Alright, let's take our Bibles
and turn with me to the book of Luke chapter 5. Luke chapter 5. I'd like to look at the first
11 verses of Luke 5, but to just bring us up to where we are. The Lord had been teaching chapter
4 of Luke. I made a few comments on this
last week, I think, and preached out of 2 Kings 5, but I made
a few comments out of Luke 4. But to reiterate, the Lord had
been preaching to the people, and He went to His hometown,
Nazareth. They received what he was saying
until he started declaring his sovereignty. He said in the latter part of
verse 4, talking about when Elijah had gone to a widow woman's house,
when God shut up the heavens, And also He made mention of a
lot of lepers being in Israel too. But the Lord didn't heal
any of those lepers except one man, Naaman. He was a Gentile. And they got mad. They got mad
because God declared that He had the right to show mercy and
compassion to whomsoever He will. And He told them that A prophet
is not without honor except in his own hometown. And then the scriptures declare
that after he had been preaching a lot of part of the fourth chapter
of Luke, he departed and went into a desert place, Mark 1.35
of this particular incident reveals that he went
there to pray. And you know I thought that was
an amazing revelation. Here is the Lord of glory, holy,
harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners. And he himself
saw the necessity as our representative before God to not neglect the
means of communion and fellowship before God. He knew well the
need of prayer for us, and as our representative, federal head,
he prayed. And then after he had retired
to that desert place in the In the 42nd verse of Luke 4, He
departed and went into a desert place, and the people sought
Him, came unto Him, and stayed Him, that He should not depart
from them. And He said unto them, I must
preach the kingdom of God to other cities also. For therefore
am I sent. And He preached in the synagogue
in Galilee. In chapter 5 of Luke, we have
an account given of a miraculous drought of fish that was caught. And I want us to consider those
11 verses that deals with that miracle. And the Lord never performed
a miracle for no reason. He didn't do it just to... He
was confirmed by signs and wonders and all of these miracles that
He did. God confirmed Him to be who He
was. But in those miracles, He was
going to teach His disciples and us the surety of God's elect
being brought to Himself, but also the necessity in the bringing
of God's sheep of His power and His will to receive His own unto
Himself. He told His disciples, John 15,
5, I am the vine. I'm the trunk. You're the branches. He that abideth in Me and I in
him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without Me, you
can do nothing. What profit does a branch have
without being grafted into the trunk? You cut a branch off from
a tree and leave it on the ground, what's going to happen? It's
going to die. Now, our Lord in teaching, I'm
going to go ahead and do something I don't always do. I'm going
to tell you right now why. he performed this miracle, or
at least one of the reasons why he performed this miracle, that
mighty drought of fishes. It was in verse 10 of Luke 5.
He said, in the latter part, and Jesus said in Simon, fear
not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men. Now, what he was doing
is, he was telling them this is what I was teaching you in
this miracle. So knowing what He was teaching,
let's look at this miracle and see how the Lord was pleased
to bring this to our understanding. Verse 1 and 2 of Luke 5, And
it came to pass, that as the people pressed upon him to hear
the word of God, he stood by the lake Genesaret and saw two
ships standing by the lake. But the fishermen were gone out
of them and were washing their nets. Now here's an amazing thing
I noticed first. As the people pressed upon him
to hear the Word of God. Now, often we find whenever there
were large crowds with the Lord and they were following Him and
listening to Him, often we find that some believed and some didn't.
We're not told why they were all there, but they were there
and the Scripture says they pressed upon Him, they admonished Him. We want to hear what you're saying.
And for whatever reason they were there, whether there were
some in that group that wanted to try to catch him in his words
and criticize him, whether there were some that by the grace of
God were there and God was going to call them out of darkness
and here was grace before grace, whether there were some there
that were believers and they already heard in truth, there
was an urgency. There was an urgency and a hanging
on to every word with an eagerness to hear what they pressed upon
him. We need to hear. We need to ask
for understanding with a willingness to obey. We need to hear prayerfully
and we need to hear often. We need to meet together. It's
not enough. It's not enough to just, you
know, hit and miss, you know, when I can. I understand it providentially. There's times that we can't always
be here. I understand that. But I'm talking about for a believer,
when they can, they want to be there. They want to hear what
God has to say. So they pressed upon Him with
an urgency, and He stood by the lake while they were pressing
upon Him, and He saw two ships It says they were standing, they
were anchored. They were anchored there by the lake. Matthew's
account of this passage right here declares that the two ships,
this is in Matthew 4 verse 18 and then verse 21. These two
ships belonged to Simon Peter and Andrew, his brother, and
the other was James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother,
John. So we're not told that there
were any other. I read an account that was written
by Josephus. Josephus was a historian and
he said that there was probably 200 plus ships in that area. Well, like I said, Josephus,
I don't think that he had an ax to grind in this thing, didn't
have a dog in this hunt as they say, you know. He was just, he
was a historian, and he wrote down a lot of the things that
he saw that happened. And we gleaned some information,
but Josephus' writings are not inspired. But according to him,
you know, he said that there were a lot of ships there. Well,
that thought right there, whether I knew whether there were any
or not, the thing that came to my mind was that the Lord saw
these two in particular, whether there were a lot of them or just
two. He saw two ships. He recognized these ships and
he was pleased to use those two ships because they belonged to
objects of his mercy. Vessels of his mercy. Some that
he was going to call unto himself to be apostles. And so here these
vessels ordained of God to be anchored right where they were,
where he stopped where a group of people was listening to Him,
and those two vessels were going to be the means by which He was
going to accomplish a miracle. So we recognize that God Almighty
is pleased to cross the paths of those that He's everlastingly
loved in mercy and grace, and He works all these things for
His good and the accomplishment of His will. and purpose. So
here were two ships. But the men that owned them weren't
in them. They weren't in the ships, that's
what it says. Came to pass, the people pressed upon him to hear
the word of God and he stood by the lake, Genesaret. He saw
two ships standing by the lake, but the fishermen were gone out
of them. Now that has significance, and
they were washing their nets. That last phrase has significance. Number one, they weren't in the
boat. Why? Because they'd already been
fishing. We know what's going to happen,
we'll read it in just a second. They had already been fishing.
And as far as they were concerned, they were done. They were washing
their nets. And the Lord, according to His
wisdom and purpose, was pleased to come to them after They had
finished their work for the night. He knew where they were. He saw
them. God. He saw them the night before
out there fishing. And so we recognize there's a
time appointed for everything. And this was their time. That's
what Ecclesiastes 3 tells us that. There's a time for every
purpose under heaven. It wasn't by accident. He just
happened to walk up and down. Those ships were there by divine
appointment. And so he would teach these men
and us through them of what they are and their inability. And
they were gonna, he's gonna teach them of their need of him. And you know, often the Lord
allows us to toil that we might behold our inability. Why do
I have to go through this? Why do I have to go through what
I'm going through? We've all done that. We've all
found ourselves in situations where we're just, you know, I'm
just spinning my wheels. But, verse 3 says, he entered
into one of the ships, which was Simon's, and prayed him,
he asked him, that he would thrust out a little from the land, and
he sat down and taught the people out of the ship. Now, how little? They probably knew nothing. They
didn't know anything. Peter and his companions did
not know anything about what the Lord was going to teach them.
But the multitude was there seeking to hear more about what he would
say. I just kind of looked at the
situation and I got to thinking it through. Now these are men.
These are hard working fishermen. It's in the morning, and the
Lord has asked him, he said, push your boat back out. And
he did. But don't you know that here's
Peter and the rest of them, and they're tired. Very few times have I ever stayed
up all night. But I remember one of the times
in particular that I did all night, and I'm telling you, it
seemed like it took me three days to get over it. I mean,
I slapped war out. These guys had been up all night
long fishing. And they're frustrated. I'm sure they didn't catch any
fish. I know because in just a few
minutes, Peter's going to say they didn't. And they're out
there, they hadn't made any money. I mean, this is their livelihood.
This is what they do. So financially, it wasn't a good
night. They're tired. They're frustrated. Hadn't made any money. And the
Lord asked Peter to thrust out a little from the land. And he did. He did what the Lord
asked him to do. Now, let's remember from this
so far. We never, I told you that, Brother
Don told me that. He said, Marvin, always remember.
We never know what God's doing. Never. We think we might, but
we don't. We have no way of knowing the
implications of whose path we crossed, what was said, We have
no idea what God's doing, but God knows what He's doing. And
here, by the grace of God, these men pushed out. The Lord was pleased to use the
common means of that day and picked, the Lord did, He picked,
I'm sure in the minds of these men, the most inopportune time
to bring to pass what was going to be so profitable for them.
And they just, they didn't get it. And we don't either. I mean,
I'll be honest with you. I mean, there's some things I've
gone through recently. And I just think, I don't know. I've done all I
can do. I don't know what else to do. I just, I don't understand. But
I know this. You've heard me say so many times,
Romans 8.28 is always Romans 8.28. And we know, we know, we
know. All things work together for
good to them that love God, to them who are Thee called according
to His purpose. We know that. So the best thing
for me to do, just be quiet. Yeah, but why'd
it... thrust out? So here, whatever
questions they may have had in their mind, by the grace of God
they were obedient. Providentially, the Lord had
brought all this to pass, as He does in our lives. Let's,
please Lord, teach us, don't grumble. Don't complain. He's promised it's going to be
for our good. It's going to be profitable to
us. It's going to be. So, Lord help me. Hush. Be quiet. Had these men known
what was getting ready to happen, I'll tell you how anxious they
would have been. Let's get out there in the water. But like all of us, they were
being taught to wait. In the Lord's time, So here's
the Lord's gonna cause us and them to remember. Well, verse
four to six. Now, when he had left speaking,
he said unto Simon, launch out into the deep and let down your
nets for a drought. And Simon answering said unto
him, master, we've toiled all the night and
have taken nothing. Nevertheless, If I word, I will
let down the net. And when they had this done,
they enclosed a great multitude of fishes and their net break. Now, from these words, may we
all be encouraged to the fact that our Lord blesses obedience.
He blesses obedience. Here the Lord spoke to those
who obviously, and previously, were disappointed, and he told
them to do something that I do not doubt for one second did
not make sense to them. I read one writer that said that
concerning where the Lord told them to go, cast out into the
deep, He said, for these men and what they did, a lot of times
you see them standing on the shore and they're throwing the
nets. He said, the fish are not usually
out in the deepest part. of the water. They're in closer
to where the little lilies and stuff grow. That's where normally
you're going to find them. But he said that it was unusual
because that was not the most likely place to put them. But here again, the Lord was
going to teach them to launch out in the depths of trusting
Him. This is the heart of my message
right here. Cast out into the deep. Into
the depth of trusting Him. You know, I think about that
passage of Scripture. Neal said, open your mouth wide
and I'll fill it. And I think, I wish I knew. I
mean, that has a sound of, I'd like to do that. The Lord may teach me something
in that. That's not good. That's hard on my flesh. But
he said, You cast out into the deep. And think of that as being,
I want you to have to trust me. Into the depth of faith. He was going to teach them something
of his power and his sovereignty, his lordship. And when he told
him, he said, cast out into the deep and let down your net. Again,
I think how Peter, and the reason I can say this, because this
is how we think. Do we think that Peter and James
and John and Bartholomew and Matt, you think they were any
different from us? You think they thought any differently?
You think they doubted any less than we do? Or questioned any
less than we do? I don't doubt for one second. He was tired. Remember, like
I said, they fished all night. And they didn't catch anything. And their nets just got cleaned.
Hey, we just cleaned the nets. And we're wore out. And we're professionals. This
is what we do. This is not our first fishing
trip here. We grew up in these waters. We know where the fish are. And
Lord, we fished all night. We toiled all night. And we didn't
catch anything. They ain't biting them. They're
not here. They're not something. How many excuses can we come
up with to disobey God or not believe God? We're just filled
with them. I can think of so many reasons
why. But with the command from the
Lord also came a promise. Listen to the words of the Lord. He says in verse 4, now when
he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, launch out into the
deep, let down your nets for a drought. There was a promise
in that word right there. To catch what you're going to
catch. Put it out there. Put out exactly the way I told
you. And again, Peter gave that answer
that we always need to remember. We've toiled all night. We've
taken nothing. But here's the word of encouragement. Nevertheless, nevertheless, at
your word, at your word, at your word, Lord, I believe, help my
unbelief. I will let down the net. We need
and do well to remember to not assess the Lord's will by our
previous failures. Well, it just hadn't worked.
We've done that before. I've tried that already. No,
here we're taught it's not our ability It's not our skill, it's
not our faith that accomplishes God's will. It's according to
His Word, according to your Word. And the Lord blessed, as I said,
His obedience. He obeyed, and though we find
ourselves often questioning, this truly is the desire of a
believer. Mixed with all the unbelief,
All of the questions and the doubts, with all of that, truly,
you ask a believer, do you want to obey God? Yes, I do. Peter
told the Lord. The Lord asked him three times,
lovest thou me? Lovest thou me more than these?
Lovest thou me? That last time he questioned, he said, Lord,
you know all things. You know I love you. I know I hadn't acted
like it. I know I hadn't. Everybody has reason to doubt.
I got reason to doubt myself. But Lord, You know. You know that I love You. And
here, Peter said, Lord, it's Your Word. Oh, the path of duty and obedience
to Him is often found to be hard and disagreeable to the flesh. I had a buddy of mine He told me one day, he was a
cadet at West Point, and he told me, he said, you know Marvin,
he said the toughest thing that I've found, the toughest thing
I've found to do is the right thing. That's the hardest thing
I've found to do, the right thing. I can always skirt the issue,
I can always look for another way, I can always..." But he
said, the hardest thing to do is to do the right thing. And
he said, I struggle with that. I thought, you know what, there's
a lot of wisdom in that. The path of duty is hard. Laughed at by the word, but we
don't consult flesh and blood. I mean, consulting our flesh
and blood, No. Lord, it's Your Word. It's Your
Word. At Your Word. That's what I want to do. I want
to. I realize we don't often see
the reason. But if His way is set forth in the Scripture, it
ain't up for debate. This is it. We obey. We obey. What does the Lord say? Man, I'm telling you, these scriptures,
this is... What's the rule of a believer's
walk? Try to obey the law? No. Believe in Christ. Honesty. Honesty. Lord, I can't, but you
have. Lord, help me. Lord, I want to
trust you. I'm going to trust you. Lord,
in all of my doubting, in all of my frailty, in my flounderings,
in my questions, Lord, forgive me. Help me. It's Your Word.
You think the Lord saw in His answer? You think the Lord saw
any doubts? Verse 7. Well, they're out there. They've
thrown it out. And I'm telling you, they have
enclosed a great multitude of fishes. And they beckoned unto
their partners which were in the other ship that they should
come and help them. And they came and filled both
the ships so that they began to sink. They beckoned. I looked up at that word beckoned. It doesn't mean they signaled
to them. Get over here. They didn't say
anything to them. Come here. Come here. Come here. Come here. Obviously they were out of earshot. And they're over there and they're
fighting these fish and they're hollering to each other and pulling
and the fish are just floundering around. And he came over and
they began to help and oh how often, in the midst of obedience,
now here's the point, in the midst of obedience, it appears as though their nets,
it says in their net break, they were beginning is what it says,
they were breaking, popping in places. And they're thinking,
we're going to lose them. We ain't going to make it. It
ain't going to work. We've got all these fish, and
we're going to lose all of them. That net breaks. It was breaking. Come over and help us. But the
others came, and they started filling up the ship, and they're,
we're going down. We're goners now. all these fish
that we caught in obedience to the Lord, it often appears that
things are so weighty and so hard. Can this be the Lord's
will for me? The Apostle Paul, who the Scripture
declared that God called him on the road to Damascus, taught
him Paul said, well I was in the body, out of the body, I
knew a man. Heard things I can't even say. God taught this man,
used this man to write the major portion of the New Testament. God had blessed him and blessed
him and blessed him and blessed him and blessed him. And here's
like Peter, James, Andrew, John, And here they are. They're obedient. They're doing what the Lord has
told them to do. They let down the net. God has
filled it up. The Lord who held back all those
fish the night before, now told them to get in the net. And they're
in the net. And it's breaking and it's singling.
They're getting them in the boat as fast as they can get in the
boat. It's going down now. Paul the Apostle said concerning
his ministry, He said, five times I received forty stripes, save
one. Thrice beaten with rods, stoned
once, three times shipwrecked, perils of robbers, perils of
countrymen, perils of the heathen, perils in the wilderness, the
sea, false brethren. He said, it's been hard on me,
on my flesh, But listen, just before the Lord took him home,
for I'm now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure
is at hand. He said, I fought a good fight.
I finished my course. I've kept the faith. Henceforth
is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord,
the righteous judge, shall give me at that day, and not to me
only, but unto all them also that love is appearing. What
do you say? It's worth it all. It's worth
it all. It's worth it. The Lord promised. He said, I'm
not going to leave you. I'm not going to forsake you.
I'm not going to forsake you. Lord, I'm with you always, even
to the end of the world. But as we consider what the Lord
was teaching Peter. I told you in verse 10, he said,
fear not, fear not, from henceforth I shall catch men. He was teaching
them something in that fishing experience that day about the
ministry. Peter on the day of Pentecost
was preaching Acts 2.41, God saved three A thousand souls. I've told you before, I'm so
excited when a visitor shows up here. Mark, I think, what
if he's one of God's elect? Three thousand souls. Acts 4,
Peter and John were preaching. The priest in the temple, the
captain, the Sadducees, they were grieved at what those men
were saying about the resurrected Christ. They laid hands upon
them. He locked them up, but the scripture says many that
heard believed. 5,000 souls. That's what it says. The number was about 5,000. Is
there anything too hard for God? Can the Lord prepare a table
in the wilderness? Listen, the Lord has a people.
He's gonna save them. So what do we do? We preach the
gospel, preach the gospel, preach the gospel. Peter, you love me?
Feed my sheep. The Lord has promised, my word
is not going to return void. It's going to accomplish the
purpose for which it was sent. So what do we do? We preach the
gospel. We're still here. The Lord has
not returned. The commission still stands.
That day those ships were so full and they began to sink.
What do we do? We know that all that the Father
has given Him, they're going to come to Him. And Him that
cometh to the Lord, He said, I'm not going to cast you out.
Had Peter and all those other men rested in their knowledge,
you know what they'd have done? That morning they'd gone to the
house. I'm going to go home. I'm going to go get me some breakfast.
I'm going to go take me a nap. But all the lesson that they
learned that day, though it surely went against their flesh, I understand.
I understand all that. But the scripture sets forth
that when the Lord blessed it, look at verse 8 again. Simon
Peter saw it. He fell down at Jesus' knees
saying, depart from me for I am a sinful man. Oh Lord! For he was astonished and all
that were with him at the drought of the fishes which they had
taken and so was also James and John the sons of Zebedee which
were partners with them. which were partners with Simon.
And Jesus said unto them, Fear not, from henceforth shalt thou
catch fish. They were so amazed. Scripture says when Peter saw
it, he fell down at the Lord's knees, depart from me. You know,
that's an amazing statement. Lord, depart from me. Depart from me. Obviously, no
believer truly wants the Lord to depart. What did David say? Psalm 51, 11, cast me not away
from thy presence and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Well,
why? Why would Peter say that? I got
this from Brother Henry Mahan. He said, and I think that it
sounds right. Peter, I don't doubt for one
second, all of the emotions that could possibly run through a
man's mind probably were right there. He was guilty. He was embarrassed, convicted. He was thinking, I just need to
crawl in a hole. I just need to crawl in a hole
and just cover me up. I think the answer is found when
you say, depart from me. When a man or a woman is made
to see themselves for what they really are, I'm filthy. Lord, like the psalmist said,
I'm not worthy of the least of your mercies. I'm not worthy. And when we know ourselves to
be so, I mean, have you ever done or said something in front
of somebody? and you embarrassed yourself so badly, you think,
oh, you mind if I just go over here in the corner and just kind
of stand here by myself for a minute and just kind of, you just think,
I am so ashamed, I'm so ashamed to face you. This was the Lord. This was the Lord of glory. And
when one is brought to see something, something, Obviously Peter saw
something of his depravity and it just broke his heart. It broke his heart. I want you
to hold this in closing. Isaiah chapter 5. Isaiah chapter 5. Now this is
a prophet. Here's a prophet preaching. A
prophet. moved upon this man to pen these
words. These words are inspired of God. Here was Isaiah, and
he was preaching in chapter 5, and listen how he was pronouncing
the woes on other people. Isaiah 5, verse 8, Woe unto them
that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there
be no place that they may be placed alone in the midst of
the earth. Woe to them, look at verse 11.
Woe to them that rise up early in the morning, that they may
follow strong drink that continue till night, till wine inflame
them. Look at verse 18. Woe to them
that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, sin as it were with
a cart rope. Look at verse 20, 21. Woe unto
them that call evil good and good evil, that put darkness
for light and light for darkness, that put bitter sweet and sweet
for bitter. Woe unto them that are wise in
their own eyes, prudent in their own sight. I'm telling you, he
was wearing them out. Look at verse five of chapter
six. Well, let me read verse one.
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting
upon a throne, high and lifted up. And his train filled the
temple. And above it did the seraphims,
each one had six wings, with twain he covered his face, twain
he covered his feet, twain he did fly. And one cried unto another
and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole
earth is full of his glory. And the post of the door moved
to the voice of him that cried. And the house was filled with
smoke. Then said I, woe is me, for I
am undone. because I am a man of unclean
lips. I dwell in the midst of a people
of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord
of hosts." Whenever Isaiah, whenever Peter,
when the Lord allowed him to see something of his glory, obviously
Peter did. The Lord was going to teach them.
This was one that God was going to He was going to call him,
the next few chapters he did, to be an apostle. These men were
going to suffer. And God was going to teach him
something. God blessed those apostles. We think to ourselves, I think
of that song we just sang, written by John Newton, you know? If
I love, why am I thus? Why this dull and lifeless frame? Surely worse could they be that
never heard his name. I'm thinking, Lord, you know,
I'm telling you, we all admit, we do see through a glass darkly.
We do. We honestly admit. Whenever Isaiah,
whenever Peter, he saw the King. He saw the Lord. He saw Him high
and lifted up. And God taught him something. He saw the majesty and the power
of the Lord. And it broke his heart. The Lord through that miracle
taught these men something concerning the calling, calling out of God's
sheep. These men had boats, they had
some nets, and I don't doubt that they had some skill. But
I'm telling you, whether it's catching fish, in that lesson
right there, or the salvation of God's elect, all the power
and all the glory and all the honor goes to the Lord. Back in our passage, I will,
I'll close right here. Luke 5. The Lord said in the latter part
of verse 10, fear not. I don't doubt that they were
afraid. They saw the Lord. From henceforth,
thou shalt catch fish. This is the way that God's gonna
call out His own. What we do, like they did. The
Lord told them, said, you throw the net out. What do we do? We
throw the net of the gospel out. The Lord said, the kingdom of
heaven is like a net. It's cast into the ocean, pulled
in, and the fish are divided. Some are kept, some are thrown
back. But what we do is we throw the
net. That's all I can do. I can throw
a net. I know what the net is. I know
it's the gospel. I know that, and that's all I can do. Who
God pulls in, who God puts in, that's of the Lord. I don't know
that. I cast out the net. That's all we do. We do all we
do for the support of the gospel. Why don't we give? Why don't
we support this assembly here? Why? Because of the keeping up
of everything? Yeah, that's right. It's for
the keeping and the establishing and the preaching of the gospel.
Put all these messages on the internet. We cast out the net. And the
scripture says in verse 11, and when they had brought their ships
to land, they forsook all and followed him. All they had was, I said they
had some boats, they had some nets, but they'd been called
of God. God had called them. He said,
I'm telling you right now. He said, you're going to be fishers
of men. You ain't going to catch fish no more. You're going to
be fishers of men. That's what you're going to do.
And the Lord gave them a willingness in the day of His power. And
they followed Him. They gave it up. Whatever they
were doing, they gave it up. I'm going to follow Him. I pray
that God teach us and bless us in this miracle right here. He
taught them. May He encourage us in what we're
doing. We're doing what we're doing
because this is what He ordained to do. Two or three are gathered
together in my name. Forsake not the assembling of
yourselves together. This is what we're doing. We're wanting
to be obedient. Preach the gospel. You love me?
Preach. Feed my sheep. That's what I want to do. I want
to feed the sheep. What do we do after that? We pray God bless
it. He said He would. He said, but I will be inquired
of. We ask you, ask the Lord to bless us. Bless it to my heart,
your heart, our heart. May it go forth in power for
God's glory and our good. Amen.