Back up a few verses to chapter
10 and verse 35. And I will read. Therefore do
not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For
you do have need of endurance, so that when you have done the
will of God you may receive what is promised. for yet a little
while, and the coming one will come and will not delay. But
my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back,
my soul has no pleasure in him. But we are not of those who shrink
back and are destroyed, but we are of those who have faith and
preserve their souls. Now faith is the assurance of
things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by faith
the people of old received their commendation. And by faith we
understand that the universe was created by the word of God
so that what is seen was not made out of the things that are
visible. By faith, Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice
than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending
him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though
he died, he still speaks. I'll stop. That's all we're going
to get to today. That's all we're going to get
to today. I told you that when we got here to the 11th chapter
and we began to look at faith, that we would slow down. and
we would begin to look at the narratives associated with these
characters. That we understand that faith in and of itself is
not an effectual thing, but that faith is that which God grants
His elect to be aware and to understand and to rest in the
proclamation of what He has done through Jesus Christ. So faith
is not that which causes God to save you. Faith is the very
thing that God gives you because he has saved you in Jesus Christ.
And so you believe that proclamation. As a way of reminder, we see
that the evangelical world in which we live, the historical
essence of Christianity since probably the mid-19th century,
we know that faith has become an action of the will or in itself
the object of assurance. People have faith in their faith.
Well, I know that I'm a Christian because I believe. But what do
you believe? Well, I believe that I asked
the Lord into my heart. Good. I think I'm a snowman. It doesn't matter what we think
or what we truly believe in the context of how we view it. Saving faith is the very thing
that God grants us to believe in the very thing God has done
for us in the person of Jesus Christ who has saved us. So when
Paul says, we are saved by grace, that is what he means. We are
saved by grace. How do I know? Through faith
to believe that proclamation of grace and the efficacy of
grace for God's people and that we, as God's people, believe
in that sufficient hope. The sufficient one. Paul has
argued already through ten chapters that Jesus Christ is the point
of life. He is the point and His mercy
and His grace and His redemptive power for His people is the point
of all creation and that He is greater than all the types and
all the shadows that have ever existed or ever will exist and
that there is nothing that man can do aside from or beside being
granted this great life, being granted this great sight to come
before the Father that Christ has not already accomplished.
Yet when we think of faith, we often confuse ourselves with
God and think, well, I can do this better. I can be better. I can be stronger. But Jesus
doesn't even give that illustration in his own teaching to his disciples.
He doesn't say you must have strong faith. He doesn't say
you must exercise your faith to build it up. He doesn't say
any of those things. He says, if you have the faith
of the smallest thing that you could fathom, it is enough. Because faith, by definition,
in the context of the Holy Scripture, is pointing to the faithfulness
of Jesus Christ alone. Sola Fide, as we would call it
historically, rests on the idea that grace alone, through Christ
alone, is the effectual focus of our hope and that faith Faith
in this one who is faithful, faith in this true high priest,
faith in the righteousness of God that the law bears witness
to is our Savior. He who has promised is faithful. So we do not look to become more
so that we can become hopeful. We do not look to carry ourselves
in such a way that we might please and honor God unto salvation. No, all that we do in the context
of our lives as believers, we do by faith or it is condemned. And to do anything by faith is
never to rest in that which we do, but to always rest in that
which has been done. To live by faith is to always
remember, no matter how smart we may become or how strong we
may feel or how active we may be in our ministry day to day,
faith always does nothing but rest in the one who did everything.
But then to live by faith, it gives the indication that we
are to do something so that all that we do, Paul would argue,
All that we do in word or in deed must be done for the glory
of Christ, for the name of Christ. That is faith. That is living
because we are alive. That is living for the sake of
Christ, because of our gratitude for him. And that wanes. It's
strong and weak and exciting and boring. And it depends on
what else is happening in our lives. As Paul has already said
there, verse 1 of 11, faith is the assurance of things hoped
for. What is it that we hope for except
the promises of God for eternal life? Jesus Christ is our life. We sing that song. Jesus Christ
is my life. We sing songs about the fact
that Christ is our all. We sing songs about the fact
that all to Him we owe. And the list goes on and on.
Where are these ideas coming from throughout history? They
come from the assurance that is ours in Christ alone, that
we have brought nothing to Him, that we have not come to Christ
with this incredible idea to lay our lives down for His sake.
Yet God the Father sent him to lay his life down for ours. And
so if we do give our lives away, it is only out of gratitude.
It is not meritorious. It does not earn us brownie points
with God. It does not put us in a place
where we are more of a Christian than someone else, that we're
closer to the Father than someone else. Sure, our intimacy can
ebb and flow. Our confidence and assurance
can ebb and flow. Our knowledge can grow stronger.
We can be ignorant. We can have understanding in
all these things, no matter how much we've learned them with
just the wish of his command. He can take our minds from us
and we wouldn't even know our own names, much less the name
of our Savior. So it's never in us that our hope lies, but
it's always in the assurance of things hoped for, the one
who is Jesus Christ, the conviction of things not seen. As I preached this several weeks
ago, we talked about what that could look like. We don't look
at ourselves. And in the context of Paul's
writing here to these Hebrew Christians, we know that he's saying, don't
look at the law. Don't look at the precepts of Judaism. Don't
look at the practices of worship. Don't look at the temple. Don't
look at the tabernacle. Don't look at Moses. Don't look at Abraham.
Look at Jesus. the founder of our faith, the
perfecter of our faith, through whom we have access to the Father
who has gone through the holy of holies and sat down at the
right hand of majesty on high. This is the Christ that we know.
This is the Christ that we serve. This is the Christ that has saved
us. And we know that the power of
God unto salvation is this good news. See, sometimes we confuse
the idea of gospel truths as magic words. There are no magic
words in the Bible. There are no magic prayers in
the Bible. There are no magic responses and responsive readings
that can come from the Bible that can bring us to a place
where then we can feel a little bit more confident before the
Lord. There is nothing that we can say with our mouth that will
cause God to treat us any differently. in the context of what we believe,
or how we hope, or who we are, or what we're going to do, I
would say that almost every one of us in the room today, I won't
say that all of us, but most of us, if we were all honest
and weren't liars, would admit that we're liars. Because we've
all said that we would do something, and then sometimes out of our
own control, those things could not come to pass. It makes us
a liar just the same. It's not necessarily the fact
that we have deceived, but we were unable to keep the promise. But brothers and sisters, God
cannot lie. Paul says that very thing earlier
in this letter. God made a promise to Abraham,
and he had no one greater to swear by, so he swore by himself,
saying, Surely I will bless you and multiply you. And thus Abraham,
having patiently waited, obtained the promise. For people swear
by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an
oath is final for confirmation. So when God desired to show more
convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable
character of His purpose, He guaranteed it with an oath, so
that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for
God to lie, we have fled for refuge. We who have fled for
refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set
before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast
anchor of the soul, hope that enters into the inner place behind
the curtain, where Jesus is gone as a forerunner on our behalf,
having become a priest forever. After the order of Melchizedek,
Jesus has finished the work of salvation. It is done. There's
nothing left to do except the day when He comes to culminate
that relationship forever. In the picture of matrimony,
in the picture of knowledge and oneness in the context of being
one in Him, as husband and wife are one together, we shall be
one with our Lord and Savior forever and ever and ever. And
there will be nothing left to do but bask in His glory. So that is the faith that we
have. That is the faith that we must understand. That is the
faith that we must rest in, not that which can be seen in our
lives, or in our hope, or in our actions, but that which is
unseen, who is Jesus Christ. I think when I taught that several
weeks ago, I read the entire first chapter of 1 Peter. Talking
about the hope that is in us even though now for a little
while if necessary we shall face various kind of trials. And that
those trials produce perseverance and what happens in the context
of trials is that it does something to us. And what it does is it
actually purifies our faith. It puts us in a place where we
realize there's nothing that we can hold on to except Jesus
Christ. and that as long as we are continually
to put tow holds or safety nets under us, we will never truly
have assurance. We will always wonder, did I
tie that tight enough? Did I dig that hole deep enough?
Did I grab hold of it hard enough? What am I going to do? There
is nothing for us to do except know that God has grabbed us
out of the darkness, and he has snatched us and put us into the
light of the domain of the kingdom of his son, and we are safe eternally,
and nothing can separate us from this. Nothing can separate us
from the love of God. We are secure. Now, verse 4,
that was the introduction, I guess. Verse 4, this is where we are
tonight. We're going to be looking at
some of the characters of antiquity, some of the characters of the
Old Testament, and we're going to show, or Paul is going to
show us as the readers, as he showed his original readers,
that all of the patriarchs, that all of the cast of history who
have been found in Christ had the same faith that we had. have
the same faith that we have today, to believe in the finished work
of Jesus, and most importantly, that means they believe in the
promises of God. It says, by faith, listen to
what's happening here, by faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable
sacrifice than Cain. Stop there. So what's happening? Some people would say, you know,
Moses believed God and he lived by faith but obedience saved
him. He built the boat. We'll get
to, did I say Moses? I meant Noah, paying attention.
That's blasphemy, heresy. How do we know Moses went on
that boat? We don't know, no I'm just joking. Noah was saved by
obedience. No he wasn't, he was saved by
God. He was saved by God. Abel did
something. Abel was told in the Bible. As
a matter of fact, let's go to Genesis chapter 4. Let's just
read it. No sense in me telling the story
when God can tell it better. Now Adam knew his wife and that
means that they had intimate moments together. And she conceived
and bore Cain. saying, I have gotten a man with
the help of the Lord, and again she bore his brother Abel. Now
there's a lot of history in that little sentence. This didn't
just all happen in the first two hours of creation. Here's
Adam and Eve, they knew each other, and Cain, and right out
of the box, Abel. Now, there's some time here.
The point of this is not to show us the timeline, the point of
this is to teach us the narrative. What is important about it? I'll
tell you what's important about it. Faith alone in Jesus Christ,
that's what's important about it. Let's keep going. Now Abel
was a keeper of sheep and Cain a worker of the ground. So what
were their professions? Abel was a shepherd. He took
care of livestock, which was his calling, his vocation. The
word vocation means divine call. That was his calling. That's
what God, God, you want to know what God's calling is for you?
You're doing it. Whatever you're doing, that's the call of God. That's tough. I don't want to
be doing this. Do it under the Lord or don't
do it at all. Sit at home. No matter what it is, that's your
vocation. That's the call of God. You may be driven to give your
life in the context of the local assembly. You may be driven to
have relationships that you will invest in, whether it be through
studying the Bible or teaching the Bible or praying or giving
or being helps or whatever. That's called of all of us too
as Christians. We all have the same call. To be content where
we are and to serve one another as under the Lord. So Abel was
a worker of sheep and Cain was a worker of the ground. He was
the one who fed everyone the crops, the grains, the vegetables,
the fruits. He was the produce manager of
the early world. And Abel was the livestock manager. That's what they did. Neither
of those jobs were better than the other. Some people like to
impart some great wisdom that they just got up off the toilet
one day and went, you know what the Lord showed me just now is
that the reason God hated Cain is because Cain's hands were
dirty and Abel was a shepherd and that's sort of like what
Jesus is and all so shepherds are better than gardeners. That's
ridiculous. You're looking at me like I'm
crazy. I've heard people say that. So look at them like, look
at them through me and go, that's just silly. It's silly, but I
hear it. I hear it. I also hear people
say something about, well, God required a blood sacrifice and
yada, yada, yada. We'll get to it. None of that's
in view here. Read the Bible as it's read.
And when we have confusion about Old Testament theology, go to
Paul, go to John, go to James, go to Jesus, go to Matthew, go
to Luke and see what they say. Because
apostolic authority defines Old Testament theology. That's how
it works. We don't get to play the numbers
game or any of the other kind of stuff to say what God is saying. God is saying what He's saying.
And He's telling us this. Adam and Eve had two sons. One
of them was a farmer and one of them was a lobster guy, was
a herder. And they had good jobs. Work
is not a curse. The hard toiling of work is the
curse. Understand that. Paul even goes so far to tell
the Thessalonians that people who aren't working, you should
not let them eat from the table of the church. If they're not
willing to work, they're not going to eat. Think about that for a second.
Doesn't sound too Christian-ly to us, does it? I'll tell you
what I want to do. I want to start an inner-city
ministry that feeds people. Now what if that was the check?
Are you working? No, sir. Are you willing to work?
Not going to happen. Sorry, cuz. Prayers and wishes. I mean, it
wouldn't work, would it? Pun intended. So here is Cain
and Abel. Here's what they do. Verse three. In the course of time, see how
that sounds? We don't know how much time.
We just know that somewhere in the midst of this life, Cain
and Abel grew up, they became young men, and they were doing
their jobs, and they were doing their jobs well because that's
what people do. They work. If we don't have something to
do, and job does not always mean income, Look at the ministry. You never know what it's going
to be like. Sometimes we have to go and work hard to accomplish
life without ever being compensated. And I was taught years ago that
a man that won't do what he's doing for free ain't worth paying.
Something to think about. There's no theology in that,
but I think there's some good wisdom in it. But in the course
of time, Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the first
fruits of the ground. And Abel also brought of the
first fruit of his flock and of their fat portions. And this
is what's happened. Here's these two brothers. Here
are these two brothers. And they've grown up together.
And I know this because of what Paul says. Why did Cain kill
his brother? Paul asked the question in the
letter to the Ephesians. And what does he say? Because
he hated him. Why did he hate him? Why did
Cain hate Abel? Because Abel's works were righteous
and Cain's works were evil. I want you to think about that
for a second. So the whole time these boys are growing up, there
is this hatred. I don't think Cain just hated
Abel all of a sudden. That doesn't happen. They weren't
bosom buddies and best friends and going around life. And I
think that Cain was always in the shadow of the righteousness
of Abel. based on what Paul teaches us,
not based on my own interpretation, based on what Paul teaches us.
So therefore, as Jesus promised, if you are with me, the world's
going to hate you. We even talked about that a little
bit on Sunday. So if you are righteous, the world is going
to hate you. And the only way that we are
righteous is if we believe in the finished work of Jesus Christ.
So when we are truly righteous people, it means we live by faith
in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. Those
are Paul's words. So true righteousness is to be
found in the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ because God the
Father has given us to Him and He got on the cross with us in
His mind, with us in view, and with us in the judicial court
of God. Abel was righteous. Cain was
not. And I think Cain was a wonderful
gardener. His crops were probably the best
that have ever been in the world. Why? Because if you know anything
about atrophy, things just sort of wind down as they age. Proof! Just look at science. Christians
can believe science. Yeah, we can. And so I believe
that Cain was the greatest gardener that ever lived. I believe he
could grow things in a way that none of us could even imagine.
And likewise, I believe Abel was probably an incredible shepherd.
He probably had a lot less disease than we would have today. A lot
of less pestilence than we have today. And so these two boys
produced great outcomes with the job that God had had them
to do. Yet Cain all the while hated
his brother. Because he was righteous and
Cain was not. He was righteous and Cain was
not. And so somewhere in time, as God had commanded them, we
don't know the details of that, but we know that there was something
commanded of God. and their father probably had
taught them. You need to take, at this moment in time, it's
time, you need to take the first fruits of this crop and you need
to sacrifice it to the Lord as a thank you. As an offering. Was it the first offering? I
don't know. Probably not. It's probably every
season. First fruits, sacrifice. So both
boys have been doing the same thing. And I'm willing to bet
you if we could rewind and look at the home videos of this first
family, we would see Cain constantly trying to one up Abel. Maybe he had more. Instead of
a thousand cantaloupes, I'm going to give four thousand. Instead
of, you know, three perfect palm trees, I'm going to give twelve
perfect palm trees. I'm going to burn anything I
can unto the Lord because I'm going to show God that I am good. I'm going to show God that I'm
righteous. I'm going to show God that I mean business when
it comes to His name. I'm going to earn God's favor. Didn't work. The Bible says that Abel and
Cain brought their firstfruits offerings. And here's the reason
that it just pushed Cain over the edge. It says, And the Lord
had regard for Abel. And the Lord had regard for Abel's
offering. But for Cain, the Lord had no
regard. And for his offering, he had
no regard. Now, the reason that the writer
puts these things in there in that way is to show us that God
loved Abel and therefore loved what Abel brought. And God hated
Cain and therefore hated what Cain brought. And people go,
those are harsh words to be talking about God. This is the word of
God. If God has favor for you, He
loves you. There's a little systematic word
in theology called immutability. And what it means is that God
is unchangeable. That's the term that we have
created to talk about the unchangeability of God. That God is the same
forever because God is not in time. Time is owned by Him. He created it. He will destroy
it one day and we will not have to worry about it any longer.
There's a little pun in that, isn't there? And so God doesn't change. So
there is never a time in human history where God starts to love
some people. And likewise, there's never a
time in human history where God starts to hate certain people.
And we call that theological philosophy that's inferred and
derived out of the clear context of teaching. Well, that's not
in the Bible. It isn't, but it is, you see.
Just because we have to create language to fit what we learn
doesn't mean that it's not biblical. But if you know those terms,
you better know what's in the Bible before you know the terms. You
see the difference? So God did not approve of Cain
and God likewise did not approve of Cain's offering, but yet he
loved Abel. So Cain was very angry and his
face fell. Now I'm going to put some words
in Cain's mind for a minute. I'm sick and tired of this brother
of mine who does everything right. And I do exactly as he does. And I do more than he does. And
God dares not accept what I do. Who does he think he is? I'll
tell you who he is. He's the dead man. There it is. That's it. And that's how it
works. That's how it works. How do you
know that? Because I'm a human being with a murderous heart. And if you've never felt that,
maybe not in that same way, if you've never felt that type of
anger, then you don't have many relationships. Or you don't drive anywhere. You don't go somewhere for two
hours and they've canceled your reservation. I mean, everybody's
felt that. And when we have disdain towards
some people, it doesn't matter how they act or what they say,
no matter what they do, there's nothing that they can do that's
right in our eyes, right? And we look at them, and even if
they're being very genuine and they come and say, you know what,
I've been praying for you, you think, yeah, right. praying that I die. I mean, that's what you're thinking.
You treat me like a dog. Now you're going to love me.
See these relationships? And sadly, they're most of the
time in congregations. McCain was done. Space fail. He was through with
Abel. The only way that he could ever be as righteous as Abel
is if there was no comparison. I have to get rid of this person. I have to hurry because this
isn't even important. And the Lord said to Cain, why are you
angry? And why has your face fallen? There's so much I want
to say about this. If you do well, will you not be accepted?
And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire, I had this conversation
in brief without any explanation, but this word here in this phraseology,
its desire means it wants to control you. Sin wants to control you and
it is contrary to you. You must rule over it. See, this
isn't an instruction or a command. This is just how it is. And Cain spoke to Abel, his brother. And when they were in the field,
Cain rose up against his brother and he killed him. And the Lord
said to Cain, where is Abel, your brother? And Cain lied. And he says, I do not know. Am
I my brother's keeper? And the Lord said, what have
you done? The voice of your brother's blood
is crying out to me from the ground. And now you are cursed
from the ground. Your gardening days are over. You're not even going to be able
to grow a beard, Cain. And the ground had opened its
mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you
work the ground, it will no longer yield to you in its strength.
You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer over the earth. There's a lot
more to say, but let's get back to Hebrews 11. By faith, Abel offered to God
a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. Through which he was commended
as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And
through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. I'm going to have to preach this
again next week. Abel, in his blood, speaks. What did Abel's blood cry for? Vengeance. Justice. There's a difference. Sometimes it looks the same,
doesn't it? And we're all thinking, yeah, I'm going to be like Abel,
justice. Let's be honest. We want vengeance. We want recompense. We want to
feel as though we're satisfied. Not that God's law and holiness
and name is vindicated. Cain hated Abel because Abel
was Christ's And he thought the way all religious
people think, I can do something to look like them. But God still
doesn't accept it, does he? But when we do by faith, all
that we do, anything that we do, we are able to offer good
works and good deeds and loving service and worship and prayers
and tithes and talents and everything else that we could ever want
to offer for the sake of the name of Christ, working for our
employer, we can do it unto the Lord. And the Lord looks at it
and He says, that is a good work. Cain looked at the works, and
he mimicked the works, and he perfected the works, and he sat
before the Lord, his works, and the Lord says, this is garbage. Perfect offering, but not by
faith. And I would say that as much
as I think that I'm able, I'm really Cain. And Hebrews here is saying faith
is the assurance of things not seen. You can't look at the works of
another Christian and go, I'm just a terrible Christian. I'm
a terrible believer. Woe is me. The Lord may bring
us to that place and it's a quick second to remember the cross.
A believer who is settled at peace with the Lord in his court
of justice will not mar themselves and be mired in the bog of guilt
and condemnation. He or she will look to the cross
and bust in the front door of the throne room of God and say,
hey, pops, your son is here. That's acceptable. It's acceptable. But yet the
canes of the world will come through and they'll see the ables
busting into the front door of their daddy's house saying, hey
pops, how dare you call God pops? That's what Abba means. How dare you bust into the throne
of God because I have access to it. I got the key. You're not even dressed correctly.
You're not even bathed. You smell of sheep. Able. I'm just doing the job my father
has sent me out to do. He's pleased with the odor of
sheep. It's like when you drive up to my father's house and the
wind comes down and your eyes bleed and daddy goes, that's
the smell of money, son. Chicken farmer. As a kid, I had
a distant relative who was a hog farmer and that place stunk.
And they lived right next door. Thinking, how do you do that?
How do you eat breakfast with the windows up? And the religious would say,
this is filth. You're not ready. Let me show you how to dress.
Let me show you how to present yourself to God. Let me show
you how to walk in. Let me show you how to wait.
Let the usher, the usher I mean, let the usher get the door. Wait.
You hear that prayer until the man of God says, Amen. Don't you go in. And the Bible says Christ has
already gone in. The scripture says that we're
clothed in the righteousness of God and the imputed righteousness
of Christ. We are ready. We are clothed. We are bathed. We are washed. And we have a full heart of assurance. And our bodies have been sprinkled
clean. And our hearts have been sprinkled clean. And we have
been washed. So let us hold fast to the confession
of our hope as Abel's blood cried out to God for justice. The true
blood that cries, cries out for mercy. So the blood of Jesus
cries like the blood of Abel. And that's why Paul says the
blood of Christ that cries out better than the blood of Abel. Because the blood of Abel cried
out for the condemnation of self-righteousness. The blood of Christ cries out
for mercy on the sinner. And God shows his approval of
his people by the approval of their work. What is our work? What is the greatest work? What
must we be doing, Jesus? To be doing the work of God,
John 6. This is the work of God. What
does he say? That you believe on the one that
he has sent. Now what does that do for everything
else? It lets us rest. I need to serve my fellow man. I need to serve my brothers and
sisters. I need to pray. I need to clean up a little bit. I need
to put to death this flesh. Why? Because it's crucified with
Christ. It's dead. And the blood of Jesus
cries out to the Father. That flesh that's fighting Him
right now, it's dead. Don't worry about it. Your justice
has been served. But the Jews here were thinking
because they were being enamored by these revisionists and these
Judaizers and these others who fell into this mindset of doing
all this in order to be sure of this. And Paul is saying, don't do
these things. Paul is saying none of the people who have ever
had eternal life have ever put hope in these things. They put
hope in Jesus Christ. And the blood of Abel still speaks.
But the blood of Abel is a shadow of the blood of Christ that still
speaks. We have faith in His blood. What has his blood done? Promise
us a better day, a better possession, a better hope, and an abiding
one. That's the context of Paul launching
into this now. Faith is. So as we close our
time tonight, we will go through this again next week. But as
we leave, know this. You are safe. You are secure. And nothing can snatch you out
of the hand of God. Let's pray. Lord, I pray that you would just
work what we've heard tonight and what we've seen in your word
actively in our hearts and minds, Lord, that we would be aware
of the knowledge of Jesus, that we know Christ because you knew
us before the foundations of the world. Lord, there is a very fine line
between self-righteousness and what we see in the world as true
righteousness. Because we've become sort of
dull of hearing and when we hear good things that are reasonable
and wise and in a sense righteous in their doing, we think, yeah,
that's nothing, there's no problem there. Let's do these things.
So Father, I pray that as those thoughts come into my mind and
come into the minds of our family, that you would arrest them. And
He would cause us to ask the question, to truly see the motivation. Are you seeing these things as
good to pacify your fear? Or are you seeing these things
as good because you have no fear? Lord, give us that clarity. Do not let us fear man. Do not
let us fear the religion of the world. Do not let us fear the
culture around us. Do not let us fear the social
media bandits. Do not let us fear. But Father, help us to have joyful
faith. For the two do not go together.
And we cannot do it without your power. So, Lord, drive us to
your word. Lord, drive me to the word. so that I might see and know
and rejoice in Jesus name.