Participants: Shelley Quinn (Host), Jennifer Jill Schwirzer
Series Code: IAA
Program Code: IAA000314
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00:29 Hello, I'm Shelley Quinn and welcome again to
00:32 Issues and Answers Today our issue is going to be 00:36 about assertiveness. Can we be graciously assertive? Let me 00:40 read to you a scripture that I think goes really well with this 00:45 program. It comes from 2 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 7 and Paul 00:49 wrote to Timothy and he said: God did not give us a spirit of 00:55 fear but of power and love and a sound mind. That's what we're 00:59 going to be talking about today is gracious assertiveness. 01:04 Our special guest is Jennifer Schwirzer and Jennifer we thank 01:09 you so much for coming back. 01:10 It's great to be here, great to be here. 01:12 Now you are a Christian psychologist and also you're the 01:17 director of a ministry called Michael Ministry from 01:21 Philadelphia. I live in Philadelphia, that's 01:23 right. I operate my ministry out of my house in Philadelphia and 01:27 I have my counseling office in my house in Philadelphia. 01:29 Oh how I miss the days of working out of my home. 01:32 Oh I love it, I really love it. 01:34 We're going to be hitting on an issue today that's kind of 01:38 probably going to hit me a little bit square in the face 01:43 because as I was just sharing with you I can be a very 01:47 assertive person if it has to do with principle or with someone 01:51 else's rights. But when it comes to my own rights I'm not very 01:54 assertive at all because I'm a peacemaker. I don't like 01:57 confrontation and I've got an incredibly long fuse. When I go 02:01 out and minister you know you always try to minister from 02:04 personal experience but when you're ministering to someone 02:08 about anger issues it's difficult for me because it 02:12 takes... You know, I always tell them I'm speaking from theory 02:15 now because I have such a long fuse that it takes a whole lot 02:18 to make me angry. 02:19 You know what, I have the opposite problem. I have a 02:21 history I think genetically inherited from my father who 02:25 had a rage problem and also environmentally inherited just 02:29 witnessing him, you know, handling conflict in that way. 02:33 I adopted that into my own life and struggled with that for 02:37 years as a Christian. It's largely in the past at this 02:40 point but I would get in the conflicted situation and I'd 02:43 blow my stack. I remember my daughter saying one time daddy 02:47 had a short temper and I thought why is she saying he had a short 02:50 temper and then she looked at me and she said and you had a long 02:54 temper. So my kids know I really struggled with this issue and a 02:58 lot of my clients do too. They do the same thing. They fail to 03:02 assert themselves in the right time and in the right way and 03:05 then they end up setting themselves up for frustration 03:08 and they blow their stack. Very common, very common. 03:11 This is interesting. You know I grew up in a very argumentative 03:14 environment. It would be interesting to know if I was 03:19 always... My grandfather called me the ambassador in the family 03:22 because I was a peacemaker from the time I was a child. 03:25 You were always trying to smooth things over. 03:27 Always trying to smooth things over. So I determined in my life 03:30 that I don't want to live like that and, praise the Lord, I 03:34 married a man who is also a peacemaker. People say that's 03:38 not healthy for you that you never argue but both of us feel 03:43 that... As long as you're not avoiding 03:44 conflict. I do get concerned when married couples don't argue 03:47 at all because sometimes, not always, but sometimes it means 03:50 that they're just avoiding the problem. But then there are 03:52 some people with the temperament of a peacemaker and they just 03:55 get along. You know for us, we're just so 03:57 perfect... We're so perfectly matched that I don't feel like 04:02 there's anything that either one of us is stuffing. 04:05 Oh that's awesome, that's awesome. 04:06 So let's talk about this. Let's talk about both angles of it; 04:12 there's the lack of assertiveness and then there are 04:14 those who go beyond assertive to being aggressive is the word. 04:18 Do you agree that that's the next stage is aggressiveness. 04:21 And typically it's the same person and they go through a 04:24 cycle. It starts with a feeling that it's wrong, somehow it's 04:28 wrong to ask for me to ask for my rights to be granted me or my 04:31 desires to be granted me. It's wrong to say that. I should just 04:35 let other people have their way all the time and then what 04:38 happens is there's a withdrawal from that relationship where I'm 04:41 no longer really relating to that person. I'm no longer 04:44 present in the relationship. I am somewhere else and I'm kind 04:48 of viewing the relationship through a lens. So I've 04:51 withdrawn and then I start to feel oppressed in the 04:53 relationship because the person isn't really connected to me, 04:56 they're connected to a facade of me and then that sets me up for 05:00 an explosion of anger and then I feel guilty that I lost my 05:03 composure and then the cycle starts all over again because 05:06 I'm guilty and shamed and I feel like I can't assert myself. 05:09 So there are a number of people, clients that I have had that 05:12 I've had that cycle through that over and over again and what I 05:16 try to do is teach them. There's a very specific method that I 05:19 use that we're going to get to a little bit later as to how to 05:22 assert themselves in the right time and in the right way. 05:25 You threw me off. I'm sitting here looking quizzical because 05:28 you said typically it's the same person. I see people that just 05:32 seem aggressive and assertive all the time. 05:34 But you don't see them at home. I mean passive people, you don't 05:37 see those people at home. Sometime the passive ones... 05:41 You know the home life is what really brings out who you really 05:44 are. So sometimes you don't see all of what's there. 05:47 I see in my sister's life, she and her husband are both 05:50 incredibly assertive and intense. 05:53 How long have they been married? 05:56 Almost 30 years. Okay, okay. 05:58 They're doing something right. 06:00 They must be. Okay now let's talk about this guilt and anger 06:05 cycle. Okay. Well one of the questions 06:08 we have to tackle in the context of Christian counseling is do 06:12 Christians have rights. You hear people say Christians we don't 06:16 have rights, human beings don't have any rights and I agree with 06:19 that up to a point. In the context of our relationship to 06:23 God we really don't have any rights that are ours that have 06:27 derived from us innately so to speak. He grants us certain 06:31 rights. They're God-given rights but in terms of our relationship 06:35 to him we don't have anything that we can boast about before 06:38 him or we can claim as our right except one thing and that's our 06:42 grave. That's the only thing that we are entitled to before 06:45 him. But that doesn't mean that we don't have any 06:47 Our grave? Our grave yes. The wages of sin is death. That's 06:51 the only thing we have coming to us by rights that we are 06:55 entitled to. But in the context of our relationships with other 06:59 people we do have rights and that's where we need to make a 07:02 very clear distinction. Because perpetrators will use this 07:06 notion that you don't have any rights to perpetrate on their 07:10 victims by trying to deprive them of their rights in the 07:13 context of a human relationship. In the context of human 07:17 relationships I do have rights. They are God-give rights and so 07:21 I need to learn the proper way of asserting those rights. 07:24 So let me back up and make sure I understood what you just said. 07:29 Let's do it by example. For example when you're talking 07:32 about the perpetrator will try to tell... let's use an abusive 07:36 husband will try to tell the wife submit to you husband 07:40 total submission and they're taking a Bible verse and... 07:43 twisting it out of context that you have no rights. You've got 07:47 to do what I said. I'm the head of the household so you have to 07:50 do everything I say the way I said it and if I beat on you 07:54 it's your fault, you deserve it. That's right, that's right. 07:59 Then there are parents who will absolutely take away the child's 08:05 idea that they have any right to their own opinion. So what 08:09 we're talking about here is saying innately if we're looking 08:13 to the Lord the only right we can claim, as you said, the 08:17 grave but God, what a privilege it is to be his child, 08:21 has given us all these rights then we don't have to let people 08:26 just walk over us and beat us up and try to manipulate our 08:30 mind. What we should be looking to is in the word of God to know 08:34 who we are and what God says. 08:36 That's exactly right and what happens to Christians is they 08:40 run into difficulty here because they feel that to assert their 08:43 rights is contradictory to the gospel or to the whole message 08:47 of laying yourself down for the good of others. But I maintain 08:51 that there is a way of asserting our rights that is not just a 08:54 benefit to us but a benefit to the person that we're being 08:58 assertive with. So it isn't a self-centered assertiveness. 09:01 It is an others-centered assertiveness. It's the best 09:04 thing for us, it's the best thing for them, and it's the 09:06 best thing for the relationship. So it is kind of a God-centered 09:10 gospel-based form of assertiveness. And what I find 09:13 is that if it isn't a gospel- based form of assertiveness 09:16 what happens is people get really egotistical or really 09:19 puffed up and I'm going to claim my rights and it lasts for 09:23 awhile but they end up alienating people, they end up 09:25 as they are supposedly maintaining their own rights 09:28 they end up running rough shod over the rights of other people. 09:31 Give us an example of when it would be right to assert 09:34 yourself. Well okay, good question. In an 09:40 abusive situation. A wife needs to recognize that merely 09:45 overlooking the abuse that's being brought upon her is 09:49 harming the husband as much as it's harming her and she needs 09:53 to recognize that asserting herself in that situation and 09:57 laying down some healthy boundaries is the best thing for 10:00 everyone concerned and it's a very Christ-centered thing to do 10:05 In fact, it's very selfish to fail to claim one's own rights 10:09 in a relationship because what you're doing is setting that 10:13 person up for failure in other relationships. 10:16 You're conditioning them to expect absolute submission and 10:19 it's not a healthy thing. 10:21 Let's take it out side of that. There's many areas in our lives 10:29 where things are being superimposed upon us, if you 10:33 would, and someone else is imposing their will and 10:38 sometimes it's contrary to the will of God on us and in a 10:42 relationship maybe because you are afraid of confrontation you 10:46 just have this tendency to withdraw and let the bully get 10:51 away with it. So how would you counsel somebody to get out of 10:56 that withdrawal syndrome? 10:58 Well the first thing I would do is I would establish with them 11:02 that our example Jesus Christ was very assertive. Most people 11:06 don't realize that. They say oh he went to the cross and they 11:09 beat him and they tortured him and he just let them do all 11:12 these things but as I've studied the passion, and I want to go 11:16 through a few texts here. This is so powerful. I mean, I get 11:19 like chills when I think about this because Jesus was the most 11:24 present person in a relationship He showed up for relationships. 11:28 What happens when people don't assert themselves is they 11:30 withdraw from relationships and the individual they're relating 11:33 to is relating to a facade of them. They're not really showing 11:37 up for the relationship. Jesus was very present in 11:40 relationships and he was willing to tell people who he was. 11:43 For instance when you go through the story of the passion 11:46 you find over and over again Jesus says things to the effect 11:49 of I'm not here because I have to be here. I'm here because I 11:53 choose to be here. In other words, I am not the victim. I'm 11:56 here because this is God's will for me and I choose to follow 12:00 God's will. For instance Peter, he said put your sword back, all 12:04 who live by the sword will die by the sword. Don't you know 12:06 that I could pray right now and my father would send me more 12:09 than 12 legions of angels. But how would the scriptures be 12:13 fulfilled that it must happen thus. The cup that my Father has 12:16 given me, shouldn't I drink it? In other words, I'm following 12:19 God's plan. I'm not here because I have to be. It's not a lack of 12:23 power. It's my choice that put me here. Then you go on to Jesus 12:27 before Annas and they asked him about his disciples and his 12:31 doctrine we're told. He said, You know I spoke openly. 12:33 I taught in the synagogues, people witnessed what I taught. 12:37 Ask them what I said. And then the attendant got very angry and 12:41 slapped him and Jesus said to the attendant, If I have spoken 12:44 evil tell me what the evil is but if I haven't then why are 12:48 you slapping me? In other words, he's continually confronting 12:52 them with what they're doing to him and with who he is. He's 12:55 very present in the relationship He is submitting to the abuse 12:59 it's true but that was a necessary part of laying down 13:02 his life for the salvation of humanity. It was what he chose 13:06 to do at that time. But he wasn't a victim in the midst of 13:09 it. He said no one takes my life from me. I lay it down of my own 13:13 accord. Isn't that cool. Okay so let's go on. Then he was before 13:17 Caiaphas and Caiaphas says did you say that you're the Son of 13:21 man. And Jesus said, you have said, I agree with you, he said, 13:24 but hereafter you will see the Son of Man coming on the right 13:27 hand of power coming in the clouds of glory. In other words, 13:31 Do you know who I am, Caiaphas? I'm the Messiah, I am God's Son 13:35 and you're going to see me coming in power. So he was, as 13:38 I said before, present in the relationship. He was not afraid 13:41 to say who he was. And what happens when people lack the 13:44 appropriate kind of assertiveness is they're afraid 13:47 to say who they are. The wife is afraid to say to the husband, 13:51 Look I'm your wife. You're to treat me in this way according 13:54 to God's standard. You're to love and cherish me. You know, 13:57 we're afraid to do that because we will get resistance from that 14:01 person and experience further rejection. And then one more 14:04 example and then we'll go into more detail, but Pilot; you 14:09 remember Pilot got very angry and he said you know your own 14:12 nation has delivered you to me. What have you done? And Jesus 14:16 said my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom was of this 14:19 world then my servants would fight. But I'm only here 14:24 because I've chosen not to fight Then Pilot got very angry a 14:27 little while later and he said don't you now that I have power 14:31 to crucify you or power to release you and Jesus said you 14:34 would have no power at all if it were not given to you from 14:38 above. So over and over again he's telling people I am God's 14:41 Son, I am the Messiah, I have all of heaven at my command. 14:45 I am here because I choose to be here, not because I have to be 14:48 here. In other words, Jesus told people who he really was. 14:53 And at the same time he was absolutely totally humble. 14:58 He had the spirit of humility. It wasn't that here I am look at 15:02 me. It was this is who I am. You have your choice to accept me or 15:07 reject me and he was trying to show them the truth. I think 15:13 especially for women that there's a difference between 15:20 being assertive and aggressive. Let's establish that because 15:24 there's this negative connotation of a woman 15:26 who asserts herself and sometimes 15:28 men will say well she's aggressive and sometimes 15:31 women don't what the distinction is between being aggressive and 15:35 being assertive so let's establish that baseline. 15:39 It isn't just about women, but it's true that women often get 15:43 labeled with negative evaluations if they are 15:47 assertive. They're kind of in some circles and some cultures 15:51 expected to be very kind of submissive and meek and quiet 15:54 and invisible even. There's a place for that. You know the 15:58 scriptures tell us that a meek and quiet spirit is of great 16:02 price. So I don't want to belittle that, but on the other 16:05 hand there's a boldness in the Lord that God's daughters need 16:09 to have. What I do with my clients that are struggling with 16:14 assertiveness issues is I teach them a technique called RAD. 16:19 I like to use mnemonics because mnemonics are easy to remember 16:22 and I keep them real simple like three letters. So what RAD is 16:25 it's a protocol, it's a process where you start out with the 16:29 most gentle form of assertiveness, then you bring it 16:31 up a notch if that doesn't work and then you bring it up to the 16:34 final form which is a very demanding, very assertive 16:38 thing if the other two didn't work. Usually the problem is 16:42 solved with the first step but we don't bother with the first 16:45 step. Typically people like for instance in a marriage will go 16:48 straight to the last step of being very demanding. They won't 16:52 even try the more gentle forms of assertiveness. So this is 16:57 what I try to help people to develop. It's RAD, it's a 17:01 radical kind of gracious assertiveness so it starts with 17:06 request. The first thing you do is you ask for the person to 17:10 give you what you want. I mean that sounds like sort of a duh 17:13 as we would say. But it's not a duh because it's amazing how 17:16 many people don't do this. It's amazing we don't do this. 17:20 We don't think of just asking for things that we need or want 17:24 or even for our rights. I think we can in certain situations ask 17:28 for our rights to be granted if the person is overlooking them 17:32 accidentally or insensitively. So the first think you do is you 17:36 just ask for what you want, what you think you have coming. I can 17:39 think of one client who was really troubled because her 17:43 husband was not providing enough affection for her, he 17:46 wasn't physically affectionate. It really made her feel bad and 17:49 she would get very demanding with him, You should be more 17:53 loving to me. And it wasn't working. I always ask is this 17:55 working, how well is this working for you. And they say 17:58 no. Is it giving you what you want. No it's not working. 18:00 So I said try just asking for it She came back the next week and 18:04 she was like, This is great. I asked him to kiss me and now 18:07 he's kissing me and it's just awesome. But we don't think of 18:11 that so we start with just requesting, just request, you 18:15 know, ask for it. Ask and you shall receive. Then the second 18:19 step is appeal. If the request doesn't work and it will not 18:23 always work, you appeal to the person's conscience. You add a 18:27 little bit of pressure to the mix. You tell them, you know 18:30 would you like it if I treated you that way? Or would you like 18:33 it if I ignored you when you walked in the door. You try to 18:36 to just appeal to their conscience. Add a little bit of 18:39 guilt, not a lot but just a little bit and see if that like 18:42 sort of wakes up their conscience and then finally if 18:45 that doesn't work you use a more demanding approach. So it's 18:49 Request, Appeal, Demand. The third step is to demand and 18:53 there are times when we will have to demand our rights. 18:56 In a work situation where the boss is not being honest or not 19:00 giving us what he promised or in a marriage situation where 19:03 our rights are being violated. We will at times have to say 19:06 look if this doesn't change I'm moving out or if this doesn't 19:09 change I'm going to seek other employment. That is the last 19:13 resort though because typically demanding something shuts a 19:17 person down emotionally. So we want to only use that as a last 19:20 resort. So request, appeal and demand. 19:23 There's an example coming to my mind and I don't know that I can 19:27 even articulate this but let's say that someone at work is a... 19:31 I think many people have worked with someone like this. You work 19:34 with someone who's a glory hog. For example, you've got all 19:38 these wonderful ideas and they take credit for everything and 19:42 then that leaves the person, if they never get credit for it, 19:45 especially if they're in the corporate world they're never 19:49 going to be able to advance. So instead of going in and 19:53 demanding and saying I need to get the credit for this one, the 19:56 credit is due. What they should do is go to their boss and say 20:00 you know I would like when I put these together and stuff 20:06 when you present it, if I could get the credit. 20:08 And you know Christians might be prone to say well that would 20:11 be too proud. But if they're really honest with themselves 20:14 they'll admit that it bothers them that someone else is 20:17 getting the credit for what they did. Here's the thing, Shelley, 20:20 is Jesus did say if someone strikes you on one cheek turn 20:23 the other, offer him that cheek as well. If he takes your coat 20:26 give him your cloak as well. So there's a place for being 20:28 totally submissive. I'm not sure though that Jesus was talking 20:32 about a close relationship there If you're going to be working 20:36 closely with people there has to be a certain equality in the 20:40 relationship. So there is a place in an intimate 20:42 relationship where asking for things just like that example 20:46 you just gave saying I really need you to give me credit 20:49 because I would feel better working for you if I knew you... 20:52 Well the appeal could be then if that's not working, the appeal 20:57 could be I need some of these things in my file so that I can 21:01 be considered for advancement and promotion. I have seen so 21:05 many people... Now see that's where I'll get assertive is 21:09 where I'll see somebody within a corporate realm that is 21:13 trouncing on somebody else. They're trying to keep... I've 21:16 worked with some people who the people who worked for them I 21:19 don't know how they even did it. But you'll see that you in a 21:23 group setting and somebody comes up with the idea and even does 21:26 all the leg work on it and then someone else presents it to the 21:29 top management as if it were all their idea. I've even seen 21:33 who've been promoted and that old Peter principle; they got 21:37 promoted beyond what was beyond their own ability simply because 21:40 the ideas were never theirs, they were from people under them 21:43 They knew how to steal thunder. 21:44 Steal thunder. So for me for some reason I think that's very 21:48 important that people are affirmed in that way plus it 21:52 helps them. Like I said, this may not be a great example 21:55 particularly to try to air here in just a few minutes. 21:59 Well here's a scripture that might help and when I read this 22:02 just recently it just went like stab right in my heart because 22:05 I was in the middle of a situation in which I was not 22:08 getting credit for something and it bothered me. I felt very 22:11 wounded by it but I never got up the nerve to say anything 22:14 about it and then I read this. When Jesus gave his first 22:18 scripture reading he read the passage from Isaiah that says 22:21 the Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has 22:24 anointed me to preach glad tidings to the meek, bind up the 22:27 broken hearted, set at liberty them that are bound, to proclaim 22:30 the acceptable year of the Lord, just this wonderful description 22:34 of the Messiah and his mission. He finished reading that passage 22:37 and we're told that he closed the scroll and handed it back to 22:41 the attendant and that all eyes were upon him. Now I can just 22:45 imagine the tension in the air when Jesus read that. People 22:50 somehow sensing that the very fulfillment of those prophecies 22:54 was reading them out of the scroll and the tension in the 22:58 air in that moment, all eyes upon him and then he said to the 23:02 people, and the air is dead silent, he said today this 23:05 scripture is fulfilled in your ears. When I read that, Shelley, 23:08 I just said Jesus was not afraid to say who he was. That's 23:11 assertiveness, that's gracious assertiveness. It's for their 23:15 good to know who he is. Sometimes it's for people's good 23:18 to know the role we have served in their lives and we need to 23:22 just ask them for proper recognition. 23:24 I don't want people to get the wrong idea because I used that 23:28 example because I don't think it's important that we all get 23:32 credit for what we do. There are times though when somebody is 23:35 being stepped on and that was just one example but there are 23:39 times when something is repeatedly happening that 23:42 whatever it is we need to first go to them and request that this 23:47 behavior stop. If they don't we need to appeal to them 23:50 explaining what our reason is and how would they feel if 23:53 this was happening to them and then third is to make a gracious 23:57 demand saying that this is not acceptable. 24:00 That's right. This would be the consequence if this need isn't 24:03 filled. That's excellent. You have really grasped this thing. 24:08 I get an A. We've just got a few minutes left. Tell us how to 24:13 make a gracious demand because we're talking about being as 24:17 Christians graciously assertive. We don't want this to be 24:21 something that we're going out and it's me, me, me, or I, I, I. 24:24 But how can you be graciously assertive? 24:27 First step we need to deal with our own wrong ideas about 24:30 assertiveness. Sometimes we're afraid of making people angry 24:33 or we assume that they'll become angry. We need to deal with our 24:36 own thinking. They won't necessarily become angry. 24:39 We also need to deal with the fear of hurting people. 24:41 Sometimes hurt is a good thing. We shouldn't be so concerned or 24:46 so protective towards other people's feelings that we 24:49 withhold what they really need which is kind of a revelation of 24:52 what's going on with us. And then another thing that is an 24:56 idol for many is the desire to be popular. Being popular isn't 25:00 all it's cracked up to be. Jesus said beware when all men speak 25:03 well of you. So a little unpopularity is actually a good 25:07 sign. So we need to first deal with our own thinking. But then 25:09 what I'd recommend in terms of dealing directly with a person 25:12 in a tense situation is to make a sandwich. Begin with an 25:15 affirmation. This is what I love about working with you or this 25:19 is what I love about being married to you. These are your 25:22 good qualities. Then you put the tough stuff in the middle and 25:25 then you end with another soft piece of bread so to speak. 25:28 Something that's affirming and kind and gives them a sense that 25:32 there's good there, you're not condemning them, you don't have 25:37 contempt for them. Give them a definite sense of this is what 25:40 you would need to do to fix this situation for me. Don't just 25:44 condemn them for what they're doing but give them definite 25:47 concrete goals that they can achieve that will better the 25:51 situation. To me there's nothing worse than 25:55 a demanding person. So when you meet someone that's constantly 26:00 have to have it their way, we're not trying to set that example 26:04 up here. But what we're saying is that there are times when 26:08 you see principles being violated that are very important 26:13 Christian principles, that there are times to stand up whether it 26:17 is something that has to do with self or with your children or in 26:21 your work place, there are times to stand up and say I need... 26:26 this is not right, here's what I would like. That's the request 26:31 then there's the appeal and then the demand is by saying however 26:35 you said, sandwich it to go in there and it's not being 26:38 demanding but it is saying this is unacceptable. Here is what is 26:43 acceptable and therein lies the demand. 26:45 That's good. I can tell you've dealt with a lot of these types 26:49 of situations and you've grasped right onto them. It's affirming 26:52 to me because I sort of came up with this idea because it works. 26:55 But, yeah I think it's helpful. 26:57 I like the RAD. Request, Appeal, Demand. 27:00 So thank you so much, Jennifer. Our time just flies by when 27:04 your here. This is good. Thank you for coming and we want to 27:08 have you come back again. Sounds good. 27:10 For those of you at home, I hope that you don't take anything 27:13 out of context that we said today because we're not trying 27:16 to make you a demanding Christian that has to have 27:19 your way, but rather to learn to accept that spirit of power, 27:24 love and self-discipline and know when to stand up for the 27:27 principles of God's word. What's right and what should be 27:32 happening. Remember request, appeal and then a gracious 27:36 demand so that you have those stages up and you can bring 27:42 into the picture the reality that God wants there to be. 27:47 Now I pray that the love of the Father, the grace of our Lord 27:52 Jesus Christ and the fellowship 27:54 of the Holy Spirit will be with you throughout the day. |
Revised 2014-12-17