Pastor Hector Boucet

The question is not what did we learn. The question is what are we going to do with what we’ve learned?

“Today, we’re not going to have a sermon,” Pastor Hector Boucet told the room. “I’m going to talk less. You guys are going to talk more.” For the final week of United as One Body, he divided the congregation at The Gathering Church into five small groups — deliberately mixing people who least expected to sit together — and handed the night over to them.

He anchored the evening in the theme verse that had carried the entire series, reminding everyone that a body only works when each individual part does its own work.

“From HIM the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”

Ephesians 4:16

Pastor Boucet walked the church back through the series: week one, we are one body; week two, we build one another up; week three, we grow through the WORD and prayer; week four, we reach others together. Then he narrowed it to the only question that mattered on the final night. “The question is not what did we learn,” he said. “The question is what are we going to do with what we’ve learned?”

It is easy, he admitted, to fill notebooks week after week and change nothing. “Click and do that change,” he urged. “Not stay the same way every single week.” He also warned against performing holiness for other people: “You don’t need to demonstrate to me that you’re the most holy. HE needs to see it.”

“The question is not what did we learn. The question is what are we going to do with what we’ve learned?”

— Pastor Hector Boucet

Each group worked through five questions and reported back. On the biggest lesson GOD taught them during the series, the answers echoed each other across every group: be united in CHRIST. Be doers, not just hearers. Shine your light and share the WORD. Pray for people without shame. Be patient, don’t judge, don’t worry — take action. Be a seed planter. Step out of your comfort zone. Know that there is purpose in it.

On what they would personally change, prayer came up again and again — being intentional with it, praying more, praying in the moment, praying for others. Others named seeking GOD first in everything, reading and meditating on the Bible more, inviting people to church, encouraging others, staying consistent and committed, refusing to isolate themselves, shutting down gossip, being more humble, and using the gifts GOD has given them.

Asked how the church could become even more united, groups pointed to fellowship and shared meals, worship and prayer together, calling and checking on one another, visiting each other, more Bible study and accountability, following up after prayer, and reaching out — especially to the youth. Several visitors said walking through the doors felt like stepping into a family’s living room. One shared that she felt like she had known someone forever after only a short time. Another, now returning home, said simply: “Our hearts are still here.”

When it came to serving, hands went up for hospitality, prayer, outreach, youth, worship, ushering, children’s church, preaching, teaching, cleaning — and, as Pastor Boucet noted with a laugh, a whole lot of cleaning. Many simply wrote “wherever GOD wants me to be.”

“Now you are the body of CHRIST, and each one of you is a part of HIM.”

1 Corinthians 12:27

Each person then filled out an index card completing five sentences: because of this series, I will… GOD has challenged me to… one person I will intentionally encourage is… one person I will invite to church is… one ministry I want to help with is. “This is not a contract,” Pastor Boucet emphasized. “This is something between you and GOD. The HOLY SPIRIT has put things in your heart — that’s the reason why you wrote what you wrote.” He offered to collect the cards and pray over them, or let people keep them.

The night closed with a symbolic exercise called Build the Body. Everyone wrote their name on a piece and, on the back, the quality GOD was calling them toward — love, faith, prayer, unity, forgiveness, compassion, joy, encouragement — then came forward and placed it together with the others. One body, assembled piece by piece, right there in the room.

Pastor Boucet also shared something the LORD had placed on his heart during worship that evening: take the songs out to the beach. Set up the speakers, sing, and let people be drawn in and touched right where they are. “We are here,” he said. “But the LORD wants us out there also now.”

“This exercise opened our hearts. It opened our minds — for us to just say, where am I stuck that I need to open up?”

Pastor Hector Boucet

Living it out was never meant to be one more page of notes. Five weeks of teaching came down to index cards, honest conversation with people you don’t normally sit beside, and a room full of believers naming out loud the one thing they will actually do. That is how a body grows — as each part does its work.

Watch the Full Service

Watch Pastor Hector Boucet and The Gathering Church close out Living It Out — Part 5, United As One Body Series — August 18, 2026.

Reflect & Respond

Because of this series, what will you actually do — and which part of the body is GOD calling you to be?