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[ Silence ] [ Music ] [ Music ] Oh, how good, oh, how good and how pleasant for me to dwell in your peace.

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Oh, how good, oh, how good and how pleasant for me to dwell in your peace. We've got to walk together, together, together. Oh yes, oh yes, it's wonderful. Oh yes, oh yes, it's beautiful.

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For it is well in unity. For our good and our presence. ♪ For the people and you ♪ ♪ For our good and our presence ♪

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♪ For the people and you ♪ ♪ We've got to walk together ♪ ♪ Together ♪ ♪ Together ♪

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♪ Oh yes ♪ ♪ Oh yes, it's wonderful ♪ ♪ Oh yes, it's beautiful ♪ ♪ Oh, can you have a unity ♪

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♪ Oh, how beautiful for me ♪ ♪ To dwell in unity ♪ ♪ Oh, yes it is ♪ ♪ Surely you know what's good ♪

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♪ For good ♪ ♪ Spread the love of God ♪ ♪ Just you and me ♪ ♪ What a fellowship ♪

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♪ What joy divine ♪ ♪ How sweet to walk in the bright sunshine ♪ ♪ Oh yeah ♪ ♪ Oh yes, it's wonderful ♪

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♪ Oh yes, you it's beautiful ♪ ♪ For me you're a girl in unity ♪ ♪ Oh how good it is that ♪ ♪ Me is a girl in unity ♪

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♪ I know it ♪ ♪ Surely you know it too ♪ ♪ Talk to one another ♪ ♪ Spread the love of God ♪

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♪ Just you and me ♪ ♪ What a fellowship ♪ ♪ What a joy divine ♪ ♪ How sweet to walk in the bright sunshine ♪

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♪ Oh yes, it's wonderful ♪ ♪ Oh yes, it's beautiful ♪ ♪ Oh, give you the new beauty ♪ [MUSIC]

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♪ Oh, how good ♪ ♪ Oh, how good and how blessed ♪ ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh ♪ ♪ Together, together, together ♪

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♪ Oh, yes, it's wonderful ♪ ♪ Oh, yes, it's beautiful ♪ ♪ Oh, renewed with unity ♪ ♪ It's so good, so good ♪

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♪ It's very good, so good ♪ ♪ It's wonderful, so good ♪ ♪ It's beautiful, so good ♪ ♪ It's wonderful, so good ♪

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♪ Oh, joyous news, so good ♪ ♪ It's wonderful, so good ♪ ♪ It's wonderful, so good ♪ ♪ Oh, hear the words, so good ♪

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♪ Oh, here the words, so good ♪ ♪ Hear the words, so good ♪ ♪ Tell the Mighty ♪ ♪ Tell the Mighty, so good ♪

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♪ Let's walk together, so good ♪ ♪ Equal together, so sweet ♪ ♪ Together...so good ♪ ♪ Great together, so good ♪

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♪ It's so good, so good ♪ ♪ So good, so good ♪ ♪ So good, so good, so good, so good ♪ ♪ For me to dwell, for me to dwell in you ♪

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♪ Oh, how good it is ♪ ♪ For how good and how pleasant ♪ ♪ For me to dwell in you ♪ ♪ Oh, it's mighty good ♪

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♪ How good and how pleasant ♪ ♪ For me to dwell in you ♪ ♪ We've got to walk ♪ ♪ Together ♪

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♪ We've got to talk ♪ ♪ Together ♪ ♪ We've got to sing ♪ ♪ We've got to pray ♪

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♪ Oh, yes ♪ ♪ Oh, yes, it's wonderful ♪ ♪ Oh, yes ♪ ♪ Oh, yes, it's beautiful ♪

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♪ For me ♪ ♪ Welcome you to Bethlehem ♪ ♪ Oh yes it is ♪ - So say amen.

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- Amen. - Amen. (soft piano music) - I want to lift up this word

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found in the first letter of the Apostle Paul to the church in Corinth. Paul called to be an apostle by the will of God and Sostenes our brother. The subject of the message is suggested by the philosopher, theologian, Paul Tillich. The courage to be.

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The courage to be. Being and non-being describe existence on this planet. They're the words that describe how we utilize the space allotted to us, our values, our substance, our essence, our commitment, and those things we rely upon.

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Paul called to be an apostle. You may put it this way that Paul is called to be, to be. He's called to live a meaningful existence, called to become the person he is divinely designed to be.

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Each of us is challenged to participate in the romance of becoming. Shakespeare puts it this way, "To be or not to be, that is the question."

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You know it takes courage to be yourself. It's a struggle to dare and do, to leave the shores of nothingness in in quest of being, and truthfully say in our heart of hearts, "I just want to be me." That is challenging.

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That is a struggle. Early in our existence, we are confronted with the question. often raised by parents, relatives, teachers, friends. What do you want to be?

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We hear that early in life. And we are ill-prepared to answer many times because we don't know. We are pushed here and there in different directions by strong winds before we are really prepared to answer the question.

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So all along life's way we are pestered by the question, "What do you want to be?" But it's said that there are no two persons alike. That we're all different. None of us is exactly like somebody else.

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And how we make it with the individuality that it's given us to participate meaningfully in the universality of the human family That's the struggle.

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I think that's what the poet meant when he said, "To be or not to be, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing in them to be or not to be. How is this word related to the courage to be? Courage to be. Let me relate an experience

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that happened in our family when I was a lad. My uncle wanted a raise on his job. He was working at the hotel, the Dolphins Hotel in Dallas, and he wanted a raise,

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but he was afraid to ask for the raise. He was afraid that if he went to the boss, so to speak, seeking a raise, the boss may answer that if he's dissatisfied, he can leave.

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Many others would like to have his job. So he thought he would get a good drink of liquor. that that would somehow provide the courage that he needed. So he did because he went there, but even after having taken a good dose of that liquor,

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He still didn't have the courage to approach his supervisor about a raise. But he had set a pattern somehow in his life that whenever he had some difficulty, some to come up against, he would resort to the bottle. He did it over and over again,

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and he died a confirmed alcoholic. And he never became the person that he was designed to be. And the truth of the matter is that this story is repeated over and over again in the lives of people.

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So what does it mean to have the courage to be? Not to depend, as so many are doing today, upon alcohol and drugs, but to actually have the courage to be. Now Paul begins this letter by identifying himself.

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Paul called to be. Put your name there where Paul is. - Yes Lord. - Called to be.

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That's all you have to do, to be. not to be in the category of having been. A man was trying to buy a car and he went to the car lot and the man said, "Now this is a car

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"that has been a good car in its days." And he showed him another and said, "Now that car over there is going to be And he said, "What I want is not to have men going to be,

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what I want is an Israel." [laughter] The courage, courage to be. So, this introduction is something that should cause us to examine ourselves here in the morning of another year.

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For Paul is just concerned about being the person that God wants him to be. "I want to be me." He is called of God to be an apostle. He's involved in the romance of becoming.

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And each of us is on a journey. It's a journey from "I" to "we." It's a journey that depends upon our willingness to embark on the voyage and reach the destiny for which we are divinely designed.

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Paul is called to be. I can hear my grandmother now saying about another person in the community, "If he ain't gonna be nothing."

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Be. In other words, we can sort of Change the language to fit this message, "I be, I be, I am." Paul, an apostle, called to be an apostle of God.

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We exist in the here and now, but we are summoned by the eternal. Paul is called to be. Soon after we appear on planet Earth, we are confronted with this challenge. We are creatures of decision.

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Our lives are shaped in a peculiar way by the decisions that we make. So as Paul is called, so are we called to engage in the romance of becoming. We do not yet know what we will be, but we are on our way. We are on our journey.

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We're not where we were. We're not where we're going to be, but we are on our way. No longer a child playing on the streets of Tarsus. Not yet at the end of the journey.

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That is where we are today. We are between the no longer and the not yet. That is where we are. That's where our nation is. Where we are individually, that's where we are collectively.

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Between the no longer and the not yet. So we're sailors on the seashore of nothingness, waiting to sail uncharted seas and to engage in the romance of becoming. Being is a personal matter.

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It concerns our individuality. So as I said earlier, each of us is unique. We're all different. We're all peculiar.

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We have our idiosyncrasies. Each of us, however, has a particular role to play in the development of humankind. all to be an apostle. The apostle is sent to others. The apostle is to become dynamically involved in the work of humankind, and he must be rightly related to the designer.

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So if I really want to know and to understand my being as a creature of the eternal, then I need to be rightly related to the eternal because God had something in mind when he made me, when he made you, when he made each one of us. So the courage to be, to be, to be good.

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We often have different state things we say to one another in greeting. Be good to yourself, be good, be patient, be kind. Then just be, not blown about by every wind and doctrine,

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But to be steadfast, to be loving, to be kind, to be, that's the question. There's not a neutral zone. We either are on the road of being or we are being swallowed up by more and more by nothingness. In other words, they say that the human personality

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is like an iceberg, that two thirds of it, or eight tenths of it, may be underwater. So we just see a little of each other. Rest of it's underwater, like a submarine.

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But the challenge we face is to be rightly related to the Creator and to pursue those goals that will develop us more and more into the likeness of the Master.

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And not only does Paul describe himself as an apostle, He recognizes that he has a particular mission. He says he is called of God. Called of God.

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And you say, "I wonder why the pastor is addressing this message to us?" That means to preach. Most of the time we think about a call, we think it's to preach. He's the only one called.

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But every one of us is called. There is this human calling, a certain sacredness of human callings. In other words, someone may be called to sweep the floor. It doesn't mean that he has to have a Bible and given a lesson or a sermon or some Christian vocation.

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Paul was a tent maker and he used the income from that tent making in order to support him in doing the thing that it was really number one and that was to be an apostle of God sent to the world. Paul called to be called to be sent to do the will of God and to work with others and he says and sustenance my brother. Now

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that requires courage, it requires having that spirit within us, that steadfastness, that solidarity to hold on in spite of contrary winds and sometimes it doesn't always go well. Again another story when I was a boy my dad's stepfather was off with a group picking cotton and they decided that they ought to be getting

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more money, more than just 50 cents a hundred. And they met those who were picking and they decided that they would select him as the agent to represent them before the owner. And when he presented the case to the owner, the owner owner said to them, "Do you agree with this?"

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All the others said, "No." [laughter] And when he got around he said, "Well, Jesse, I think you need to leave." So everybody had said that they were with that and selected him to represent them,

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but he ended up being the only one before the supervisor or the owner and he was the one dismissed. And sometimes that will happen when you stand up for what you believe, your convictions, but you must have the courage to be.

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Paul has the courage to be. He has the courage to address the situation that is in Corinth.

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Now many people don't want to address difficult situations. Paul could have very well failed to answer. He had received word from Clothes House about how things were in Corinth.

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They were all entangled here and there and there was conflict looming here and there. And he could have said, "Well, I don't want to be involved with that mess."

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That's what many people say. But he says as he writes to them, "Paul, call to be an apostle, called of God." Called of God. To be called of God is to somehow hear the voice of God. To hear the voice of God, Jesus calls us o'er the tumult of our lives while restlessly day

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by day his sweet voice sounded saying Christian follow me. Well sometimes we need others to help us hear the call. Samuel was just a lad and he heard the voice of God and he didn't know it. And he ran to Samuel, to Eli. Eli was the one who opened his eyes and his understanding to say next time you hear

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the voice answer it. The voice of God. The voice of God speaks to us now. It has spoken to us in the past and the voice of God will always be there as we go on on this journey through another year saying this is the way and be with us to walk. Call, call to be an apostle and then along with that is the name

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Sosthenes, Sosthenes our brother. In other words he has a revelation that Sosthenes is his companion in the struggle. He's not alone. He's with God and Sosthenes is the brother. And God leads us where he wants us to go. The missionary was in the jungles of Africa and had a guide,

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and asked the guide to lead him through the jungle. They traveled for hours through the jungle. The missionary said, "It may be better for you just to give me directions and let me find my way. Maybe I can do it quicker if you just leave me on my own.

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And he said, "No, there is no cut path through this jungle. "I am the way, follow me." So God through Jesus Christ comes to walk with us as we come through the jungle of this life.

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And he comforts us with his word saying, I am the way, I'm the way, walk with me. And so we walk with the Lord. And when you walk with the Lord,

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in the power of his might. You don't have to worry about what's going to happen. If you hold hands with God, someone has said, where there is a will,

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There is a way. So if we have the will, if we have the courage to keep our hand in the hand of God, God provides a way.

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I know that's true. He provides a path through the sea. He opens closed doors. He helps us over the hills.

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He leads us through the valleys. He prepares a table for us in the presence of our enemies. When we walk with the Lord, we need not be dismayed because he will lead us, as the old folk used to say,

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from one good degree of grace to another when we walk with the Lord. So thanks be to God that he gives us the courage, the courage to make the right decisions,

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the courage to hold on to his unchanging hand. Thanks be to God that he is with us on this journey as we embark upon one high level to the next with the presence of God.

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So, be not dismayed. May not have the things you'd like to have on this journey. Sometimes you have to make this trip with limited supplies. But make it anyhow.

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Have the courage to be who you are, no matter what the situation may be. Sometimes I'd be going out for a social event as a teenager and my mother would be in the bed and she would call out

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and I'd go to the door and she'd say, "Marvin, remember who you are." So remember who you are, you're a child of God. And that's enough.

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That's enough to say that I've put my life in the hands of God and He is able to direct me and to take care of me, God will. When you're in the will of God, He will take care of you through every day, all the way. God, God, God will take care of you.

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That's sort of a mystery. Mister, we don't understand that boy went away to college and he didn't have any money. He said, "We see here on your application, God as the reference, just God." So this is a Christian institution, and he invited me in.

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And he went on in, just on God. It's a mystery. That's the mystery in my life. That's the mystery in yours.

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God. I don't know what the future holds, and neither do you. We just say God. And when we put our hand in the hand of God,

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we have our hand linked with the mystery of our history. Thanks be to God. He gives us the courage to be in the midst of the waters of nothingness that threaten us. He gives us courage to be. We come now to the hymn of invitation and

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And as we sing it, let us all join in singing this hymn. Lord, this is what our ancestors said, Lord, I want to be, not act, but I want to be a Christian in my heart.

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In my heart, in my heart. Lord, I want to be a Christian in my heart. want to be God. I extend now the invitation to Christian discipleship, the invitation to accept Jesus Christ as Lord of your life, seek to walk in his

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steps, to follow his commands. We invite you to come, become a member of the family of God here at Ebenezer by letter by Christian experience on profession of faith. The door is open. Come. [MUSIC] ♪ In my heart ♪

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♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Lord, I want to be a Christian ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪

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♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Lord, I want to be a Christian ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪

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Lord, I want to live for loving in my heart, in my heart. Lord, I want to live for loving in my heart. [Music] [Music]

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♪ In my home ♪ ♪ In my home ♪ ♪ Lord, I want to be your slave ♪ ♪ In my home ♪

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♪ Lord, I want to be your home ♪ [Music] [Music] ♪ I want to keep your holy name in my heart ♪

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♪ Lord, I want to keep my holy name in my heart ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Lord, I want to be ♪ ♪ Followed here in my heart ♪

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♪ Lord, I want to be like Jesus ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Lord, I want ♪

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♪ To be like Jesus ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Take my heart ♪

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♪ In my heart ♪ ♪ Take my heart ♪ ♪ Lord, I want ♪ ♪ To be a Christian ♪

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♪ In my heart ♪ [Chorus singing] I would like for the following persons to meet here for just a moment, right here in the front row. General Marshall, Lord we thank you that you provide as creator for all of your creatures

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the courage to be, to be loving, to be true, to be brave. Grace, mercy, peace be with you from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. [MUSIC]