I'd like for you to turn first
in your Bible to 2 Chronicles chapter 32. You've got to place,
mark it there in Isaiah 39. We'll come back to that in just
one moment. I'd like for us to begin 2 Chronicles
32. The title of the message is A
Trial of Plenty. And seeing the Lord's message
here in Isaiah 39, understanding what it is that happens here
in Isaiah 39, I promise you will make Isaiah 40 a whole lot more
sweeter. It'll just sweeten it up when
we see this trial of plenty that Hezekiah went through in Isaiah
39. But here in 2 Chronicles 32, we have the same account,
but we receive some more information here, beginning in verse 27. And Hezekiah, had exceeding much
riches and honor, and he made himself treasuries for silver
and for gold and for precious stones and for spices and for
shields and for all manner of pleasant jewels. Storehouses
also for the increase of corn and wine and oil, and stalls
for all manner of beasts and coats for flocks. Moreover, he
provided him cities and possessions of flocks and herds in abundance,
for God had given him substance very much. This same Hezekiah
also stopped the upper water course in Gihon and brought it
straight down to the west side of the city of David. And Hezekiah
prospered in all his works, albeit in the business of the ambassadors
of the princes of Babylon, who sent unto him to inquire of the
wonder that was done in the land." This is a scary phrase. God left
him. God left him to try him. that
he might know all that was in his heart. Now, we think of trials,
I'll tell you what we immediately think of. We think of hardship. We think of sickness. We think
about what Golden and Kent are going through right now. That's
what we think of. We think of a trial. We think
of loss of things, loss of health, loss of loved ones, loss of possessions. But I'll tell you the trial that's
most likely to cause our faith to fail is the trial of Plymouth. The trial of plenty is more difficult
for us than the trial of suffering and want, because it's sneaky. We tend to think of having plenty
as a blessing, not as a trial. But God can send us plenty as
a trial, just like he did to Hezekiah. So when the Lord sends
us the trial of plenty, because we think having all these plenty,
well, God's blessing me. We don't even realize we're being
tried. And we just read here how the Lord blessed Hezekiah
with an enormous amount of wealth. I mean, he just had several bumper
crops in a row. All the flocks were growing and
healthy. And Hezekiah had an engineering
mind. He stopped up some pool up in
the mountains, and he brought water straight down the city.
Maybe he had some sort of indoor plumbing or something. People,
not sure how far that went. But I mean, the man was smart. I mean, he's very successful.
Everything he put his hand to turned to gold. Now, how did
Hezekiah get all this, all this honor and all this riches? How
did he get it? Well, the end of verse 29 says,
God gave it to him, didn't it? For God had given him substance
very much. Well, how did Hezekiah fare in
this trial of printing? Well, he failed miserably. And
we just read why he failed miserably. God left him. God left him. And God sent this trial, not
so God would know what was in Hezekiah's heart, but so that
Hezekiah would know what was in his heart. And what was in
his heart was weakness, it was lack of faith, it was pride.
Look at verse 24 in 2 Chronicles 32. This is what he found in
his heart when God tried him. Verse 24. In those days, Hezekiah
was sick to death and prayed unto the Lord and he spake unto
him and he gave him a sign. but Hezekiah rendered not again
according to the benefit done unto him. He didn't give thanks
for what God had done to him, for his heart was lifted up.
Therefore, there was wrath upon him and upon Judah and Jerusalem. Notwithstanding, Hezekiah humbled
himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants
of Jerusalem, so that the wrath of the Lord came not upon them
in the days of Hezekiah. You remember last week, we looked
at this trial of Hezekiah's sickness. Well, he handled that trial very
well, didn't he? When he was in this trial of his enemy, surrounded
by an enemy mightier than him, Sennacherib's mighty army, he
handled that trial very well. Because in those instances, what
did Hezekiah do? He humbled himself before the
Lord. He called upon the Lord to save him. And you know why
he did that? Because it was obvious to Hezekiah.
He's powerless against these enemies. He can't do anything
against this sickness. He can't do anything about Sennacherib's
army. They're all stronger than him. And this is the situation
we find ourselves in if God gives us this trial of plenty. We don't
as easily see how powerless we are against the trial of plenty
like we do the trial of sickness and heartache and loss, but we
are. You know, we're just as dependent
on God's grace in the day of plenty as the day we're on our
deathbed. When you think you're at your
weakest physically on your deathbed, at that moment, you're just as
dependent on God's grace as you are in the day of plenty. Look
at Proverbs chapter 30. Solomon, in his wisdom, gave
us a good prayer for this very situation. Proverbs 30 and verse seven. Two things have I required of
thee. Deny me them not before I die. Remove far from me vanity
and lies. Give me neither poverty nor riches.
Feed me with food convenient for me. Give me just what I need,
just enough, lest I be full and deny thee and say, who's the
Lord? Or lest I be poor and steal and
take the name of my God in vain. Now look back at Isaiah chapter
39. Let's see if we might learn something from Hezekiah here
in this trial of plenty. Verse one. At that time, Merodach,
Baladdon, the son of Baladdon, king of Babylon, sent letters
and a present to Hezekiah, for he had heard that he had been
sick and was recovered. Now the king of Babylon sent
these ambassadors. He got his top men, you know,
and he sent them to Hezekiah. but not because he was so glad
Hezekiah had been healed. There is an ulterior religious
motive in this. Second Chronicles, we just read,
chapter 32, verse 31, said the ambassadors came to inquire about
the wonder that was done in the land. What they wondered about
was the sun. Remember when God rotated the
earth backwards, turned the sun back 10 degrees? The Babylonians
knew that happened because they worshiped the sun. Astrology
was a big part of their religion. And they knew the sun had gone
back 10 degrees. They'd heard why it went back
because of Hezekiah. And they came to find out the
religious significance of this issue where the sun went backwards
10 degrees. And what they're saying to Hezekiah
is, we must worship the same God. We worship the sun. Well,
you must worship the sun because it went backwards 10 degrees
for you. Here, we've just found out we're all saying the same
thing. There's no reason for us to have a division between
us. Let's make an alliance together.
You know, if we're together, there's strength in numbers.
We're bigger and stronger if we're together. There's just
no point having this division between us. The enemy of my enemy
is my friend. Well, they are both enemies of
Assyria. They both hated Assyria. So the Babylonians said, let's
join together. Now how did Hezekiah handle this
attention from this rich and powerful but wicked nation? How did he handle it? Verse 2,
And Hezekiah was glad of them, and showed them the house of
his precious things, the silver and the gold and the spices and
the precious ointment, and all the house of his armor, and all
that was found in his treasures. There was nothing in his house
nor in all his dominion that Hezekiah showed them not. Now
it says here Hezekiah was glad of him and that word means he
was just overcome. He was giddy with happiness and
gladness when these ambassadors came to him from a country like
Babylon. Oh, they came all the way from Babylon to me. He was
just giddy about that. He was giddy. These men want
to be my friends. They came seeking a treaty with
me. I think this is good. This must be, they'll be a good
ally to have. Now this happened immediately
after. God sent an angel out one night and killed all Sennacherib's
army by himself. I think Hezekiah forgot all he
needed was God, wasn't it? Did he forget if God be for us,
who can be against us? What does he need the Babylonians
to be his ally for? And this is the time, this is
what it was referring to over 2 Chronicles, when Hezekiah wasn't
thankful for everything that God had given him, everything
that God had done for him. Hezekiah wasn't thankful. Now,
there's nothing wrong with Hezekiah talking to these ambassadors,
even though they are heathen. There's nothing wrong with that.
You've got to talk to the heathen every day. You work and you go to Wal-Mart. You've got to talk to the heathen
every day. There's nothing wrong with that. The problem is the
religious error that Hezekiah made. These men knew a divine
miracle had taken place. The earth rotated backwards.
The sun went back 10 degrees and they thought, we better make
an alliance with Hezekiah. I mean, it went to Hezekiah's
head. Now these men, these heathen
men, they come to Hezekiah. This would have been a very good
time for Hezekiah to tell them about the Lord. They were asking
about it. This would have been a good time for Hezekiah to say,
man, I was sick. I was so sick. I was dying. I
was going to die any day. And Jehovah, the God of heaven
and earth, the God who created everything, He healed me. And He gave me a sign that I
prayed to Him and He healed me and He gave me a sign that I
would be able to go back to the temple and worship Him. And the
sign He gave me was He turned the earth backwards and let the
sun go back 10 degrees. Now the God who did that is God.
That's not the God you worship. That's not the God you ignorantly
worship. Now let's sit down and let me tell you about the true
and living God, the God who healed me, the God who did all these
things. God's sovereign. He does as he will. He showed that, didn't he? He
turned earth backwards, for goodness sakes. He made the sun go back
10 degrees. He's sovereign. He does as he
will. And making the sun go back 10
degrees, that's nothing to how he saves his people. He's sovereign. He has the power to choose a
people and to save them through the sacrifice of his son. God's
holy. God doesn't play games with sin.
God's holy. When he saves a sinner, he's
got to save that sinner in truth and mercy. He's great in mercy. He's great in grace, abundant
grace. But now he's going to show it
in truth. He's going to show his mercy through the sacrifice
of his son, by killing his son to put away the sin of his people.
Because we can't do anything for ourselves. We can't make
ourselves better. We can't make ourselves acceptable
to God. God must do something for us
that we can't do for ourselves. And this almighty, sovereign,
holy God sent his son to this earth, made him a man. You think
turning the earth backwards is hard? God prepared a body for
His Son. God Almighty appeared in human
flesh to be the substitute for His people. And He suffered and
He died for their sin. God has to send His Son to be
our righteousness or we'll never have it. He was perfectly obedient
to the law, perfectly righteous. And He made His people righteous
in Him. You see, we're all dead in Adam.
We lost all of our righteousness in Adam. We can't do anything
righteous. If we're going to, we died in Adam. If we're going
to have life, God's got to give it to us in his son through the
new birth. Well, what an opportunity was presented to Hezekiah to
tell these heathen about Christ. They were coming looking for
religious reasons these things happened. And it would have been
so good if Hezekiah did that. That would have been so good.
But that's not what he did. Hezekiah took those ambassadors
and he showed them everything the Lord done for him in his
kingdom. I mean, he just took them on his chariot, got the
whole realm. I mean, he just unlocked every
door, the treasuries, all the stalls, all the storehouses,
all the silos, just showed them all. And he took credit for it. He going around his kingdom saying,
look what I did. Look what I've got. You men are
smart to want to be my friend. Look at all these things I've
done. And you want to know what happened? What happened here? What caused Hezekiah to do this? God blessed him, and he got full
pride for it. Now, there's not a person in
this room who can be hard on Hezekiah. Every one of us knows
that's the nature we have, isn't it? Ask yourself, how do we handle
the same situation? Here this little congregation,
suppose somebody comes in, they got a bunch of money, I mean
a boatload of money. They got influence and they want
to come in and give all that to us, you know. That's nice,
I suppose. But now beware. They could have
an ulterior motive. They could want to use all this
so they can influence the message it's preached. They could do
all this so they can influence the way things are done. And
when we're faced with that, are we going to remember the Lord's
going to provide, or are we going to jump at this chance for all
this influence and money and things? Will we remember if God
be for us, who can be against us? Or will we be glad to have
this person as an ally? Well, it depends solely on this. Is God going to leave us alone
or is he going to hold us up? That's what it depends upon.
If the Lord would bless us with plenty, if he'd send this tribe
plenty to us, we'd get full of pride too, just like Hezekiah
did, unless the Lord and his grace would prevent it. This
is the very reason Paul said, or God told Paul, that he gave
him a thorn in the flesh. Paul was given a thorn in the
flesh to buffeting, just constantly. You just imagine going through
your days just being punched all the time. And Paul asked
God three times, take this thorn in the flesh away from me. And
God said, I'm not going to do it. And Paul said, I know why
God gave me that thorn in the flesh, lest I be lifted up because
of the abundance of revelations. He said, so I'm glad for it.
I'm glad for that thorn in the flesh because when I'm weak,
then I'll depend on Christ. Then I'll look to Christ. Now
we need to remember this, and this day of materialism, this
day where my soul, I mean, I don't care what you got, it's not enough.
You always gotta have more, more and more. I mean, wow, what a
day. Well, let's remember this now.
All the material blessings the Lord's given us. He's given us
health, He's given us possessions, He's given us things that, you
know, we use to make us happy. There's nothing wrong with that,
but just remember, None of those things are an indication of our
salvation. None of those things are an indication
that God's pleased with us. God took everything Job had. And Job was just as saved when
he was sitting there naked, scraping the boils in a pile of dust,
having nothing as he was when he was the richest man around.
Just as saved, just as righteous. God called him righteous. God
made Abraham rich, didn't he? But Abraham's salvation wasn't
affected by any of those riches. Abraham knew his salvation was
in covenant mercies. Covenant mercies. Some of our
children learn about those covenant mercies, the covenant promises
of God. Abraham knew his salvation was
in the seed of Abraham that would come and bless every nation.
God made David wildly wealthy, wildly powerful. David was the
most wealthy, most powerful man on the planet. And none of those
blessings were an indication of David's salvation. David was
just as saved when he was in a cave with a few men that were
all poor and discontented. And you know, they were just
in debt just to say to him when he's in the cave, it was, he's
on the throne and didn't have a single enemy. David said, the
Lord has become my salvation. My salvation is found in God's
covenant that's ordered in all things and sure. None of these
things affect that. And these ambassadors came to
Hezekiah and he showed them everything he had. He said, look at the
riches I've accumulated. I've got all this gold and silver
and ointment. Look at the strength of my military
I built up. I've got these spears and these, I got some new technology
that enabled me to build this mighty army. Come with me in
my chariot up to the top of this mountain. Let me show you this.
I got this water and I pulled it all together and I made some
pipes to take it all the way down the city so people don't
have to carry it so far. I mean, isn't that a good idea? Look what I
did. Not one mention is made here of Hezekiah saying, I'm
thankful. The Lord's given me everything
I had. I didn't deserve it. I deserved God just letting me
die when I was there. I turned my face against the wall. What
I deserved for God to let me die, but he didn't. He healed
me. and he's blessed me with all
this abundance and I'm so thankful. The writers say Hezekiah even
took these ambassadors into the temple and showed them all the
precious things of the temple. Showed them all those gold and
silver and all those utensils. It was a religious error Hezekiah
made, wasn't it? He took them into the temple
and showed them all these instruments of worship and the pride of his
flesh. And that's the very error I pray
God will keep us from. I pray about this often, that
God will keep us from the error of pride of grace. What can be
worse than pride of grace? Now, it would be false humility,
but we deal falsely with people. If we tried to deny that God's
blessed his people, He blessed us above all people. He blessed
us. All the more reason we need to
pray that the Lord will keep us from the pride of grace. Look
at Psalm 119. Hezekiah had gold and silver
to show off, didn't he? You know, we've got something
better. We've got the word of God. Psalm 119, verse 72. The law of thy mouth, the word
of God's mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold or
silver. We've got something better than
gold and silver. We've got God's word. God has given his people
an understanding of God's word. He's given his people pastors
and teachers who have an understanding of the word so we can teach others. God's given this congregation
faithful teachers. We've got teachers teaching our
children every Sunday, even this week in Bible school. And God's
given them an understanding of his word. That make you proud? No, it doesn't. It humbles us. God gave that
to me. Oh, that humbles us. God's given
his people a hearing ear. So when you hear the word priest,
you say, that's it. I understand that. I see Christ
and I see that. That's no reason to be proud.
That humbles us, doesn't it? Well, we're so thankful. God
didn't give him that to everybody, but he has to his people. The
only reason we have something that false religion doesn't have
is God's been pleased to give it to us by His grace. He gives
it to His people. And He gives it to us for His
glory. He's given us His Word. We got something better than
silver and gold. We got the Word of God. Look at Matthew chapter
26. Hezekiah showed off his spices
and his precious ointment. Well, we've got ointment that's
more precious. We've got the ointment of the Gospel of Christ.
The ointment of His sacrifice. Matthew 26 verse 6 Now when Jesus was in Bethany,
in the house of Simon the leper, there came unto him a woman,
having an alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured
it on his head as he sat at meat. But when his disciples saw it,
they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste?
For this ointment might have been sold for much and given
to the poor. And when our Lord Jesus understood
it, he said unto them, why trouble you the woman? For she hath wrought
a good work on me. For the poor always, you had
the poor always with you, but me, you had not always. For in
that she hath poured this ointment on my body, she did it for my
burial. This is connected to the sacrifice
of Christ, to his death. Verily I say unto you, wheresoever
this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall
also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial
of her." The gospel of Christ is a precious ointment, a precious
ointment that heals, an ointment that makes the whole house smell
good. I want you to look at another scripture, Ecclesiastes chapter
10. God's given us this precious
ointment. Be mighty careful with it. Treat
it with reverence and respect. That was Hezekiah's problem.
He didn't treat it with reverence and respect. What happens if
we don't treat this precious ointment, the precious ointment
of the gospel of Christ? What happens if we don't treat
it with reverence and respect? Ecclesiastes 10 verse one. Dead
flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking
savor. So doth a little folly, him that
is in reputation for wisdom and honor. All you gotta do to take
the reverence out of the gospel is just treat it with a little
folly. And you got dead flies and a stinking smell, not the
precious ointment of the gospel. You and I didn't figure this
message, the gospel out. Now, God gave it to us. God's
revealed it to us in his word. Look at Psalm 133. I'll tell
you another ointment we have. We have the ointment of unity
and peace with each other. And the older I get, I'm not
very old, but the older I get, the more precious this becomes. I think that's why old John Flaming
quoted this so often. He lived long enough, this really
became precious to him. The unity of the saints. Psalm
133, John quoted this all the time. How good and how pleasant it
is for brethren to dwell together in unity. It's like the precious
ointment upon the head that ran down the beard, even Aaron's
beard that went down to the skirts of his garment. God's given us
the precious ointment of unity and peace with each other so
that we can worship together. Be thankful for that gift. Take
care of it. It's precious. God's given his
people treasure of righteousness. God has made his people righteous. Now we can tell somebody about
that treasure. It's true. You believe you've
been given the treasure of righteousness. God made you righteous. But when
you tell somebody about not tell the truth, you didn't earn it.
Did you? God gave it to you freely from
his son. It's not your righteousness.
It's the righteousness that Christ gave you. And we can't say we
keep ourselves righteous either. Christ has to do that. He had
to make us righteous. He got to keep us righteous by
his power and by his grace. And by God's grace, we're not
going to hide anything from anybody. Not going to hide it. The temple's
gone. We can't take somebody in the
building of the temple and show them the things in there, but
we can still go to the mercy seat. It's still our responsibility
to point people to the mercy seat. We have a mercy seat. Christ
is our mercy seat. Christ is our propitiation. The
temple's gone. We can't take somebody to the
high priest and all his high priestly robes, but we have a
high priest. And it's our responsibility not
to hide that, but to point men to Christ, our great high priest.
The temple's gone. We don't have that altar there,
that brazen altar where they're killing the animals and burning
their bodies all the time. But brethren, we have an altar.
And it's our responsibility not to hide that, but to point men
to Christ, our altar. We don't hide those things. And
by God's grace, we won't take pride in them either. Our hearts
are humbled at the grace and mercy that God's just poured
out upon us, poured it out upon us. Hezekiah showed these ambassadors
everything that God had given him. in pride, in pride. And I want to tell you what,
he gave an impressive tour. It was so impressive that a couple
of generations down the road, those Babylonian kings knew everything
Hezekiah had. Those ambassadors came back and
told people, they remembered, this is an impressive storehouse
of riches. And you know what they did when
Nebuchadnezzar was king? They came and took it all, took
it all. It's true, isn't it? Pride goeth
before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall, as Solomon
said. Now there was destruction there, destruction, because there's
nothing that God hates more than pride. Now verse three, back
in our text, God sends his prophet Isaiah. In verse three, Then came Isaiah
the prophet unto King Hezekiah, and said unto him, What said
these men, and from whence came they unto thee? And Hezekiah
said, They are come from a far country unto me, even from Babylon.
Then said he, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah
answered, All that is in mine house have they seen. There is
nothing among my treasures that I have not showed them. Then
said Isaiah to Hezekiah, Hear the word of the Lord of hosts.
Behold, the days come that all that is in thine house and that
which thy fathers have laid up in store to this day shall be
carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, saith
the Lord. And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which
thou shalt begat, shall they take away. And they shall be
eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon. Now Hezekiah,
as Isaiah had told him, he said, if you were showing these ambassadors
everything that God gave you, for the glory of God, that would
have been good for you. That would have been good for
you to do that, not to hide anything from Him. The Apostle Paul told
the Ephesian elders, I didn't hold anything back from you.
I held back nothing profitable from you. But that's not what
Hezekiah was doing. He was taking all the credit
for what God had done for him. He lifted up with pride. And
because of that, Isaiah said, destruction's coming. God is
a jealous God. God is jealous of his glory.
He will not give his glory unto another, even to a good king
like Hezekiah. Hezekiah was one of the good
kings and God's not going to share his glory even with Hezekiah. Now we may as well get this through
our head. We're not going to get any glory
now. We don't, we don't get any glory because we've somehow held
up this bastion of truth and we're the only ones preaching
the gospel, the only ones in true worship of God. We're not
going to get glory for that. Be thankful for it, but we're
not going to get any glory in this matter. Now, God is a jealous
God. He'll not share His glory with
another. And this is a warning to everyone who's a leader. If
you're a leader in the church, you're a leader in the home,
you're a leader on the job, pay attention to Hezekiah's example.
Hezekiah's sons, all those that he was responsible for, the whole
nation of Israel he was the leader of. is going to pay the price
for Hezekiah's pride. They're all going to pay the
price. Hezekiah did the same thing to his sons that Adam did
to his race. Left us without any hope other
than Christ. And God sent his word to Hezekiah.
And I want us last to look here. What's the effect of God's word
on the heart of a believer? Can we become lifted up with
pride? Absolutely we could. Well, what is the effect of God's
word on our heart? Even at that time, we're lifted
up with pride. Verse eight. Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah,
good is the word of the Lord which thou hast spoken. He said,
moreover, for there should be peace and truth in my days. Now Hezekiah isn't saying, well,
that's good. At least nothing bad is going
to happen in my lifetime. My sons, who cares about them? He's
not saying that. What Hezekiah is saying is God's
word is good. His judgments are good and righteous,
true and righteous altogether. This is the very reason David
said, it's good for me that I've been afflicted. You know why
it's good for me I've been afflicted? So that I might learn thy statutes.
So that I might learn thy words. So I might learn who God is.
A trial to a believer will always produce submission to God's will. Always. Because he sends it to
correct us. And Hezekiah sees God's mercy.
Even in God's judgment and justice, he sees mercy. Why didn't God
just wipe Hezekiah out? Why not just wipe him out? Look
back at chapter 38, verse 5. He didn't wipe him out because
of God's covenant mercies to David. In verse 5, chapter 38. Go and
say to Hezekiah, thus saith the Lord, the God of David, thy father. God didn't wipe Hezekiah out
because of God's covenant, because of His promise to David. And
God doesn't wipe His people out today for the exact same reason,
because of covenant mercies. When we sin and we become lifted
up with pride just like Hezekiah, God doesn't wipe us out because
of His covenant of grace that exists between the Father and
the Son. God doesn't wipe us out because Christ has already
suffered for the sin of His people. Remember when the disciples asked
the Lord to teach us to pray? And that was one of the things
the Lord taught them to pray. Lead us not into temptation.
I say with Solomon, Lord, lead me not into the temptation of
poverty or riches. Deliver me from the trial of
poverty so I don't steal bread and bring shame on your name. And deliver me from the trial
of plenty so I won't steal your glory. I pray God will give me
a thankful heart. You too. He'll give us a thankful
heart that rejoices in who God is and what He's done for us
and what He's done in His people. Not because of anything I've
done. It's all because of His grace, His covenant, what He
promised to do for His people. And what He promised to do, He'll
do. God's faithful. Let's bow and
pray. Father, we're thankful for Your
Word. We're thankful for the precious promises of our Lord
Jesus Christ in your word. We're thankful for the precious
promise of the forgiveness of sin in his blood. It couldn't
come to sinners such as we are any other way than being cleansed
and washed in his blood. We're thankful for the precious
promise of righteousness in our Lord Jesus Christ that he is
our righteousness. He is Jehovah Sidkenu, the Lord
our righteousness. We're thankful for all your precious
promises of the gospel, that your word won't return unto you
void. We're thankful that you've promised to keep and preserve
and save your people. Not one of them can be lost.
Father, we're thankful. And we're thankful for the warnings
that are in your word. Warnings that teach us not to
presume on your grace, not to become lifted up with pride,
but to keep us ever at thy feet, begging your mercy. ever looking
to the total dependence to supply everything we need. Father, we're
thankful. We pray that you bless your word
to your glory and to the hearts of your people. It's in the matchless
name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we pray and give thanks. Amen.