If you will let's turn to Hosea
chapter 2 The gospel of Hosea Got Ezekiel Daniel Hosea Joel
and Amos Matthew if you can count that high turn left of 12 books
and you'll be Hosea Hosea chapter two, I want to look at irresistible
grace this morning. I got some comments from others
around the country and from several of you about Wednesday night's
service. And I told those folks in other
places, I said, you should have been there when the spirit was.
It was something I pray the Lord will visit us again this morning
and not leave us to ourselves. And I pray earnestly that we're
not just coming to church today. that we're here to worship God,
honor His Son, and Lord will bless that. Hosea 2, look in
verse 14, this will be our text. Hosea 2, verse 14. Therefore,
behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness.
and speak comfortably unto her. Like I said, the title of this
message is we're going through the Sunday school. I hope we
always look at the Lord's sovereignty and His holiness as paramount. And then we looked at total depravity,
warn them of sin. You need to get back to these
things. You know, I preach the message on warning of sin. Watch
out for false prophets. Next week, Gabe preached on it.
A couple other ones preached on it. And then I started to
tell her to practice. We need to get back to basics. We need to lay
a foundation. And you know, Clay and Gabe,
they're all starting on Tulip. I told Kim, I said, apparently
this nation needs to be warned of sin, cautioned of false prophets,
and brought back to basics. We didn't communicate that. You
get that for free. I just thought I'd tell you.
Maybe that'd give you some comfort. I thought of so many scriptures that I
would preach on to show that the Lord's grace is irresistible. I'm sure you think of many too.
This isn't exhaustive, but I thought of Psalm 65. Here's what God
says. Blessed is the man whom thou
choosest. and causest to approach unto
thee that he may dwell in thy courts." People talk about being
blessed, left, right, and center in this country. Oh, blessed.
Or they just so flippantly just say, blessed. How are you doing?
Blessed. Well, what is that? Well, the blessed man, God says,
is one that he chose through unconditional election, that
had no merit in themselves because they're totally depraved, and
he sent his son to atone for, redeem, and he calls us to approach
unto him that we may dwell in his courts. He makes us. He makes
us. God says that's the blessed man.
In John 6, 44, it says, no man can come to me except the father
which hath sent me draw him, and I'll raise him up to the
last day. It's written in the prophets, they shall all be taught
of God. He said this is what the whole
scripture is saying, is God's gonna save his people. He's gonna
draw them irresistibly. Every man therefore that hath
heard and hath learned of the Father cometh to me. The Lord
comes to him, he gives him new life, and he draws him to his
son, and we come to Christ. I don't feel like I've done that.
I've often known either, but it's not my doing, it's the Lord's
doing. Salvation's of the Lord. I thought
of Jeremiah 31, the Lord hath appeared unto me of old, saying,
yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love. That's before
we was even alive, before we even knew what love was. He loved
us. Therefore, because of that, because he loved the people with
loving kindness, we learned something about that. Have I drawn thee? That's irresistible grace. The
Lord had a people, He loved them, He put them in Christ, and He
ain't gonna miss one. He's gonna get them all. And
we're going through the motions right now of how He does that.
He's bringing it to pass through the preaching of the gospel.
How important is that to you? Think about it. I thought of
Ephesians 1. We know that well, don't we? And I thought of Ephesians
2. But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love, wherewith
he loved us, even when you were dead in sins, you didn't want
nothing to do with him, graveyard dead, hath he quickened, made
alive, brought drawn to life with Christ, together with Christ,
by grace are you saved. That's being saved, that's having
eternal life, being drawn to life, from what we wasn't to
what he's made us. That's grace, that's irresistible. Well, I don't think I'm going
to do that today. It don't matter what you think. My children, I said, I'm
not going to let you stay in that hole. I'm going to rescue
you out of the pit. And I said, well, I'm going to
stay down here in the pit. Hush. You snatch them up, take them out
of there. I'm the father. You're the child. You do as I
say. and do it. You ever see a small
child getting snatched out of a store to go get whipped in
a parking lot, and they get him up out of their arms and them
legs just kicking and stuff and scrawling? It don't matter what
they want. Get them out of there. Take them,
because that's your child. You love them, right? Have to.
That's irresistible grace. James said, of his own will.
That's God's will. God wanted to, and he does what
he wants. He's the only one that can do what he wants. begat he
us, he gave life to his people with the word of truth. Let me
tell you, I hope this really gets hold of somebody and make
you mad, glad, or sad. The Lord does not save with 85%
truth. He said he won't bless that. That the false prophets, he said,
it ain't gonna bless my people at all. No, you ain't gonna be
saved under that. He said so. He saves with the
word of truth. That's his word, that's true,
but Christ's the word and Christ's the truth. That's how he saves.
Not by one that's 86% close. This ain't horseshoes, this ain't
hand grenades. Of his own will begat he us with the word of
truth that we should be the kind of first fruits of his creatures.
We're gonna bear fruit. I never want to agree. I don't
want to just agree that the grace of that holy, sovereign God elected
a people. He sent God the Son to live and
die for them and them alone. And by sending His Spirit, He
draws them to Himself and no amount of resistance is capable
of stopping Him. And they're notified of this
by the Holy Ghost. I don't want to just agree with
that. I don't want to just say, yes, I can give head knowledge
that this, according to these, all these plethora of scriptures,
that God has a grace, he saved a people, and it's irresistible.
I want to find that grace irresistible. Some of y'all get the difference.
I don't want to agree with a doctrine, a theological standpoint, a fact.
I want to be drawn to a person. That's called life. Eternal life. God says so. I don't want to
agree that elect sinners are drawn to Christ. I want to be
drawn to Christ again and again and again. And I pray for that
for you and for your families as much as I pray for it for
me and my family. That's something I want. I thought this text would
be great, especially since we're looking at Tulip on Sunday mornings.
There's a sovereign, holy God on his throne. All of creation
from Adam, all of mankind from Adam is completely and utterly
sin. That's our instinct. We drank
it like water and we can't do nothing about it. We're completely
helpless, hopeless in a pit. And because of that, Therefore,
because of that, God chose a people. He said, I'm gonna make them
just like my son. And he put them in him. We're
putting that cliff to the rock. And that one we're putting, he
came to this earth, he was born of the law because we were, made
bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh because we're flesh. He
lived perfect for us, honored the father in his dreams. Never
had a cross micro-expression to anybody. He was holy and unblameable
without sin, and He bore our sin. He was made His bride on
that cross, and God saw the sin and punished it. He turned His
back on it. And that tomb He was laid in
is empty. That sacrifice has been accepted,
and He's on His throne right now, interceding for His people. What a thought. That one that's on his throne,
he paid the price. He then sends his spirit through
the preaching of the gospel, and without resistance, which
you can kick and scream if you want to, without success, he
draws his people to his son. He said, I bought them, they're
mine, I'm gonna redeem them. I'm taking them, I'm bringing
them to me. I'm not gonna go say hi and leave
them out in the woods by themselves. I'm gonna go leave the 99, I'm
gonna go get that one, I'm gonna bring them together. It'll be
one body, and I'm gonna rub them together like this until all
that dirt fell off of them, and they're fitly framed together.
Isn't that what the Word says? That's what He said. That's what
He's gonna do. Because of this sin, look here in Hosea 2, verse
14, our text. Hosea 2, verse 14. Therefore,
behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness
and speak comfortably to her. I know you all remember that
just like I do. You got it in the same Sunday school. Well,
if you see a therefore, what's it there for? Right? Therefore. Well, who's this talking about?
There's a lady there. I will allure her. Who's her? That's Gomer. That's Gomer. She had went back to her old
ways. This is the wife of the prophet. He went and married
a wife and she would turn to whoredoms. Look here in verse
two, Hosea two, verse two. God gave a message to the prophet.
to talk to his family. He said, you go home, talk to
your children. Plead with your mother. Plead. For she's not
my wife, neither am I her husband. Let her therefore put away her
whoredoms out of her sight and her adulteries from between her
breasts. Everything she holds so dear. Go plead with her to
knock it off. Come back to your husband. warn
her, caution her, beg with her, plead with her. Why was this
prophet married to this woman anyway? It wasn't just he was
married. Why did he marry this woman? You know, that's against
the law. God's prophets wasn't allowed to take them wives of
whoredoms, those wives that weren't in the house that he said he
had to marry out of. But God told him to, didn't he? Look
here, if you've got the same Bible, I'll do one page to the
left. Chapter one, verse two. The beginning of the word of
the Lord by Hosea, this is God speaking, Hosea is writing it
out. And the Lord said to Hosea, go, take thee a wife of whoredoms
and children of whoredoms. Why, Lord? For, because the land
hath committed great whoredom departing from the Lord. They
have no potential in them, the land. That's speaking of God's
bride. He said, my people, you go take
that wife, because I'm going to show, take this whole book,
and I'm going to show my people what I am going to do for them.
What a rough life. Do you think that's fair to Gomer?
She had to go through all that pain and agony and get wrinkles
and be sold on a slave block and be embarrassed in public
so God can show his people throughout time. And in 2024, this is how
I saved my bride. While she's in it, she probably
didn't like it. But at the end, she said, that's all right. I'll be fine. Thank
you, Lord. You was right. Gomer was given
to Hosea to show that our kinsman redeemer is going to redeem his
bride. And we ain't worthy. And he's
altogether gracious. This is talking to those that
are totally depraved. Not those that agree with total
depravity as a fact. Mankind's sinful. This man's
sinful. Well, those other people drink iniquity like water. I'm
the one that drinks it like water. And we're chosen in Christ without
a cause in them and that atonement's been made, it's been paid in
full. After that prior act, grace is revealed. Lord comes to us
and he graciously calls us. And that does something. I can't
remember who wrote it, but it's in one of them articles in the
books. There's a difference. I think Drew Dietz did. Some
of y'all have experienced that. People you've not seen in 15,
20 years. I said, you ain't the same. You're different now. What
got into you? That ain't a what, it's a who.
That's a difference, isn't it? Verse five, chapter two, verse
five. For their mother hath played the harlot. She hath convinced
them, she hath conceived them, hath done shamefully. For she
said, I will go after my lovers. I, that give me bread, and my
water, and my wool, and my flax, and mine oil, and my drain. All those things are hers, ain't
they? She said, I can take care of myself. I don't need what's
going on here. I don't need this husband that God gave me. I'm
fine. Therefore, verse six, behold,
I will. Hedge up thy way with thorns,
and make a wall that she shall not find her path. She's after
her path. She's after her way. And the
Lord said, I'm gonna change that. She's mine. I'm doing all this
to show what I'm gonna do for my people, and I'm gonna hedge up
her path with thorns. I'm gonna send trial after trial,
do whatever is needed. I'm gonna pigeonhole her right
where I want her. Why would he do that? Why would
he give us this picture? That's exactly what he does to the bride
of Christ. We're going to be put in him the way. We'll be
taken out of our way. Remember Judas and all those,
and they went back to their way. When are we putting Christ's
the way? And all of our ways of destruction is just going
to be cut off. We're trying to ruin this at every turn. And
the Lord said, nope, ain't happening. You're coming to me. I'm drawing
you irresistibly, my grace. What's the Lord going to do with
this irresistible calling and drawing? First thing is going
to be convict of sin. You know, that's a great grace. I've met
people that have, they have no pain whatsoever of their sin. That's all we have. Man's bad.
Hmm. They're just so hardened to sin. The Lord hadn't ripped
that open and caused them to see not just what they are, but
who it's against. Who it's against? We've sinned
against God. And it whacks worse and worse.
Well, yeah, the world itself is getting worse and worse. No,
as a believer, we're on a deserted island. As Lord grows us in grace,
I just see more of myself as time goes on. I'm worse and worse.
Lord's telling the truth. And then by me decreasing, people
say, that's terrible. We don't just do that. We're
of men most miserable if all we do is God just convicts us
of sin. We see his righteousness. The lower we go, the higher he
goes. And that makes us happy. New creation grins, doesn't it?
Rejoices. He's going to head us about. He's going to convict
us of sin, verse 10. Hosea 2, 10. I'm going to put her right where
I want her. I'm going to show her she's nothing
and she's going to cry out. Did Lord do this to Gomer? Well,
he used Hosea and this took place, but what's it? It's a picture.
Throughout time, what God does was bright. He irresistibly caused
them, caused them. And he makes all those things
that we used to deal with stink. Not just the, well, that church
is wrong, that church is wrong, that church is wrong, that church
is wrong. It makes us, I was wrong. We'll sit next to her
with the frogs. They're going to be heaped up like piles of snow
around lampposts and it's going to stink. Billions of frogs stinking
and we don't want nothing to do with it. It smells bad. Just get me out of that room.
I don't want nothing to do with it. I don't. Verse 11. I will also
cause her murder to cease, her feast days, her new moons, her
Sabbaths, her solemn feast. I will destroy her vines and
her fig trees. Whereof she hath said, these
are my rewards that my lovers have given me, and I will make
them a forest, and the beast of the field's gonna eat them.
And I will visit upon her the days of Balaam, wherein she burned
incense to him, and she decked herself with earrings of jewels,
and she went after her lovers and forgot me, saith the Lord. He's speaking to us here. Did
you know that? I'm the lewd one. I'm the one that forgot him.
I'm the one that thought I had the world by the tail, and everything's
mine. And the Lord destroyed every
bit of that. So that ain't fun. That's God's irresistible grace,
Him saving somebody. I was talking to a brother this
week. I said, everything people think, like, oh, I got religion,
and Jesus loves me, and I'm going to do cartwheels, and it's all
sunshine and rainbows from here out. You better get you a box
of Kleenexes. There's going to be a lot of snot involved. It's
a hard way. Because he's weaning us from
this world and drawing us to himself. And this old man can't
stand it. And the new man can't have your
patience. We want it done right now. I
want it done right. I want it done right now. That's us. I'm the
forgetting one. I'm the one that drinks iniquity,
all the good deeds, like water. Oh, we did a good job, didn't
we? That's drinking iniquity like water. Therefore, because
of this bride of Christ cannot come to him will not come to
him, is in direct rebellion to him, and is drunk on self-righteousness
and self-worship. Because of that, he said in Isaiah,
come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins
be as scarlet, they're gonna be white as snow. When that law
entered, that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded,
grace did much more abound. Grace did. Therefore, because
of this bride, verse 14, therefore, behold, pay attention. Get the
whole world to notice this. I will. She can come to me and
make it effectual if she wants to. That is not what God's word
says. I will allure her. God's saying she will not come
to me, she cannot come to me, but this gomer's a picture of
my people. I'm gonna hedge her paths about, I'm gonna allure
her. In our language, allure means to draw, to compel, attract,
right? But the root word here means
open. Open. God and only God can open the
ears. God and only God can open the
eyes. He can open the heart of stone
and put a living heart in there. And he said, that's what I'm
gonna do. I'm gonna give her new eyes, new ears, new heart. She's gonna
be a new creation, top to bottom. Said Ezekiel 36, a new heart
also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.
And I will take the stony heart out of your flesh, and I'll give
you a heart of flesh, and I will put my spirit within you, and
cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments
and do them. I sure don't feel like I'm keeping
them and doing them. Well, Christ did, and I'm in Him. He walks
in us. Where is this going to take place?
Verse 14. Therefore, behold, I will allure
her. I'm going to open her up and
bring her, that means carry, into the wilderness. She's already
in that wilderness of the world, isn't she? She's already in that
wilderness of self and desire and fulfillment apart from God.
And it's implied, the word there for wilderness, it's implied
a desert. And I can agree with that. The Lord gets us alone
in a dry and thirsty land and makes us the dry and thirsty
ones. That's what he does. And he reveals the water of life
to us, that fountain of living water to us. But the word there,
wilderness, literally means pasture. Pasture. Though we start dry
and thirsty, that's where we're brought. were carried to pasture. He maketh me, Psalm 23. Everybody,
that's the most quoted Psalm in the world, Psalm 23. He maketh
me to lie down in green pasture. Well, whoever, this is, it's
an open lot, whoever feels like parking their cattle here on
this green pasture, no, he makes them. That's irresistible grace.
That's a good thing to be putting pasture in that wilderness. He
maketh me lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still
waters, not raging waters of justice. He's calmed them. He
shows us that we're convicted of sin, convicted of righteousness,
convicted of judgment. It's done, took care of. He restores
my soul. He leadeth me in paths of righteousness.
Why would the Lord do that? For His name's sake. For His
glory. For His grace's sake. That's
what Ephesians 1, 6 tells us. We are to the praise of the glory
of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Because we ain't worth nothing, because He atoned for us, and
now He irresistibly draws us by His grace, we're to the praise
of His grace. The Lord did it, and we thank
Him. It says in verse 14, therefore, behold, I will allure her and
bring her into the wilderness and speak comfortably unto her. That means speak to the heart.
I could say things as sweet as sugar, and bless your little
hearts, and just be so kind, and the Lord could bless that.
And I could scream and throw dynamite, and the Lord could
bless that. And He could not bless either one of them. I can't
speak to people's hearts. I can talk to your head. I could
say what the Lord says, only He can bless that. Only His Spirit
being there to make that effectual, and put it in somebody's heart.
He's gotta put the heart there. He's gotta give the ears to hear
it, eyes to see it, and then he has to speak comfortably to
the heart. Speak comfortably to her. What
will he speak that she will find so irresistible when he speaks
to the heart? He's gonna bring her out in the wilderness. He's
gonna open her up. carry her out there and speak
to her heart. What's he gonna say? That same
words in Isaiah 40. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem.
Go talk to their hearts. Could you imagine getting that charge?
Something you can't do. Go talk to the hearts of those
people. Lord, my mouth can't do that. What'd he tell Moses?
I made the mouth. Go do it. Go tell them what I
say. I'll take care of the rest of
it. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem and cry unto her that her warfare
is accomplished. If somebody ain't never been
at war with God, that ain't good news. God shows we're at war,
we're enmity, we are at war with him. And he said, you was at
war with me, you was fighting me tooth and toenail and my people
and my prophets and everything else, and I've ceased the war,
I won. He said, the war is over. Tell
her that her iniquity is pardoned. All the sin, all the iniquity,
all the transgression, all the good things, all the bad things
we think we did, it's all bad. And he says, I'll put every bit
of it away. For she hath received the Lord's hands double, Machpelah,
for all her sins. The water and the blood. You've
been bought and you've been washed and you can't ever sin again.
Holy. Perfectly sanctified. From the
second that seed went in you and I germinated it. And that
seed came from before time, so it ain't never changed. Everlasting
love. And then he goes on, he says, all flesh is grass, behold
your God. That's not just facts. This took
place with Gomer, and that's not just a theoretical, spiritual
application to a text. That took place in the hearts
of God's people. And it still is. And when that last one's
drawn irresistibly by His grace, this is done. This world's over. I was talking to Paul Mahan in
his kitchen years ago about that, and I said, Paul, someday that
last one's gonna hear and this is over. And he said, maybe you'll
be the one to preach to him, Kevin. And I got terrified and
so motivated, I couldn't hardly, I said, let's go right now. Buy
a TV station, let's get to preaching. We can go home. Here's what took
place, verse 15. And I will give her vineyards
from thence, after I speak to her heart, after I do all this,
I'll give her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Acre
for a door of hope, and she shall sing there, she gonna be happy
about it, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when
she came up out of the land of Egypt, because I've brought her
out, I've delivered her out. And it shall be at that day,
that saith the Lord, thou shalt call me Isaiah, And shalt call
me no more Baeliel. Remember what those words were?
That's been several years since we looked at that. He said, you're going
to call me husband and shalt no more call me master. You're
not just going to give mental assent to that's the boss. You're
going to say that's the one I love because he loved me and he married
me and he gave me his last name. He's done all this for me, for
me. For I will take away thy names
of Balaam out of her mouth. and they shall no more be remembered
by their name. And in that day will I make a covenant for them
with the beast of the field and the fowls of heaven and with
the creeping things of the ground. And I will break the bow and
the sword and the battle out of the earth and will make them
to lie down safely. And I will betroth thee unto
me forever. I'm gonna marry you in a ceremony
to me forever. Yea, I will betroth thee unto
me in righteousness and in judgment and in loving kindness and in
mercies. And I will betroth thee unto
me in faithfulness, and thou shalt know the Lord." God says,
that's what I want to do. Whenever that conviction of sin
comes, we'll look at this next hour or two. When judgment comes
and trials come and that reality of sin comes, we have remorse,
don't we? Judgment has never turned anybody
to Christ. Grace does. When we are brought so low, we
see what we are. We don't just sit there and see
the rest of our lives. We see how great he is. And we say how
gracious and long kind, long suffering and kind and rich in
mercy and rich in grace. And he's done all this and it's
just a magnet. You can't, you'll grit your teeth,
try to kill him or you'll fall in love and hug him. That's the two sides of the fence.
That's it. How's that going to take place?
Look over in chapter 11. I'll finish. Hosea 11. It ain't gonna happen the way
we think. Somebody thinks they heard, well, God spoke to me
and I was on some desert highway in the middle of the night. No,
a demon might've spoke to you or a mockingjay, but Lord don't
speak to people that way. He don't speak audibly to people. Verse 11, I'm sorry, Hosea 11,
verse three. I taught Ephraim also to go,
taking them by their arms, but they knew not that I healed them.
I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love. And I was
to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaw. And I
laid meat unto them." We were in bondage. We had that bit and
bridle in our mouth of this world and loving every minute of it. And the Lord came and he threw
the cords of a man, through somebody that already experienced this,
and bands of love. Not love like we want to be loved.
Loved as God commands, as he is. And that looks like he ganks
you out in the desert and he's gonna put thorns all in your
way and strip you naked and put you on his auction block. He
said, that's deep love, isn't it? Bands of love. And he said,
I'm gonna be to them as the one that took that yoke off their
jaw. He says, my yoke's easy. My burden's light, isn't it?
He's gonna be the one that freed us from bondage and laid meat
right at us. Lord, you freed me. I'm hungry.
Here's meat. There's nothing needed that they didn't provide.
Cords of a man. I thought of Paul writing in
Romans 10. How then shall they call on him whom they not believed?
And how shall they believe in who they've not heard? And how
shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless
they be sent? How beautiful are the feet of them that preach
the gospel of peace and bring good tidings of good things.
Some of y'all ain't heard this, so I'll tell it. It'll be new
to you. When I was a little kid, they'd say, how beautiful are
the feet, those that bring good tidings. And Don Fortner was
staying with us back in like 84, 85, something, in Parkville.
And all the old grownups around the table after dinner talking,
and I'd sneak in, and I low crawled underneath that table. Nobody
could see me. And he had his shoes off. And
I saw his feet, and I thought, well, his feet's just like anybody
else's feet. I wonder what makes his feet
prettier than somebody else's. 20 years later, I understood
the foundation and the providence, the one that that man stood on,
the rock he stood on, and the providence that brought him was
what was beautiful. The one that set him was beautiful.
In all their affliction, he was afflicted, and the angel of his
presence saved them. In his love and in his pity,
he redeemed them, and he bared them and carried them all the
days of old. So what do I say with all these
things to you? There's a general call. When
we preach the gospel, we're taking the seed of the net, broadcasting
it, throwing it out there. Come! Live! God make us alive
in us. Dwell in us. Save your people,
Lord. That's a general call. And then
there's an effectual call, when the Lord does it. It goes to
everybody. People hear with the physical
ear. And then there's an effectual call where he gives a living
here that worships him. I say with Jose there, chapter
two, verse two. Plead with your mother. Plead. Come. Put your shotguns down. Quit being at war with him and
find this grace just He has to do that. Find it irresistible.
Not that God deals with irresistible grace. I got to have it. I pray,
Lord, do that for us. That'd be something. Let's pray
together. Father, bless your word as you
promised you will. It's a glorious word, a glorious
salvation that's wise, that's just wonderful, wonderfully contained
in your son, Lord, for an undeserving people. How holy and majestic,
hallowed is your name. What grace you've showed to your
people, Lord. Thank you for this. Lord, make
us rejoice, make us happy, make us sing as Gomer did, and be
thankful. Put a smile on our hearts and
on our faces, Lord, for what Christ has accomplished and what
he's doing right now. He has not failed and he shall
not fail. Forgive us our sin, forgive us our unbelief and our
wanderings, Lord, and hedge us about with thorns, if so be,
if that's what's needed. And keep us as you promised you
will, Lord. Thank you for revealing this
to a people and knitting us together. It's because of Christ, because
of his name, who he is, where he is, his love and kindness
and his faithfulness that we ask these things. Amen. All right,
we'll meet back at 1030.