The third, well a number of them, but especially the third verse, very appropriate for our theme this month as we think back four hundred years to the pilgrims that came to these shores. The life by which alone we live and all our substance. and our strength receive. Sustain us by Thy faith and by Thy power and give us strength in every trying hour." Certainly they displayed that and it has been an encouragement for me to give consideration to these things and then in turn to bring them to you. And I turn your attention tonight to Psalm 78 where we read this morning, I could think of no better portion. for our reading of the Word of God tonight than the 78th Psalm. The very verses we read in the providence of the Lord this morning, and rather than read something else, I thought let's go back and read these verses again. It is a great crime that we don't know our history as well as we ought to, and I just plug again to you the importance of being at least somewhat familiar. You don't have to be a historian as such, but just somewhat familiar. to appreciate those things that have gone before, those individuals who have lived and that display great strength in their faith particularly. It's not that we only are concerned about Christians, but Christians that have gone before are uniquely of interest to the Christian, to the believer. They are our family. We will sit down with them in glory and it will be, no doubt, I don't know exactly how it will all work out there, but I imagine that some of the things we have read of and been aware of, we will turn to those individuals and ask for more details. What was it like? How did you feel? What was going on in your mind when you did this and that and the other? We can talk about all the ventures of the Lord's people, and no doubt also there will be far too often those in glory talking about events, and we'll stand back and say, I never knew that. I had no idea that you went through this or that or the other, and we'll spend time getting to know all that the Lord has done through the lives of His saints through all eternity. So, those ideas of boredom in eternity, you can set that all aside. There'll be great labors done and great stories told as we share in the Lord's goodness to us, and He perfects us in His own holiness in that great day that is to come for all who love the Lord Jesus Christ. But let's read the Word of God tonight. Psalm 78, Reading again verse 1, and it should be of benefit to you to have already read these verses today. Let us hear them again. Mascul of Asaph, give ear, O my people, to my law. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable, I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and His strength and His wonderful works that He hath done. For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel. which He commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children, that the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born, who should arise, and declare them to their children, that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments, and might not be as their fathers, stubborn, and rebellious generation, a generation that set not their heart aright and whose spirit was not steadfast with God. The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle. They kept not the covenant of God and refused to walk in His law and forgot His works and His wonders that He had showed them. But marvellous things did he in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zon. He divided the sea and caused them to pass through, and he made the waters to stand as in heap. In the daytime also he led them with a cloud, and all the night with a light of fire. He cleaved the rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink as out of the great depths, and brought streams also out of the rock. caused waters to run down like rivers. And they sinned yet more against Him by provoking the Most High in the wilderness. And they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust. Yea, they spake against God. They said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?" Amen. We'll end reading again at the same place that we ended it. This morning, it goes on to detail other events in the record and the Lord's mercy to His people and their sins, their doubt and disbelief in His presence, and we are warned against such. Let's seek the Lord tonight. Let's again pray just for His help in this season as we consider the things that are before us. Lord, again, we are thankful for who Thou art and what Thou dost mean to Thy people. We're thankful that Thou art a sure Redeemer, and we pray that everyone here tonight will know Thee as Redeemer. It would be a very sad thing to be here and be so close to the gates of heaven and yet not enter through. And so again we pray that should there be any here tonight that are standing so close to eternal life, And yet they haven't entered in. May it please Thee to give them the desire, the longing to know life through Christ and to have their sins all washed away. Let none here be like those who have been unfaithful in the past. May we learn from them. May we not doubt our God or question Thy mercies. Bless us tonight. Give us the Holy Ghost. That's our great need, that what we consider may be of benefit and may strengthen us in our sojourn and pilgrimage here on the earth. Come now, we ask in Jesus' precious name. Amen. has been our privilege over recent weeks to give consideration to the Pilgrim Fathers as they are known. And I've been doing my best as a blow-in to America to try and bring before you this matter and refresh your memory and perhaps add some spiritual application that may be of benefit to us both in the present as well as in the future. It is a great sadness, and it ought to be a great sadness to all of our hearts that we live in a time where people have no real consideration of history. They have no idea. And we are seeing that more and more. even in some of the language that is being declared in the present. And I'm not sure how much you keep your ear to the ground of the things that are being said and the various ideologies that are very much at the forefront in our day, but it is very popular to decry everything that is wrong about those that have lived in the past, to look at their lives and scrutinize them in such a way so that we can dismiss everything about them. It's like what we said this morning. If you can find something to taint an individual with, then you can cast aside the entire testimony, the entire witness of their lives. And the enemy likes to do that. The enemy loves to do that. The enemy loves to just cast aside everything good, And so, when we as believers are given, not just in Hebrews 11 where we read the first week, an insight into the importance of history and the continuity of the faith and how we are to learn from those who have gone before, but right throughout the Word of God we are pointed back. It is in a way that is designed to be helpful. Certainly, even as we have read tonight, there are those that we are to learn from because of their errors, because of their sins. In Psalm 78, it is presented to us the fact that in the initial prologue of the psalm, what we ought to do that we are given the truth, the law of God, the words of God, have been committed to the people of God. The intention is then that we will share that, that we will spread that. You have a messianic indication in the language of verse 2 and following, I will open my mouth in a parable, I will utter dark sayings of old, and that there's an indication of Christ's work in declaring those things from the past and furthering them in the generation in which He ministered. But He does so prophetically in all ages. The great prophet Jesus Christ is always prophetically helping His church and His people to know His mind and His will, and then those who know the mind of God perpetuate that truth to the coming generations. So we're not to hide them. We are told, verse 5, He established a testimony in Jacob, not to be forgotten. And He has appointed a law in Israel, not to be cast aside, but commanded to the fathers that they should make them known to their children that what has been taught and given by God should be passed on to coming generations. Why? To what end? Why is it important that the generation to come might know them? even the children which should be born." You're looking to those generations that are not yet even born, and then they should arise and declare them to their children. So, you have multiple generations in view, and the idea is that the truth of God deposited to any generation must be carried faithfully, and is not being carried faithfully merely by you living faithfully. But we have failed if we fail to pass it on and the next generation have an ignorance of the truth. We must be very hesitant and measured when we consider those in the past and how they lived. One of the remarkable things about the Word of God is the fact that it doesn't kind of gloss over the lives of the heroes of the faith. We have details of their failings. We have information of their sins. But never forget, we don't have all their sins. And even in giving to us their sins, even in putting before us their sins, We are taught that God was pleased to use them in spite of their sins. If that was not the case, none of us could be used by God. None of us would have any hope of being useful in the kingdom if it required perfection, if it required us to be impeccable. Thank God that is not the case. And every flawed individual, every person here tonight, you know your sins, and the devil likes to remind you of them. And one of the things he endeavors to do is so remind you of those sins and the things you have done, so as to bring you to a point of despondency, and you say to yourself, I can't do anything for God. That's a lie. That's not the case. We're thinking particularly of 400 years ago. And I've suggested to you already that there will come a time, if it isn't already present, where those in this land will desire to delete that history entirely. If not delete it, they will try to manipulate it so that you look upon it as a negative thing, as if it was a tragedy that men would come to these shores and bring the gospel. Certainly, there were things that occurred that are lamentable, things that happened that must be confessed as sin. But never forget, these nations belong to no one but Christ. And Christ has given a mandate, which was clearly expressed by the pilgrims, that part of their motivation to travel across the Atlantic was to bring Christ to the nations. They wanted men and women to know the God they loved and served, not to remain in darkness, not to remain in ignorance, but that they would know the God that they knew and the salvation He has provided in His Son. We have this idea that certain lands belong to people in such a way that other ideologies that come from other cultures and nations should never be allowed in. like it's a sin for a Christian, a missionary, to walk into a nation, to walk into a place and declare Christ as Lord, and it's not. It's a lie. It is the mandate of every believer to declare Christ as Lord wherever he goes. And the nations belong to Christ, all of them. And therefore we go boldly in the name of Jesus Christ under the authority given to us in the Great Commission to preach Christ to all creatures to the glory of the Savior's name. Tonight we're considering the establishing of the new community at Plymouth, establishing the new community at Plymouth. And I want us to, again, just think of three things that are before us, beginning first of all with the providence that helped, the providence that helped. We left the pilgrims last time. in Cape Cod, where they had arrived in the middle of November. And we want to move a little further in terms of what developed from that point. And I have a number of things here in the Providence that helped them. First, finding food, and then finding friends. Finding food. Having arrived on land, it was necessary for the pilgrims to find a suitable place of habitation. For this, they would depend upon the leadership of an English military officer who had been hired by the Pilgrims for their venture, a man by the name of Captain Miles Standish. Now, Standish was more rough, perhaps, than some of the others. As a soldier, he had that demeanor and he had that way, and certainly he seems to have been more aggressive in his manner than the likes of Bradford would have been. But to caricature as a man who had no sympathy or heart would be wrong. Standish would not only survive the first winter, but become a key individual in the success of the colony. He was typical as a soldier, and yet as a disciplined man he used his discipline and his ethic of work and desire for survival to help everyone, not just himself. Last time I mentioned that during the worst of the first winter, there were times when there were only six or seven of the entire group who were in good enough health to look after themselves and others. And Standish was one of them. He was one of the few that did not fall ill at all, and therefore was one of the few that, if you remember back to what we said last time, was tending to all the ill and the sick, lighting fires, keeping them warm, feeding them and cleaning them and everything that was necessary when individuals were incapable of taking care of themselves at all. So while he was a soldier, he was a man who had a heart for the individuals who were with him and desired the success of the colony. Nathaniel Morton, a nephew of William Bradford and secretary to his uncle as he served as governor for many years, he wasn't there at this time but he would come later on. He recorded concerning Captain Standish in his New England memorial. that Standish, quote, in his younger time, he went over into the Low Countries, that's another way of describing Holland, and was a soldier there and became acquainted with the church at Leiden and came over into New England with such of them as at the first set out for the planting of the plantation of New Plymouth and bear a deep share of their first difficulties and was always very faithful to their interest. You see, in any great venture you need men of varied skills. You can't do it by everyone being the same. They needed a man like this. They needed a man who was trained in military, was not afraid when others would be afraid, who was acquainted with defending and setting up things so that they would survive in terms of if anyone tried to come and attack them, anyone would try to take their lives, he would know what to do. And so it is in the church, beloved. We are not all to be the same. I know sometimes we look at various individuals and Christians who seem aloft and greatly gifted, and they stand apart from everyone else, and everyone kind of looks and wishes, I wish I was more like that. And yet if we all had our wish, the church of Jesus Christ could not go forward. It could not advance if we were all the same as those that we think to ourselves are the great individuals of the church. We need variety. We need different skills. There are things that some of you do here that if you tried to get me to do it, it would just be, it would be a disaster. Things would fall apart very quickly. If you were depending upon me to organize, for example, suppers after church or whatever, well, that would Just the best I could do is call someone in and get someone else to come in and bring the food. But if it was depending on me to cook it and provide and try to determine, okay, this number of people are going to be here, all right, how much food am I going to need? I wouldn't know where to begin. I would have no clue at all. Whether some of you have been at that, it's second nature to you. It's easy. You know exactly what to do. And there are many other things I'm not going to take time to describe, just some of the simple tasks that are done and performed with efficiency by those who are gifted in those areas. And it takes us all, beloved. It takes us all. Never stand back as someone who has nothing to do for the kingdom. And then never think that the little that you're doing is nothing. It's not nothing. Don't make comparisons that denigrate what you do for Christ in His name. Rejoice in it. This is a wonderful thing. that Jesus Christ values even a cup of cold water given in His name, and such will be rewarded in the day that is to come. Standish then was crucial, as we've said, in this first winter, avoiding sickness by the kind providence of God, unable to look after those unable to look after themselves, just four days after landing. Bradford accounts the first expedition in which sixteen of the men set off under the charge of Standish. So again, they're in Cape Cod, they're trying to find a particular place where they could settle and the perfect location for them as far as they could find it. And it wasn't long before they came across the first natives who ran out of their sight, and these sixteen men tried to follow them. tried to go after them, not to threaten them in any way, but just to try to communicate and see if they could be a help one to another. And the next day, having lost the tracks of the natives, the men stumbled upon a deserted site where they found the graves of natives as well as corn that they had planted. I touched on this very briefly last Lord's Day. Speaking of the early findings of corn and beans, which they would later compensate to the natives, they would discover who they belonged to and then compensate them for the fact that they took them. But Bradford says this, he says, and it is to be noted as a special providence of God, and this is our point, the providence that helped them, God's mercy to them in these early days. It is to be noted as a special providence of God and a great mercy to this poor people that they thus got seed to plant corn the next year, or they might have starved, for they had none nor any likelihood of getting any till too late for the planting season. Nor is it likely that they would have got it if this first voyage had not been made, for the ground was soon all covered with snow and frozen hard. But the Lord is never wanting unto His in their great need. Let His holy name have all the praise." They could see the hand of God. leading them as they're running around trying to find somewhere, and these men looking and going in the direction of the natives, but losing them, but then stumbling across this particular place where corn was there in sufficient quantity to help them. Again, we read it here in Psalm 78, when those children of Israel were in the wilderness. We read in verse 18, they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust. They weren't content with what God was providing them. And yet he spake against God and said, can God furnish a table in the wilderness? Well, let me just say to you, beloved, when you begin any sentence as can God, you be very careful. Be very careful. Can God do this? Can God? Be very careful because you're treading on ground of doubt and sin that God does not appreciate at all. You can see this. But God deals with His people. We didn't read it, but verse 21, "'Therefore the Lord heard this and was wroth.'" He was angry against them. But this was not the case for those at Plymouth. They trusted God, and God led them, God guided them, and mercifully did a wonderful work in finding this food and helping them in their survival. This is the Lord's doing. This is the Lord's doing. Let us not miss it. We live in prosperous times, and I fear that living in prosperous times, surrounded by this prosperity, we might imagine that this is all our own doing. Turn for a moment to Deuteronomy chapter 8, Deuteronomy chapter 8, because the Lord anticipated the sin That is, people would be prone to when days of prosperity would come. And we live in such days of prosperity, so such passages ought to be familiar to us. Deuteronomy chapter 8. So, this is the watchword of Deuteronomy, a command that comes again and again. Verse 2, "'Thou shalt remember.'" Remember. There's the call to know your history, right there. You have to remember, you have to know the things that God has done. Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments or no. And he humbled thee. and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know, that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. Thy raiment wax not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell these forty years. Thou shalt also consider in thine heart that as a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee. Therefore, thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways and to fear him. For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of oil, olive and honey, a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness. Thou shalt not lack anything In it a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass." Let me just stop there for a minute. There may not be, aside from Israel, there may not be any other land in the entire world that was so set up to prosper like this land. One of the most expensive things to do is to transport stuff. It's very expensive to transport things. The more expensive it is to transport something requiring rail, or roads, or whatever it is, the more expensive it is to transport things, the more prices have to be high, and the more difficult it is then to prosper. But this land, with its tributary of rivers, and the way the Mississippi and all the other rivers work together You're never far. All the places, the great areas of farmland of this country, none of them are far from rivers. The ability to send what was necessary, move from one location to the other, you would have to try very hard to feel in this land. And yet at the same time, as it was for Israel, being blessed with a land, Here's the danger. Verse 10, when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt therein, and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied, then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the Lord thy God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, and so on and so forth. You see, verse 17, read there, thou shalt say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. That's the danger. You think you've accomplished it. And with the pragmatic philosophy of the average American, it is about us. It's America that lines the shelves of the English-speaking world with promises of what can be done if you only believe the right thing in terms of your own ability. All the self-help gurus giving to you, feeding into your ego the idea that you can do it. And perhaps that's the greatest danger and fear that we see in this land, a people that are becoming more proud. Their origins were humble. They depended on God. The hand of God led them, fed them, provided for them, but in their prosperity they forget God, and they imagine that they have gotten themselves this wealth. And it doesn't matter how perfectly The land is for prosperity, how it's all perfectly in the providence of God, lending itself to prosperity. It doesn't matter how much there is favor in those areas, God can take it all away. Beware that thou forget not the Lord thy God. We look at the pilgrim fathers. We remember what they have done, and we see the humility. that they possessed as they came to these shores with a great dependence upon God. You can see it, it peppers the writings of Bradford. He's detailing it historically, he's giving the account, but there's just these moments, he keeps peppering with their thanksgiving to God and the Lord's mercy in hearing their prayers. As they continued to explore the area, the pilgrims finally landed at Plymouth. Exactly one month after they first reached the shores of North America, the exploring party found at Plymouth an area that had already been cleared, and it was there that they were to establish themselves. Deaths were taking place. I'll not account them all to you, but people were beginning to die due to the severity of the journey across and the scurvy-like illnesses that were setting in and the cold that was causing deep trouble at that time of the year. I mentioned that Bradford's wife would die. She died in December. Captain Standish's wife also died in February, and many others over the course of those early months. In fact, on March 3rd, I read that four died in the same day. And you can, someone sent me a link to two images that present the parties as they arrived, sort of these silhouettes of the families paired up in their families as they arrived on the shores, and then after that first year with the faded-out silhouettes of those who had passed away. And it would break your heart to look at it, all the families that were divided through death and loss and the Tremendous numbers of them, if I'm remembering correctly, of the eighteen adult women that were there, fourteen of them would die in that first year. And yet the Lord looked after them. He graciously looked after them. So, we've seen them finding food. This is a kind providence of the Lord. Then finding friends, that's the next aspect of the providence of the Lord that helped them On this occasion, in the middle of March 1621, a native called Samoset walked into Plymouth, and to everyone's surprise, he spoke a little bit of English. And so he communicates to them in an English that he had apparently learned from fishermen. And he spent the day giving them information on the surrounding tribes and so on, and he told them that the area where they were, the pilgrims that is, and had made their home, once was the location of a large and hostile tribe. This tribe just four years prior had suffered at the hands of a plague that had come through and wiped them all out, killing them, frightening neighboring tribes so that they wouldn't even go to the area afraid that it might set upon them and they also might be lost to the plague. A couple of weeks later, Son of Set introduced the pilgrims to another individual, another native called Tisquantum, or who Bradford nicknamed or calls, I'm not sure where the name comes from, but he records it as Squanto. And this is remarkable. If you've never read about this, it's absolutely remarkable again to see the providence of God and that here they are arriving on the shores of this land, imagining the worst, even in terms of how the natives might treat them. And this man, Squanto, is right there in the providence of God to play a key role in the establishment of Plymouth. His story is fascinating. I'm going to detail it to you so you have an idea of just how God worked to provide someone to help His people. According to the record, Squanto and four others had been bribed and kidnapped in 1605 and taken to England. There he was taught English by the owner of the Plymouth Company who wanted to know more about the New World and thought that, well, if we teach them English, then we can communicate and share an understanding and get more details about what goes on and whatever other information that he was after. He was then taken back to New England nine years later in 1614, where he was eventually kidnapped again and sold as a slave in Malaga, Spain. He managed to escape on a ship to Newfoundland and was recognized by the captain of the ship who had worked for the Plymouth Company many years prior, and so he sends him back to England. Whereupon in 1619 he was sent on a ship back to Cape Cod and arrives in Cape Cod six months before the pilgrims arrived. His story then, and that's it summarized very briefly, 15 years or so of journeying across the world, England, Spain, Newfoundland, back to England, back again then to his homeland. he walks in to Plymouth. When he came home himself, before the pilgrims got there, he was part of that tribe that had died in the aforementioned plague. And so this was his territory, this was his area, but that was not where he was living when the pilgrims arrived. But what you find then is that he actually stays in Plymouth with the pilgrims, makes that his home. and develops a friendship that can only go down to the hand of God in what it developed and how God used it. When I read of Squanto, I thought of Joseph. I thought of a young man as a prisoner to a foreign land, only that fifteen years later would be instrumental in the survival of the pilgrims. You remember the words of Joseph, this is what came to mind when Joseph testified in Genesis 50 verse 20, God meant it unto good to bring to pass as it is this day, to save much people alive. It has been noted that without Squanto, it would have been very difficult for the pilgrims to survive and to prosper as they did. With his help, the pilgrims were taught how to plant and fertilize their fields. how to catch the fish of the area, how the tribes determined when to plant their crops. For example, waiting in the spring until the white oak bud to the size of a mouse's ear, and once the white oak would bud to the size of a mouse's ear, then it is time to plant the corn. He taught them this. He served as a guide as well, as an interpreter in interactions with other natives. One of the most key things that he did was influencing the chief of a local tribe, Mesosiot, to become friends with the pilgrims and then to establish a peace treaty between them. The peace treaty is very simple, just a number of points that was established because of this man and his help in order that the tribe as well as the pilgrims would work together and help one another in their own survival. Point one, this is what the treaty says, that neither he nor any of his should injure or do hurt to any of our people. So no hurt to one another. Two, if any of his did hurt to any of ours, he should send the offender that we might punish him. Three, that if any of our tools were taken away when our people were at work, he should cause them to be restored. And if ours did any harm to any of his, we would do the like to them. Four, if any did unjustly war against him, we would aid him. If any did war against us, he should aid us. So, let's come together in times when we might be attacked by other forces. Five, he should send to his neighbor confederates to certify them of this, that they might not wrong us, but might be likewise comprised in the conditions of peace. And six, that when their men came to us, they should leave their bows and arrows behind them, as we should do to our pieces when we came to them. Lastly, that doing thus, King James would esteem of him as his friend and ally. And this treaty was observed for forty years and helped again in the preservation of both of them at that time. Squanto then was a mercy of the Lord. He was able to communicate in perfect English and was able to help the pilgrims in their interactions with the other natives in a way that they could have never planned. And in order to prepare such an instrument for His people, in 1605, fifteen years prior, God is moving on the life of an individual in very difficult circumstances to put them in the very place where God needed them to be with the skills that God needed them to have. Now Christian, when you wonder about what God is doing in your life, and why am I here, or why is God doing this? Be very careful. God is always at work for His own purposes. And sometimes He'll take an individual, pull them out of anything that is normal or what they would expect, in order to move them in places and among people that they would never imagine themselves to be, to do things that they never thought they would ever do. Always be in An attitude and spirit of surrender to the Lord, always, every day. Surrender. You don't know what God is doing. You don't know what He's intending, but just live your life in surrender. Put your life before God. Let Him steer the ship. Let Him direct your life. Let Him have control. And you never know. I mean, I'm testimony to this. I'm not the only one. Many of you are the same. You have your own story of the Lord's guidance in your life. You find yourself. You have certain things in your life. You look upon it and you say, I would never have done this. But the Lord brought me here. The Lord put me here. And the way the Lord has directed me and my family, I can only say the same. Just with a surrender, you never know what God may do. So be careful in resisting the will of God. Squanto was to die late in 1622, and Bradford, who became close to him, recorded, here Squanto fell ill of Indian fever, bleeding much at the nose, which the Indians take for a symptom of death. And within a few days he died. He begged the governor to pray for him that he might go to the Englishman's garden heaven and bequeath several of his things to some of his English friends as remembrances. His death was a great loss." This is the providence of God. Who would ever have suspected that God would have a native able to speak English? to help the pilgrims settle and understand the territory in which God had directed them so that they might succeed in all practical ways. Secondly then, the plan that worked, the plan that worked. As I mentioned last Lord's Day, the first winter was a devastating experience for those that landed at Plymouth. I mentioned there just a moment ago the passengers that died in that image that shows you the silhouettes of all those that passed away. And it's hard. Your heart sinks when you look at it. Some entire families were wiped out. No one survived. Other families, none of them were lost at all. But it was amazing just to think again, and I mentioned this last time. how in my own personal evaluation of the losses of that year, how I went to see, well, what was normal? And I mentioned to you last week that I looked at Jamestown and saw there that the losses were much higher, up to eighty percent losses, and yet what I did not do was look at subsequent years and make comparisons over a period of time. Dr. Matsko sent me some information that helped me fill in some of these details in relation to the devastation that took place at Jamestown and the difference between Plymouth and Jamestown. I didn't have the foresight to look at all the subsequent years, but according to what was given to me, the colony at Plymouth, while it suffered devastation the first year, It was not the same in subsequent years. They settled, God provided. They had a harvest and they lived and began to prosper. But Jamestown suffered huge loss of life year after year, going by the records available from 1607 to 1624. Of the 7,000 that traveled the Atlantic and arrived in Jamestown, little over 1,000 survived. That's a 15% survival rate. There's awful numbers, terrible numbers, and the reasons for this may be numerous, but the primary significance was the demographics, the difference between those who came and how they lived in both locations. Whereas Jamestown was populated with unmarried and ungodly men, Plymouth was settled by families. And that's been on my mind. I've been thinking about this since I read of it. Just to see that God's primary mode of civilization is through that which He establishes very early on in His Word. Plymouth succeeded, in part at least, because what they did is what is necessary if you want a civilized, well-ordered, peaceful society. And if it is your goal, if it is your goal to promote a civilized, well-ordered, peaceful society, you must, you have no choice here, you must support the institutions God establishes in the early chapters of Genesis, three particularly that I give to you tonight. The first is that of work. God built man to work. And any society that fails to embrace work, not just in the terms of working for the sake of helping you to survive, but working to build something to the future. I think this, again, this is something that gets lost in certain generations in certain parts of the world. that work is not just to survive from day to day. Work is to build something for the future. Now, it doesn't always work out, and God is pleased in His providence sometimes to cause everything we seek to work for to come crashing down. But generally the idea is to work, to progress, to develop, to build, and to add something of significance that others may come in and enter into and build upon after you're gone. The sins that attack work are numerous. For example, the sense of futility. Turn for a moment to Ecclesiastes. Turn just for a moment just to Ecclesiastes to consider this temptation that can set into our hearts and did not set into those at Plymouth. In spite of the losses, in spite of the devastation, losing wives, losing children. They continued on with resolve to the glory of God. And Ecclesiastes chapter 2, I can't read all of the chapter, I don't have time, but you can read it. at some time for yourself. But look just even at verse 11. He talks about gathering. You can see verse 4, He made great works, built houses, vineyards, gardens, orchards, trees, pools of water, so on and so forth. Got them servants and maidens and everything. He builds and He builds and He builds. He gathers silver and gold. Verse 8. Verse 9, So I was great and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem. And then verse 11, "'Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labor that I had labored to do, and behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit unto the Son.'" Go to verse 17. Again, he's talking about this more, his heart's grieving, and then he says in verse 17, "'Therefore I hated life. Because the work that is wrought under the sun is grievous unto me. For all is vanity and vexation of spirit. Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun, because I should leave it unto the man that shall be after me. And who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool? He actually have rule over all my labour wherein I have laboured, and wherein I have showed myself wise under the sun. This is also vanity. Therefore I went about to cause my heart to despair of all the labor which I took under the sun." He laments. It seems futile. What is the point? But it is put there not as an example, it's put there as a warning of what can set into our hearts, that we work and we labor and then we stand back and say, what's the point in all of this? If we lose perspective, if we lose sight of what God has commanded to do, even if we don't always understand how it may continue, as he rightly points out, someone can come in behind us and flatten it all, destroy it all. That is possible, but that doesn't take away. And that's why when you get to the end of the book, he says, what are we to do? Fear God, keep His commandments. And in keeping of His commandments, what does He call us to do? To work. In the sweat of your brow you'll eat bread. Keep laboring. Keep laboring and leave it up to God. But don't stop working. You have idolatry as well that keeps men or twists men's idea of work. Imagine, for example, the parable the Lord tells in Luke chapter 12 where the man just is all about pulling down his barns and building greater. He hasn't a proper understanding of why God has blessed him in this way. It's an idol to him. Slothfulness is warned against as well. These are warnings in terms of work, but God has called us to work. He has called us to labor. This is an important thing, and any civilization that wants to accomplish anything must embrace God's perspective of work. So, Paul says, In Ephesians 4, 28, let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labour, working with his hands a thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. The goal isn't just to feed yourself, it's to have surplus, God willing, to help others in need. It's to build, so there's surplus. And the pilgrims did that. They lived very frugal, very careful, very particular lives in order that they might build and not consume everything and have for the next year and the next year and keep building with a vision of wealth and prosperity for them and their children. You can't have a civil society that denies work or any attack upon it. Now, work is attacked today. People don't want to work, or they have faulty ideas about work, or they get all jealous about their work. They're jealous because this person and that person earns more than them, and that's not fair. They want graduated tax brackets so that we can punish those who have worked hard and God's been pleased to prosper, punish them for prospering. I mean, this is twisted. It is twisted. And I am well aware there's such a thing as crony capitalism. I'm well aware of that. But the idea that we should attack everyone who prospers, and you can actually sell it as a good idea. Everyone who earns over $400,000 a year, let's tax them even more. And everyone thinks, yay, that's a great idea. There's something wrong in the mentality about work. It wants to punish work. It wants to remove incentives to work, and God has not so designed it. He encourages us to labor, and any civilization that attacks work and employment will degrade and fall apart. The other thing that God has established in Genesis very clearly is marriage and procreation. Again, there are exceptions to these things. Some people are unable to work. Some people do not marry or have children. But the general idea clearly established in Genesis is that men would marry and procreate, that children should be born, and the vision continued from one generation to the next. If you have a faulty view of this, which we do, we redefine marriage today. We take it and make it to be something God never intended. We put people together and call it marriage that God says is not marriage, and then we attack that which is the fruit of marriage. We attack children. We murder them in the womb. Or we even despise those that are born. You see it. You have three children, that's okay. You have a fourth. People start looking at you as if there's something wrong with you. If you've any more, well, I'm sure there's plenty of stories from those of you who have experienced it for yourself. We don't like children anymore. Children are consumers. They're going to bring, they use up energy and supplies, and the climate's going to get worse and kill us all. Hate children. I mean, whatever, whatever they can think of. Whatever they can think of. People don't even want their children in their home. They love the public school system, not for its education and its purpose there, because if that was really what they were after, they'd be disappointed. that's barely happening at all, but they like it because it gets these creatures out from under their feet so they can pursue the real goal, what they want for life. They have children just because it looks right. The family should have children. That's the way it looks. You know, we want to have whatever it is that's seen as normal, but no real love for children. We're on this path. I mean, we're already there. I'm not inventing things that are to come in the future. This is happening. This is the denigration of this society, of this country. Now, thankfully, America is just about leading the way in terms of how many children families have, but it's going down and down and down, just like Europe. We're not even reproducing ourselves. We're not replacing ourselves, I should say. Because we hate children. And the other institution is the Sabbath. God instituted a day of rest, a day of rest to rejoice in the blessings received from our Creator and send praise His way collectively. And I tell you, you attack any of these, you will fail. Now, you see it even in the pilgrims, and they're hanging on for dear life. They're just trying to survive. And when the natives came on a particular day to do trade with them, with animal skins and so on. The first time they came to do that, it was on the Lord's Day. Sorry, we don't do business on the Lord's Day. We're not trading on the Lord's Day. But again, this is a problem for America. No, no, no, my time is my time. All days of the week are mine. I get to do what I want, and I will not render to my Creator one day in seven to praise Him and worship Him with His people. And I believe the lack of setting apart one day in seven adds to, contributes to, the deterioration of a society. If you care about America, if you have any care about America, You will value work as God has established it. You will value marriage and procreation in the context God has given it. And you will value a day of rest that is purposed to be a day of ceasing from labor and celebrating the work of Jesus Christ and what He's done for us. Attack any of them, you're undermining the community. Plymouth succeeded because these individuals prioritized these things. Jamestown did not. Fifteen percent survival rate? Over the course of years? Years? Because there were young men who were unmarried, there for selfish reasons, living sinful ways, And even in the work that they did, it was without the right motivation. This is the plan that works. And I say to you, protect this with all of your might. And any big ideas of dreams, Now, comment to your mind about what you think God has for you. If it militates against any of these, be very careful about what you think the Lord's will is in your life. Be very clear. If you're to say, the Lord doesn't want me to work, well, you better have something very clear about why you're saying that. A province may prevent it and stop it. You may say that I'm not to get married. To be very clear, you know that that's the will of the Lord. And you may have work and employment that is an act of necessity or mercy on the normal day of rest, but again, let these things be an exception, not the rule. My time is almost gone. My third point is the praise that's remembered, the praise that's remembered. This I take you a little later into that year of 1621. And while the exact date is uncertain, it is likely that sometime in October 1621, Bradford declared three days of thanksgiving, of praise and celebration to God. He invited Massasoit, the chief that they had done the peace treaty with, 90 other natives were there, and the record is given in a journal from 1622, The year after which says, our corn did prove well. And God be praised, we had a good increase of Indian corn and our barley indifferent good. But our peas not worth the gathering for we feared they were too late sown. They came up very well and blossomed, but the sun parts them in the blossom. Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fouling. so we might after have a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They, four in one day, killed as much fowl as with little help beside, served the company almost a week, at which time amongst other recreations we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king, Massasoit, with some ninety men whom for three days we entertained and feasted. He talks about them going on to kill deer, and just a celebration of thanksgiving to God. And he says, and although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty. This is the message he sends back home, as it were, back to England. God supplied their need in abundance and blessed them greatly. And so we have Thanksgiving to this day. It wasn't always a national holiday, but it is now. And yet so many minds are in want of the gratitude that these men possessed. To feel yourself in poverty, to land on shores with very little, and everything seemingly working against you, you're late in getting there. You're in the winter, you're further north than you intended to be, so it's even colder than you imagined. You don't know about the hostility of the natives that are there and how they're going to treat you. Everything's uncertain. One by one you see disease set into the lives of your loved ones, and they pass away, half of them gone in those first few months. And they're looking into the future. I can tell you now, I don't know details of their daily devotions. There are some indications of their prayers every morning and so on, but I can just see them in praise and worship to God daily, begging God to help them daily, to guide them, to lead them, to supply their need. And God did in a wonderful way. So we remember them. We remember them with gratitude, and we thank God that such characters as they came to these shores and established a colony as they did, and not just people who were out for their own ends and their own gain. Do you live in thanksgiving to God? Is your life a thankful one? You know, it's a mark of the last days. that we're unthankful. You think of all the things people talk about in the last days. You think of all the ideas that some have about what's going to come in the last days, what's going to develop at the end. But very few ever stop to consider that one of the marks given in Romans as well as in Paul's writing to Timothy, one of the marks is that they are unthankful. They are not truly thankful. you have something to be thankful for. And if you don't, if it doesn't come to mind, start thinking, start studying, and start counting your blessings and thanking God. We're very swift to complain. We have all these reasons to moan, and all these reasons that we could bring before God and say, this isn't fair. Just stop. Don't say, can God? Don't doubt God. Don't question God. But praise Him. for all He has done, and thank Him even when it's hard. And if there's nothing else that comes to mind, Christian, can you not thank God your sins are forgiven, that you'll never see the inside of hell? Though it may be that through much tribulation you enter the kingdom of God, it is amidst all that tribulation with the knowledge, my sins are paid for in full by Jesus Christ. It is well, it is well with my soul." May the Lord help us. Let's bow together in prayer. There's every reason for you to be thankful that you live in this country. Many criticisms can be offered for how things are in the present, but if you make your criticisms but you don't work for the better, then that's all you are. You're just a critic that brings nothing productive. Labor, labor for the kingdom. Labor for the glory of God on these shores, and that your neighbor may see what God has done for you, that they may even Asquanto came to know the same God of the pilgrims and desired that he might know the same peace that the pilgrims knew. Lord, help us. We have received great treasure. We have been blessed immeasurably. While we're thankful for a season that is in the not-too-distant future in which many in this land will pause to be thankful, we pray that this thanksgiving 400 years from the pilgrim's landing would be heightened with a true sense of gratitude. We pray that gratitude would be very clear from the lives of Thy people. Make us a thankful people. Help us, Lord, to appreciate the blessings we enjoy. And we ask, Lord, that You will deliver us from being so overly critical of those who have gone before that we fail to learn from their example in all the ways in which we can learn from them. Bless us here. We pray for our children. Let them not forget the Word of the Lord. Let them not lose sight of who Thou art, and we pray that Thou would help us to deposit in their hearts that which Thou has given to us, and that they may teach them to their children, and that from one generation to the next they might set their hope in God. And bless us then with this, and should there be one here in our midst who has never thanked Thee for saving their soul, who's never thanked Thee for forgiving their sins. I pray that You will have mercy on them this night and help them to see, amidst all the blessings of this land, the greatest blessing of all on the cross of Calvary. Be with us then in our fellowship. Bless those that go downstairs. May the grace of our Lord Jesus, the love of God our Father, and the fellowship of the Be with all thy people, now and evermore. Amen.