The last phrase of the second to last song that we just sang here a moment ago struck me as we were singing it. In Shepherds Watch Their Flocks, last verse says, all glory be to God on high and to earth be peace. Goodwill henceforth from heaven to men begin and never cease. begin and never cease. Peace on earth and goodwill to men in whom he is well pleased. We have the opportunity, the privilege to be called of God into his presence and to be given a trust in Christ That is preemptive. Now preemptive, that's an awful big word. We're not but humble pirates, right? Preemptive means to guard against beforehand or to put into motion those things that are protective in a sense beforehand. And so we're talking about trust that is in place and protective and guiding and present beforehand. You know, the reality is, I think, that many times we see trust as being reactionary. Something bad happens and I trust God to take care of it, right? And I think we all have circumstances in our life where we have looked at our relationship with God in that way. that I'm just kind of going on about my business, I'm floating merrily, merrily down the stream, which is not true, by the way. We don't float merrily, merrily downstream. Life's not a dream. But we see that, and we live that way many times, that we're just kind of going on about our business, and then wham, something hits us. And we go, oh God, please take care of me. And I trust you that you will take care of me. Well, Psalm 71, at least the first eight verses, teach us that our trust of Christ is not just floating merrily down the stream waiting for the next set of rapids and that for God to get us through those rapids, but that really genuine trust in Christ is preempted, that we are trusting Christ before anything might happen, whether it be good or bad, right? And so we want to think about this in that way. Psalm 71, verses one to eight. In you, O Lord, do I take refuge. Let me never be put to shame. In your righteousness, deliver me and rescue me. Incline your ear to me and save me. Be to me a rock of refuge to which I may continually come. You have given the command to save me. For you are my rock and my fortress. Rescue me, O God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and the cruel man. For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. Upon you I have leaned from before my birth. You are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise. is continually of you. I have been as a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge. My mouth is filled with your praise and with your glory all the day. And then verse nine, do not cast me off in the time of my old age. Father, we thank you for the day that you've given to us. We continue to praise you, Lord. Thank you for all that you've blessed us with. We pray, Father, that as we have sung, as we've prayed, as we've already heard from your word today, that you have prepared our hearts to receive what you have for us. And that, Father, as we hear and as we listen intently to your most blessed and holy word, we ask, Father, that you would build within us a trust that runs to you beforehand and not just in reaction to those things in life. Help us, Father, in our weakness to realize we are not capable of handling life's circumstances, good or bad, on our own. We need your grace. Forgive us wherein our frailty we have seen our successes as really our own doing and our failures we run to you for protection. And build within us, Father, a heart that trusts you. We love you, Father. We praise you. We thank you. And we ask these things in your precious and holy name. Amen. There is an old rabbinical legend, and I love these old legends. They come straight out of the Jewish culture. They don't always have a theology that points to Christ, but they do have a lot of wisdom in them. And this old rabbinic legend comes from the days of Joseph, when he was prime minister of Egypt. And the legend goes something like this, that during the extreme famines that occurred in Egypt during Joseph's day, that he emptied out the chaff that was in his granaries into the River Nile. And the chaff floated down the river, downstream, moving along with the currents. And the people on the banks, at a great distance below where they dumped the chaff out, saw it. And they realized that it was just the chaff and nothing else. But they understood that if they followed the chaff to where it entered the river, that there was the promise of plenty. Now, I don't know about Egyptian history, but I assume that they probably were like a lot of people, that as they were threshing out the grain they may very well have dumped the chaff into the river just to get rid of it, right? And so it seems to be that from that day in time that people understood that floating chaff in the river was a sign of grain being harvested. Now obviously in a famine there isn't any grain to be harvested, so you would take note if you saw chaff in the river. And so that's what they did. They saw the chaff floating in the river, and they realized that if they had the strength to make it to where it was dumped, and they reached the point to where the chaff entered the river, that they would find plenty of grain for nourishment. And as I read that, I said, you know what? I think that's a great picture of our day-to-day trust in Christ. We see the effects of Christ the chaff floating in the river. And it may not be benefit to us. It may be benefit to somebody else. It may be God working in somebody else's life. It may be God's provision in circumstances that are completely unrelated to us. But we understand that because Christ is at work, that if we would follow the trail of what's going on in the world, follow the chaff upstream, that we can find the fountainhead of those blessings. We can find the fountainhead of that goodness and grace that Christ is pouring out upon the world. And in that sense, as we are looking at the chaff in the water, we're looking at the work of Christ all around us, then what's happening is that we are trusting beforehand. We may be in difficult circumstances. We may be in good circumstances. We may just notice the chaff and go upstream. We may be hungry and really need something to eat, and so then we go upstream. But we are trusting Christ before something actually happens. And I think that's what David is telling us in this Psalm 71. Again, historically, Psalm 71, David is dealing with the rebellion that his son Absalom is perpetrating within his kingdom. Absalom is trying to take the kingdom away from David. So it is a period of stress. It is a period of emergency. It's one of those things that needs to be attended to now, that is true. But as you read the words of David in the first part of this psalm, you get the sense that it's not a reaction to what's happening, but it's a continuation of a faith that David has had in God before all of this happened, and now it's brought him to this point. And I think that's the key thing that these verses in this psalm are trying to teach us that we can't and shouldn't be reactionary in our trust of God, that we really ought to be trusting in God preemptively, moment by moment, every day, every circumstance, every thought, every decision, everything we do, the very warp and wolf of our life is trusting in Christ. You know, there was a praise song that came out a number of years ago that went something like this. This is the air I breathe, right? You remember that song? And what was the air that I breathe? God's word is the air that I breathe. That is a moment-by-moment dependence upon Christ and his word and trusting in what his word says. And so that is the idea that I want to develop for us today as we look at these verses. That is that trusting in God's divine protection must be a moment-by-moment state of mind and not a reaction to crisis. A moment-by-moment state of mind, state of heart, a condition of who we are. that we are trusting in Christ in everything. Now, we're going to look at several aspects of that as we develop this idea, the practical implications explained, right? I'm going to give you three pieces of pie this morning. Yay, pie. Dad is great. He lets us eat chocolate cake, the great philosopher Bill Cosby once said, right? Pie. So we need to be trusting in God and asking for his guidance. We must be submitted to God and surrendering ourselves to his ordination, and that is evidenced by the fact that we bear the fruit of praise, right? Those are the three pieces of pie we're gonna talk about in a moment. But that's only possible if we are trusting God moment by moment as a state of mind, a being, a condition of our heart, and not just reacting to the crisis. In the very first verse, Psalm 71, 1, we find David saying, In you, O Lord, do I take refuge. Let me never be put to shame. In your righteousness, deliver me and rescue me. Incline your ear to me and save me. Now the question that I have is how much safety and security do I have outside the citadel? Outside the fortress, outside the castle, how much safety do I have out there? Well, obviously, I probably don't have much safety out there, any more than we would have safety outside our houses. You know, we had a nice little winter rainstorm a couple days ago. Well, little, it rained two inches. I would be willing to bet you that for most of us, when the storm hit, we stayed inside, didn't we? Why didn't we go outside? Because we know there's no protection outside, right? And David is making the point. He's not saying in this instance that we have to run into the refuge. He is saying these things as if he is in the citadel. He is in the castle right now. He is in the place of safety right now. How did he get there? Because he's trusting in that place of safety before the storm ever came. Just like we went into our houses the other night before the storm ever came, or if we were out and about in town or trying to get home, we made efforts to get home so that we could get into the warmth and the safety of our houses before the rain at 33 degrees with a promise of sleet and snow hit, right? Beforehand, preemptively. You see, it was David's state of mind, though we've already seen in various and sundry places that David didn't always have this state of mind, But I think it is fair to say, David, a man after God's own heart, that his state of mind, his state of heart, where he was, how he lived, was trusting in God every moment of every day. Now, I would bet that David was like us, and there were days where he didn't do it quite as much as the days that he did, but his state of mind, his heart, who he was, was one of trusting God, moment by moment, and not just reacting to the crises. In 1 Peter chapter two, verses one through three, we find these words. So Peter says, put away all malice and deceit and hypocrisy and envy and slander. And like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up into salvation, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. It's interesting to me that as we look at the first part of this text, verse one, Peter says that we should not rely on the worldly ways of thinking. We should not rely on those things that are about malice and vengeance, that we should not rely on deceiving others or hypocrisy, saying that we're one thing when we're actually something else. or envying other people or slandering other people. We're not to live that way. That's not to be even our attitude. Not only our behavior, but our attitude. Because he says in verse 2 that we should be like newborn infants. Did you notice that? Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk. Well, can infants take care of themselves? Of course not. Now, I'd be willing to bet you probably for the first maybe 12 or 13 years, you can't really take care of yourself. Oh, yeah, I know. You think you can. I got it. But really, even till you get to maybe your late teens or early 20s, you really need somebody else to kind of come alongside you and help you, don't you? And even then, in young adulthood, 20s and 30s, it's really helpful to have somebody come alongside you too. But as a newborn infant, you are completely dependent upon somebody else to do things for you and to guide you, to strengthen you, to protect you, and give you the things that you need. And Peter says, as a newborn infant, we should come to God, we should trust God in the same way, longing for the pure spiritual milk that by it you may grow up into salvation. See, this is all preemptive. We are to set aside the I-can-do-it-myself attitude of the world and relate to God, live life every day related to God as a newborn infant that is completely dependent upon God taking care of me. Now, that doesn't mean that we just sit back and do nothing. That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is is that our heart attitude, our minds, how we think about things is one of trusting God beforehand to provide those things that we need and to grow us through the pure spiritual milk, the word of God, grow us up into salvation. But then Peter also gives us a little bit of a word of warning at the end of this text in verse three. He says, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good, Well, what does that mean? Well, what it means is that if we are truly loving Christ, trusting Christ, following Christ, or let's put it in the modern-day vernacular, if I am saved, then I will see that trusting Christ is my only option. And I'm living life trusting Christ. And even now, if I'm being convicted that I don't necessarily trust Christ in everything, I am repenting of that and turning back to him. Because if I'm not willing to trust Christ, maybe I haven't actually tasted of Christ to see that he's good. Maybe I don't know Christ as I ought. It's a stern warning. It has some salvation implications, I agree. It has some disobedience applications, I agree, too. Maybe you just don't know Christ at all, or maybe you know Christ and you're just not being obedient. Either one of those is not a good option, and it's a warning that we really ought to take seriously, that we ought to, by the declaration of the Lord, live in this moment-by-moment state of mind, trusting Christ, following Christ, asking Christ for guidance, listening to the guidance that Christ gives us, and then bearing the fruit of praise that comes as a natural product of those who trust Christ and follow him, and not just run to Jesus every time we have an uh-oh, right? Thomas Matten put it this way, he said, one good way to get comfort is to plead the promises to God in prayer. I love this text. I was first introduced to this saying back when we were working through Don Whitney's Praying the Bible in men's group. Guys, y'all remember that, Praying the Bible? And that book, Praying the Bible, made such an impact on me that on Sunday mornings when we come together and we have the responsive readings, I will always at the end of that pray that scripture. Now, have y'all ever noticed that? Right? Now, I may pray it verse by verse verbatim at times, or I may pray the idea found in that scripture, but praying scripture, praying the Bible. Matten says one good way to get comfort is to plead the promises not of God in prayer, but plead the promises to God in prayer. He goes on to say, show him his handwriting. God is tender of his word. These arguings or this argument in praying scripture to God is not to work upon God, but to work upon ourselves. as we pray God's word to him. We pray the promises of God back to him. We claim the promises, not a name it, claim it, but we're praying God's word, we're praying the scriptures back to God and saying, this is what you have said in your word, and I am praying this to you as an acknowledgement that I have read your word, I understand your word, I know what you're doing, and I am pleading your word to you." And Manton says, you're not obligating God by doing that. You're actually working on yourself. Right? So there's a sense in which we need to understand none of us are there. There is not one single one of us sitting here today that is trusting Christ the way we ought to. That's what I say perfectly. We're far from perfect. We're not trusting Christ as we ought. We're not going to Christ preemptively many times, we're going to Christ reactively many times, after the problem has already happened, after the decision is already made, after the goodness has already been poured out. Let us go to Christ preemptively before those situations. So what does that look like, trusting Christ in this way? Well, this is the three pieces of pie that I wanted to give to you, the practical implications explained. And here's the first one. Trusting moment by moment means that we are continually seeking the Lord's guidance, not just His protection. We are continually seeking the Lord's guidance and not just His protection. Listen to verse 3, Psalm 71, 3. Be to me a rock of refuge to which I may continually come. You have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress. Rescue me, oh my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man. Look, the reality is we live in a fallen world. There are wicked people everywhere. Now, let me just qualify what I mean by wicked. Yeah, there are bad people acting badly in the world, that's true, but wickedness is not necessarily immoral. There are wicked people who are not immoral. They're wicked, they're lost, they're anti-Christ, they don't care about God, they don't care about the church, but they're really nice people. You know, they're great folk, they would give you the shirt off their back, they'd help you any way they could, but they're just not trusting in Christ. They don't love Christ, they don't love his word, they're not reading his word, they don't love his church, they're not part of his church, they're just kinda out there on their own, right? There's that class of wicked folk. And then there are the people who do bad things. And the world is full of unjust and cruel men. People who in their wickedness are living out injustice. They're living in all kinds of cruelty. It's everywhere, we see it. So to think that we can escape the wickedness and the injustice and the cruelty of this world unscathed is just foolish. If you think that you can live and not be affected by the wickedness of the world, you're foolish. It's everywhere. There's people trying to take advantage of us. There's people trying to influence us. There are people who are trying to get us to silence ourselves, silence our own witness to the things of Christ. It's everywhere. So we need someone to protect us. We need someone to guide us. The trusting this moment by moment is exactly that. We are continually seeking the Lord's guidance. And when we need the protection of Christ, it's available to us. But I might say this, if we're following the guidance of Christ, I think many times we will avoid needing the protection of Christ. Now, there's times that when we follow Christ, he puts us directly within the path of harm and we need his protection. But as a matter, just a normal course of life, just an everyday functioning, if we are following Christ's guidance, we don't really need his protection because he causes us to feed in green pastures. He leads us beside the still waters, right? In the 23rd Psalm, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. If I'm following the shepherd, look at what he gives. He gives green pastures, abundant food. He gives still waters where we don't have to worry about getting swept away by the current when we go down to drink. I mean, he protects us if we follow his guidance. And here, David says, for you are my hope and my trust. Why, excuse me, you're the rock and the refuge of which I may continually come. Why is he continually coming? Because he gave the command to save him. Now, I don't think this is just circumstantial. This is the eternal call of God upon the life of those whom he saves. He has saved us from the very beginning of the created order. He called us into fellowship with Himself before the created order. Look at Ephesians chapter 1, right? In love, He predestined us to be conformed into the image of His beloved Son, right? Before the created order, He loved us. Before creation, He called us. And so with our understanding of God's goodness and His grace, His calling in our lives, we should continually go to Him for guidance. This is probably one of the most practical parts of this entire message, in that we are to go and ask for His guidance continually. Not just in big decisions, not just in important decisions, not just in some decisions that I really don't know what to do, but every decision, right? Now, can we honestly say that we go to Christ before every decision? Every decision? I hope so, but probably not. And it's evidenced by the fact that we get ourselves in a bind somewhere, right? And then we're dependent upon his protection. So that's proof positive that we probably didn't follow his guidance up front. But if we're going to live in this moment by moment trust, this preemptive trust that we're talking about, it means that we have to continually seek his guidance and not just his protection. Matthew chapter six verses 11 through 13 say this, give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. Have you ever thought about that? lead us not into temptation. What does lead us not into temptation presuppose? It presupposes we're being led, right? You see, the Lord himself, as he taught his disciples to pray, acknowledges that we have to be led of God in daily life, everyday life. And if we are following God, he will not lead us into temptation. And in those times when we find ourselves in the presence of evil, he will deliver us. That most famous of hymns that we all know says, when we walk with the Lord in the light of his word, what a glory he sheds on our way. While we will do his goodwill, he abides with us still and with all who trust and obey. When we walk with the Lord in the light of his word, that's when the glory he sheds on our way. If we are not walking with him in the light of his word, there is no glory. That's when problems come. So as we sing, as we pray, as we hear from his word, we commit ourselves to continually seek God's guidance in everything that we do. But not just that, here's the second piece of pie, right? Trusting moment by moment means that we will live as those submitted to the Lord's divine ordination. Trusting his guidance, continually going to the Lord for guidance means that we understand that he has ordained every event in our life. There are no accidents in God's ordination. Now, I realize God uses secondary means. I'm with Edwards on that one, but truly, if you think about it, there's nothing unplanned in God's activity, is there? Nothing. If God is omniscient, y'all remember that big fancy word when we did the attributes of God, omniscient? omniscience, all-knowing, everything. There is nothing that God doesn't know, hasn't known, because if it exists, it proceeds from the mind of God, right? Y'all remember that? There are no accidents. God is not in heaven going, oopsie, right? No. He knows all. And if God knows all, and if God has ordained all, then why would we not submit ourselves to that? It seems kind of foolish not to, doesn't it? To say, well, God, yeah, okay, yeah, I know that you know everything, God, and I know that you've ordained everything, and I know that if I just follow you, that's really the best way to go, but you know what? Today, God, I just don't wanna do that. I wanna go my own way, right? Then we're found in Romans 3, we like sheep have all done that. We've all gone our own way. We've all told God, I know your way is best, but I want to try it for myself. But if we're going to have this preemptive trust that we're talking about, then Then we've gotta be submitted, we gotta live life submitted to the Lord's divine ordination. Look at verse five, Psalm 71 verse five. For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord. From my youth upon you I have leaned from before my birth. Did you catch that? Not at birth or from birth, but before my birth. And you who took me from my mother's womb. You're not an accident. You're here because the Lord has purposed for you to be here. The Lord knew you before you were born. The Lord knows the number of hairs on your head. The Lord has numbered your days, ordained the end from the beginning. The Lord is working in each of our lives to accomplish his purposes. And we are, as we've said in the last several weeks, we are where we are because that's where the Lord has put us. Now here's the rub. We may intellectually understand that, right? We might very well have an intellectual understanding of God's sovereignty. And I think there's a lot of people in the world, a lot of people within religious life that have an intellectual ascent or understanding of God's sovereignty. You know, they'll say things like this, God is sovereign, but I chose him. How does that work? How is it that God is sovereign, but you chose him? Did God not call you, and then you responded to God? If God is sovereign, then that's probably what, that is what happened. You see, they have an intellectual ascent of God's sovereignty, but they have a practical anthropocentric or man-centered view of life. God is sovereign, but he lets me make those choices. Well, if he lets you make those choices, then he's not sovereign. You are. You're simply responding to the activity of God in your life. That's more a sovereign grace view of things. but we have to submit ourselves to God's divine ordination. We have to say things like this, no, you didn't choose him, he chose you before the foundation of the world and is working in your heart as he worked in my heart, and if he hadn't have worked in my heart, I'd still be doing my own thing because I was lost in my sin, I was a hater of God, I didn't care about him, I wasn't a bad person, but I was doing my own thing, and God changed my heart to give me a love for him that I didn't have before. That's what's going on in your life. And you may have responded to the voice of God calling you, that's certainly true, but you would not have responded, first of all, if God had not called you and enabled you to hear his call and then respond. But you see, even that can be an intellectual ascent sometimes if we're not living moment by moment by that ordination idea. We're not living moment by moment understanding that whatever I'm facing right now has been given to me of God. I am here today, you are here today, listening to this because God has brought you here. And not only has God brought you here, he's given you the wherewithal, he's given you the energy, he's given you the ability to stay awake for a few minutes, to listen to this so that you understand that you must be submitted to his ordination. You must be submitted, living and alive, kneeling before Christ, submitted to him. And whatever it is that he brings to you, whatever that guidance is that you ask him for, right, because we talked about seeking his guidance up front, Well, you know, you can seek his guidance and then not do it, right? You got that? So I am seeking his guidance, but I'm also submitting to his guidance. Whatever Christ says, I do. I think I need to say that again. Whatever Christ says, I do. Did you know that's how Jesus lived? Did you know that? Jesus said, John 5, I don't say anything I haven't heard my father say. I don't do anything I haven't seen my father do. Right? Amen or oh me? Can we say that about ourselves? Can we say, I don't say anything that I haven't seen Christ say or heard Christ say through his word. I don't do anything that I haven't seen Jesus do. We may be hitting on four of the five cylinders, but we're not hitting on all five. That's a European car, by the way. If we're gonna have this preemptive trust, we have to live moment by moment, live moment by moment being submitted to Christ's ordination over not only all things, but our lives. 2 Timothy 3, 14 through 16, Paul speaking of Timothy, but as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you have learned it, and how from childhood you have been equated with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ. And then he goes on to say in verse 16, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness. Why would Paul even say that at this juncture? Why would Paul add into his admonition, his encouragement to Timothy, all scripture is God-breathed and profitable for all these things. It's because Timothy was living every day in that mindset. Timothy had a whatever you tell me to do, I will do mindset when it came to the things of Christ. And we have to have the same mindset. We have to do whatever it is that Christ tells us to do. Well, how do I know if I'm doing that? Isn't that fair? Is that a fair question? How do I know that I'm continually seeking the Lord's guidance as I ought, and how do I know that I'm being submitted to his ordination? Well, David tells us in Psalm 71 how we know, and here it is. Is there the fruit of continual praise? Trusting moment by moment produces the fruit of continual ongoing praise. This is the third piece of pie. It's not whether you're successful in life. It's not whether you just seem to know things are gonna happen or not. It's not whether you have peace like a river. It's about praise. Do you have continual ongoing praise? Are you able to praise Christ even in the worst of circumstances? You see, living moment by moment, this preemptive trust produces a fruit of continual praise. Listen to the last part of verse six and then verse seven and eight in Psalm 71. My praise is continually of you, David says. Continually. I have been a portent, that's a sign or a warning. It tends to be a bad, like an omen. I have been an omen or a warning to many. because there were a lot of people who criticized David for what he was doing, but you are my strong refuge. Even when others are saying, don't listen to him because he doesn't know what he's talking about, or he needs to get out of here because he's a bad king, and David's, my strength, my refuge is you. I turn to you, Christ. My mouth is filled with praise and with your glory all day long. In the worst of the worst, if I don't have anything else that I can say, I say, praise be to God that he has me right here. I don't necessarily get what he's trying to teach me. I don't necessarily understand everything that's happening, but praise God that he's in control. Praise God that even though when I didn't listen to him, I went the wrong way, I veered off of the road, I found myself off the path and over there in the land of the giant despair, right? I got off the path and I'm trying to find this little, it's easier to walk on the green grass than it is on the bumpy path, right? Right? Y'all remember that? which is always so amazing to me that Christian, and I think it was hopeful or fateful that was with him, whichever one was with him at that point in time, they said, look, we can get off the path. It's all rocky and it's hard to walk, but the grass is green over here. We can jump the fence and we just follow right along the path. That makes sense, right? I can just follow right along the path. As long as I keep the path in sight, I'm in good shape. But you know what happened? They jumped the fence, got over in the green grass. It was easy walking and next thing you know, a storm blows in. and they lose sight of the path. When the storm hit, they ran to shelter. Instead of staying on the path and running on the path, they ran to shelter and they got caught by giant despair. See how easily, how quickly we can deviate from the path, thinking that I'm all good as long as I keep it in sight. But is keeping it in sight the same thing as walking in it or on it? No. And they wound up in despair. And the interesting thing about it is, is that, and this was borne out for me in one of the later versions of Pilgrim's Progress, where they realized that giant despair couldn't kill them. He had them locked up, right? But he himself could not kill them. He could drive them to kill themselves. As a matter of fact, he encourages them to do that. But despair couldn't hurt him. Giant despair could not hurt them. He could drive them to hurt themselves. And it's when they remembered the promises, as embodied by the key that Christian had with him, that they were able to unlock the cage they were in, and unlock the door of the room they were in, and unlock the gate of the walls that held them in, and they received freedom from despair through the promises of God. Right? And when they got outside the wall, free from giant despair, what'd they do? They praised God. It's a valuable lesson that if we're trusting Christ preemptively, we're seeking his guidance, which he's already given to us. They knew they shouldn't have gotten off the road. They knew it. They're submitting to what Christ is saying, and it was a hard lesson, but they didn't get off the path again in the whole rest of the story, did they? They stayed on that path. They submitted themselves to the ordination of Christ, and it bore great fruit. The praise of God was continually upon their lips. Was Christians Decision to get off the path, was it a omen? Was it a sign? Is it a warning? Is it a teaching moment for us that don't do that? Sure, that's why Bunyan put it in there. But it also leads us to realize that Christ is our strong refuge. The path was safe. Was it easy? No. Was it smooth? Apparently not, that's why they got off of it. Was it pleasant to look at? Not necessarily. Did it lead to the eternal kingdom? Yes. By the way, in Pilgrim's Progress, they come across people all the time on the path, don't they? Most of those people are not on the path the right way. They jumped the fence. They jumped the wall. They came in from some other direction. They didn't come in through the wicket gate. They came in some other way. They never last, do they? They never stayed with Christian very long. They always tried to get Christian to get off the path. They complained about how hard the path it was. They complained about there was a lot of other more interesting places to go, like Vanity Fair and all kinds of other things. and it's only when Christians stayed on the path that he made it to the gates of the eternal city, right? Do you see? It's a hard lesson to learn, granted, but if we will learn the lesson, then it is much easier in a sense. The road is still rocky, the path is still hard, there's still a lot of interesting places to go, but we can have a trust that is preemptive. Have a trust that though I stub my toe on a big old cobble in the middle of the path, when the grass is smoother and greener, don't go over there. I can trust preemptively that though I've got to go through some place like Vanity Fair, that if I would just keep my eyes on Christ, then I can make it through there. And though there's some of us that might not make it out of Vanity Fair, right? that if I trust Christ even in death, there is glory, there is the praise of his eternal glory. See, we have to trust moment by moment, and that means we continually seek his guidance. We continually are submitting to his guidance. We're living in it day in and day out, and it produces the fruit of continual, ongoing praise. Ephesians 5, 16. Paul says, making the best use of the time because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not get drunk with wine, for that's debauchery. Be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another with psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always for everything to God the Father, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and submitting to one another out of reverence to Christ. You see, when we're living life this way, the fruit of praise is the product. And not just praise as we sing here in familiar company. And it may not even be praise in song. It might be praise in song. It may be praise in prayer. Here's an interesting thought. I got a minute or two. Another practical implication. How do we praise corporately? Well, we praise corporately through psalm. We praise corporately through prayer. We praise corporately through the study of God's word and taking those truths into our hearts. We praise God corporately through fellowship with one another. And I suppose we could make a list of ways that we praise corporately, but here's my point. Each one of those ways we can praise him individually too, can't we? Can we not praise God through prayer individually? Can we not praise God through singing individually? I love that about Brother Lamar. He doesn't mind singing wherever he is. He doesn't know this, but I pass him quite regularly on the road, and he doesn't even notice that I'm pulled up beside him because he's singing, right? And I don't ever want to honk my horn and disrupt that, so I just let him go. And it's a joy to my soul to see him singing like that, right? So we can praise God singing individually. We can praise God through giving of our time and our talents and our resources, our efforts, you know, as we do corporately. We can give of ourselves to others. There's all kinds of ways that we can live with a continual and an ongoing praise of Christ. And those are just some examples that we see in corporate life that we can employ in our individual and private worship, our private praise, or as a family. We can pray together as a family. We can sing together as a family. We can give of ourselves to one another as a family. It's a mini corporate worship service, right? Right? But the point is, is that if we are submitting, if we're living with a preemptive type trust, when it's not just going to Christ in crisis, but actually going to Christ moment by moment, then that's the fruit, the joy of the Lord is our strength, and we're praising him always, right? I read a story. It's a familiar story, but it's about the North Star, right? Y'all know what the North Star is? It's kind of sad, I would be willing to bet, and I was convicted by this, of even finding the North Star. I'm not even sure I know where it is. I guess it's in the North. But that's not always true. The Northern Star, you know the North Star? For thousands of years, this article said, for thousands of years, it has been the brightest and most reliable guide for travelers, especially sailors. Sailors have navigated by the North Star for millennia. It's called Polaris, or the Pole Star, better known in common language as the North Star. And it's located directly above the North Pole. You can find the North Star pretty easily. It's from an imaginary line through the pointers of the Great Dipper. And I'm not sure what the pointers are, but everybody knows what the Big Dipper is. You can find the North Star off of the Big Dipper. Well, the North Star, It was used by the Phoenicians, now catch this, the North Star was used by the Phoenicians in 1100 B.C. to sail. It was used by the Vikings in 1000 A.D. to sail, that's 2,000 years spread, and is being used by sailors today to sail wherever it is that they need to go. Do you think the North Star is a trustworthy landmark? But did you know there's one more trustworthy than him, than that? It's not the North Star, it's the Morning Star, the bright and morning star. Christ is more trustworthy than the North Star that's been around since the beginning of time, because Christ is the one who placed the North Star at the beginning of time. Right? So I think we all agree that we need to trust Christ, right? Let's trust him preemptively. Father, we thank you for the day that you've given to us. We praise you for your goodness, your mercy, and your grace. And we ask, Father, today that as we reflect upon all that you've shown us, that we would go to you continually seeking your guidance, and that we would submit ourselves to what you tell us. Your word is truth. It gives us all that we need to know for life, for faith, for liberty, for godliness, Father. So we ask that you would help us to seek and submit to all that you give to us in your word, and that our praise of you would be continually upon our lips as the fruit of trusting you beforehand, not just in a crisis. And that, Father, in so doing, you would purify a people for your own possession, that we might be salt and light in the world as well. We thank you, Father. We praise you. We glorify you. And we ask these things in your precious and holy name. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, we ask. Amen.