All right, I want you to turn your Bibles with me, if you would, please, the Book of Judges. If you don't have a Bible with you, you ought to make plans to bring it. We use the King James Version here. And we got some extra Bibles we can give you, that we give away sometimes when people get saved. But sometimes it's better to get one where you have a study Bible. Schofield is a good one, but it's not the only one out there. But as I've gotten older, large print is real helpful, amen? And them free Bibles is real tiny. Them Dollar Tree Bibles is really small print. So big Bible, big print might be up your alley. It's been good for you to bring it, amen. And not let just someone tell you what's in it, but you can read it for yourself, you can study it for yourself. I wanna call your attention to the book of Judges, chapter number four. The book of Judges is named the book of Judges because it's about the time of the judges in the nation of Israel's life. They didn't have kings yet, and judges were ruling over them. as they were interacting with other nations around them, especially the Canaanites. And they went into Canaan land. God allowed them to go into Canaan land and create their new nation, but they didn't drive all the inhabitants out. They had a lot of enemies around them and had a lot of trouble with them over many years. You've probably heard of Samson before and his great strength and his Nazarite vow, one of the most famous judges. And we have Samuel was also a judge. Gideon's pretty famous. Here we're gonna meet Deborah, a female judge and probably, to be honest with you, she's probably one of the best ones they had. She'd sit under a palm tree and they would come to her and listen to her wisdom and discuss things and she helped counsel them as a nation. Bringing us to what my theme is this morning. We'll get to this verse in a little bit But the thought of my title of my message this morning is about those who willingly offered themselves We'll tie that into Memorial Day as well the nation of Israel had a lot of battles and They fought a lot of enemies. Some of the most famous stories you know of, they were either in captivity or they were in some kind of conflict. David and Goliath was a conflict. There's all kinds of battles mentioned in the Bible of all types of different miracles God did in their lives. But we'll open up with verse number one of chapter number four in the book of Judges. And the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord. when Ehud was dead, which was one of their judges, and the Lord sold him into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan that reigned in Hazor, the captain of whose host was Caesara. So Caesara was the captain of the host over the whole army, which dwelled in Hashareth of the Gentiles. And the children of Israel cried, unto the Lord. Many times they would sin and disobey and when they got into a mess and God turned them over to the wicked people around them, then they would cry out to God and ask for help. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? But we are all guilty of that in our own individual lives sometimes. The Bible says in here four, he had 900 chariots of iron. This was like a modern day tank. Our version of a tank today was what they had back then. This military had iron covered plaid tanks. And 20 years he mildly oppressed the children of Israel. And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lappidoth, She judged Israel at that time, verse five, and she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah, between Ramah and Bethel, and Mount Ephraim, and the children of Israel came unto her for judgment. Verse seven, well, let me, I gotta back up. Verse six, she sent and called Barak, which is one of her generals, the son of Abonaim of Kedesh Naphtali, and said unto him, hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded, saying, go and draw toward Mount Tabor, take with thee 10,000 men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun. Now these names might not mean anything unto you if you don't know any of these names, but there were 12 tribes, and these are two of the tribes, and they were northern areas, really close to Canaan, and they had to deal with this battle for 20 years. These were the ones that had the most to lose. These were the ones that had the most passion. If you could call somebody together, probably about some kind of passionate, Situation right now, maybe somebody down towards Texas would be passionate about protecting the border down there. Maybe somebody that's got a family member in another country right now, like we have Brother Jerry in Kuwait. They're concerned about what's going on when it concerns them, because they're very close to it. Now, you can be close to it physically, but you can also be close to it emotionally and with your heart and mentally. And it's important that we stay engaged mentally, close, stay close to what's going on. Not abandon our soldiers, or not abandon what's going on in our country just because it doesn't affect me. That's in Chicago. It doesn't affect me. That's in California. Well, we've done that long enough in America, and now it's right on our front doorsteps. Everything is here now. It's no longer in another country. Well, these men, these tribes, were really close, Naphtali and Zebulun, they were really close to the area where the advancement of the chariots would come in. So, I wanna look at this story. We got other places we'll bring your attention to, but I don't wanna drag it out for you. I know sometimes people get glazy-eyed when they hear all these different biblical names, Zebulun, Naphtali, Rahman, Gilead, and all that. Some of y'all is cool, y'all just fade away on me, amen? But just plug in if you know what Fountain Inn is, you know what Great Court is, you know what Simpsonville is, you'd perk up more because it was your town, it was your tribe, it is your people, your territory, your terrain. So I want to look number one this morning at the task involved with those who willingly offered themselves. and Deborah was the judge, and she was a good godly judge, one of the best judges, actually, and that's my opinion, anyway. But she dwelt under that palm tree, she spent time giving judgment to the people, and here she calls her general in and said, God has commanded me, orders from the top, amen? I've got orders from the top, and I'm asking you to join me, and then right later in the next chapter, he doesn't want to go to battle without Deborah. I don't know what kind of skills Deborah had. She was very wise, but she must have had a little bit a little weaponry about her, a little bit of training about her, but they're gonna go to battle together because God commanded them to go. God gave them favor to go. God was gonna be supporting them and helping them. No doubt America's been in a lot of wars that God didn't help us very much. He just had mercy on us. Because we got ourselves into situations that we probably shouldn't have done But there have been wars for certain like World War two when we knew Germany was advancing across the world We knew our place involved in that we were drawn in with World War two with Pearl Harbor We went in and helped other people. We liberated people like in France and areas in England and but it cost a lot of lives and a lot of blood. The task here in this story we're looking at as these two tribes, Zebulun and Naphtali, and you can call them Ze and Na if you want or something, I don't know, whatever helps you stay awake, amen, but pretty close. But they had been in conflict with their area for about 20 years. It'd be like for us having some area near us always fighting us, attacking us, killing people, robbing people, jumping on people, always border conflicts, always oppressing us for 20 years right around where we live. And they called these men and these tribes together to get involved with this battle. But part of the problem here, this was a mighty big army they were going to be facing. Thousands and thousands of people 900 chariots with a driver on the front, archers on the, they had four archers on the back. They said they had pockets on the chariots where they would store extra arrows and extra ammunition for them, and then it was covered with iron, and on the wheels that would spin, they had these blades that come out, and if they rolled over, they could cut you in the leg, and if you were real unlucky, you're bending down to tie your sandal, you might lose your head. These were vicious people. And the task at hand was pretty amazing to face. You know, a lot of people remember what World War II was like for the United States of America. Germany was well more advanced. Their tanks were better than our tanks. Their machine guns were better than our machine guns. They created a concrete that was more superior than any concrete anybody had in the world at the time. They put guns with big 100-something millimeter rockets on them. They could shoot people, shoot our ships from the shoreline. And it's amazing the task that was faced, but there were people there that believed that God would help them, and they were willing to give their lives. And that is the equal of this story here in the book of Judges. These 900 chariots would be pulled by 10 horses. You can imagine the thundering sound that that would have. And the Lord gave command to Deborah to tell them in this task that they were going to face to go to Mount Tabor, as we looked at it a while ago. And that brings us to the thought of the territory or the terrain where they were. They were rocky. There were passes to crawl through and climb up to the top of the mountain and try to get an established vantage point to look down there to be ready to fight these people in that valley there. There was a river of Kishon it is called that comes through that area here. I got to thinking about, many times we hear stuff about geography or something like that, some kind of terrain in the Bible. we hear some little area, and if it's not your backyard where you live, it don't mean a whole lot to you, but we need to put ourselves in the stories that we read in the Bible. And these that traveled and climbed up through those rocky areas and climbed up 1,800 feet on the top of Mount Tabor to get ready for this battle, it reminded me a lot of our own similar stories of our country. of the different territories that our soldiers had to go and leave the United States of America. You know, we've been very blessed in our country. We haven't had a lot of conflicts that came to our borders. Until the terrorist attack, Pearl Harbor was probably the closest thing we'd ever been. And we normally went to somebody else's backyard to defend them. and we've gone and our soldiers have risked their lives. They've gone in places where the climate, as Brother Jerry is, 111, 114 degrees last Tuesday. In World War II, there were areas in Germany during the wintertime, in Russia as well, where it was frigid and cold and very low. Cold temperatures below zero. People got frostbitten. Noses got rotten off with frostbite. Toes and fingers. They went through a lot with that task and the territory, the terrain that they were going through. And this area here on Mount Tabor and the river and the canyon that come in, if there was a heavy rain, I don't know how many of y'all got any rain yesterday or this morning. We had a little bit of rain, little bit. And there's so many houses and so many driveways that the water just runs all the way down from Mount Tabor into your backyard, amen? Well, this area was known for turning into a brook to a river with the rains becoming very heavy. The Bible in Judges chapter five, which is the next chapter, is after the battle is won. Here's a storyline of it. It is described in Judges five, this is the song of Deborah. She is singing a song about victory, which we had some leaders, when God gave the victory, they didn't steal it for themselves, but they gave God the glory. It'd be nice to have some leaders like that. Some kings, some judges, some presidents, amen, that would give God the glory. But as she mentions in this verse, Judges 5, 5, here's how it describes what took place on that day. There was a great storm that came up that even Josephus, a historian, wrote about. But in this verse it says, the mountains melted from before the Lord. This is described like a landslide, mud and other debris just rolling down the hill there. going in. Now while they're on top and God sends this rain, it helps to defeat the enemy down there so when they go down, they don't have the biggest battle to face. And it's amazing to me that sometimes I read stuff like that and I say, boy, gotta hold that enemy. But these that were fighting that battle, they were in the storm as well. They had to endure the elements as well. It's just God protected them and defeated the enemy. Our US soldiers have been all over the place, here and abroad. There's been a lot of things in the terrain that they've gone through. I've heard stories from some of our people in our church that have been in the military, places in the jungle with snakes. I would be out immediately. That would already, that'd be rough. That's probably where the Lord would have sent me if I'd ever went in the military. They'd have sent me to some place with a boa constrictor or something to bend my bedmate. I don't know how that would have handled that, but that'd have been rough. Some people have gone to places that are dry. Some places are very cold. Some have served in the Navy and had to learn how to swim in the water and do all these things, to hold their breath for two or three minutes. Many people have gone through a lot, but basically the task was changed and hard because of the terrain or the territory where they were. because that always plays a great role in a battle. Many battles were fought in valleys, and many of those who had the advantage, Brother Donnie, were on the hill, waiting for them to come to them. When you're on the hill, you can throw and shoot, and you can see way before the enemy gets there, and that's where God put them this day. So we're gonna look at Judges chapter four. If you'll go backwards, we'll look quickly at the triumph of this battle, real quickly. Deborah said unto Barak, For this is the day in which the Lord hath delivered Cicero into thine hand. Get up, Barak. God's gonna deliver their captain of the host into your hands. The Bible says, is not the Lord gone out before thee? So Barak went down from Mount Tabor and 10,000 men after him. They went down the mountain and headed towards the battle with a promise, says Deborah, as a leader, was inspired from God, that God's gonna give the enemy into your hand. And the Bible uses it in verse 15, if you'll look with me there, the Lord involved in this battle. There's some battles going on that have gone on in the history of America that it's really no way to describe it, but God just gave us favor. God just blessed. Even though there was lives lost and people willingly gave themselves, you can't leave out the God factor that God provided a miracle and a blessing, he protected and he provided. He uses a word here in verse 15, if y'all are reading with me. The Lord discomfited, that means he messed him up good, amen. The Lord discomfited all his chariots and all his host with the edge of the sword before Barak, so Cicero lighted down off his chariot and fled away on his feet. Their captain got so bewildered, so disconfited, God was doing so much, and I'm gonna describe more to you in a little bit. They said that there was a storm that happened. Hail storms were falling out of the sky. The water began to roll down the canyon, flooding, rain in their face. They began to fight each otherness, necessarily. And then their captain, whatever happened to the chariot, because God knows how to disconfit chariot wheels. If you go all the way back to the time of Egypt and Pharaoh, he can mess up people's chariot wheels. You can have fancy blades out there to cut people's ankles off, but God can disconfit that chariot where you can't even drive in it, and their own captain abandoned his so-called tank and took off running. I love stories like that. I'm sure he thought he was gonna win the battle easily with the thousands of men that he had, the technology that he had, but God disconfitted all his chariots and all his hosts. And the Bible said in verse 16, but Barak pursued after chariots and after the host unto Harasheth of the Gentiles and all the host of Caesara fell upon the edge of the sword and there was not a man left. That was a pretty successful battle. not a man left, except for the king runs. And I don't have time to go on this story, but if you think the Bible's boring, you oughta read a little bit further in this story. This fella's gonna get his, this lady's gonna make a mistake with a tent stake. No, I'm just kidding, it's not a mistake. Gonna nail his head to the floor. Y'all are already interested already. A lady kills him and nails him to the floor. He runs for his life. But in this story, The book of Judges chapter five, as I reminded you, this is a song she's singing. And she's singing about this triumph, this victory. And in verse four, she said, Lord, when thou wentest out of seer, when thou marchest out of the field, look at how she describes this. She's singing a song about a battle they won, giving glory to God, talking about the Lord and what he did and how he marched for them. That's the proper glory to give God. Anytime your nation's involved in a conflict or a battle, you ought to give God his proper place and give him thanks for protecting you and taking care of you. I promise you this, if God continues to remove his protecting hand off America, you will know it. You won't be barbecuing tomorrow. The enemy will be all over us. God has protected us. God has won victories for us and men and women have offered their lives willingly and are all over the world right now. We have one in our church right now because he was asked to go and he was willing to go to hold back the peace. And many times we have foolish leaders who have made foolish decisions and yet there are still faithful men and women who willingly offer themselves and give themselves. And Judges chapter five, verse five, it says, the mountains melted from before the Lord, even the Sinai from before the Lord, God of Israel. They fought from heaven. The stars in their courses fought against the city. He apparently drowned. That happened to some of these men, but God protected the people of Israel. He said he swept them away, verse 21, that ancient river, the river Kishon. Oh my soul, she says, thou hast trodden downstream. She's praising the Lord. It's hard for us to get this sometimes, but that's what she's doing in this song. She goes, oh my soul, God has trodden downstream. What does that mean? God's more powerful than the strongest enemy this world has. At the time, and I know you younger people don't know this. You probably don't even study it in school anymore. Germany were some bad people. Hitler was an evil, wicked man. And it looked like the devil was driving him to dominate this world. If God had not intervened, we'd all be speaking German today, I promise you. He would have not stopped in England, he would have came over here. And he had the technology. But God wrought a victory. God, he trod down, he beat down that which looked like it was stronger. The scripture says in Judges 5.22, then were their horse hooves broken by the means of their prancings. They were hopping and jumping around, probably because of rocks and things falling in the water. Hail was flying everywhere. I wanna read this to you. This is a Jewish historian. He's dead now, and this is not Nostradamus, this is Josephus. Nostradamus is some crackpot prophetic dude that you see on the tabloid papers. Y'all do know what I'm talking about, right? Okay. Well, Josephus is a very well-known Jewish historian, and here's what he said. In the tradition of the battle described in this scene here, he said they joined battle as the ranks closed, referring to the men and God joining in battle. A violent storm came on and much rain and hail and the wind drove the rain against the faces of the Canaanites. You ever been out in a stinging rain or some sleep? Some of you had to deal with the hail not too long ago. Can you imagine the hail blowing into your face in this battle? There's no doubt God was fighting against their enemies. And the Bible said the wind drove against the faces of the Canaanites, darkening their outlook. He visibly said in the description, he could tell that they got discouraged. They felt like they had lost the battle. I don't know if y'all watched any basketball. Anybody watch any basketball? I got away from it for a while, but I watched a little bit. last night. There's this team that came back, looked like they were gonna win with the last second shot, and gonna stop the other team, but there was a little bit of time on the clock, and the guy just topped the ball in, and he beat the other team on their home court, and now they gotta go one more game and go back to this other town in Boston. And you can see everybody going, whoo! Took all the wind out of their sails. They went from believing with all their heart that they had won that game and were going to the championship, and then three tenths of a second later, they lost the game. Their outlook changed really quickly. and this army went in there thinking, oh yeah, you're on top of the mountain, but we got these 900 chariots, we got more soldiers than you, we're more advanced than you. Be reminded, Israel came out of Egypt as slaves and God made a nation out of them. They were not a hardened race of people with chariots and all kinds of weaponry. They didn't have a great army, but they had a great God. And it's hard to describe sometimes how they won some of the battles that they won. And we know even when it come down to the plagues of Egypt and them crossing the Red Sea, it wasn't some great strategy that they went across the Red Sea. It was a great God that opened up that Red Sea and made a path for them. Josephus says that it was darkening their outlook so that their archers and their slings rendered useless. They couldn't, didn't have the heart for battle. and they also did not be able to have the ability to battle. They couldn't see where they were aiming or shooting. You can have all these little pockets. Can you imagine having all this ammunition and couldn't shoot it? Hundreds of extra arrows, Brother Donnie, but he's like, I can't, I can't see, I can't see. Here's what Asaph, the recorder, said in the book of Psalms. He referred to this battle, he said, to another instance, he said, do unto them as to Midianites, as to Caesara, and Jabin, remember Jabin is the king, at the brook of Kisan, which perish at Endor, they became as dung for the earth. God defeated them all and buried them like dung for the earth. It's recorded in many places, this battle is a very famous battle, and a lot of times we don't know much about. And to be honest with you, I didn't really know much about it until I studied it myself. And this triumph here turned into a tribute in chapter number five as Deborah sings this song. And look at chapter five, verse one. Then sang Deborah and Barak. Now I don't know if he was a tenor or a bass, but he was singing with her. He got to singing too, amen? And here's what they said in verse two. Praise ye the Lord. for avenging of Israel when the people willingly offered themselves. That's where I got that tribute, that thought of that message from. These people, when they were willing to offer themselves, God avenged the whole nation of Israel. They were willing to give themselves and God sent in the protection and the help for them. They organized together. They obeyed the command of their judge. They left their families to protect their families. They left their possessions. They left their heritage. And they left not even knowing if they were going to come back. I know it's kind of hard for some of you that are not in the military. and I never was myself, but God has given me a perspective, and he's given me some friends that I've been around. I'm gonna tell you, even though Brother Jerry's not over there fighting every day, you don't know what he's doing every day. We don't know what they're facing every day. And he left his home, he left his church, he left his family, he left the comforts here to be over there, 114 degrees the other day. That's not comfortable. That's not a vacation. And I promise you, he would rather be here. So let's pray for people. that are willing to offer themselves. And tomorrow, as we have a tribute, a memorial day, let's be thankful to the God and the people who were willing to offer their lives for our freedoms of our country. I know you adults understand this, or maybe you don't, but we're responsible for these younger kids understanding what these holidays mean. We're responsible for them to appreciate it. But most people today, I saw a t-shirt the other day. It had a barbecue grill on it, and it said freedom. That's not my image of freedom. I'm glad we can grill. I like to eat just as much as anybody. But the barbecue grill is not the representation of freedom. I'm going to tell you, when you think about some of the phrases as those that were willingly offered themselves, it brought me to one that's more modern for our day that you probably have heard of before. Some that offered, you know, were killed and never came back. Some that survived and returned home were never the same. PTSD, physical things, mental things happened to them, damages and scars. All of them were willing, and all of them gave. And it brought us this phrase I know you have heard before, all gave some, some gave all. And church, it's our responsibility. And Jared, my son, was sharing something with me a while ago at a Deuteronomy. It talked about the younger generation had a responsibility to go ask your parents what these things mean. And find out what something means. Listen, Google don't know everything. Google don't know much of nothing, to be honest with you. Facebook sure will fail you. Don't share everything you see on Facebook. Go do some research. Amen? You do some research from four or five different places, you might get some little semblance of the truth. But you're responsible to want to know something yourself, and then the Bible also puts the responsibility on the parents to tell the generation coming up before them what those things mean as well. There are all kinds of memorials in the children of Israel's life. The stones left in the Jordan River. stories like this, and you and I have similar stories and tributes and memorials and things in our lives that we need to honor and recognize and remember. And that's the spirit of what Memorial Day is. It used to be Decoration Day, and they would decorate the tombstones and sit there with their family, and it seems kind of odd, but they would decorate those tombstones, and they would remember the dead who gave their lives so they could have freedom. And then they changed it to Memorial Day, And as the generations have passed, all it is now is a barbecue or a ball game. Now I'm not saying it's wrong to have a barbecue, or have a ball game, or go somewhere to enjoy your freedom. But if you don't pause to appreciate your freedom. and those who willingly offered themselves. You know, Israel would have never had kings, it would have never gone forward. If God hadn't have won this victory, they would have been Canaanites, they would have been destroyed, or they would have complied to the slavery of the people and been slaves once again. Freedom isn't free, amen, and it always needs to be invested in as time goes on. In verse number two, he talks about the Lord avenging them. And I reminded you already of World War II, all the weaponry and all the things that they had. And there was such wickedness there. I wouldn't go into great detail, but I promise some of you need to talk to your children about the Holocaust and how Germany attacked the Jewish people. It was a genocide. It was a battle and attack on a race of people. It was satanic against God and no way else to describe it. Murdered, I believe it was six million Jews. died during that time frame. And when our American soldiers and British soldiers got into some of those camps and liberated those and destroyed the powers and destroyed the German army and there were people starving to death and people had been buried in mass graves. Listen, that That's the reason they willingly offered themselves. They didn't even know some of that was going on, but then later they began to understand what was taking place in these battles. And God has brought our nation through so many battles and wars and conflicts. And we're living in a day today, some of the worst problems we think about is, is gas prices gonna go up? Is a cheeseburger gonna be $5? I promise you, these problems could get more complex. They could get a lot more dangerous if God took his protective hand off of us. And some of the people today that I look around this world today, we're going to be in pretty bad shape. Some of the people I see today, if they're going to be our heroes, we're in bad trouble. We need some real heroes to stand up. And we need to appreciate those who have stood up and were willing to offer themselves for our freedoms. God is the power, as Deborah prayed or sang. He's the power and the source behind these victories and the people who gave them life. And I want to close out with this, because no tribute in God's word like this could be crowned without bringing us to A picture, all these are pictures or stories that brings my mind to somebody named Jesus. Because there's no description in the Bible greater than somebody willing to offer themselves like what Jesus did when he died on the cross. The Bible says in John 15, 13, greater love hath no man than this, than he lay down his life for his friends. And Jesus gave himself willingly, offered his life freely for your sin and for my sin. He submitted to the will of his Father and the plan of God that he would give himself to die for us, become the Lamb of God, die as a lamb before the shearers, give his self for us that he could pay the price with his own blood for every sin that every one of us together has ever committed, Jesus paid it all. You know the Bible says in 1 Timothy 2.6, talks about Jesus who gave himself a ransom, gave his own life a ransom payment for all to be testified in due time. John 10, 10 says, the thief cometh not but for to steal and to kill and to destroy. Jesus said, I have come that they might have life. and that he might have it more abundantly. He gave his life for mine. In fact, he gave his life so that I might have life beyond this life, but I could have abundant life within this life, not just exist, not just endure it, but I could have abundant life. If you don't have abundant life, you're missing out. God's good, amen? I wanna enjoy the blessings and the goodness of God. I have an abundant life, but even more than that, because sometimes I have bad days just like anybody else. I'm glad my blessed hope is beyond this world, I have everlasting life through the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said, I'm the good shepherd, and the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. You know, there's an instance there where someone was willing to give themselves freely. It's hard to understand that Jesus would give his life for a sinner like me, and for the worst sinner in this world, he gave his life and shed his blood for. The Bible says in 1 Peter 2, 24, he bear our sins on his own body. on the tree, that we being dead to sin should live under righteousness by whose stripes you were healed. His stripes should have been mine. His life, amen, it should have been me on that cross, but he gave himself. And the Bible says he loved us, Revelation 1.5, he loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. You think about the blood of our soldiers. That blood was precious, but Brother John, it could not wash away sins. It would preserve freedom for a temporary time. but the sacrifice of another soldier, for yours and mine, would never take away our sin. Even the blood of bulls and goats in the Old Testament pictures there that's in the Bible, they'd take a lamb and offer for a transgression or a failure, they would offer an animal instead. God set that whole thing up to help us understand that the blood of rams and bulls and goats would never take away sin, and God finally sent his own lamb, who was Jesus Christ, to die for our sins. He gave his life for ours. He's the only blood in this world that can wash away sin. When I got saved on May the 15th, 1989, I looked and trusted in one who never loved me like anyone ever loved me, Jesus, the one who gave his life and was willing like no one else to willingly offer himself. And that was his blood that he paid the ransom. And if you're not saved today, you're not gonna be able to look at God and his throne one day and say, nobody loved me. You know, people trying to take their life, people are suicidal, they're discouraged, they're depressed, they think no one loves them. Would you not look at the cross? Would you not see someone there who is willing to offer himself for your sin? Can you not even look back to even a less degree, but a great degree of soldiers and people that don't even know who you are, generations forgotten, They gave their life so you could have the freedom to sit in this church today There's been a lot of people that loved you and I that we never met and never will meet But there's never gonna be anyone as brother Donnie bought up earlier this morning when we sang in that one song We love him because he first loved us, and he showed that love when he died on the cross for our sins. As we look at Memorial Day, Sister Tonda, I want you to come if you would, please. As we look at this Memorial Day, I want you to be reminded of those who willingly offered themselves for you and for me, but never forget biblically of Jesus who was the one who was willing and the only one who was able to take away your sin. Only one who could die to pay for the sin of the whole world. Who could that be? It was the only begotten son of God. And God gave that only son for you and for me. As I said before, You don't know what something means or why somebody honors something or memorializes something or respects something. You don't understand what that flag means or you don't know about something. You feel like something's been left out that you just don't know. Go ask somebody. Get in the Bible. Get on your knees and ask God to give you a greater appreciation for the freedom that you have. Every head bowed, every eye closed. Ask you real quick, anybody here say preacher pray for me. I'm not saved. And I never really paid much attention to those who gave their life for mine and those who sacrificed themselves for me. And I've never called upon the Lord Jesus Christ and asked him to save me. Anybody here? Preacher, I'm not saved. I'll tell you this, church. I don't know if God will get it across to you. But I wish it would arrest our souls. Of those who were willing to give themselves for us and the freedom that we have. And that Jesus died for us on the cross. When you sing these songs that we sing in church, these hymns, sing them from the very depths and bottom of your heart. Be passionate about your faith. that someone willingly offered themselves for you, and that greatest sacrifice was the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, we thank you for this day. We ask you, God, to speak to hearts. We know, Lord, that you're gonna have to get this message across. You're gonna have to get these thoughts in our heart and our mind. You're gonna have to make us appreciative, Lord, of the freedoms that we have. but we're so close, we're just a very thin, thin moment away from the next generation, completely forgetting God, forgetting why we have these freedoms and we're so close to losing it all, because we do not appreciate what we have and the price paid for it. Lord, send a revival, Lord, concerning those things in our lives. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.