Welcome to the Friday Five! Every Friday we share our top five articles, stories, and quotes for you to read and share with your friends and church families.
"No more separate restrooms for boys and girls, with rows of feet-showing stalls. The North Kansas City school district is going fully gender neutral at two new elementary schools, opening on Wednesday, as well as in a few renovated restrooms in North Kansas City High School and the sixth-grade centers."
4. WRAL: Judge issues injunction, delays ballot printing over Supreme Court race
UPDATE: "A Wake County judge issued injunctions Monday to keep the state from printing ballots in the November elections unless a pair of of candidates who've sued are identified as members of their preferred political parties. Chris Anglin and Rebecca Edwards switched their party registrations shortly before filing for office, missing a legal deadline."
"Turkey on Wednesday rejected the U.S.' appeal for an American pastor's release from detention, Turkish media reported. Pastor Andrew Brunson's lawyer renewed an appeal on Tuesday for Brunson’s release from house arrest and for his travel ban to be lifted."

WEEKLY PRAYER: FAMILY
LORD, we cry out to you as Father. You are a beautiful Dad. You are a model of the love, mercy, and authority of the perfect parent. We thank you for modeling for us what every parent should strive for, and for creating this wonderful institution called family.
LORD, we thank you for creating us with a basic nature designed to not be alone. Our very nature calls us into the most intimate of relationships, where we experience joys indescribable: the joys of marriage, the joys of having children; the joys of seeing our children have children. What a blessing and mercy you gave us in the family! In it we find our first teachers, our first guardians, and our first authorities.
LORD, we recognize how deeply you love your children, and how deeply it pains you when they go astray. Alongside our adoration and thanksgiving, we pray in confession--as individuals and as members of larger communities--over any sins we may have committed that undermine your beloved institution. Forgive us when we endanger your institution through selfishness and arrogance. Forgive our communities and nation for attempting to redefine some of the most basic and deepest parts of being human--being made male and female, having lifelong marriage vows and responsibilities, and having parental rights over educating one's children.
LORD, we also bring these specific prayer requests to you, and pray that your Spirit may empower and protect our labor: LORD, be with those individuals in our state who suffer from drug addictions. We particularly pray today for those suffering from addiction to opioids, which continues to be a growing epidemic in our state. We also pray for Pastor Andrew Brunson's family. Embolden them during their current trial. Finally, we pray for all the parents sending their children back to school this month. Father, protect those children, and be with their various teachers and student officials.
"Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." (Colossians 3:12-17)
Amen