Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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Come to know you and that through
you you would, you would save us
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from the world, from ourselves,
from the power of the evil one who
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would seek to separate us from you. Lord, you have bound US close
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to you and such a way that
nothing can ever separate us from you.
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We ask even now that you would
draw near to us in your word,
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that we might be comforted, assured
and strengthened in the confession of our faith
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in you. We pray this in
Jesus name. A men, brothers and
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sisters, if you're able to remain
standing, please do so and let's try
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our attention to Hagi, chapter one. Hagi, Chapter One HIG I is
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a small book. Yet the very
end of the Old Testament. There's only
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two other books after it, I
believe, yes, so you'll find it
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right at the end in my Bible. It's only on one page, front
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and back, so it's really easy
to miss. So I'll give you a
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second to turn there. We're going
to read Hagi one this morning and focus
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on the first eleven verses in the
sermon this morning. In the next week
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we'll look at twelve through fifteen,
or, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
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We're going to focus on chapter one. In the next week will look at
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chapter two. So let's give our
attention to God's word. It is good
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for us. Let's hear it.
In the second year of King of Darius,
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the king, and the sixth month, on the first day of the
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month, the word of the Lord
came by the hand of Hagi the Prophet
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to zero Babel, the son of
Shale Teal, governor of Judah, and
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to Joshua, the son of Jeosedak, the high priest. Thus says the
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Lord of hosts. These people say
the time is not yet come to rebuild
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the house of Lord. Then the
word of the Lord came by the hand
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of Hagi the Prophet. Is it
a time for you yourselves to dwell in
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your says while this house lies in
ruins? Thus says the Lord of hosts.
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Consider your ways. You have sown
much and harvested little. You eat,
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but you never have enough. You
drink, but you never have your
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fill. You clothe yourselves, but
no one is warm, and he who
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earns wages does so to put them
into a bag with holes. Thus says
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the Lord of hosts. Consider your
ways, go up to the hills and
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bring wood and build the House that
I may take pleasure in it, glorified,
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says the Lord. You looked for
much and behold, it came to
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little, and when you brought it
home, I blew it away. Why,
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declares the Lord of hosts? Because
of my house that lies in ruins,
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while each of you busies himself with
his own house. Therefore, the
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heavens above you have withheld the D
and the earth has withheld its produce,
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and I have called for a drought
on the land and the hills, on
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the grain, the new wine,
the oil, on what the ground brings
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forth, on man and beast and
on all their labors. Then Ze Rebeb
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all, the son of Shelti,
all in Joshua, the son of Jeosedak,
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the high priest, with all the
remnants of the people, obeyed the
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voice of the Lord, their God, and the words of Haggi, the
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Prophet, as the Lord, their
God, had sent him, and the
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people feared the Lord. Then Hagi, the Messenger of the Lord, spoke
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to the people with the Lord's message. I am with you, declares the
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Lord, and the Lord stirred up
the spirit of Zerebebel, the son of
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Shealtiol, governor of Judah, and
the spirit of Joshua, the son of
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Jeosdak, the high priest and the
spirit of all the remnant of the people,
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and they came and worked on the
House of the Lord of God,
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the Lord of hosts, their God, on the twenty four day of the
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month, in the sixth month,
in the second year of Darius the king,
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you may be seated. Right from
the very first verse we get a
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sense that this book and the events
that are happening at this book are happening
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in a very particular time and place
in history, in the second year of
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Darius the king, the sixth month, on the first day of the month,
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the word of the Lord came by
the hat, by the hand of
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Hagi, the Prophet. What is
what is the context of these verses?
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Who is Darius the king? WHO
IS HAGI? It's helpful to know a
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little bit of background before we get
in to the text. In five hundred
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and eighty seven, nebuchadnezzar destroyed the
Temple of God. Nebuchadnezzar, not named
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here because it's happening earlier, Great
King of Babylon. He destroyed the Temple
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of God and then, about fifty
years later, another king, a King
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of another country, the country of
Persia. Cyrus captured Babylon. Right,
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so one king took over another,
and that man Cyrus, the King of
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Persia, by the command of God, amazingly commanded the people who were in
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exile because Nebuchadnezzar had taken them out
of their country. Commanded the people of
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God to return back to Jerusalem and
rebuild the temple. An amazing thing,
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right, the King of Persia commanding
that the Temple of God be rebuilt.
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Not only that, he gave them
wealth from the temple that Nebuchadnezzar had taken
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out and sent it back with them. Now we know from the book of
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Ezra, another book in the Old
Testament, that among those people who came
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out of first battle and then Persia, came out of Persia and went back,
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were Hagi and rebebel and Joshua.
These people who are mentioned here in
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the book, Hagi, the Prophet, is a Rebebel, the governor of
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Judah, and Joshua the high priest. We also know from the book of
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Ezra that the first thing that they
did when they came back was they rebuilt
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the altar. They rebuilt the altar
to God so that sacrifices could be offered,
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and sacrifices were offered. After that
they build the foundation of the temple,
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but then the project kind of hit
some snags. There were enemies around
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them who didn't want this to continue
on. They didn't want the work project,
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the building of the temple, to
happen. They opposed God and his
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people and there was sort of some
hiccups at first and then eventually it just
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stopped. And then for about forty
years after the people had returned, the
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temple lay in complete undone. And
do you remember? Some of you may
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remember when the housing bubble collapsed in
two thousand and eight a lot of building
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just stopped right. Remember this?
You could drive around and there would be
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neighborhoods right houses that there would be
maybe a foundation and some frame and that
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was it. You know, maybe
even bags of cement and other things lying
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around. But where are the workers? And you drive back the next there's
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no workers that you drive by next
said nothing's happening these houses, these they're
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just sitting there undone. That work
had had stopped and the project lay unfinished.
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What was like that with the House
of God started and then just stopped
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almost for a whole generation, forty
years. However, not all the building
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projects stopped in the land of Israel. God's house lay unfinished. But as
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he has, Hag I says,
is through. The Lord says to Hagi.
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You, however, he says,
the people are in paneled houses.
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It's not. We're not exactly sure
what paneled means, whether it's a roofing
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thing or something having to do with
the walls, but nevertheless, there's this
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sense of finishing right. There's a
sense in which the house is weren't just
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constructed, but they were really finished
right. They were brought to a completion,
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and even in a nice way.
These aren't near just sort of tents
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and that people are living in there. They're wimming and built solid houses.
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Meanwhile, the House of the Lord
was remained unfinished. So as they looked
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around them, perhaps for quite some
time, you know, people are talking
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about, Oh, where did you
grow up? All over there is my
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childhood home. You know, you
could bike around in your neighborhood or whatever.
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There was a sense of completeness in
the people's lives, but all was
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not well in the land. Scriptures
tell us that there was this prosperity they
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were all expecting. Cyrus had commanded
them to come back. God had commanded
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to the comeback. The project got
started on the temple. The sacrifices were
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there, the neighborhoods were all built
out, the people were living there,
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and yet things weren't quite going right. There was a drought. The Earth
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withheld its produce. The description of
this in verse six is sounds like this.
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You've so much and harvested little,
like, where's your work going?
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You eat, but you're not full. You'd never have enough to drink your
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you clothe yourself, but you're never
warm. Your own money, it's just
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you put it in bags with holes. It's right, it's it's not working.
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The prosperity in the productivity and all
that is expected, especially with the
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Lord's blessing on his people, is
not happening. And so we can buy
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the dates that are given. We
can know that on September nine, five
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hundred and twenty BC, God spoke
through the Prophet Hagi and called them to
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consider their ways. Look around you, look in your hearts, pay attention.
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Something is going on here. There
is a problem here, and God
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wants to explain to them and show
them what it is. He calls them
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to consider their ways twice in this
chapter and then a slightly different form,
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twice in the next chapter, so
four times in a two chapter book.
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It's a big theme and it's significant
one. In Hagi he calls them to
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examine their heart. Self examination.
Have you ever felt there was necessaries necessary
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to do some self examination in your
own life? Maybe it's sprung up in
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your own heart, maybe it was
an external sense or a request or command
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someone. Maybe you're in the middle
of a job transition and you're wondering,
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am I really doing what I'm supposed
to be doing? Maybe you're at a
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doctor's appointment and they're asking questions about
the doctors asking questions about your health.
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Maybe you're reading scripture and a quiet
time with the Lord and you're reading things
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that the Lord is bringing to your
mind, into your heart. Self examination
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is an important part of the Christian
life. We are called, as the
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people were here, to consider our
ways. Like anything, of course,
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self examination can be abused, but
that doesn't mean it's not important. Self
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examination is important and we see God
calling his people to it here in our
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passage. Consider your ways, the
Lord says consider your ways. And it's
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partly for lack of self examination that
God's people have been backsliding. But how,
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in particular? Let's look at the
passage and and think about that.
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So God addresses the exiles and their
two leaders. God tells them to consider
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their ways. He asked them to
consider how they are sinning. And they
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have sinned, as we have said, in building their own houses first and
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giving priority to themselves and to this
world over the Lord. That comes in
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verse four. It's comes in the
form of a question. Is it time
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for you yourselves to dwell in your
paneled houses while this house, my house,
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lies in ruins? We hear the
justification for that in verse two,
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from the minds of the people.
Thus, as the Lord of hosts,
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these people say the time has not
yet come to rebuild the House of the
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Lord. So that's their justification right
there, saying the time has not yet
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come on your one or whatever.
The time is not yet come to the
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time is not yet come. The
time is not yet come. This is
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how they're justifying it, and the
Lord says really, as the time really
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not yet come, look at the
Times, look at what you're experiencing.
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You are experiencing my wrath, you
are experiencing my curse. And if they
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would remember what they had been told
under Moses back in Deuteronomy Twenty eight,
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when the Lord under the Mosaic Covenant
found his people to be serving him and
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honoring him, he would bless them
with prosperity, with rain, with fertility,
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with wealth, with all kinds of
long life, all kinds of good
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things. But he tells them very
explicitly, when you don't obey, you
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will experience curse, you will experience
drought and poverty and infertility and all kinds
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of ways in your own lives and
plants and animals. It won't work,
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society won't work, the land won't
work, the beasts won't work, everything
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won't work. It will be frustrated, just like it was in the curse
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that God gave to Adam. Consider
your ways, look around you, he
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says. Remember my word, remember
the curse that you prod, that that
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I promised if you did not obey. This is why they are suffering.
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And so in verse seven and in
Verse Five, God says consider your ways,
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which is and that's and as set
is essentially a call to repentance.
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He doesn't want them to just look
at their situation, look at his providence,
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understand his curse, see their disobedience
and the problem of their priorities and
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go okay, considered right. The
implication is that you're supposed to do something
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with that consideration. Once you examine
your heart and you see that things are
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wrong, when you see things are
messed up, when you see that there's
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sin in there, there's a reaction
that's supposed to happen to that and obedience
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that's supposed to follow, a repentance
that's supposed to follow. And most wonderfully,
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that's exactly what happens in verses twelve
through that end of that chapter,
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thirteen, fourteen and fifteen. We
read starting verse twelve, that is Rebeil
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and Joshua, with all the remnant
of the people, obeyed the voice of
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the Lord, their God, and
the words of Hagi, the Prophet,
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as the Lord, their God had
sent him. Notice how obedience is tied
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to the fear of the Lord,
and the people feared the Lord. And
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then what came? Well, in
verse thirteen, Haguy speaks, the Messenger
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of the Lord, a very short
prophecy, very wonderful one. The Lord
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says I am with you. I
am with you, declares the Lord.
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Those are the words that you want
to hear all of the time. I
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am with you, I am with
you, because when the Lord is on
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our side, what else do we
need? When the Lord is on our
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side, even the most terrible circumstances
of life are a little thing. And
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consider the example of job or or
many other things that tonight, when we
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consider God's word in Ezekiel, will
hear about how the Lord is not with
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a Pharaoh of Egypt. The Lord
says, I will break both of your
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arms, you will separate himself,
he will pour. It will be with
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him, but only in an act
of curse. And in that situation you
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can't do anything when the Lord is
not with you, when the Lord is
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against you, you can't do anything. You are prohibited, you are restrained,
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you are cut off. But here, in their obedience, he says,
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I am with you. God responds
with an announcement of his nearness.
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But there's more, and it's more
complicated than that too. Notice what happens
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in verses fourteen and fifteen. The
Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerebebel,
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the son of Shelti old governor of
Judah and the spirit of Joshua, the
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son of Jeosetak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnants
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of the people. And they came
and they worked on the House of the
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Lord, their hosts. So what
is it that God wants them to understand?
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God wants them to recognize that,
after being mercifully brought back to the
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land, brought back from exile,
brought back from under the hand of their
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enemies and now commanding them to rebuild
the temple at the he wants them to
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understand that they've been slowing down and
that for about forty years, this temple
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project has become a low priority.
In this is not good. He calls
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them to examine their hearts, consider
their ways, consider their priorities and turn
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to the Lord in Repentance. They
must recognize their sins and turn towards obedience,
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but they also must recognize that that
obedience happens because of God's working in
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them. Their obedience is empowered by
the spirit of God himself. How is
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it that these people turn? How
is it that they begin to do what
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they were formerly not doing? First, the word of the Lord comes to
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them. Second, the spirit who
gives that word, accompanies that word and
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changes their hearts. He enables them
to understand the word, to hear the
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word, to obey the word and
to trust the Lord that he will forgive
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them, that he will repent.
They come and they hear the work of
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God in His Prophet, and they
trust in him and his spirit working in
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them. This is, of course, a good opportunity for us to consider
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our own ways, our own lives. Are there ways in which we let
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our priority slip? Are there ways
in which we are ignoring things that we
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know we've been called to do and
yet we put off for another day?
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We say, well, it's not
yet time, when we know it is
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time. This passage teaches us that
self examination and considering our ways involves two
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things. The first is hearing and
comparing our lives with the word of the
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Lord in due fear. That's a
first part of self examination, hearing God's
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word, hearing the stander, and
then comparing our lives with that. And
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the second is trusting in the faithfulness
of the Lord, again with do fear.
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Let's think about those briefly. On
both of those parts, the first
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one hearing and hearing and considering our
lives and comparing them with the Lord of
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the Lord. Our problem often is
that we examine ourselves in the light of
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our own standards or the world standards. There's some thing that is convenient for
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us at the time. This is
not how to judge things. If you're
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trying to build something right and you
you take out you take out a ruler
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and you find that it's been warped
for some reason. Maybe it got wet
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and then sat in the sun and
you know it's all like this. You
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should not use that ruler to work
on your project, but the very first
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thing you should do is just throw
it away and go get yourself a proper
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ruler. Right. It would be
a foolish thing to do that. And
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yet we do that with our own
lives all the time, our own priorities.
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We say, we come up with
our own warped, twisted guidelines,
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the standards of the world that come
to us in all kinds of ways,
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and we say, Oh, measure
my life by this. Now we ought
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not to do that. Instead,
we measure our lives, we examine and
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consider our hearts by the standard of
God's word. They were in trouble because
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they were not doing what God had
said. It's really that simple. God
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had commanded them through Cyrus to build
the temple. He had sent them back,
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he had supplied them, had given
them good leaders, he had given
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them wealth, he had given them
strength, and they all rejoice. And
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they started and then they stopped.
Now I am happy to raise my hand
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among the people who have started good
things and stopped. I know what that
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feels like and it's hard and it's
frustrating. But what can we do right?
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Suppose we could despair and fall into
ourselves and just give up and say,
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well, I guess they're just never
is going to happen. Or you
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can repent. When we consider these
things and we recognize them and we see
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that we've got off course, we
see that we've gone away from the standard.
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We repent and repentings repentance has,
of course, turning back to the
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Lord in his word, but doing
so trusting that he will forgive, trusting
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that he will empower new obedience,
trusting that he loves US and wants to
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be near to us. They stopped
because it was hard. Honestly, they
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stopped because they feared the opposition that
they were really facing. They stopped because
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they decided other things were easier to
pursue or more worth pursuing. They were
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busy with their own lives and their
own households and they neglected God's. The
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world says that the worship of God
is not practical. Why would you build
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the House of God and you need
a shelter to live in? And of
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course we need a shelter. God
never said don't build a house, but
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he did say build mine, right. But the world comes to as it
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says. I don't worry about the
worship of God. There's another day,
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another time. You're busy, you
have things to do. The world says
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there's more urgent things. The world
says there's better things to spend time and
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money on. The world sometimes says
that it's not just better, but you
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better not spend your money, in
your time and your energy on the things
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of the Lord, because to do
so is an attack on the world,
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as how it is sometimes taken,
and so there can be sometimes fierce opposition
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against the against the things that we
do when we make the Lord, our
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life with him, a priority.
But, brothers and sisters, it's not
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about the world, it's about the
word. The word of God. God
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says, seek first the Kingdom of
Righteousness and his righteousness, and everything else
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will be added. Unto you,
the Word is how we must set us
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set our standards, and so that
means we must listen to it and know
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it and pursue it. But the
second part is that we must trust in
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the faithfulness of God, as I
mentioned before, to forgive us. We
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can't simply dig deeper into our own
strengths and go off of our own power
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and resources, because those are the
things that were failing us in the first
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place. The word of the Lord
not only comes to us in the law,
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but it comes to us in the
Gospel and tells us that God will
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give to us what the law is
unable to do. The law sets the
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standard, the law commands, the
law tells us how we go right and
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how we go left and what's wrong
and all of that, but the law
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is not capable of empowering us to
do the right think they knew what they
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were supposed to do before. It
was the good news of God's being with
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them, of desiring to be with
them. It was the God's spirit and
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his promises to work. Even apart
from their disobedience and to keep them near
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himself, that all of this works
and that he that he brought brings them
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back to himself. Notice it happens
even in the message of Prophet Hag I
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right. God, in His grace, came to them, he came to
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them and revealed himself to them.
He woke them up in a way.
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Again, I raised my hand and
thinking about repentance and say, and I
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will say, that turning around is
sometimes a very hard thing to do and
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honestly, it's even impossible to do. It is impossible to repent in such
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a way that is faithful enough to
the Lord when you are under a curse,
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when everything in your heart and in
your life is is being ruled by
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a bet and twisted ruler. You
cannot obey the Lord. You can't.
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It just doesn't work. It's not
enough to see that we're wrong and understand
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that we're weak, but we need
to be saved by the grace of God's
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spirit working in us. We must
come to trust and believe in that salvation.
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We have to come to an end
in ourselves and say there's nothing I
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can do more here and trust entirely
in the Lord to be at work in
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us, whether it's hard external circumstances, as Israel, looks out at our
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enemies and say, these people are
impossible. We're trying, Lord, we're
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trying to build, we're trying to
do the work, and they keep fighting
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US and they keep stopping us.
We can't control them, we can't manage
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them, we can't overpower them.
In that moment when they look at those
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external stay or circumstances that are keeping
them from obeying or making it difficult anyway,
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what do you do? You look
to the Lord God and you say,
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Lord, it is you who wants
me to do this, so help
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me for Vibe, for me,
help me to be faithful, even when
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there is external opposition. What I'm
going to say to you now is that
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it works no differently at an internal
level, when your heart like the enemies
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and the opposition outside, when your
own heart seems to be working against you,
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when your own flesh seems to be
working against you and you're like,
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I can't do this, this is
so hard, these temptations are so strong,
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I keep failing over and over.
Here's what you do. You Stop
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Trusting in yourself and you stop trusting
in your own heart and you say,
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Lord, I can't seem to control
this, I can't seem to overpower this,
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I can't seem to do this.
I need you, I need you
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to work for me, I need
you to fight for me, I need
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you to strengthen me, I need
you to win this battle. That's faith.
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Whether we're looking at our outside opposition
or our inside opposition, we we
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look to the Lord and we trust
him and we believe that he will do
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what he says he will do,
and then we get to work. We
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get to work, we start laying
the bricks, we start fighting the sin,
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we do whatever needs to be done
with our hands and with our heart
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to serve him, but we do
so believing that he is at work in
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US and has forgiven us for when
we have fallen. It's not enough to
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just see that you are wrong and
you're weak. We must trust the Lord
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with everything, and the good news
that's revealed in the scriptures and even here
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in our passage, is that you
can trust God and he will answer your
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prayers. He calls them to obedience
and then He provides the strength for obedience.
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The very spirit of God stirs in
their spirits, moves their hands and
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moves their hearts, empowering them to
do what they were for forty years not
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doing, and notice something else.
It's easy to skip, but go back
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to verse eight. God says,
go up to the hills and bring wood
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and build the house, that I
may take pleasure in it and that I
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may be glorified. Okay, you
hear the command in that, probably,
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but ask yourself this question. Why
in the world is it God's pleasure to
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have a house for himself? Why
is God commanding this obedience? He doesn't
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need a house, he doesn't need
anything. He doesn't need a house of
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bricks and wood. Even find jewels
and nice and Gravy, he doesn't need
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that. God is eternally self sufficient, forever, always has been, always
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will be, full of glory beyond
anything that we can imagine. Why does
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he need a house? Why does
he take pleasure in a house being built
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in this little city, this little
part of the world? It's not because
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God means it, but it's because
we need it. God takes pleasure in
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it because he has already taken pleasure
in us. God takes pleasure in building
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a house and being near a people
because he loves us, because he loved
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them even while they are still being
disobedient, even while they were rebelling,
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God wants to be near them,
love them, change their hearts and have
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communion with them. This point about
the closeness of God, the nearness of
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God and his pleasure and his love
and his communion with his people becomes even
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more clear in the life of Jesus, and the son of God comes into
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this world, whose named Emmanuel,
which means God with us. Jesus comes
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into the world to be the new
temple. One, this temple that we're
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talking about in hearing about it Hagi, eventually gets built and then destroyed again,
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this house of the Lord. It
pleases the Lord for a time,
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but he has also it's pointing forward
to something else, something that he wants
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to do, in which he will
establish a union that is forever with his
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people, the he will dwell with
his people forever, and their own sin
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can never even break that apart.
He is going to do something in the
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world, and he does it through
Jesus that covers that sin, forgives it
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perfectly and completely, so that God
can take pleasure in being with his people
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and dwelling with them forever with no
risk of separation forever. In the Gospels,
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Jesus tells people tear down this temple
and I will rebuild it, or
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it will rise again in three days. Like, what are you talking about?
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You know how long it took to
build this temple. Are you going
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to raise it up in three days? The scriptures tell us he was talking
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about himself. He calls himself the
temple. Why? Because it is in
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him that the fullness of Deity dwells
and it's in him that God draws near
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to his people. It's in him
that, as the temple complex was,
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this point of access and communion and
closeness and forgiveness. All that gets gets,
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you know, sort of swallowed up
and and super charged in Jesus.
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He becomes that place for us.
In the book of Hebrews A, Chapter
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Nine, you can read this with
me if you like, or or just
390
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listen, and Hebrews nine, verse
eleven, Their Author says this when Christ
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appeared as a high priest, of
the good things that have come then through
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the greater and more perfect tent.
This is referring to the Tabernacle and temple
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ideas. This tent, this Tabernacle, this temple, not made with hands
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that is not of this creation.
He entered into that temple once for all,
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into the holy places. Now listen
to this. Not by means of
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the blood of goats and calves,
but by means of his own blood.
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God provided his own lamb, a
sacrifice for all of our sins, all
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of our sins, they would perfectly
forgive us forever. So, based on
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that sacrifice, the sacrifice of the
blood of the son of God, he
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does this me. Read then a
verse twelve. There again I'm in Hebrews
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nine, by the means of his
own blood, thus securing and eat turnal
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redemption, not a redemption that lasts
for a little while until you sin again,
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but at eternal redemption through the blood
of Jesus. For if the blood
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of goats and bowls and the sprinkling
of defiled persons with the ashes of a
405
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Heifer, all old testament mosaic economy
stuff, if those sanctify for the purification
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of the flesh, how much more
will the blood of Christ, who threw
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the eternal spirit, offered himself without
blemish to God, purify our conscience from
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00:36:32.119 --> 00:36:42.039
dead works, to serve the living
God, to eternally redeem us? And
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then strengthen US and empower us for
O for obedience forever. That's what the
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blood of Jesus does for us.
Amazing. Now, skipping down to verse
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twenty three. Thus it was necessary
for the copies of the heavenly things.
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He's talking about, the temple,
which is I can't explain it here,
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but it was a copy of a
heavenly pattern, that heavenly Jerusalem and all
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of that. It was necessary for
the copies of heavenly things to be purified
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with these rights, but the heavenly
things themselves with better sacrifices than knees.
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For Christ has entered not into holy
places made with hands, which are copies
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of the truth things, but into
heaven itself now to appear in the presence
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of God on our behalf. Nor
was it to offer himself repeatedly, as
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the high priest enters the whole place
every year, with blood not his own,
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for then he would have to suffer
repeatedly since the foundation of the world.
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But as it is, he has
appeared once for all at the end
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of the ages to put away sin
by the sacrifice of himself. And just
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as it is appointed for man to
die once, and after that comes judgment.
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So Christ, having been offered once
to bear the sins of many,
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will appear a second time, not
to deal with sin, but to save
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those who are eagerly waiting for him. Amazing. This is why God says
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in verse a of Hagi, go
up to the hills, bring the wood,
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build the house, that I may
take pleasure in it, that I
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may be glorified. He is doing
something at this moment in history with the
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copies of the heavenly things, because
he desires this closeness with us, a
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00:38:47.199 --> 00:38:52.639
communion with us, an eternal redemption
for us, and one that will be
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completed and perfected in Jesus, as
he is a high priest, as he
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00:39:00.119 --> 00:39:06.039
is the sacrifice, and is he
as he establishes in himself this temple,
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not made with human hands, that
God might dwell with us forever according to
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00:39:10.400 --> 00:39:20.639
his pleasure. It's God's pleasure to
dwell with us. This is how God
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00:39:20.679 --> 00:39:27.920
removes the curse from us through the
forgiveness of our sins in the sacrifice of
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Jesus. The curse ultimately is removed, the the vinyl curse, the big
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00:39:32.960 --> 00:39:39.519
one, the final judgment. It's
removed not by our righteousness, it's not
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00:39:39.599 --> 00:39:45.880
even removed by our God helped righteousness, which is great, but that's not
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00:39:45.920 --> 00:39:53.039
what does it. What ultimately does
it is God's own righteousness in Jesus,
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who is a perfect sacrifice without blemish, empowered and anointed by the eternal spirit,
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and in him a new temple is
raised. In Him we have access
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to God and in him the pleasure
of God to save us and be with
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us forever is brought into fulfillment.
So when we come and look at this
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first chapter of Hagi we see that
self examination the leads to condemnation. It
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leads to the revelation of the curse
that is rightfully on us, and there's
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nothing wrong with that. That is
a good thing, but it is not
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a sufficient thing for our salvation.
We must not only examine our hearts according
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to the law, but we must
also believe the Gospel promises, according to
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00:41:00.719 --> 00:41:07.119
God's grace. We must believe that
God, route by his spirit, can
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00:41:07.159 --> 00:41:14.599
and does change our hearts, can
and has removed the curse and forgiven us
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00:41:14.599 --> 00:41:21.599
our sins and has built a temple
in which we can dwell with him forever,
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00:41:22.239 --> 00:41:30.159
a temple that we enjoy and we
hear and experience him and his salvation
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00:41:30.679 --> 00:41:36.599
and know his nearness with us.
So let us also learn to consider our
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ways, to look to the Lord
and all that he says and to trust
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him to be at work in us, for the forgiveness of our sins,
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00:41:45.639 --> 00:41:52.480
our sanctification and, one day,
our glorification as well. Let's pray our
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father in heaven. We thank you
for your word to us. Please help
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us to consider our hearts and to
do so wisely and truly. And when
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we come to see the weakness in
ourselves, the sin in ourselves, the
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the lack of obedience, oh Lord, we ask that you would help us
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00:42:08.840 --> 00:42:15.280
to turn not again to ourselves but
to you, to strive after new obedience
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00:42:15.400 --> 00:42:22.800
through faith, to walk in the
ways of Christ through faith, trusting and
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00:42:22.840 --> 00:42:30.639
believing of your work that began even
before we were made Lord, we thank
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00:42:30.719 --> 00:42:35.440
you for doing that work here,
and it's a rebable and in Joshua's lives.
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Why did they forget? Why did
they slow down? They were afraid
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00:42:43.800 --> 00:42:49.360
of the wrong things. They lost
sight of their priorities, they lost sight
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00:42:49.480 --> 00:42:52.559
of what they were called to do, just as we do. And so,
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00:42:52.760 --> 00:42:55.639
Lord, as you did for them, we asked that you would do
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00:42:55.719 --> 00:43:00.800
for us call us again to our
first love, call us again to proper
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00:43:00.880 --> 00:43:07.119
priorities, call us to praise you
and worship you and glorify you in all
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00:43:07.159 --> 00:43:12.800
things. Show US your way and
empower us by your spirit to do these
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00:43:12.840 --> 00:43:17.800
things, to serve you now and
forever. We ask, O Lord,
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00:43:17.880 --> 00:43:22.000
that as we face the enemy is
in our own hearts, as we face
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00:43:22.079 --> 00:43:27.440
the enemies of the evil one and
the the spiritual powers that are arrayed against
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00:43:27.559 --> 00:43:31.199
us, as we face enemies in
this world, that you would help us
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00:43:31.239 --> 00:43:37.159
to wear the armor of God.
We would put on those things that you
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00:43:37.239 --> 00:43:43.679
have freely given to us, an
armor that is strong and can put out
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00:43:43.760 --> 00:43:47.719
all the flaming darts of the evil
one. Thank you, Lord, for
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00:43:47.760 --> 00:43:51.960
your grace to us. Thank you
for wanting to be near to us.
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We praise you for your the glorious
things that you have done and the salvation
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00:43:57.519 --> 00:44:01.599
that we have and experienced in you. Bless us in all these things through
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00:44:01.719 --> 00:44:06.760
Jesus Christ alone. We pray this
in his name. Amen.
