I'm gonna be looking in Jude, the book of Jude. Each week for about the last 23 years, the Lord has enabled me, given me a message to print and share with some who are desirous of reading it. And I print that every week and put several copies back on the back table. And there are more Copies of that left sometimes than are taken.

Now some of you are on the mailing list and you get those messages in your email. But some of you are not on my mailing list. And it is not an affront to me that you don't take those and read them. Because I understand that anything that I would write would be a gift from the Lord. If it's true, if it's not, then it's not worthy of reading anyway. But I would exhort you. If you don't get it in email, to pick up a copy of that and read it, I think you'd profit from it.

And I know that everybody reads something during the week. There's not anybody that doesn't read something if it's nothing more than a billboard going down the road. And sadly, much of the stuff that we read and occupy our mind with, we'd be better off if we didn't. You know, we'd be better off just to sleep than we would to put some of the stuff in our mind that we do. But I would exhort you to read that, not because I wrote it, not because I'm seeking fame. If I was seeking fame, I'd probably be doing it somewhere else. But, you know, because I think it would profit you.

And I think if the Lord gave it to me, then he didn't give it to me simply for my sake, although it is a blessing to me each time that the Lord gives me something to write, but I believe that he gives those things for the benefit of God's people. And so I would just exhort you to do that as you are enabled. And if you can't read, then I will be glad to see what I can do to help you. You know, and that Linda is a teacher, and she was a reading coach, and she can teach you how to read if you can't. So, huh? So may the Lord help us, and don't take that as me coming down hard on you, but just for your benefit. and you'll help.

So we're looking in Jude, and I've been looking here for a few weeks. Jude. I'm gonna begin, now we looked at some of these verses last week, but I'm gonna read some of this, because really, you have to read these verses I'm going to read in continuation so that you get the context of what it is because there's some verses in this passage here in Jude that if you just try to take them out and you try to ascertain what Jude is saying just on reading that one verse, you're going to be very puzzled. And you might be even when you read it in the context, and I might be when I get through. But nonetheless, I believe this is a passage of scripture that has to be taken as a whole or there's some great stumbling blocks here and things people get off on this tangent and that about which in reality shouldn't happen.

But nonetheless, so beginning in verse three, It says, Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the saints. Now there's the exhortation. He's exhorting them. He says, I gave diligence to write unto you. It was needful and it to exhort you to earnestly contend, that is strive for the faith. Seek the truth. Don't be turned aside from one side to the next. And then he gives the reason for his warning here. For there are certain men crept in unawares who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.

I will therefore put you in remembrance that though you once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believe not. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitations, he has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness, under the judgment of the great day.

Even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities. Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.

But these speak evil of those things which they know not. But what they know naturally is brute beast, and those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them! For they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the heir of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Corrie.

These are spots in your feasts of charity when they feast without you, feeding themselves without fear. Clouds they are without water, carried about of winds, trees whose fruit withereth. Without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots, raging waves of the sea. foaming out their own shame, wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

And Enoch also the seventh from Adam prophesied of these, saying, behold, the Lord cometh with 10,000 of his saints to execute judgment upon all and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches, which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

These are murmurs, complainers, walking after their own lusts, and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having persons in admiration because of advantage.

Now we're gonna stop there, because all of that is descriptive of those whom he is speaking of here in the fourth verse, who are those who have crept in unawares, or they've crept in stealthily. They didn't come in an open way saying, hey, I'm gonna come here to deceive you. I've come here to teach you something that's not true. I've come here to teach you something that is not of the Lord.

No, they came in stealthily, and how did they do it? They came saying, thus saith the Lord. They came saying, this is a better way. Listen to this. And they came with the scripture. Because you remember when Satan, Tempted the Lord Jesus Christ in the wilderness after he had fasted for 40 days. He used the scriptures He came to him and he said hadn't God said this. I And so it is that the gainsayers, those whom he's speaking of, these ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, that is, the way of the flesh.

Now, lasciviousness can have reference to sexual impropriety and immorality, but it can also have to do with any sin that is bound in the flesh. as men would seek after riches, or they would seek after anything that builds up men in the flesh. That could be considered as lasciviousness. And so that's the purpose of them, is to take the grace of God, the truth of God, that which appears to us as being one thing, they have taken it and made it into something that it is not.

Now Paul was accused, as we all know, of preaching grace, or preaching that sin may abound in the name of preaching grace. And Paul said, God forbid, how can we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? So the power of grace is in the operation of the Spirit of God upon the people of God to show them what sin is and then to work in them both the will and to do of His good pleasure that they might desire to escape it.

See, the man that's satisfied in his sin or is wanting to increase in his sin, he can't possibly be walking in the grace of God. A man that will make excuses for his sin is not walking in the grace of God.

Now we're all, I mean, we're all sinners. We're all in the flesh. And the Spirit of God wars against the flesh. The Spirit of God that works in us wars against the flesh. And the flesh desires its own way. The flesh delights in lasciviousness. The flesh delights in everything that the flesh works in. I mean, that's the realm of the flesh.

And so it is that we need to be ever mindful because we as the children of God who are the true children of grace know what, we know what the truth about these matters is. See, we're not ignorant. When, When Paul's writing to the Thessalonians, I believe it was, or perhaps to Timothy, he said that the day of the Lord shall overtake the world as a thief in the night. But he said, brethren, we are not in the darkness. That day should overtake us as a thief in the night.

See, there's a difference between those who have been given eyes to see the truth as it is in Christ and those who have not. And the coming of the Lord will come upon the world as a great calamity. It will come upon the world as an amazing thing that they have no concept or no consideration.

Now it surely be a glorious thing for all of us, but we expect it. See, we believe that he's coming again. He said he was. And most assuredly, these things that we see in the world, they do not cause us to delight to stay in this world. I mean, when we look around us and we see the wickedness of this world, we're not wanting it to be improved. We want to get out of it, because we know there's no improvement of it. It doesn't make any difference what men do, it's still going to be the same.

How many peace treaties that men sign, there's always going to be peace. The ink hadn't even dried on the pages of the recent peace agreement, and both sides were still killing one another. And so it will be to the time of the end, and we know that. And so we're not to be as those who, these men that come in unawares. We see them. We warn one another about them. And they, you know, there's all manner of error that has crept in, calling itself preaching the word of God. denying, and of course the major things that he says here that are the identifying factors is they turn the grace of God into lasciviousness. That is, their concept of what it is to be in Christ and walking in faith is that which promotes the flesh. Now when you listen to these health and wealth preachers, They may say a lot of things that are good, beneficial, and whatever, but the crux of their message is appealing to the flesh of men.

Anybody that would seek to gain men to come into the kingdom of God so that they can become wealthier, They can become healthier or any of these things. They can benefit themselves in this world by coming to the Lord is not the preaching of the grace of God.

I'm not preaching to you that you might be healed from some physical malady and so that when you're healed, you'll say, oh, praise God, I've been healed and I'm on follow the Lord. That's not. That's not the message we're sent to preach.

Because dear brethren, if you are healed of every disease that ever's known to man, and you live to be 150 years old, if you don't have a love of Jesus Christ wrought in your heart, given you by the Spirit of God that constrains you to love him and to love his way, you have missed the truth. Now that's just the hard facts.

And now there's plenty of preaching today. You don't have to go very far to hear preaching, especially on Sunday mornings. You can turn the radio on and you can get it on about every channel that's on there, somebody telling something. But there are many who are crept in unawares and they are stealthily and they are teaching lies because they are causing men to desire some benefit in the flesh.

Now, and they're denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. To put Jesus Christ in some position that makes him less than the eternal God is to deny who he is. He said who he was. The scriptures say who He is. There's no denying, there's no doubting it. He is the everlasting Father, according to what Isaiah's prophecy is, I shall call Him the everlasting Father. He is God with us. He's the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And to deny that, is exactly what he's describing here.

Why would we want to do that? We want to do whatever the scripture says. You see, there's nothing heretical about saying Jesus Christ is God. That Jesus Christ is the only revelation of God that any man will ever have. Nothing heretical about that, that's the absolute truth. And anybody that comes telling you something different than that, is not telling you what the truth of God is.

I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this. Now see, he's saying to them, look, just think back. You've known this. This is something that you, especially as Jews, which primarily those he's writing to are Jews, he's saying, you've known this. You've been taught these things ever since you were knee high. how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

Now he brought a host out of Egypt, but there wasn't but a handful of them that ever made it to the promised land. And he says that by way of warning. Because there's always among the people of God the tares that are sown as the Lord said, and they'll grow to the time of the harvest. And I have no way of knowing who the tares are. I do, by the grace of God, desire not to be one. And I believe that all of those who are indeed not the tares, their greatest fear would be that they would be a tare.

The religious man, he says, you're making it too difficult. It's more simple than that. If we just make a decision and we show up to church every Sunday and we kind of go through the motions, why, that means something. But remember, when the Lord gathered in the great multitude, or when he said the master of the wedding feast gathered in the great multitude, and then when he came in, he looked out among that crowd that was there, and he pointed out somebody. He said, what are you doing here? He says, you don't have on a wedding garment. And he cast him out. And that's what he's speaking about here. He said after he saved the people out of the land of Egypt, he destroyed them that believed not. They didn't believe him. They doubted him. They went their own way.

And then he says, and he's giving these examples one after the other. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation. He hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

Now, you know, that's, we don't know a lot about what he's speaking about here. The Lord doesn't give us a lot of detail about this. But there are verses here and there in the scripture that speaks about the fact that there was a rebellion in the heavens before we were ever on the scene. And out of that the Lord cast out those who were not the elect angels. Those who rebelled against him. Those who hated the way of God.

Now how did they come into being? He made them. What'd he make them for? He made them to destroy them. that he might show his mercy and his grace to the sons of men who have each one committed the exact same sins as those angels which are bound in everlasting darkness. Why does the Lord not save everybody? For the very same reason. the Lord will manifest the glory of his grace. It's not for our sake, per se. I mean, we are the beneficiaries of it, but keep in mind that the Lord has saved his people for his glory. See, the Lord has saved, the Lord saves men that he might be glorified, not that they might be glorified. Now, they are glorified. In it, he has brought glory to them, but for his sake.

Now, some people say, well, that's pretty selfish. Well, he's God. He says, I am the Lord and there is none else. He says, I make peace and create evil. I form the light and create darkness. What are we gonna say about that? But fall down and worship him. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. Oh, to be an object of his mercy. What a glorious place for a man to be.

When you think about the fact that the angels, which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, just like Adam did in the garden, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. They're in everlasting chains under darkness. Now think about this for a minute. There seems to be, as I read that, a finality to their place. They're reserved unto this darkness. Says here, in everlasting chains, In other words, they're chains that can never be taken away because the Lord's purpose for them is to destroy them. The judgment of the great day. Scripture speaks about there is coming a day when the Lord will judge all things. And Satan and his angels And all who are not found written in the Lamb's book of life shall be cast into the lake of fire. Now that's what the scripture says. You make of that what you will. But it is a place of total destruction in my understanding of what he's saying here. It's a final judgment. there's coming a destruction just like he says here, even as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh are set forth, for example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

Now what is this eternal fire? Eternal fire is fire that is total, is complete. Now we don't think, I mean you can't go over to Sodom where Sodom and Gomorrah was and see fire burning, can you? But they suffered the consequences of eternal fire according to what this says. Now there again, you know you make of that what you will. Now do I believe the wicked will be punished? Yes, an everlasting fire. Do I believe that men have an immortal soul? No. Now that poses a great problem in the minds of some because they've got more of their ideas about what God will do with the wicked from reading something like Dante's Inferno or listening to the Catholic Church than they do about reading what the Bible says about it. Now I know there's many that would say what I just said as an error. You know, because they want to picture man in the hands of God as having an immortal soul and writhing in pain forever and ever and ever in a place of fire in order to somehow they think that that calls them in and say, man, I wouldn't want to be there, so I'm gonna seek the Lord, look. You can preach hell so hot that you can feel the fire burning on your shirt tail, and it will not cause a man to seek the Lord. The goodness of God is that which leadeth thee to repentance. The Lord Almighty in his grace and his mercy draws his people out from among those who are appointed unto wrath. And they suffer the vengeance of eternal fire.

Likewise, also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, speak evil of dignities. That is, they have no regard to the authority of God.

Because you see, the authority of Those who have dominion, whatever that dominion is, they're appointed by God. Every government on the earth is appointed by God for the purpose of the punishment of evildoers. That's what scripture says. And we're not to be trying to overturn governments. That's not what the Lord sent us to do.

No, we're not to speak evil of governments. Now we can certainly as human beings, we can look on the actions of what men do as those leaders and say that's an ungodly way to act. That's an ungodly thing to do. But the Lord hasn't sent us into the world to foment revolution and cause people to rise up and kill one another in order to establish a political power. Lord never called us to such things as that.

God's people are people of peace. We're to love one another. And I never understood how you could pick up a gun and kill somebody in the name of the government for a political end. That's one thing if you're protecting your family from harm and somebody like a mad dog is determined to come and kill your family, and you got a choice of letting your family live or killing him, then kill him. You know, that's, so I'm not saying we don't ever have a, there is a time to kill.

But there's not a time to kill because a government somewhere says, well brother, y'all need to get your guns together and let's go kill these people. See, that's not what God's people are called to do.

Now there's governments and God has raised up governments with armies to do all of that. I mean, that's his business, to do all of that, but he hadn't called God's people to do that, to encourage it.

You know, during the Civil War, it was often true that there was churches on both sides of that conflict that urged their members to take up arms and go kill them wicked men. The South was gonna kill the wicked men that was coming to disrupt their way of life, and the North was killing them old sorry slave owners. They were all wicked men, killing one another.

And the churches, the churches of all places should have been saying, brethren, let's fall down on our faces before God and seek that he might show mercy to us and deliver us from this conflict. not go kill people.

So, you know, I don't know how I got off on all that, but anyway, likewise, these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities. That can be true.

See, everybody, I heard somebody say the other day, well, God's on our side. Talking, you know, they were promoting some position of the government. Everybody thinks God's on their side. When they go to war, don't they?

Now, indeed, I believe God brings about his purpose through war often. He destroys wicked men through war. Yes, he does. And I don't have all the answers to all of those things, but I know what the Lord has taught us as his followers, how we're to look at this.

How are we to look at it? We're to look at it circumspectly. Not just off the cuff because something, we want to get even with somebody or something like that. And so we're not to speak evil of dignities, but that's what these deceivers often do. Speaking evil of dignities.

And then he gives the example. Now here's a passage of scripture. that has been twisted and some people have made like a whole industry out of what this means. Now I'll be the first to tell you that this language that's used in this scripture here is very difficult to understand. And if all you do is take this verse and read it, you'll probably be puzzled from now on about what he's talking about.

But I believe this is what he's giving this as an example of what he's talking about, about speaking evil of dignities, that is not being submissive unto those who are in places of power by the hand of God.

Yet Michael, the archangel, when contending with the devil, he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, the Lord rebuke thee.

Now what does that mean? I can tell you what I believe it does not mean. It does not mean that there was an angel named Michael who got into a tug of war with the devil over what the Lord was gonna do with the body, the physical body of Moses. It does not mean that.

I can almost, I can't 100% say much of anything, but I can pretty well say that's not what he's talking about. Because that would just be something thrown in there for what reason?

Here's what I believe the scripture's saying. When you find Michael the archangel spoken of in the scriptures, I believe it is generally and perhaps always speaking about the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the spokesman of God. He is the angel of God. He is that one who's the messenger of God.

And so Michael, the archangel, when contending with the devil, disputing about the body of Moses, what was it when the Lord was tempted in the wilderness? When he was tempted in the wilderness, what did he do? He disputed with the devil about the body of Moses, that is, the body of the law that was given to Moses, the word of God that was delivered to Moses. He disputed with him, but here's what he did not do. He didn't rebuke him. In other words, he didn't speak evil against him. He said, get thee behind me, Satan. See, he recognized it as a man.

Now this is some serious stuff here. As a man being tempted by this powerful being whom he created for his own purpose. I mean, his same one that he put in the garden in the form of a serpent that came to Eve. The same one for his own purpose. Now he came to her, he deceived her. And Adam was tempted thereby. But when he came to the Lord Jesus Christ, he didn't have any success. And the Lord didn't destroy him right then, did he?

What about when the demons came? And they said, have you come to destroy us before the time? See, they know their time's coming. That's what he's talking about here. They're reserved in everlasting change to the judgment of the day. They said, well, don't destroy us right now. Let us get into the swine. Then they went into the swine and they went off.

Now, did that destroy the demons? No, I don't think so. I don't think that's what the Lord meant by that. He just sent them off because they're reserved. See, every one of them was exactly where he put them. There wasn't one of those hogs that had a demon in it that the Lord didn't know the name of that demon. Knew the name of the hog. He knew where he was. He'd been with him when he was rooting in the dirt.

The Lord ordained these things to come to pass. But he shows us that those that come without a respect unto the dignity, here's the essence of it, the dignity and the glory and the majesty of the one true and living God.

Now if Michael the archangel didn't speak evil, so to speak, of this one who came but was the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, the one who is spoken of as the God of this world, he let him live. He didn't tear him down. He put him in his place, most assuredly. Why? Because he's God. Just like when the Lord spoke to those demons and those hogs. He put them in their place. He'd run them off the cliff.

He said the Lord would be with thee. He cast, the Lord said, you know, all judgment. He committed it into the hands of the Father. And the Lord, the scripture says, the Father's committed all judgment into his hands. Now, which is true? They both are, because they're talking about God.

What a glorious thing, dear brother. See, what the Lord Jesus said when he said to men that I'm not sent to judge you. Now, on the one hand, he is the judge of all the earth, is he not? But yet he said he didn't come to bring judgment. What'd he come to do? He came to save his people. See, that was his purpose in the earth. He didn't come into the earth to destroy Satan. He's gonna destroy Satan, but he's using Satan at the present time to accomplish his purpose.

And so how foolish by way of illustration is it when men would seek to bring down the glory of Christ in any way and make him somehow less than the glorious God and ruler of the earth that he is. They would say that, well, he can only do so much. You gotta do the rest. I mean, what's I want to say how stupid is that? And I guess it is, but men can't help but be stupid. You know, that's just the way they are by nature. They cannot grasp the things of God.

Oh, that the Lord might give us some understanding of these things, but these speak evil of those things which they know not. Now, why do we know anything? If we know anything, it's because God showed it to us. You don't know one thing. You've never learned anything in the world on your own. God showed it to you. The greatest scientists that's ever lived, how'd they know these things? God showed it to them. Now he might have shown it to them through their research and all of these things, but be sure that it was God that gave them the understanding.

Men don't like that. Wait a minute, that's not, I mean, you're saying that I'm not smart? You're not a bit smarter than God will make you to be. And you're not a bit dumber than he'll make you to be. You'll be what he determines for you to be. Now there again, what does that do? That causes men that hate dominions and speak evil of dignities to say, that's not right. We don't like that. Well, that makes man to be a robot. You ever heard that? No, men are not robots because God made them accountable. Robots aren't accountable, but men are accountable. And men are accountable not because of what they do or what they will or anything else. Men are accountable because God said, thou shalt not. He said to Adam, in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Adam, you are accountable. That was before Adam ever did anything.

You know, people say, well, you know, God can't hold us accountable if we didn't know something. I mean, that's why we like, you know, when we get caught breaking some law that we didn't know or we say we didn't know, we say, well, I didn't know. What does the sheriff tell you? Don't make any difference whether you knew it. I was watching a video the other day, and these guys, they caught like 24 lobsters. I think you can have two, or maybe you can have five. I don't remember, but anyway, you sure can't have them when they're like six inches long. And they had this whole bucket full of these lobsters. Half of them, or more than half of them, was undersized. And the game warden said, you can't have this. Oh, well, we didn't know. Now, in the first place, they were lying, because they did know that. I mean, if they had sense enough to go out after the lobsters, they knew good and well that there had to be some kind of law regarding that. but it doesn't make any difference whether or not, even if they didn't know, they were still accountable.

That same video, this game, I guess I saw this so we could use this as an illustration, but these two dear old ladies, were fishing on a pier. And they had a whole bucket full of fish. And the game warden comes up there and he says, how you ladies doing? Oh, we're doing fine, you know. And we're really catching them. And he said, well, can I look and see what you caught? Well, they had like, I forget now, 25 redfish in a bucket. Now, you can have two redfish per person One redfish, but Ed knows more about it than I do, of course. And they got to be a certain length. Well, none of the ones they had was the right length, nor was they supposed to have 25 of them. And the game warden gave them a ticket.

Now, they were dear, dear old ladies. And I feel pretty confident they probably was just fishing. I mean, they probably didn't, you know, maybe they didn't know. They were just having a good time catching these fish, buddy. They was going to have a big fish fry when they got home. But the game warden said, you broke the law. And they were amazed. But he gave them a ticket. And they had to go to court. And they probably had to pay a fine. Why? Because they were accountable, whether they knew it or not.

So it's a foolish argument for men to say, well, you know, you can't hold somebody accountable if they don't know. Yes, you can, because God said you are accountable. He said this is my law. These speak evil of those things which they know not, but what they know naturally is brute beasts, and those things they corrupt themselves. Isn't that what Paul said? He said that the man who says he doesn't know the law of God is lying, because God has written the law in his heart.

And he may not know that it's wrong for him to go and steal something from you. He may say, he may justify it in his mind, say, well, you know, he's got more than he needs, and I need one of those, and here it is. I mean, he just left it laying right out there. I mean, and so he can justify in his mind and say, well, you know, I'm gonna take that. And he can feel good about it. But guess what? Somebody comes along and steals something from him Oh, that's different then. Because why? Because the law of God's written in his heart. He knows that it's wrong to steal. He may convince himself it's not wrong to steal from you, but he knows good and well it's wrong for you to steal from him.

See, every man, every person in jail, up there, there's people that kill one another in jail because somebody stole something from them. And they might be in jail for stealing something from somebody else. We're corrupt in ourself. And men who seek to excuse that and say that it's all right, the scripture says they're as brute beasts. They're foaming out their own shame. They're demonstrating what they are. And the only thing that'll ever change a man is the grace of God. Paul said, such were some of you. May the Lord help us. May He work in us by His Spirit, cause us to see who we are and who the Lord is.

to never speak evil of dignities because we don't speak evil of the Lord. See, when a man speaks evil of the dignities that the Lord has set up in the earth, he's in essence speaking evil against God. He's saying, Lord, you shouldn't have put me in there. Now, they're fixing to elect old Mondami up there in New York. I think the man's an idiot. But if he gets in there, I'll tell you this. It's because God put him there. Now why he put him there, I don't know. I've got a good idea why he put him there, but there's not one person up there that can complain because God put him there. They may not like the things that he does, but you can't overturn the power of God.

Now only as a man is made to bow down before the sovereign purpose and will of God can he say such a thing as that. And can he really mean it? That's why the Lord said that we're to pray. Father, thy will be done in the earth as it is in heaven. Because the Lord's got things ordered according to the way he would have them to be. And whether we like it or not, that's the way that it is. And we might not ever really like some of the stuff that happens to us, to others. But we say, Father, we fall on our faces before you. We worship you. You're worthy of all praise. Though everything be taken from me, yet will I praise the Lord. May the Lord help us.