the cell he fell and the prison guard slammed the door shut on his foot He had not gotten his foot inside yet and it just screamed with pain And the prison guard did not let him get it back in he went ahead and shoved the door tight and Finally the shazer was able after a period of time to work his foot loose and get it in He was sure it was broken he was raging with anger He wanted his mind to go blank so he could hate Everyone who was doing this to him, but God kept filling his mind with these scriptures that he had read over the past few months And he made a decision that day He said tomorrow When that prison guard comes I'm going to speak to him in Japanese. I'm going to greet him warmly It took everything in him to do that all the spirits power to do that because he wanted to strike out an anger at that man But he spoke to him gently in Japanese and greeted him warmly The prison guard just looked at him like crazy Never said a word walked off this one on for a month every day He's greeting him warmly in Japanese and the prison guards looking at him like he's crazy walking off Finally after about a month of that this prison guard walked up to the shazers cell Responded to him in Japanese asked him how he was doing They started conversing Got to be friends got to know about each other's family In 1945 when the atomic bomb was dropped the shazer had been in prison for three years He'd been transferred to another prisoner camp in China by this time where again he thought he would die The day the atomic bomb was dropped he woke up at seven o'clock that morning and just felt impressed to pray He didn't of course know any outside news at two o'clock that afternoon. He stopped praying I felt the Lord had just given him a sense of peace that the war was over And surely it was He was released from that prison camp Could not get the Japanese people out of his mind And so Jacob the shazer with his wife in 1948 went back to Japan as a missionary And spent the rest of his life ministering to the Japanese people People that he had come to forgive People that he had learned to love By the time he got there in 1948 They're there to track written about his experience in the prison of war camp and many Japanese people had read it They wanted to meet the man whom they'd heard had forgiven them an American Who was here to tell them about the love of God Many people came to know Jesus as savior in Japan because of his testimony He established several churches But he still had a great burden for the country of Japan and prayed earnestly for revival in that land One day went on a 40 day fast to pray for revival in Japan The last day of that fast a man came to his residence and introduced himself It was the man who had led the 160 playing bombardment On our troops that started the war And Hawaii He had read the tract that had been written about the shazer had committed his life to Christ And that man became a Japanese evangelist that again won many people to Christ And it all started in Jacob's disagers' heart With God prompting him to greet his tormentor In a kind way To start expressing interest in him And that's where God began that great work in the shazer's heart I would not dare presume That when you greet someone in the lobby today it will be life changing That it will result in that kind of a great story of God's providence But you never know You never know What a simple family warm greeting May do to change the course of someone's life Let's pray Father help us to greet one another To greet one another as brothers and sisters as family warmly In a caring way sincerely selflessly And even in our quick momentary greetings Help us to communicate We really do care We really are interested in that of the person And so fulfill This command you've given us to greet one another with a holy kiss In Jesus name we pray Amen