As you can see from your handout, the message is entitled, The Threshing Floor of Ornan. Actually, it's a message from the entire chapter. 1 Chronicles chapter 21 verse 28 is just the one I put up at the top and it seems to actually fit the very last note that we'll end up covering as far as how we can apply this truth to our lives. But 1 Chronicles chapter 21 parallel 2 Samuel chapter 24, which we looked at a year and a half ago on December 20th, 2020. I didn't just pull that out of my head. I actually looked it up on the sermon audio last night, and I think I got the date right. But anyway, 1 Chronicles 21, verse 28, as you see on the top of your handout. Oh, that's 2 Samuel. 1 Chronicles 21, verse 28, that says, At that time, in the English Standard Version, at that time when David saw that the Lord had answered him out of the threshing floor of Ornan, the Jebusite, he sacrificed there. That's the word of the Lord. It'll most certainly add his abundant blessing to the reading of his holy truth. And I know Brother Larry prayed, but I'd like to pray again as well. our most blessed and gracious father in god in jesus name and for his sake we thank you lord for the blessed truth that you have set before us as we look at your word may we be encouraged by your word may we see uh with spiritual eyes and spiritual hearts may we see the lord jesus christ may he be exalted that you may be glorified, because it's all about Him. Our worship, the Bible, the world was created for your glorification, Heavenly Father, through Christ's exaltation. So may we see Christ and may we see ourselves in the light of Christ. In Jesus' name and for His sake, we do pray. Amen. Now the background for our chapter, and I'm going to try to do this a little bit differently. When I cover the background also for this chapter, I'm going to intersperse it with the second part of your notes, where it says beautiful pictures in our chapter. But before we get there, just as a background to where we've led up to, the word of David from the Lord in chapter 17, remember that David now being in Jerusalem, he captured Jerusalem, which was owned by the Jebusites. It was called Jebus and the Jebusites lived there. But now that he has a palace, he is king in Jerusalem. He was king in Hebron for seven years. Now being in Jerusalem and having taken Jerusalem, he wants to build a temple for the Lord because the Lord dwells, in his words, dwells in a tent, and I live in a home of cedar. I want to build a house for the Lord. But he was a bloody man, as actually 1 Chronicles chapter 22 tells us, because that's what he tells his son Solomon. He was a man of war. So a man of peace must build the house for God. And God says to him, David, you want to build me a house? I'm going to build you a house. You can't build me a house, but I'm going to build you a house. Wow, what a great word from the Lord. And in chapter 18, well, if you're going to build me a house, well, I guess I could just sit back. No, that's not David's answer. In chapter 18, we see the warfare of David and the Lord. He goes to war because he is a warrior king. And that's, as we saw, reflective of our Christian lives. That though the Lord is building us up in our most holy faith, and though he is building us as temples of the Holy Spirit in which the Spirit of Christ dwells, we don't just sit on our laurels. We go forth and we pray and we fight Christian battles in prayer, which is what chapter 19 is about, the wickedness against David. And we saw the spiritual warfare that ruled and reigned within the world, but that battles were still being fought. And we saw in practicality, the wonderful thing about prayer is, is not getting our shopping list of things done, our grocery list. We saw that through the access to heaven by the death, resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have a mediator in Christ who mediates on our behalf. And if he has saved us, he's given us access to heaven to be with him, spiritually speaking, until he comes again. And so prayer is really, the essence of prayer is being with God, is being with Christ. And so we saw that in chapter 19. The wars and rewards and repetition, the wars, rewards, and repetition we saw last week in 1 Chronicles chapter 20, which paralleled 2 Samuel chapter 11, verse one. It was in the springtime, in a time when kings go forth to war, probably March or April timeframe, just before the Passover. And David doesn't, as a warrior king, he doesn't go forth to war. He stays behind. In 2 Samuel chapter 11, and also noted throughout chapter 11, he commits adultery and murder in 2 Samuel. He has an affair with Bathsheba when he should have been out to war fighting the Ammonites, and he didn't. Joab and his cousins Joab and Abishai were fighting the Ammonites. And then Uriah the Hittite, who was Bathsheba's husband, when he comes back because Bathsheba is pregnant, He tries to get him to go home, but this guy who's not even a Jew, he's a Hittite, he is loyal to David. He is so loyal to David that he sleeps at his doorstep. So David writes a letter, sends it to Joab, and gives it to Uriah to take to Joab, which in the letter says, when the heat of the battle comes, put Uriah the Hittite right up in front of the battle, and then withdraw your forces. and Uriah dies. So David commits murder, he lies, he commits adultery, he attempts to lie and cover it up, and then he commits murder. Now all goes well, and so he thinks. And 2 Samuel, there's all the way up until 2 Samuel 21, it reveals all the repercussions of this great sin. But last week, as we saw in 1 Chronicles 20, that whole thing was bypassed. It says, well, The Ammonites have won, David puts a crown on his head, and we see the gospel picture in there of his sins being forgiven. They've been wiped out, but there's still battles to be fought. Giants that come back and the repetition of those giants, because remember that when David was just about 17, 18, or 19 years old, not a whelp of a boy of 12, but he wasn't old enough to go to war because the age was 20, but he goes out and he gathers five smooth stones and kills Goliath. And we saw in 1 Chronicles 20 why he gathered five smooth stones, because Goliath had brothers. There are four other giants that got taken care of. And we recognize the spiritual warfare that though we've gotten victory in one area of our life, sometimes in that same area, we struggle again and we need to rely upon the Lord Jesus Christ again. for that, because we need to rely on the Lord Jesus Christ for everything. It is He in whom we rely upon. And so in chapter 20, which parallels 2 Samuel 24 verses one through 25, we see the worldly arrogance of David, because the whole time these spiritual battles are being fought. Now remember in the Old Testament, everything is a spiritual picture, because every time they went forth in the battle, They relied upon the strength of the Lord, not the power of their own might. As we hear in the Old Testament, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord. And they won their victories through the power of God delivering the enemy to them, and they lost. Because sin was in their lives, they weren't focusing upon the Lord. They did not have faith upon his promises. And the ultimate promise being the champion of Israel, the Messiah, the Christ to come. Looking forward to that when all their battles would be put down. And so David has a period of ignorance and arrogance. Whereas the battles that he had won as a warrior king and the battles that his generals, his cousins, Joab and Abishai, that they won, it was through the might of the Lord, which we also saw in 1 Chronicles chapter 20. Excuse me, 1 Chronicles chapter 19. Excuse me, 1 Chronicles chapter 18. Through there, we saw that the battles that are being won, they're won by the hand of the Lord. And we were just participants of it. But this is an interesting thing. Now, David sins here in this chapter, as we saw. He doesn't rely upon God. He wants to number his people to see, the fighting men to see, well, how many men do I have? And what is the strength of my armies? The strength of your armies was the Lord. And we saw that already in your history, David. And so we have, in this worldly arrogance, a picture of some things of what goes on in a Christian life. Because a question may come up, well, why was the one sin not recorded in 1 Chronicles 20 of his committing adultery with Bathsheba as if that was wiped away? And now this sin is recorded. Because in your Christian life, in my Christian life, as Christians, the Lord doesn't want us to give over to the strength of our own might. You see, the question, why, again, to rephrase the question, why is this Synod David recorded in 1 Chronicles 20, is not recorded in 1 Chronicles 20 when this Synod of numbering the people is? because Jesus wants to show us that in the second part of your notes, John 15 verse five, Jesus said to his disciples, I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. And David had forgotten that, and sometimes we as Christians forget that too. So as you see a progression from 1 Chronicles 17 to 1 Chronicles 21, we see a picture of our Christian lives. We see the very important truths we can glean from the Old Testament just as the New Testament explains it. Last week I mentioned that I preach and teach types of Christ in the Old Testament. that Jesus is there. It speaks of Jesus, but it's somewhat hidden. But we need to see Christ in our lives. We need to see Christ in one another as we see Christ in other believers. We need to see the potential of Christ in those that don't believe so that we can introduce them to the Christ that we know, so that the Spirit of Christ may minister to them to save them. And I mentioned this, I said explanation, exaltation, and application from the type. Sometimes these types, whereas David is a type of Christ, sometimes it's very powerful and predominant. Other times it's an application where we see David as a type of sinful man and we can relate to that. Sometimes the emphasis is on one or the other more than the other. more than, one is more emphasized more than the other. Jesus said all the scripture is about him as we looked at last week in John chapter 5 verse 39. You search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life but they are they that testify of me. And so the whole Bible, the 66 books by over 40 authors, it's all about Jesus. It reveals the Son of God to us. But another reason for my passion to show you Christ from the scripture is so that as your pastor, you don't rely upon me. that I'm not here to get you to rely upon me. I am here to teach you to rely upon the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone. I am here to preach the truths of the gospel so that you trust in Christ alone, by faith alone, because of His grace alone, to see His word as the authority, to see Christ in scripture. And then when you see Christ in Scripture, then you'll start seeing Him in His workings and operation within the world, even in this wicked world. And you'll see the parallels that He is presenting unto us so that we could live wisely, as wisely as a sinner saved by grace can in this wicked world. To show you Christ constantly from Scripture is my mission. But many blessed truths that are in this chapter, we don't have time to cover. There's a ton of them here. And so as we see just the history of it, because the explanation of scripture, this is an historical event, it actually happened. It does exalt Christ because there are pictures of Christ and his gospel in it. But it also applies then to us as there are lessons for us to glean from it. This is the kind of God that we serve. A God that can put all those things together because He is God and I am not. You are not. That's the wonderful thing about the Bible. We see this God who is amazing and so far above our human comprehension, but He brings things down to us so that we can grasp them, just at least a little bit. In verses one through six, we see a king who commands the numbering of Israel. And Joab doesn't want to do it. May the Lord multiply a hundred times what we have. Lord, or King, O King, don't do this. Joab was his cousin, but he was the son of Zariah, which was David's sister. He was not his cousin, well, he was his nephew. Joab was his nephew, and he was very like conscience. saying, this shouldn't be done. And sometimes we, as we saw in the holy war from John Bunyan, sometimes our conscience runs away from us when we're taken captive by the devil. And the king commended, was condemned by God for his arrogance in verses seven through 12. The king was condemned for his arrogance in seven through 12. But David is a type of Adam in the fall because of his arrogance, numbering the people as if by his wisdom as king and by his numbers and strength through his army that he could defeat the enemy. And that's exactly what Adam did in the garden. When his wife in Genesis chapter three took the fruit Not an apple, it might have been an apple, I don't know, but it says fruit pre in Hebrew. When she took of the fruit and she gave unto her husband also who was with him, Genesis 3 verse 6, he partook. He took wisdom, it can make you wise, it can make us like God, we will be illuminated, we'll know the difference between good and evil, but he wouldn't have the power because he disobeyed God, and he had died immediately in spirit. And this is what was going on with David. David's fall is reflective of a type of Adam in verses one through six, and as we see, he commands the numbering of Israel. In verses seven through 12, as the king was condemned by God for his arrogance, we see this also in verses seven through 12. David is a type of sinner facing God's judgment. See, God is an infinitely holy God, an infinitely good God, and so the smallest infraction of God's law, in thought, word, and deed, not just what you do, but what you think is impure. Whoever here has never had an impure thought, I could say raise your hand, but I don't even need to because I know that you haven't. The word says that you haven't. We've all had some impure thoughts, even impure motives. There's only one who never did, and that was God who became man, the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why he came, so he could walk the righteous life that you and I can't. But David was a type of sinner facing judgment because the least sin against the holy God who is infinite is infinitely sinful, which must be punished. And in verses 13 to 18, or 13 to 17, where the king is humbly contrite before God in his humility, we see David is a recipient of God's grace and mercy. David should have been struck down, but he wasn't. But there were repercussions for his sin, that when you as a believer, when you sin, there will be consequences. And it may affect others. In David's case, 70,000 died for his arrogance because a pestilence came, which is what happened with Adam when he fell, was it not? It infected the entire human race. So many have gone to eternal condemnation because of Adam's sin, because of his consequence, the consequences of his sins, likewise with David. We see the, but as he humbles himself in verses 13 to 17, knowing that there's a judgment, he receives grace. And David is a type of Christ, offers a costly sacrifice. And I think I wrote verses 19 to 17 there, but I believe it, yes, or 19 to 27, verse 24. He wants to buy, as he sees the angel of the Lord. And the angel of the Lord here is a, it starts with a C, young people. What's that word that we learned in Sunday school that Sister Keely taught us last year? What's that word that starts with a C when we see the angel of the Lord? Christophany, I heard Brielle and both Nick say that, Christophany, very good, that's what it is. It's an appearance of Christ in the Old Testament before his incarnation. And this is the angel of the Lord. We know this because of verse 18, it says, now the angel of the Lord had commanded Gad to say to David that David should go up and raise an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor Ornon the Jebusite and so verse 19 so David went up at at Gad's word which he had spoken in the name of the Lord that's who Jesus is he speaks in the name of the Lord because he's the second person of the Trinity he's God incarnate and before his incarnation he was that angel because angel Interestingly, in Hebrew, the Hebrew word for angel is malach. Malach is where you get Malachi from, the name Malachi, my messenger. But it's very close to melech, which is the word for king, and Jesus is the king who is the messenger, that the king became a messenger and came to us with the message, and the message was that he died on a cross and rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. So anyway, as far as the angel of the Lord being a type of Christ, David becomes the type of Christ to show the payment of the penalty of sin. Because when he wants to buy Ornan's threshing floor, he says, I'll buy it. No, you're the king, I'll give it to you. I'll give you the oxen and you could use those for sacrifice. No, I'll buy it. And he says here in verse 24, But King David said to Ornan, No, but I will buy them for the full price. I will not take for the Lord what is yours, not offer burnt offerings that cost me nothing. And that's what the Lord Jesus Christ did. God became a man and it cost him everything. It cost him his life. He left his celestial robes in glory to humble himself to become a servant and a man and ministered for 33 and a half years, well actually he lived for 33 and a half years, ministered for three and a half years, teaching and raising up some disciples and he went to the cross because that's the cost of what our freedom, this sacrifice cost him everything. In fact, even the old King James Version, the burnt offerings that cost me nothing. It costs us nothing for what it costs Christ everything. He paid a debt he did not owe for a debt that we owe and can't possibly pay. So as the king commanded by Christ to raise an altar in verses 18 to 27 in this, David as a redeemed sinner offers sacrifices that are offerings from his soul because now he's saved, he's been redeemed, he offers them in godly fear and verses 28 to 30. And so that kind of shows us an exaltation of Christ's gospel and those are reflections of how our lives work. We still sin. The best of what we do still needs all of God's grace. Because sometimes I have motives that are not clear and heavenly. Sometimes I have thoughts that are not a blessing or a glory to God. I have had dreams just recently that tell me there's enough of my flesh to condemn me to hell if it were not for the Lord Jesus Christ, and I'm sure you have too. You think, well, I've been saved, and how come I'm still dreaming that dream? I'm doing sinful stuff in that dream. And I wake up and go, oh, thank the Lord. Woo. Sweating as if I'm already in hell. For real. Now you know why I wear Hawaiian shirts. Not because some pastor said, oh, it's good that you wear Hawaiian shirts. I wear them because I lived in Hawaii, and it's easier to get a tan this way. Now, what are the blessings, the application, because I don't want to go on and on and on. We still have a renewal of vows to conduct, and the gospel will be there as well. The blessings and application from our chapter. Galatians chapter 6 and verse 14 says, but far be it from me to boast except in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. It's in your handout. And the first thing we see, and I want to draw your attention to, of the many things that are here, which I'm not going to cover and you can ask me about them later or you can look them up online or what have you. And be careful when you look them up online, there's a lot of Misinformation out there? That's what I've been told. There is a lot of stuff. Concerning the Bible, there's a lot of misinformation out there. But as far as verse one goes, we see in our text, it says, then Satan stood against Israel and incited David to number Israel. But interestingly, in 2 Samuel chapter 24, it says, again, the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. And he incited David against them saying, go number Israel and Judah. Well, that gives us several lessons. I don't want to go over all of them, but I'll give you briefly this. That despite whether we had a crooked man in the White House or a good man in the White House, a blessed man or a man after God's own heart as David was, what if we had one of those? There's still going to be wickedness in the world. And there was in Judah and there was in all of Israel. There were wicked men. God was going to bring punishment to them because he's a sovereign God But he did so through Satan as we know that a lot of calamity comes because well Satan wants to do his mischief Anyway, okay. God lets him go, but he gives him a restraining Rope if you will he only lets him go so far. He's he is a God is sovereign. And this is the point that we should understand is that the Christian serves a sovereign God. And though it seems like, well, how come this is happening and how come that's not happening? Well, the reason is simply this. Isaiah 53, verse 10, the first part of this. In Isaiah 53, for those of you who are familiar with it, I think it's the holy of holies of the Old Testament. And in verse 10, it says, and it was the will of the Lord to crush him. Speaking of the Messiah, the Christ that was to come, through Isaiah, who preached this 600 years before the Lord Jesus came. In the Old King James Version, it says, it pleased the Lord to bruise him, but it was the will of the Lord to crush him. And those two words, the will, or pleased, and crush, or bruise, those are two important words. Those two words are being quite significant, will and crush. And as a young Christian, I used to hear this. I used to hear this from some preachers, pastors that I used to have early on in my Christianity. God has a perfect will and a permissive will. And that used to disturb me. I was perplexed by that back then. Now I'm just appalled by it. Because God, to suggest that God has a permissive will is to suggest that the sovereign God, the almighty God, the omnipotent God, the all-knowing God, the all-powerful God, the all-knowing God would do something he rather not. Well, of course, why wouldn't we sin? Because he just turns his back on it and pays no attention to it. No, that's not the truth. Because the truth of his sovereignty is in this tiny little portion of verse 10 of Isaiah 53. just that tiny portion because the verse goes on and in this portion it says it's the will of the Lord to crush him. The will of the Lord is to bring all truth to what will we call it, an epitome or an epiphany, that's another word, but a summit like we have with Mount Eliamna, a summit at the top with Christ crucified. It's to take us to Calvary. It's to take us to Golgotha where Christ was crucified. It was the will of the Lord to crush him. And for all of us who were saved by God's grace, we're pardoned by that sin. or excuse me, by that salvation that saved us from our sin. See, the same word for will is found in Isaiah 46 verse 10. It says, speaking of the Lord God, he says, he knows the end from the beginning and from ancient times, things yet not done, saying my counsel shall stand and I will accomplish all my purpose. And that word my purpose comes from the same Hebrew word Kefaitz. Kefaitz. I'm not going to ask you to say it because it has the chet word in it or chet letter. Kefaitz, which means will, it means pleasure or purpose. He will do all his will, he will do all his pleasure, he will do all his purpose. And so he sent Christ in order to save us. Well, he has a permissive will because some people aren't saved and they're going on. No, they will either be saved eventually because that is God's will and purpose for them in Christ, or when Christ returns, they will be accountable for that in judgment. And that sovereign God will see the fulfillment of his will It was his will to crush him for their judgment, but in refusal of that, they will come into accountability for their own sins. And so he's sovereign over all of that. Well, what if it's, brother John, what if it's, if God had foreordained me to be saved, what if he didn't? Well, Call out to him and look to him and you'll be saved. We tend to try to focus on things that are not given to us to understand. He is God, we are not, and those things are far above my pay grade, and I'm sure they're above yours too. We're made lower than the angels, the Psalms tell us. So we don't have to put that into an operating function for our lives. He was crushed for our iniquities, as it says in verse five. It uses the word crushed in Isaiah 53, verse five, the same way, that same word, the Hebrew word dachah, which means like taking a two and a half ton millstone and crushing wheat with it as it rolls across the grain, that that's what Jesus suffered when he died upon the cross, when he suffered God's wrath for your sins and mine. And among many other things, Jesus was crushed in soul and spirit because the intimacy he knew with the heavenly father and relationship far closer than any man has ever known with God was cast away to utterly abandon the Messiah with a forsakenness no man will ever know. Including those sinful rebels sent to eternal torment for the unpardoned sins committed against the holy and sovereign God. And we can never fully comprehend the intricacies of God's holy and eternal will. However, we may be satisfied with its peace when we recognize we need look no further than the cross of Jesus Christ and to know his will and good pleasure for that. And so if we trust in Christ's cross, we know God's will and good pleasure. He went to the uttermost in order to save wretches like you and me. The second point is, and I know I spent a lot of time on the first point, but the Christian deserves eternal punishment. Verses seven and eight of our text says, but God was displeased with the thing and he struck Israel. And David said to God, I have sinned greatly in that I have done this thing, but now please take away the iniquity of your servant, for I acted very foolishly. That's not just for those who are not believers. Oh man, this is what it's due to be. This is for believers. That when we see the holiness of God and the judgment of God, we celebrate the grace of God because this is what we deserve. We deserve eternal hell. And we celebrate the fact that by God's grace, he's removed us from eternal hell. And all it requires is to, as Isaiah says in Isaiah, in Isaiah, which we just read recently, because the last two months we've been reading Isaiah, look unto me and be saved. What does it take to look, to look upon him, but to look with spiritual eyes? And if you're looking anyway, because the spirit of God has moved you to look, then He'll save you. And we celebrate that. We recognize that the best, since we've been saved, that the best of our righteousness has enough corruptions in it that we still deserve eternal condemnation. Isaiah 64 verse 6, which we read just yesterday. says, we have all become like one who is unclean and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. King James Version says, filthy rags. We all fade like a leaf and our iniquities like the wind take us away. Romans 3 in verse 23 says, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And so when we see what we deserve, but then we look at Christ who went through the torment that's far beyond what we deserve. It's sufficient because it'll save, His blood shed will save to the last drop. That's how powerful it is. His life is sufficient in the righteousness that He walked in order to apply it to your life and so that the Father, when He looks at you when you're saved, He looks at Christ. I got a picture of that this morning because I don't like to bring my wife up as an illustration, but when I look at her, I see the woman that the Lord allowed me to marry 31 years ago. I see her as young and as wonderful and as vibrant as that woman was 31 years ago. And I don't know how, I can't explain it, but I think that even though that's a sloppy picture, that is what the Father looks at us and he sees Christ. He sees what we are, instead of looking back to what we were because we were sinners, he looks ahead through Christ to what will be in Christ when Jesus returns. And so that's a blessing of the saving grace of God in Christ. The Christian is saved by God's grace. The angel's hand stayed in verse 15 because Christ sacrificed to come, as we saw in point one, that it's all built upon 1 Corinthians chapter two and verse two. For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and am crucified, Paul says. It's all about the cross. And so when we're saved by God's grace, this is what we get. that God does this for his own namesake, not because of anything that's in you. Isaiah 48 and verse nine. Let me look at my time. Isaiah 48 and verse nine says, for my namesake, I defer my anger for the sake of my praise. I restrain it for you. that I may not cut you off. He does it for his own namesake. There's also another one in Ezekiel that it says, for my own namesake, I do this. And he says the way that it'll save us by regeneration in Ezekiel 36, he says that I will put into you a new heart and a new spirit, and I'll write my laws upon your heart so that you may walk according to my statutes, in Ezekiel 36. We know that the New Testament tells us, Ephesians 2, verses eight and nine, it says, by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, not of works, lest any man can boast. So therefore, what you try to do to get into heaven isn't gonna work. It's what God has done. So not only is one saved by grace, if you're a believer today, you're also kept by God's grace. Spurgeon says this in a message that he had preached some time ago. It was long before I was born. He died in 1892, so that ought to tell you something. But Spurgeon said this concerning how man is kept by God's grace. He says, Quote, Adam in perfection could not keep himself in paradise. How can his imperfect children be so proud as to rely upon their own steadfastness? End quote. That's a terrific quote. And this is why it's my mission to teach you to rely and trust in Christ and not me. Now certainly, as we walk through life, God will use others so that you may learn from others and see examples from others or be blessed by others. But for example, like witnessing. You don't need me to come over to your house and go witness to your children. You trust in Christ. Because even the youngest Christian, if they're truly saved by Christ, they have every capacity, every capability, and every power to be able to witness the same as you. Why? Because they're going to introduce Christ to that person that's unsaved. Because you don't save anybody. I don't save anybody. I've never saved anyone. I didn't save myself and I can't save anyone else. Neither can you. Only Jesus can do that. Only the Holy Spirit can do that. Only the Father can do that. So you have every power to be able to share Christ with them. And if it's God's will to do so, to bring them the truth of the cross, He will do so. It might take several of us doing this, but that's God's plan and design to get us working together as a body of Christ. It's wonderful. It's a mystery. You are a wonder if you're saved by God's grace. In fact, it's a mystery like the manna that fell. And I was gonna look up on the internet what all the naysayers see about the manna. How do they explain the manna that fell for the people of Israel in the wilderness? I don't know. I don't think they have an explanation. It's like, well, frost came on the ground and they just started eating frost. And apparently it was a, it was nutrition for them. Really? Well, that sounds like a greater miracle than God sending them angels food. They have all these weird things, but it's a mystery. And Spurgeon said it like this, and it's in about the middle of your handout, but you don't have to find it there. He says, quote, brethren, the manna came from heaven. And here is the very marrow of the truth as to what we have lived upon spiritually. We have lived upon heavenly food. If our supply, If our supplies had depended on human ministry, they would have failed. If they had depended upon the mere reading of good books, there might be times when we could read to profit, but the everlasting wellsprings of divine love are not affected by our condition. body or of mine. The grace and love that are treasured up in Christ Jesus come to us when creature cisterns are broken and all the help of friends is unavailing." Again, what he's saying simply by that whole thing? Rely upon Christ and not yourself. Rely upon Christ and not others. Trust alone in the Lord Jesus Christ. Point number four, the Christian delights in worshiping God. Verse 28 was our key verse there, and I won't repeat it for redundancy's sake, but I'm gonna turn to Romans chapter 12, verse one. Many of you know it, verses one and two. In godly fear, as it says in verse 30 of David, we look again to Christ's cross and his judgment to come, that though he delights in worshiping God and he brought forth sacrifices, he did so because he was afraid of the angel of the Lord. But that was a hint of the godly fear that all Christians should have, a reverence for God, A joyful reference, it contains joy, it contains love because when we see that it took nothing less for God to become a man and walk that righteous life and suffer God's wrath, his infinite and eternal wrath for those three hours of darkness upon the cross, to actually die a death as a man and to have his blood shed for the forgiveness of sins when a spear pierced his side, rise from the dead and ascend into heaven, In that truth, as we look at this, it says in Romans 1, I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, I beseech you, brethren, as it says in the old King James Version, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice. But it says, by the mercies of God. What mercy was that? That Christ went to the cross. So we're always taken to the truth of the cross. That we offer our bodies as a living sacrifice. Now we're purchased by his blood. We are not our own. He paid for your sin debt, so he owns you. We were slaves to Satan, now we're glorious slaves, wonderful slaves, willing slaves to the Lord Jesus Christ. So we present our lives, our lives as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable God, which is our spiritual worship. And verse two says, do not be conformed to this world. but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. In other words, in verse two, it's telling us that everything that we face, every situation and circumstance is given by a sovereign God to remind you and me of the cross of Jesus Christ. Again, verse two, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, reading the scriptures to renew our minds, because we're now made a new creation in Christ, but now our minds, which make up our will to determine what to do, needs to be renewed by the standard that God has given, the word. so that you may discern, it says that by testing, that's the trials, tribulations, the situations and circumstances you encounter, that you may discern what is the will of God. We know the will of God, it's the cross of Christ. what is good and acceptable and perfect. So whatever takes us away from the cross in those situations and circumstances is neither good or acceptable, it's imperfect. But what brings us to the truth of the cross so that we may trust in Christ more and more, that is what is good and acceptable and perfect. That's how the sovereign God works. He puts everything in order through all history to preach of the cross, to tell of the cross, and then to make the cross fulfilled in the work and person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And likewise, now that since it's been done, that everything he's doing is to point you and me to the truth of the cross. Let's pray. Our most blessed and gracious Father in God, in Jesus' name and for his sake, we thank you, Lord, for the truth that you have given us in the Scripture, and ask, Father, that the cross may be the blessed truth from the threshing floor of Arena. Or Ornan. And we ask, Father, that even though I left so many things out, I trust that Your Spirit will minister unto the souls that need to hear what You have to say and not Your servant. In Jesus' name and for His sake, I do pray. Amen.