2nd Kings chapter 3 We really need to read this whole
chapter because we'll look at this Chapter as a whole, but
I want to Sort of cue you to to the narrative here and so
you can see it as we read through this a man named Misha King of Moab He had been paying
tribute to Israel while Ahab was king And it was pretty substantial
tribute if you read in verse 4 He was a sheep master and so
his tribute to Ahab and Israel was a hundred thousand lambs
and a hundred thousand rams with the wool and And I assume that
was an annual tribute. Don't know for sure. But Misha
was paying that tribute while Ahab lived. But when Ahab died
in Jehoram, Ahab's son began to reign over Israel. Then Misha,
the king of Moab, took that opportunity to say, that's it, no more. I'm
not paying the tribute anymore. No more lambs no more rams. No more wool And Jehoram he was not a smart
man, we'll see that in the scriptures But even he was smart enough
to know that his father's God Baal was Fictitious he was he
was just an excuse Engage in fleshly sin and the image of
Baal was a joke not a God It was just a joke and he understood
that and so he removed that The image of Baal. Let's go ahead
and read. I wanted to just get in our heads
the situation. Misha says no more, that's it.
I'm not paying any more tribute. And the consequences, most of
what we'll read are the consequences of him saying that. Now Jehoram,
the son of Ahab, began to reign over Israel and Samaria the 18th
year of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah. Remember Israel was divided
at this time since the days of Jeroboam. There were the 10 tribes
and then there were the two tribes that began to be called Judah,
because one of the tribes was Judah, the primary tribe was
Judah. So Jehoshaphat was king of Judah,
and he was a pretty decent king. We see that, and we'll talk about
him a little bit. But Jehoram, Ahab's son, wrought
evil, verse two, in the sight of the Lord, but not like his
father and like his mother. For he put away the image of
Baal that his father had made. Nevertheless, he cleaved unto
the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, which made Israel to
sin. He departed not therefrom." And
that was the practice of worshiping God in the wrong place, in the
wrong way. It was a counterfeit worship
of God that Jeroboam set up. because he said in his heart,
the scripture says that the people will go to Jerusalem to worship
like they're supposed to, and their heart will be moved away
from me. They'll end up just giving their
allegiance to Rehoboam, his rival in Judah. They'll kill me and
of course so it was all selfish. He set up false religion religion
for selfish reasons That's what they do it now in our day to
for gain for for re-eminence for the praise of men for all
those false and selfish reasons they Change what God said? Verse four, and Misha king of
Moab was a sheep master and rendered unto the king of Israel 100,000
lambs and 100,000 rams with the wool. But it came to pass when
Ahab was dead that the king of Moab rebelled against the king
of Israel. And King Jehoram went out of
Samaria the same time and numbered all Israel. And he went and sent
to Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, saying, the king of Moab hath
rebelled against me. Wilt thou go with me against
Moab to battle? And he said, I will go up. I
am as thou art, my people as thy people, and my horses as
thy horses. Remember now, Jehoshaphat had
done this before with Ahab and was rebuked very harshly for
it. It was an unadvisable alliance with Ahab and He had learned
his lesson about it, but he said he Did say that he would help
in this matter with with Jehoram as well and Verse 18 he said
which way shall we go up and he answered the way through the
wilderness of Edom that's that was that's an ill a foreboding Bad decision right there verse
9 so the king of Israel went and the king of Judah and the
king of Edom and They fetched a compass of seven days journey
and there was no water for the host and for the cattle that
followed them and the king of Israel said alas that the Lord
hath called these three kings together to deliver them into
the hand of Moab we're goners our enemies are gonna just Come
and spoil everything we have once we dive thirst a horrible
death of not having any water so you see going by the way of
Edom and Not planning this out We see how that Jehoram wasn't
the brightest of Kings and But Jehoshaphat verse 11 said, is
there not here a prophet of the Lord? The light just came on
and here comes a ray of sunshine on this scene, on this dark scene. Isn't there a prophet of the
Lord that we may inquire of the Lord by him? Inquire of the Lord
is the name of this message because that's the turning point right
there. Inquire, that word is a good word. And it sort of means
what you think it means, but it sort of doesn't. We'll talk
about it. And one of the king of Israel's servants answered
and said, here is Elisha, the son of Shaphat, which poured
water on the hands of Elijah. That's just a symbol of his servitude
to Elijah. He was Elijah's water faucet,
whenever he needed to wash his hands. Elisha was the one to
pour water on his hands. He was his servant in other words.
And Jehoshaphat verse 12 said, the word of the Lord is with
him. Key phrase. So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat
and the king of Edom went down to him and Elisha said unto the
king of Israel, what have I to do with thee? Didn't have a great,
great response. You know, Here he comes, he's
in trouble now, and all of a sudden, let's go find, you know, let's
go talk to the prophet, let's find out, I'm interested in God
now, that I have gotten myself into a horrible situation. Before,
I wasn't, and afterwards, I won't be. But now, I wanna know what
God said. And Elijah said, what are you
doing here? What have I to do with thee?
Get thee to the prophets of thy father, and to the prophets of
thy mother, the prophets of Baal, in other words. And the king
of Israel said unto him, Nay, for the Lord hath called these
three kings together to deliver them into the hand of Moab. He's talking about himself, of
course. the other two kings that were with him. And Elisha said,
as the Lord of hosts liveth, before whom I stand, surely,
were it not that I regard the presence of Jehoshaphat, the
king of Judah, I would not look toward thee, nor see thee. If
you didn't have Jehoshaphat with you, which as we said, was the
only king in this, Situation the only one that looked to the
Lord we saw that why don't we add why don't we inquire of the
Lord? And so he said that's that's
why I'm gonna help you right there otherwise I've got no use
use for you but now verse 15 bring me a minstrel and it came
to pass when the minstrel played that the hand of the Lord came
upon him and And he said, thus saith the Lord, make this valley
full of ditches. For thus saith the Lord, you
shall not see wind, neither shall you see rain, yet that valley
shall be filled with water. It's not gonna happen the way
you would think it would. The Lord often blesses us. He'll
give us what we need, but it won't necessarily be what we're
looking for. that you may drink. It's gonna
be filled with water for you so that you might drink both
ye and your cattle and your beasts. And this is but a light thing
in the sight of the Lord. He will deliver the Moabites
also into your hand and you shall smite every fenced city and every
choice city and shall fell every good tree and stop all wells
of water and mar every good piece of land with stones. Well, that
sounds like a waste, doesn't it? We're gonna Lord willing
we're gonna talk a little bit about that and it came to pass
verse 20 in the morning when the meat offering was offered
that behold there came water by the way of Edom and The country
was filled with water And when all the Moabites heard that the
Kings were come up to fight against them that gathered all that were
able to put on armor and upward and stood in the border and they
rose up early in the morning and the Sun shone upon the water
and And the Moabites saw the water on the other side as red
as blood. So you picture this, they got
up early in the morning, you know, early in the morning, sometimes
the sunrise is bright red. I suspect that's what the situation
was here. And you know, early in the morning,
it gives us a clue here. And so when they looked at the
water, it was bright red. And they said, it's blood. They
said, this is blood. The kings are surely slain. They've
smitten one another. They had an alliance at the beginning,
but they got in a fight with one another and killed each other.
And everything's fine now for us. Now therefore, Moab, to the
spoil. So let's just go pick up all
their belongings and their valuables and be on our way. Ah, at verse
24, when they came to the camp of Israel, the Israelites rose
up and smote Moabites so that they fled before them, but they
went forward smiting the Moabites even in their country and they
beat down the cities and on every good piece of Land cast every
man his stone and filled it and they stopped all the wells of
water and felled all the good trees only in Kir Horuseth Left
they the stones thereof how be it the slingers went about it
and smote it And when the king of Moab saw that the battle was
too sore for him, he took with him 700 men that drew swords
to break through even unto the king of Edom, but they could
not. He thought, you know, we're gonna die, but I'm gonna get
that king of Edom at least. We're gonna take 700 men just
for the purpose of just breaking through the ranks right toward
that man and kill him. They couldn't do it. The Lord
had said, I'm gonna give them to you. I'm gonna give you the
Moabites. That's the way it's gonna be. Verse 27 then he took his eldest
son that should have reigned in his stead and offered him
For a burnt offering upon the wall and there was great indignation
against Israel and they departed from him and returned to their
own land Misha The king of Moab he stopped
paying the tribute Jehoram didn't like it and he immediately gathers
the army and goes after Moab Garnering some help along the
way there and As we saw Jehoram knew that
his father's God Baal was a joke But it doesn't mean that he had
any regard for the God of heaven and earth he still Perpetrated the false counterfeit
Religion that was kind of like the Passover if you remember
the language Back in the story of Jeroboam. It was like that,
but it was it wasn't where God said worship. It wasn't how God
said worship In other words, it wasn't Christ It was Antichrist
So we see that Jehoram was not real smart, but at least he knew
that. He knew that Baal was false. But he had no use for God until
he was in trouble. And you see the attitude of God's
man. What are you doing here? You
haven't ever had any reason to talk to me before. And I say Jehoram was not smart,
there's more to it than just... Instead of solving this problem
with Misha, I suspect if he had gone and threatened, you know,
look, the King of Judah's with me, King of Edom's with me, this
ain't gonna end well for you, you need to rethink this situation.
But instead of... Solving the problem diplomatically. He was enraged by the disrespect
shown to him. He was a proud man and So instead
of negotiating from a position of strength, which is what you
always want to do he sends an army and clearly without proper
planning of any kind and they ended up stranded in the Wilderness
of Edom without any water versus eight and nine and notice what
Jehoram says In verse 10. This is a classic Verse 10 King of Israel Jehoram said alas
that the Lord has called these three kings together to deliver
them into the hand of Moab He was the idiot that that Ordered
this and planned it or didn't plan it and got him in a situation
Where the whole army of Israel is going to die of starvation
And he says, oh, alas, that the Lord would do this. Wow. What a commentary on our nature. It was his impetuous pride, it
was his idiotic lack of planning that had gotten all these men
into a hopeless situation, but Jehoram blames it on God. That's just beautiful. You ever
heard the saying that there's a reason for everything, but
sometimes the reason is you're an idiot. I'd say that applies
right here. Jehoram presumes to know what
God has purposed. Well, he's brought us all together,
you know, in order to deliver us into the hand of the Moabites.
He means to kill us, and this is the way that he chose to do
it. You don't know what God's doing.
He has no idea what God's doing. And we don't either, unless God
tells us. We need to remember that, because
this is our nature. Well, the Lord's stuck with the
Lord, you know. We blame it on the Lord, first of all, when
we get into a horrible mess because of our sin. And of course, the
Lord's in control. He allows it, He causes it, He
brings it to pass, but it's our idiocy that's to blame. And then we presume to know the
very sovereign will of God. We see this and we presume this.
Unless God tells you what he's gonna do, you don't know what
he's gonna do. Now if he's told you what he's gonna do, you know
exactly what's gonna happen. But not unless, please remember
that, may I remember that. God is certainly in perfect control
of everything that's happening here, but Jehoram doesn't know
what he's talking about. It's not gonna happen that way.
Remember we read, where the only reason, I believe it was verse
14, the only reason that Elisha is gonna have anything to do
with Jehoram and his problems was because he liked Jehoshaphat. He had respect. for Jehoshaphat. And here's why,
verses 11 and 12. That was the reason, because
Jehoshaphat said, is there not here a prophet of the Lord? He had respect unto Jehoshaphat
because Jehoshaphat had respect unto him. And he didn't even
know about this part of the story, but he knew that all along Jehoshaphat
had been a good king for the most part in looking to the Lord
in their troubles and needs and worshiping the Lord in their
blessings. Jehoshaphat had his blunders
and his faults. He aligned with Ahab, regrettably,
and things like that. But he had regard unto God and
God's prophet. And that's the way the Lord saved
him. That's the means by which God
saved Israel here. Now, I know that, because I've been
where you are so many times over the years, I know that a message,
it's long, it's probably longer than they should be. And we end up hearing parts of it
and kind of not hearing parts of it because our mind does different
things and all that. Listen to this carefully. Young
people, parents, everybody, Look at this word inquire. Verses 11 and 12 again. Verse
11. Is there not here a prophet of
the Lord that we may inquire of the Lord by him? The circumstances of the use
of this word and this word itself. Now we're in trouble. That's the occasion, that's the
circumstances of this. We're in trouble. And whether
you and I realize it or not, we're in trouble. We're always
in trouble, even if it doesn't seem like it. You are desperate
right now for the Lord. You need the Lord right now.
If you're left to yourself for 10 seconds, You're a goner, and
I mean a spectacular goner. And me too, me more so. We're in trouble, we stay in
trouble. Man is full of trouble like the
sparks fly upward. Is that a scripture that I remember? It's like the troubled sea casting
up mire that never rests. That heart is in us. And we need the Lord more than
our next breath. We need him more than our next
drink of water. And sometimes the Lord shows
us how badly we need him by bringing about circumstances
that make it impossible to ignore how badly we need him. But that doesn't mean we only
need him then. I need to learn this. And so I suspect that maybe you
do too. Things happen that puts us on
our knees and we cry out to God. We needed him before that ever
happened just as badly as we do now. And we just didn't know
it. We just weren't aware of it.
The Lord didn't bring it front and center like he sometimes
does. That's just him showing us then
in that trouble, in that catastrophe, in that great loss or whatever
it is, that's just him showing us then how we need him all the
time. Every hour. Has he done that
for us lately? Reminded us over and over we
need him We need him when we're in trouble we need him when we
think we're not in trouble We need him every hour Jehoram said in verse 10 alas
alas That's a word indicating mourning and grief m-o-u-r-n-i-n-g
mourning and grief Everybody had given up. Before he said
that, they'd had time to assess their situation, and they said,
alas. That was their big bad leader. That was his commentary on the
situation. Alas. Game over. We need something
desperately that we can't do anything about. We have no power. The need that we have is a matter
of life and death and we have no power. That's our condition
before God by nature It's so easy to not be aware
of that I Know this life is full of distractions. We've got plans
we've got you know, things to do with our friends, we've got
projects we gotta take care of, we got all this stuff in this
life, but this is what's real. That's the thing about it. We need the water of life or
we are goners, eternal goners. Alas, alas, no, not alas, inquire. Those two words show the difference between despair and hope, between death and life. Alas,
no. Let's inquire. What a beautiful
word this is. Think about it. I know what we
think about when we hear that word. It means to ask, To look
into maybe. That's not this word. That's
not what it is. It means to resort to. It means
to seek with care. And this is not me embellishing
anything. This is the exact definition
of the word. To resort to, to seek with care. And listen to
this, to require, to require. Inquire means to require We need God That's what he's
saying Isn't there a prophet around here somewhere because
we need God We need God Let's cast ourselves upon the mercy
of the Lord now Everything else now There's window dressing in this
life. You young people need to know that. You need to do more
than agree with that. You need to live that. We need the Lord. We need him
all the time. We need him every second. We
need him more than our next breath. What a beautiful word. Let's
cast ourselves on the mercy of God. We've got to have him. We've
got to have Christ. The inherent question in this
word, if you want to use the old, you know, the definition
that we typically would apply to the word inquire, ask is a
good word too in the gospel, isn't it? Ask and you shall receive. Seek and you shall find. Knock.
and the door shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh,
receiveth. You come to the Lord asking for
mercy, you're gonna have mercy. But it can't be a religious show.
It can't just be something, you know, like repeating something
three times and clicking your heels together. It's gotta be
in your heart, coming before God, pouring out your soul unto
Him and saying, Lord, I got to have you. I'm a goner. I need you, I need you. Got to
have Christ to require him. But the inherent question, if
there's a question here, is will God save us? If he don't, there's nothing
we can do. We can't make water. Will God save us? If he will,
we know he can. But will he? Let's ask. Let's find out. Despair of self and resort to
God. Seek him with care. Require him. If you truly need God, and I
don't just mean theoretically, we can sit here and say the whole
world needs God, and that's true. That's not what I'm talking about. I mean in your heart. If you truly need God, he will
not turn you away. Don't you ever think that. He
will not turn you away. Here was David's song. One thing
have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after. that I may
dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold
the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple. A similar word there, not the
same word inquire in our text, but it means to seek, to consider,
and to reflect. We're beholding the beauty of
the Lord that by His grace through faith we see, we see that He's
beautiful. And we're seeking, considering,
and reflecting on how beautiful He is so that we might know even
more of His beauty. That's what David's talking about.
What about us? Everything follows that. Everything
revolves around that. Our text is a more needy, urgent
thing than the word inquire there, where David says, I wanna dwell,
I wanna be all the time wherever Christ is. That's where I wanna
be. And I want to behold the beauty
that he's revealed, and I wanna look into how beautiful he is
so I'll know it better. That's worship. That's the life
of the believer. Our text is a requirement. It's a different word, very similar
but different. Our text speaks of a situation
that requires God. It requires what only he's able
to do. Requiring him as a solution,
as a savior. Elisha's answer is powerful in
its message, isn't it? Because there's one person here,
There's one person here that needs the Lord Jesus Christ.
Otherwise, I wouldn't have anything to do with you. But because somebody is looking
to the Lord, let's find out. Let's resort unto him. Religion
is prostituting their false Christ to the world, but our Savior
is no such disgrace He's the king of glory that he delights
to show mercy, but he will be inquired of Remember that now he'll be inquired
of you'll find him when you seek him with all of your heart Find
him when you got to have him You can write this down for a
little homework if you want to read this together later Ezekiel
36 22 through 38 With regard to the Lord Saying I will be
inquired of That's a beautiful passage and
especially how that it sheds light on our text Now part of reconciliation, part
of restoration that's spoken of in Ezekiel 36 there, part
of the experience of knowing the Lord is that you will seek
him diligently. You will resort unto him. You will require him. And that's
a good question for us, isn't it? Do we require him? Do we require the Lord Jesus
Christ? Now, what was so special about
Elisha? Is there a prophet? There's gotta
be a prophet. There's a prophet here somewhere. Let's go see
the prophet. They all went down to the prophet.
What's so special about the prophet? Well, for one reason, verse 12,
Jehoshaphat said the word of the Lord's with him. We need to hear from God. We
need a verdict from God. And that's why we gotta go see
the prophet. So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat
and the king of Edom went down to him because the word of the
Lord was with him. And if you're gonna have hope
in your desperate need, you got to hear from God. And this is
God's means. It pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save. What did they need? They needed
to be saved. That's the beautiful picture
here of our spiritual condition before God. We need to be saved. My prayer to God, my heart's
desire and prayer to God for Israel, Paul said, is that they
might be saved. Not that they might agree with
my doctrine, that God would save them. And then they'll believe
the truth if God saves them. They need to be saved. That's
what needs to happen. And salvations of the Lord. This
is God's means, the word came before the water. You see that
in this passage? Why? Because they needed the
word more than they needed the water. They needed to hear from
God more than they needed a drink. And you're not ever gonna get
a drink, not a real one, till you hear from God. The gospel is preeminent because
the gospel is Christ. Don't neglect God's means of
blessing, of life, of salvation. We need to hear from God. And
speaking of that, look what Elisha's instructions were. Bring me a
minstrel. That word means a player of strings. Isn't that interesting? Bring
me a minstrel. Elisha, and this is a little
bit mysterious. You think, what does he need
a guitar player or a harp player for in the middle of this crisis?
I believe it's because he wanted to worship, don't you? Isn't
that why God gave music? I think he wanted to worship.
He wanted to hear the songs of Zion. We know that music is a very
powerful thing. You remember the effect that
it had on Saul when David played with his hand on the strings
of the harp. Does God use music? When the minstrel played, it
didn't bring the water. But I'll tell you what did happen.
The hand of the Lord came upon Elisha when the music was played. Has that ever happened to you?
That's why we sing. That's why we follow the clear
instruction of scripture to sing psalms and hymns and spiritual
songs. Because maybe the hand of the
Lord will come upon us and cause us not to think about this wretched
world and the petty nonsense that we call important. Does God use music? I'll ask
it again. Look at the promise given and the necessity of believing
that promise. The promise is that all your
need will be met by God. Fill this valley with ditches
and water will come. God will send water that you
may drink. Believe in the doctrine of salvation
by grace, by the sovereign grace of God. That's a good thing to
believe, but that's one thing. Drinking is another thing. I believe this is how God saves
sinners, but has he saved you? Have you come thirsty and empty
and desperate unto him for the water of life? that you may drink. That's the
promise. God will provide everything that
you need. In spiritual terms, righteousness,
submission. That's what Paul said about the
Israelite. They need to submit. They haven't submitted themselves
to the righteousness of God, which is Christ. You need faith. You're not just gonna decide
to believe on the Lord. Faith is the gift of God, not
of works, lest any man should hope. You need a sin offering.
God will provide everything you need. All that Christ is to the believer,
God has provided to his people. Part of what is needed is faith. Why did they have to dig ditches?
Why didn't the Lord just make water in a way that they could
just fill up their vessels, you know? Because part of what is needed
is faith. That's the ditch digging. Fill this valley with ditches. There's not but one reason that
they would do that. If you're gonna be there in the
wilderness, dying of thirst, the last thing you're gonna wanna
do is jump up and dig a ditch, unless you believe God. Unless you believe God. Faith is necessary. Why would you dig a ditch in
a dry valley when what you need is water? The truth is what you
need is God. And God said, dig ditches. Secondly, because you believe
him. The digging of the ditches symbolizes faith. God given faith
in Christ, the water of life. Digging a ditch when you're thirsty,
what's that gonna do? It's just gonna make you more
thirsty. It doesn't make any sense unless
you believe God. The gospel is foolishness unto
them that believe not. I'm sure everybody thought Noah
was the biggest idiot that ever lived. But he believed God. The digging of the ditch is not
gonna help you. It's just gonna make you more
thirsty. And did you know that even our
faith is full of soul-damning unbelief And yet by grace or you say through
faith And that's not of yourselves
it's the gift of God not of words lest any man should boast and
Where God gave faith God gave water By way of Edom verse 20 this
interesting, you know what Edom is The word Edom means one thing,
red. By way of red, God gave life. The meat offering that was mentioned
there at the beginning of verse 20, after the meat offering was
offered, which was always accompanied by the burnt offering, the sin
offering, In the morning, at the time of sacrifice, once the
offering was offered, there was water by way of red. Faith just has one object. That's
it. That's it. This is just a picture.
Faith has one object. Believing that God will save
this way, the way He will save by the precious blood of His
Son, and only that, only Christ and Him crucified,
nothing else, no decisions, no will of yours, that's the problem. All of that follows salvation. If you are ever gonna want to
do anything for God, God's gonna have to save you first. And see
the picture here in the next verses, where they woke up early
in the morning, they found out, I mean, they finally found out,
they're coming for us, we better get together here, get ready.
And they woke up early in the morning, they see the water,
the sun reflected on the water in such a way that it looked
like blood. And that too, that's a clear picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ and his sacrificial death, because what was the result of
that? All of his enemies died. and his people were saved. That's the result of Calvary.
Those who hate the Lord and fight against his people oppose God
and his people. The cross is not good news for
them. It was victory though for God's
chosen. Which was life to the Israelites
because it caused such delusion But it caused delusion and death
to those who opposed them the gospel is the savor of life unto
life And it's also the savor of death unto death and who is
sufficient For these things and the difference is Christ himself
the blood That blood that what the enemy
called blood is That's what God's people drank. That was their salvation. But to the enemy of God's people,
it was confusion, delusion, and death. Now when the Lord said, go in
and destroy everything worth saving, Anything worth not destroying,
destroy it. Isn't that strange? I don't suspect
they always did that. We know they didn't, they spoiled
them. They were enriched normally in
that situation. But everything that was good
and safe, any walled city within that country, tear it down. Anything that might be trusted, anything that man built that
could be trusted, don't trust it. Don't trust a fenced city. Trust God. It pictures how that those who
trust the Lord, those who inquire of the Lord, those who require
Him, those who resort to Him, and not this world and not our
own flesh, not our works, not our so-called righteousness,
which is nothing but sin. We resort to the Lord, those
that resort to him, they don't trust fence cities, they trust
him. Tear it down. Don't delight in the things of
the world, the choice places. Oh wow, that's beautiful, I might
move here, no. Rip it to shreds. Your habitation
is God. You're beautiful for situation
wherever you are. If you inquire of the Lord. Don't draw water from the wells
of this earth. Stop them up. Not interested. But draw only from the wells
of salvation. Don't eat of the fruit of the
earth. Cast stones into all the gardens and the farmland, so
that it's unproductive. Don't eat of the fruit of this
earth, not in spiritual matters. Not when you're inquiring of
the Lord. Your soul needs meat indeed, and this world doesn't
have it. By Christ and him crucified,
this world is crucified unto me. That's what that pictures. that this world has to offer,
the best that it has to offer. Show every kind of disdain for
it that you can show. And keep looking, keep resorting,
keep trusting the Lord. You see how big that word inquire
is? Oh, that we might inquire of the Lord by his prophets. the Lord Jesus Christ. By him
and his cross, this world is crucified into me, and I into
the world. May God make it so.