So Pastor Mark accidentally has one of the wrong baseball jerseys every week. I thought the way he asked me to read it, I was like, I'll give him a bigger, more of the right jerseys. But today we're reading Micah 2, 1-13, page 777, two Bibles. Let me get you guys in here real quick. Woe to those who devise wickedness and work evil on their beds. When the morning dawns, they perform it because it is in the power of their hand. They covet fields and seize them, and houses, and take them away. They oppress a man in man's house, and man in his inheritance. Therefore, thus the Lord says, Behold, against his family I am devising disaster, from which you cannot remove your necks. And you shall not walk haughtily, for it will be a time of disaster. In that day, they shall take up a torn psalm against you, and moan bitterly, and say, we're utterly ruined. He changes the portion of my people, how he removes it from me, to an apostate he allots our fields. Therefore, you will have not to cast a line by lot in the assembly of the Lord. Do not preach, thus they preach. One should not preach of such things. Your spirits will not overtake us. Should this be said, O house of Jacob, has the Lord grown impatient? Are these his deeds? Do not have words too good to him who walks brightly, for living white people have risen up as an enemy. You strip the rich roam from those who pass by trustingly, with no thought of war. The women of my people you drive out from their delightful houses, from their young children to take away my splendor forever. Arise and go, for this is no place to rest, because of uncleanliness that destroys with a grievous destruction. But man should go about under women's lies, saying, I will preach to you of wine and strong drink. You would be the preacher of this people. I will surely assemble you all among Jacob. I will gather the remnant of Israel. I will set them together like sheep in fold, like a flock in pasture, a noisy multitude of men. He who opens the breach goes up before them. They break as if past the gate, going out by it. Their king passes on before them, the Lord at their head. Let's pray as we're getting into this time in the word. Thank you, Father, for your goodness and grace and for this passage of scripture that is a challenge to us and a call to us to holiness. It's a call to us to right teaching, right preaching, and ask you, God, to use this time for your glory and for our good. And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. If you don't know, the reason that the jerseys are coming out is because we're working through a summer in the minors. We've already done Obadiah, we've done Jonah, and now we're in the book of Micah. As the years progress, we'll get through all 12, but I wanted to hit at least three this summer. And what we saw last week is Micah is dealing with a specific sin. It's a direct sin against God. And that is the sin of idolatry. We, as a nation, are an idolatrous nation. We just are, if we're honest. And we, as a people, are an idolatrous people. Our minds are idol factories. We just create idols on a regular basis. And what happens is when we replace the true God with gods of our own making, then insanity ensues. And that's what you see as you are out and about. That's what you see as you watch the worldviews that are being put before us each and every day in conversation and in media, in news. And so as a result of that insanity, we are sinning against God. And when we sin against God, what will actually start to happen is we will begin to sin against one another. That's just how it plays out. And in this passage of scripture that Josh read for us this morning, Micah is speaking against oppression. God hates oppression. The last few years, I don't know if you are getting kind of sick and tired of hearing about oppressed peoples. It can get to the point where you start to turn off something because you hear about oppression so much. There's a danger in that. But what's happening for us right now is we are actually living in a culture of exaggerated oppression. fake oppression sometimes. It's an oppression that is tied to first world problems. It's an oppression that is, I feel oppressed because I'm not given something or I'm told no. And as a result, I'm oppressed. And if that's the case, every child, every teenager is oppressed. All right. There's going to be times where we have to say, no, there's going to be times where we have to respond with, we're not going to do it the way you'd like to do. Oh, I'm oppressed. You're oppressing me. And as a result of that, when we hear it over and over and over again, we almost get deaf to it. And we, I don't want to hear about it anymore. but we open up the word and we find out that that word shows up in the second verse here. And so we have an understanding because of that, that, oh, God hates this. God does not want us to be people that are oppressive. And so if that's a part of your life right now, or you say, I'm not oppressing anybody. Well, there's different forms of oppression. If you're a bully, you're being oppressive. And that could go on, not necessarily on the school grounds. I mean, we had a bunch of it going on growing up. Fights were regular when I was growing up. They've taken away the joy of fights in school. I want you to know this rule of no tolerance. I just don't understand it. But the sad part is, and something that you and I need to have an understanding, that bullying continues, whereas a kid could go home and have a haven, that kid, if they are on social media, if they are online, it can continue if it's going on. And so as you and I think about oppression, what's he calling us to? He's saying, I don't want you to be people that manipulate people. We must not become numb to the reality of it. We also must not become unaware that politicians today use oppression to get their way. They'll use that word and as a result, oppression's going on. to ask the Lord to give us discerning minds when we see things going on and say, that is oppression, or no, that's not oppression. You'll find out how much a person is against oppression, truly biblically against oppression, when the tables are turned. There are people today that say they hate oppression. But if they receive power and they would oppress because of the fact that we've been oppressed for so long, now it's our turn, they would want revenge or they would want things flip-flopped. And that shows that whoever that individual is, we can all fall into that camp. Oh, you're really not against oppression. You're against it when you're not in power. And so that's why when I say to you, we need to be thinking people, we need to stop. When we look at the scriptures, what is the Bible saying? And then when he points the finger at me to go, I'm oppressive or I don't speak against oppression. Father, help me. Help me to be a person of peace. Help me to be a person that is not built on revenge or vengeance, but that I would be a person of grace, that I would be a person, if I've been in a situation where I've been oppressed and now I have power that I would be a person that would be, I still want to be gracious and I still want to forgive. That's why God says, love your enemies. It's such a cultural phenomenon if we were to live out this Christian life biblically. So we've seen in the first chapter this reality of retribution that is going on. And now we see one of the reasons for this retribution that is going to be going on. Why in the midst of this sermon that is being given by Micah, remember there's a few sermons that he's going to be giving. Why is God doing this? Why is God saying, I need to give judgment because You're just not getting in. So when God is invalued, human life is invalued. When God is loved, truly loved, then people will be loved. Point number one, if you want to take notes in the back of your bulletin, there's some spots there you can fill in some blanks and then write in things as we work through this together. Look at the robbers. Look at the robbers. God now pronounces judgment. Look at verse one again with me. to those who devise wickedness and work evil on their beds. When the morning dawns, they perform it because it is in the power of their hand." Judgments sometimes in the Bible begin with this Hebrew word hoy, it means woe or ah, or alas. And he's, saying it's almost like a mourning for the dead. It's as if he's saying, you are as good as dead when you head down this road. It's a funeral dirge. He's saying, if you live like this, Israel, this is what this is going to look like for you. And I want to give it to us too. When you live like this, Christian, this is what's going to happen, alas. And so these people of God who should be meditating on his word, they're lying in their beds. If you've ever had that where you're laying in bed, you can't sleep. and they're plotting about what they're gonna do the next day, and I want you to look at the contrast with David, the man after God's own heart, what was on his heart, Psalm 63, verses five and six. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips. When I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night. So I don't know what some of you maybe just laying in bed, you're going, I just wanna sleep. But there are times where you're laying there and you're making plans. And he's saying, Micah is saying, I know Israel, I know Judah, what you're thinking about at night. You're dwelling on this. So let me stop and ask you, what do you think about when you're having a hard time falling asleep? Something good to do would be maybe to spend that time in prayer. And I'm telling you, you'd be shocked how quickly you'll fall asleep. Like, oh, I fell asleep on God. He doesn't mind, all right? The fact that we would take the time to talk with him. Either way, we win. We're either praying or sleeping, all right? But here's what's happening with these guys. They're having these sinful imaginations that are going on as they're laying there. Then sinful eagerness. It says there that in the morning, when it dawns, they will perform it. And this word morning, you know how for us, it's like, you know, hey, until it's like 12 noon, it's morning to us. That's not the Hebrew word here. It's as soon as the light dawns. This is mourning. And so they've been ruminating over these evil things that they want to do. And when the sun's up, they're ready to go and sin. They're ready to go and do what they want to do. And then you see after a while, what happens is they become people that dwell on these things so much, they act on it. And here's why they act on it. They perform it, verse one there, because it is in the power of their hand. You know, I've talked about him a few times, my brother, Bob Spoonster, and we'll have these talks about different things that were going on. And we would just sit and talk about different current events and something that was so funny when we would mention, and I could count on him saying this, somebody would do a crime. Somebody would commit something that they shouldn't be doing. He goes, do you know why they're doing that? And I fell for it. I still fell for it. He goes, because they can. Now you stop and think about that. That's why so much that goes on that you and I watch people in power or people doing some things. You'll watch certain things on the news and you can't believe what they're going in that store. They're doing that. They're smashing, grab that. Why are they doing it? Because they can. And God is saying, even as we start out this first verse, I'm not gonna allow that to continue. Now, sometimes you'll be looking and you'll go, but it just keeps happening. I'd like you to stop and think about you, about your life. Do you realize how gracious God is with us? How much we are constantly, it might, but it's not to the level. It might not be, but sin is sin. The imaginations that we have, the morning comes and we act on it. And we got away with it because I could. We want God to be gracious to us. We don't want to be gracious to other people. We love grace when it's us. And God is saying, I'm keeping a record. I'm keeping an account. And I'm calling you Israel, my believing people, my beloved people. And then I'm calling you church. that God is calling us to holy living. The Bible isn't just packed with indicative statements, and that's an English term of statements, just statements. It's also full of things called imperatives, and imperatives are commands. God actually gives us commands. And one of the commands is he calls us to be holy. And so as you reflect on this, it'd be so easy in a message like this to go, yeah, they're doing this and they're doing that, yeah, instead of going, Father, what am I doing? What's in my life right now that I don't say no to? And you're calling me to that. Well, let's keep going. Verse two, here's what happens. They covet fields and they seize them and houses and take them away. They oppress a man and his house, a man and his inheritance. And you do know that money is not evil. Things are not evil. It's the love. Look at this, 1 Timothy 6, verse 10. For the love of money, not money, the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. And so whenever people look at the rich people, and they're, oh, the rich, and it's noble being poor, there's nothing in the Scriptures about that. It's talking about our affections, love. I know rich people that are extremely humble people. I know some poor people, very proud people. It's always a matter of the heart. And so God's calling on our lives is to not be this way. And if you look at the sin here, look at the sin that's listed. They covet fields. That's the 10th commandment. Look at this, Exodus 20, verse 17. You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ax, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's. Isn't it interesting? This is the sin, by the way, that Paul really felt like he struggled with. That's the one he mentioned in Romans. because he could, on the outside, oh, I didn't kill anybody. I didn't steal. I didn't do all these different things. But God, in the 10th commandment, instead of just dealing with these outside things, he goes, oh, I'm gonna throw this in for the 10th one. I want your heart to be a heart that you aren't looking all the time and going, He wants us to get to the point where we're satisfied. We're satisfied in Him. I like how James Montgomery Boyce talks about covetousness in his commentary on Micah. He says, what does coveting mean? It means to want earnestly something you do not have, particularly something belonging to another person. It means not to be satisfied with what God has already given you. It means to be materialistic and greedy. The 10th commandment reveals that sin is essentially a matter of the heart, for coveting is something that exists internally long before it expresses itself in outward action. How modern this all is, how keenly it strikes at the roots of our materialistic Western culture. We object to the sexual innuendos and come-ons and advertising, but even the more pernicious is the ceaseless pitch for materialism, the constant temptation to covetousness. It comes in subtle forms, as in the suggested that buying a particular car or home will make you a more attractive person or allow your children to grow up benefiting from another higher level of society. It comes in more vulgar forms as an advertisement for an expensive hair conditioner that says, I don't care if it is more expensive because I'm worth it. We are a generation of people never at peace with what we have, always seeking more. We are as guilty of coveting our neighbor's fields or houses or inheritance as we're the citizens of Jerusalem. And so God says to you and me, I don't want you coveting. And it's such an easy sin to hide. It sometimes comes out in a sentence here or there. But why is coveting a sin? It doesn't find its satisfaction in God. God wants it to be that we are satisfied in him. It doesn't trust God as the all-knowing provider. We look and he goes, if I had that then, it doesn't allow us to love one another. Sometimes somebody gets something and you're like, well, I'd like that. It isn't thankful for what it already has. And it is at the root of a bunch of other sins. And so what he's saying here, as he's talking to us about oppression and coveting, he's saying the reason that people oppress other people is because they covet. And it happens, by the way, in any economic, situation. Sometimes our culture pushes against capitalism. And there, let's face it, isn't there coveting in capitalism? I mean, that's what drives us a lot of times. Doesn't make the economic system bad. But then there will be people, but if we had a socialist society, then it would be right. Mm-mm. Socialism assumes that people are good. Socialism assumes that I should have what that person has. Very deceptive. And so God, instead of listing economic forums that we would look at and go, oh, this is biblical because it says, he goes, here's what I want you to do. I want you to live a life where you don't covet. I don't want you looking around. And all of these things that he listed, they're the things that get us in trouble. I wish she was my wife. You don't live with her. Boy, look at him. You don't see what he's like around the house. Oh, I wish I had that car. Do you really want that car? Yeah, I really like that car. You really want that car? And then there'll be people, yes, I really want that car. But you don't know all that's tied to that. I've had friends that have properties and you'll go to that property with them and it's great. And I said, hey man, this is great. You got this. And I get the benefit of this person owning this thing and allowing me to enjoy it. And you know what that person said to me? They go, by the way, they were happy about it, but they go, every time they go to stuff, all that's on their mind is that needs to be fixed. That needs to be fixed. That needs to be fixed. So you could say, I wish I was rich. Do you really want to be rich? I wish I was famous. Do you really want to be famous? All the things that are tied to those things. And some of you are like, yeah, I'd still want it. We can be so easily deceived. Look at verse three. Therefore, thus says the Lord, behold, against this family, I am devising disaster from which you cannot remove your necks and you shall not walk haughtily for it will be a time of disaster. See, he's saying, as a result of this, because you're plotting evil, God says, I'm plotting judgment. And it's going to be, there's a phrase, you've heard this before, poetic justice. The way you act, I'm gonna give to you. Let's keep going, verses four and five. In that day, they shall take up a taunt song against you. You taunted people, I'm gonna have people taunt you and moan bitterly. And you say, we're utterly ruined. He changes the portion of my people, how he removes it from me. You remove stuff from people, I'm gonna remove it from you. To an apostate, he allots our fields. This doesn't seem fair, but that's what you did to others. Therefore, you have none to cast the line by a lot in the assembly of the Lord. And so what will happen is you'll be talked about, but what you did to people will be done. And it isn't karma. Karma is this thing that just floats out there. God is saying, I'm watching what you're doing. And because of what you're doing, I'm going to do this. It's a humbling thing. And it should be something that stops us and makes us think, what am I doing to other people? that God has seized these things. Let's keep going. Point number two, look at the revilers. Look at the revilers. Look at verses six and seven. Do not preach, thus they preach. One should not preach of such things. Disgrace shall not overtake us. Should this be said, O house of Jacob? Has the Lord grown impatient? Are these his deeds? Do not my words do good to him who walks uprightly? He's saying this. Micah is saying, every time I preach about judgment, there are people that will come along and say, I don't want you preaching about that. As you speak the truth, I want you to have an understanding about something. Brothers and sisters, right now, I want you to hear me. As you speak the truth, you're gonna get most of your trouble from people that claim that they know God, the God of the Bible. They're gonna twist it. They're gonna say, My God would never, my God wants people to be happy. Central earlier in 1 Kings 22, I want you to write that down, 1 Kings 22, and I want you to look later at those verses. In 1 Kings 22, Ahab wants to do what Ahab wants to do. And he says, I don't know if I should take these steps. And they said, well, what has the prophet said to you? And he's got these prophets that are constantly, a lot of them, constantly telling him what he wants to hear. And they go, well, you have anybody else, like a second opinion? He goes, yeah, there's this guy named Micaiah. This is a century before Micah. But every time he says stuff, it's stuff that, it's against me. It's what I don't wanna hear. And this prophet was speaking truth to him. And so instead of surrounding himself with just yes men, he had this one guy and he hated him. Hezekiah, I'm sorry, Zedekiah, others that would be willing to listen, I'm sorry, Jehoshaphat was willing to listen and he thrived. Ahab went against what this prophet said and died. And so when you and I gather together, One of my callings as a preacher is to tell you the truth. See this, and I know you're like, oh, you're doing a lot of reading, but this is good stuff. And this is my way of saying to you, reading's a good thing, all right? I once counseled a young man who had been raised in a liberal church. He had decided to divorce his wife from the grounds that he realized he didn't love her after all. When I pressed upon him God's condemnation of his proposed action, he glibly replied, I don't believe in the God you talk about. My God is a God of love. I replied to him that this was precisely his problem. It is because God is a God of love that he hates divorce. It is because God is a God of love that he could be counted on to take up the cause of his injured wife. It is because of God's holy and true love that he will judge those who violate his loving commandments. But so ensnared with the young man by the false but convenient preaching of his upbringing that my warning had no apparent effect. On the one occasion when I spoke to him afterwards, he informed me that his hometown pastor had convinced him against my narrow-minded and legalistic counsel. I picked, this author picked one instance, but we could do that across the board. There have been times that I have spoken here about sexual purity, that are hard verses, that I had a guy, after I got done preaching, he goes, I gotta talk to you, he brings me in my office, he brings me in my office, and he goes, why do you do this? Why do you, you know I struggle with this, and I'm thinking, what man doesn't? What man doesn't struggle with this? And he wanted me so badly to not do this. And out of love, I've got to tell the truth. This is what the Bible said, he calls us to more. And there are churches or places that call themselves churches that will tell you whatever you want and just tickle your ears. and make you feel good. And that's what's going on here. Look at that verse there. He's saying, do not preach, thus preach. And then he gets to the bottom. He says, verse seven, has the Lord grown impatient and saying, well, God would be patient. He would let us do whatever we want. He's saying, no, God don't play that. It's there, that's the translation. And that's what sin needs to be confronted. Needs to be dealt with. Last point, look at the resistors. Look at verse eight. The idea expressed here is that the poor were being oppressed because they were easy targets. War is being waged on unsuspecting men. And you see the line here. He says, the women of my people, you drive off from their delightful houses From their young children, you take away my splendor forever. You see the progression here. It starts with men. And watch our society. There is an attack on masculinity today. Is there toxic males? Of course, there's toxic females. There's toxic children. There's toxic everything. But you'll see men constantly be attacked. And what's happening is men are being pulled away that we should be protectors of women. We should be people that care for women, care for children. But if we can toxic masculinity and we could say all these bad things about men and just knock them down, who's the protectors? I can protect myself, okay. But I see biblically, he's working down here and he's saying, you're playing games with God and what he wants to do. Verse nine, I read verse nine. Point number four, look at the repudiators. Look at 10 and 11. Oh, rise and go for this is no place to rest because of uncleanness that destroys with a grievous destruction. If a man should go about an utter wind, he's just. and lies saying, I will preach to you of wine and strong drink. He would be the preacher for this people. They're wanting people that just speak things that are intoxicating, just windbags, just wasting time instead of telling them, no, Israel, you keep going down this road. Judah, you keep going down this road and something really bad is going to happen. And I'm trying to protect you from it. And where's the hope? Where's the hope? Look at verses 12 and 13. Look at the remnant, point five. Look at the remnant. I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob. I will gather the remnant of Israel. I will set them together like sheep in a fold, like a flock in his pasture, a noisy multitude of men. He who opens the breach goes up before them. They break through and pass the gate, going out by it. Their king passes on before them. The Lord is at their head. And so what he's saying is, You can trust this. And so I've been giving you the last two weeks, the first one was a chapter of judgment. And now we've had a whole chapter of judgment. Now he wants to give us hope. And the hope is in Christ. He's the one. You look at the picture there. He's a shepherd. He's a commander. He's a king. He is Lord. He's the man. He's the one that can be trusted. And so what is our calling? Grace, what's our calling? Our calling is we need to be people that protect. We need to understand that he's raising up a remnant. Even today, he did it with Israel, physical Israel. He's gonna do that work again someday. But right now we're the church. What are we doing with it? It reminded me a scene from Andy Griffith. So I'm gonna show you that scene. And I'm gonna talk a little bit more, take a look at it. Before I set it up, stop it for a second, pause, thank you. What's happening in this scene is it's called Opie's Hobo Friend. Some of you are like, oh, I know that scripture passage. Buddy Epson from Beverly Hillbillies. He's a vagrant, he's going through, And Opie has struck up a friendship with him. And this guy has found a way to cut corners constantly. He steals apple pies from windowsills. He steals chicken from kitchens. And he's eating and he's saying all this stuff and he's pouring into Opie's mind how you can do life by cutting corners. And watch how Andy has to confront him. Yeah, yeah, it's been an honor. Are you home? Evening, Stu. I've got something to say now. I've got a new face for you. Yeah, I'm sure of it, son. You told me about kicking leather. Well, that, uh, yeah, that's gonna be bad. Run it out of the room. License number? You got a channel like this? Oh, the pie. The pie was there. The pie. Well, that's not why I'm here. Good. It's about over. There's something wrong. There is something wrong. Yeah, you might. It's all those little people in there. Well, where is it? You know, I don't know how to find it. I don't know what's wrong. Well, there seems to be something wrong with his sight. He's gotten a little twisted on things like that. I can't even tell the difference between right and wrong. It's not that that's an easy thing. When I was growing up, I was still struggling with that same problem. But especially when I was very young, I was playing for the Baltimore Cities next year. The suggestion that maybe I did a copy for a game, that didn't seem to be the case. It wasn't fair. Maybe I do look at things differently than other people. Is that wrong? I look at my wits. I'm not about to bend and go all hound man, keep clothes on my back, move my stomach. I look at the kind of life that other people would have missed and loved earlier, but they don't get the courage. Who's to say that the boy would be happier your way or mine? Why do I have to do this now? No, I'm afraid it don't work that way. You think about it on the side, on yourself. You get back to the first flash, you find you're shining ribbons on them. And then when you find out that, OK, this is too late. Wrong ideas come back with so much glitter as far as the defense is to know that things might be better in the long run. All a parent can do is say, well, trust me. You can try to keep the temptation away. That means that you're right at your feet. That's right. I want to challenge you on something right now. Our children's ministry needs workers and help. Hours upon hours upon hours, our culture is bombarding us with philosophies, with worldviews. I wanna thank those of you that have faithfully been doing children's ministry for a long time, that we can count on you. But I want you to understand that when all those kids get up and they're excused and some of you are going, I wish I could go with them. There's that beautiful sound as they're making their way out, that they don't just go and somebody is juggling for them or doing a magic show, there's teaching going on. And I can think back into my life, who poured into my life? I had pastors that poured in my life, but I also had Awana leaders. I had Ginny Wilson and Marjorie. I had, I could count on when I got into third grade Sunday school class, Joel Matlow was going to be my teacher. When I got to fifth grade, Mr. Peters was going to be my teacher. When I got to ninth grade, Mr. Pine was going to be my teacher and they poured into my life and they kept going, even though it was hard. And so if there's any part of you that looks at someone like me and goes, what created that? What had an impact? It was the faithfulness of not just pastors, but people that were willing to pour into lives. In fact, there's been times where we put out an emotional appeal and we put it before and people sign up, but then the hard time comes. And so there's a culture showing shiny things and there's hours of it. And just for a couple of hours on a Sunday and a couple of hours on a Wednesday night, there would be an opportunity to say, but that's not my giftedness or it's hard. I don't think it's my giftedness. But I've, and you could say, but that's your job. But on Wednesday night, I have the opportunity to do Bible teaching for the cubbies. Cause I don't want to just, I don't want to be a hypocrite. I don't want to say to you that something I'm, and I don't think kids are my thing. I love them. but they aren't necessarily my niche, but I wanna help. And I'm encouraging you that I believe a remnant is being raised up right now, and it won't happen by accident. And so this isn't just an emotional appeal, it's a challenge to you. Would you pray? Would you pray? for your willingness to serve. And that's just one aspect. And you know, those of you that come here, I don't do this every Sunday, but there's a need and I'm putting it before you. And I'd ask you to pray, not just write it off right away, that you would pray. And maybe, and I'm telling you, I look back on those leaders with such a fondness. And a kid, if you'd be willing today, side thing, I want you to hear me. A ministry that we're blessed with right now, men's breakfast. I asked Roy a while back ago, what, what, what got this started for you? And Al Soots, if you guys remember, Al Soots was doing men's breakfast and he goes, Hey Roy, come on. And Roy started doing, well, Al's not with us anymore. But instead of Roy going, well, I'm tired. I don't want to do it anymore. Or, well, Al's gone. So I guess that was my get out of jail free card. It was, I'll pick up. and we are blessed each month because of that. So however that plays out for you, you've got giftedness, you've got to be able to, first of all, are you using your gifts? And then, if you would be willing to pray about it and allow God to use you, because a remnant is being raised up. And I can think, what's God gonna do with the Atticus's, with the Michael's, with the Eberly's, with the different people that he's placed into our lives? these little ones that are watching us and what we value, what we pour our lives into. I'm saying to you, be willing, would you? Let's pray. Father, thank you again for what you're doing. And I ask you, God, to do your work in and through this place that out of Grace Bible Church, you could raise up those that would continue to follow you However, that leads to do eternal business in the lives and it's because others sacrificed time that we're willing to take those steps. Thank you for calling all of us to the Great Commission. And it's in Jesus name we pray.