This message was given at Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. At the end, we will give information about how to contact us to receive a copy of this or other messages. Turn to Genesis chapter 19. This is one of the drawbacks to consecutive expository preaching. Verse 30. Lot went up from Zoar and stayed in the mountains and his two daughters with him, for he was afraid to stay in Zoar. And he stayed in a cave, he and his two daughters. And the firstborn said to the younger, our father is old and there's not a man on the earth to come into us after the manner of the earth. Come, let us make our father drink wine and let us lie with him that we may preserve our family through our father. So they made their father drink wine that night and the firstborn went in and lay with her father and he did not know when she had laid down or when she arose. And on the following day, the firstborn said to the younger, behold, I lay last night with my father, let us make him drink wine tonight also, then you go in and lie with him that we may preserve our family through our father. So they made their father drink wine that night also and the younger arose and lay with him and he did not know when she laid down or when she arose. Thus, both the daughters of Lot were with child by their father. The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab. He is the father of the Moabites to this day. As for the younger, she also bore a son and called his name Ben-Ami. He is the father of the sons of Amon to this day. Now if you take your Bibles and turn to 2 Peter chapter 2, starting at verse 4, For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness reserved for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly, and if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example, to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter, and if he rescued righteous lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men, for by what he saw and heard, that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment." This is the word of the Lord. Well, years ago we had planned a family vacation and Kids had started to save their money. And Zach had actually squirreled away about $60, which, of course, wasn't bad for an eight-year-old. He saved birthday money. He worked extra chores. And so we finally arrived to our destination. It's actually on my way to preach in Powell, Wyoming, and we decided we would take a family vacation and spend most of it in Yellowstone. And we arrived, Yellowstone is a great, great place. And we arrived, and of course, the gift shop was already calling Zach's name. I mean, what kind of cool stuff is in the gift shop in Yellowstone? And so what we decided was that we would actually go through the park first and then make our way to the gift shop for him to waste all of that money. And I remember asking Zach, Zach, do you want me to hold your money for you? He looked at me as if I said, Zach, do you want me to take your money from you? He said, no dad, I'll hold it myself. I will put it in my shirt pocket. I said, are you sure? He said, yes. And so we went through the park and we had these two little boys that of course were running around like two little wild Indians. And then we came to the paint pots. And if you've ever been there, it's absolutely fascinating place. And Zach would run out ahead of us, run to the end of the walkway, drop down, look over with his face just inches away from boiling sulfuric stuff. Told him that wasn't a good idea, but he'd flop down and get a good close look at those paint pots. And this went on for quite a while, and finally we're standing there waiting to see Old Faithful, and Zach looks at me and says, Dad, do you have my money? I said, no, you said you would hold it. And he said, my money's gone. So of course, $60 to an eight year old, it might as well be 60,000. And so we retraced the steps. I know in my mind, we're not gonna find a wad of $60 just laying somewhere. And so we went through and we looked and of course we couldn't find it. And I had a suspicion that what had happened in his zeal to get his face down as close to the paint pots as possible, that it popped out of his pocket and probably got disintegrated by the paint pots. And so after we had looked for what seemed a long time, we gave it up as lost. And of course, at that moment, the gift shop lost its luster. And I even remember standing there kind of feeling a pit in my own stomach as I thought about what he must be experiencing as an eight-year-old boy who had just lost his entire fortune. $60 lost. As lot, fleeing Sodom. The sense of loss for Lot must have been overwhelming. You have to understand that he had made his home there. And so all of this hard work, his wealth, his business, his home, his position, all of it was gone. There was nothing he could take with him except evidently a bottle of wine. Well, here's the problem. The problem is that though Lot lost his money and his possessions, what he really lost was much more than his money and his possessions. I would argue that Lot lost a part of his soul. In fact, when somebody drifts, they always lose more than they realize. The sad thing is, is that some of you today are drifting, you're lingering in this world, you're lingering over your own sin, there's no sense of urgency to run for your life. I pray you listen today. I can almost guarantee you that as Lot sat in that cave, it would be little comfort to him that near 4,000 years later, the apostle Peter would call him righteous. In fact, Sodom had taken a part of Lot's soul that he would never, ever get back. makes $60 look like nothing. Now, the Bible says that Lot was a righteous man. Did you see that in 2 Peter 2? In fact, it says it twice. Verse seven, if he rescued righteous Lot, Lot, of course, being oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men. And then Peter says, for by what he saw and heard that righteous man. Does this confound anybody? This righteous man, what he saw and heard while living among them felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds. Now, this frankly throws us for a loop because if we read the entirety of Genesis chapter 19, we read the first part last week, we read this last sorted part this week, it seems to us that Lot is far, far from righteous. But I wanna tell you that Peter is actually saying something more than Lot was justified. I think that's true, Lot was a justified man, but I actually think that Peter is saying that Lot was ethically a righteous man. It's far too convenient just to take the word righteous at this point and just say he was a justified man who was living a very godless life. It's far more complicated than that. In fact, Lot himself is an incredibly complex person when you think about it. On the one hand, he is a righteous man, but on the other hand, he himself progressively degenerates. Bruce Waltke captures Lott's complexity. He says, Lott tries to be a blessing, but instead appears as a bungler and a buffoon. He fails as a host, as a citizen, as a husband, as a father. He wants to protect his guests, but needs to be protected by them. He tries to save his family, and they think he's joking. Afraid to journey to the mountains, he pleads for a little town, but afraid of the town, he flees to the mountains. Thanks be to God that his salvation depended wholly on God's mercy and Abraham's blessing. I want to suggest to you this morning that Lot was a righteous man, not a perfect man. It's obvious. Lot was a righteous man in at least two demonstrable ways. The first is Lot's hospitality. Now remember that hospitality in the ancient world was not only a virtue, it was actually a sacred duty. And what Lot most definitely tries to do is Lot most definitely tries to meet the challenge. He not only offers hospitality to his visitors, but he actually seeks to protect them when the violence begins to increase. In fact, how easy would it have been for Lot to simply throw the visitors out saying, okay, I did my best, but things are getting a little violent here, and so let me just, you guys, why don't you go out and meet the neighbors and lock the door behind him? Now to be sure, what Lot does in offering his daughters is abominable. There's simply no way to justify Lot trying to prevent one evil by offering another, all right? But his intentions right up to the end were to protect those that were under his roof. In the ancient world, that was the mark of a righteous man. There's something else, though, about Lot that stands out, and this is what Peter capitalizes on. Would anybody disagree with the fact that Lot, in fact, was a compromised man? Well, of course he was a compromised man, but even in the midst of being a compromised man, his own standard of righteousness never completely collapsed. And you say, well, Borgman, it sounds like you're really scraping the bottom of the righteousness barrel here. But notice, it's what Peter says. Peter says actually that his righteous soul was being vexed day after day with the things that he heard and the things that he saw. You know, what's interesting is that as we get to Genesis chapter 19, where do we find Lot? We find Lot sitting in the city gate. Now, of course, as we mentioned last week, this is an official position. The people that sat in the gate were the ones that made legal decisions and made civil decisions for the town or the community. But isn't it interesting that here's Lot sitting in the city gate at nighttime. I just wonder, I wonder if, if, if in fact this was lots practice to actually help unsuspecting visitors to avoid Sodom's welcoming parties. To be sure, when the sodomites actually come to Lot's house, he calls them friends, but he also tells them that what they are about to do is a great wickedness. Now, Abraham was convinced that Lot was righteous. Don't you know that he was counting on Lot being one of those 10? Be sure, Lot's moral edge had been blunted, but he never lost his moral compass. He never experienced a moral collapse, and so even in the midst of compromise, he still had a fundamental sense of what God said was right and what God said was wrong, and he didn't move from that. In fact, he acted upon it, although acting inappropriately. The interesting thing, though, is not only can we say, well, Peter says that Lot was a righteous man, and we can kind of sift through and try to find out why Lot would have been called a righteous man, but what seems even more abundantly clear is that the Bible presents Lot's degeneration. The Bible has no interest in sanitizing its characters. We're gonna see Abraham blow it a few more times before we're done, all right? The Bible has no interest in presenting these sanitized, halo-wearing Bible characters. These are real people with real sins and real failures, and what we have with Lot is one of God's people, indeed a righteous man. who degenerated in ways that the loss was great. You've heard, of course, of Pilgrim's progress. Derek Kidner makes the observation that not even brimstone could turn Lot into a pilgrim. And what we have is not Lot's progress, but Lot's regrets. We have a man who lingers and then a man who drifts. And what we have is a man who allows Sodom to make its dark impressions, not only upon him, but upon his family. And although Lot was righteous, there is no way to make an argument that he was consistently righteous. There were areas of his life which were indeed compromised and decisions that he made in his life which were for the sake of convenience so that in the end, Sodom shaped Lot far more than he knew and took from him far more than he realized. I'd like you to consider a few things with me this morning as we think about lot. The first is that lots sitting in the gate of Sodom. That's how chapter 19 opens up. And what's interesting is to ask the question, how did he get there? How did he get there? I alluded last week that it could very well have been Lot kind of riding on Abraham's coattails because Abraham had actually rescued the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah and the five kings back in chapter 14. And it could have been that Lot was seeking a position of influence in Sodom and perhaps really capitalized on his relationship with Abraham. Maybe even putting up in his front yard a little sign that says, vote for Lot, Abraham's nephew. It could be maybe that Lot married Mrs. Lot, she's unnamed, and maybe Mrs. Lot was connected. Whatever the case, the fact is is that when we arrive in Genesis 19, he is sitting in a place of prestige and power at the city gate. And I wanna remind you how he got there. Back in chapter 13, you'll remember that Uncle Abraham has herds and flocks that are growing and Lot, merely by his attachment to Abraham, is becoming wealthy as well. They both start to have large herds and large flocks and their herdsmen now are bickering over water rights. And Abraham, in an act of unbelievable humility, gets his nephew Lot and just basically says, Lot, we need to separate. We have too much between us. Abraham's the one who should have made the choice. But he so graciously and humbly lets Lot make the choice. Where do you want to go, Lot? And Lot eyes the luxuriant Jordan Valley. And Lot, yes, selfishly chooses the so-called greener pastures, leaving the highland desert to uncle Abraham. And what's interesting is that when we see Lot making this decision and choosing the Jordan Valley, we also see Moses, the writer, informing us that the wickedness of the men of Sodom was great. In other words, Lot knew what he was getting into. And so Lot's path of degeneration begins with an incredibly selfish decision But then from there, we see him pitching his tent as far as Sodom. So the picture is, is that there's the city of Sodom, and maybe right outside of the outskirts of Sodom, their lot decides to pitch his tent. He'd been a nomadic person with Abraham for years. They lived in tents. And so here's Lot, and what we find is that he pitches his tent outside facing Sodom, but then when we actually see what happens in Genesis chapter 14, where Abraham has to rally his men, we actually find Lot not pitching his tent as far as Sodom, but we find Lot now living in Sodom. When Locke chose the Jordan Valley, he didn't just simply say, you know what? I think what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna make the decision right here and now that I'm gonna be such a part of that society and such a part of that culture that I'm gonna be one of those sitting in the gates. That's not how it works. It's small decisions. It's small decisions that end up leading to big tragic ones. And so then we see in Genesis 14, Lot is rescued along with the king of Sodom and the inhabitants of Sodom. And I want you just to think about this. Here Lot is taken captive and who comes to the rescue? Uncle Abraham, who is blessed of the Lord, maker of heaven and earth. Does it not seem reasonable to us to think that once Abraham actually exhibited the blessing and the power and the strength of the Lord, that Lot may have thought at that point, you know what? There's better places to live. And instead he has an opportunity and that opportunity to make change is missed. And instead, he becomes one, and this is Genesis chapter 19, who is sitting in the gate and then has a house in Sodom. So you have to see the progression. He's the one who chooses that region. He's the one who sets his tent up outside the city. He's the one who is then inside the city. He's the one who's then rescued with the city. And then he is the one who builds a house in the city and ends up becoming an official in the city. And you say, well, didn't Sodom need a good witness? The answer is yes, Sodom needed a good witness and Lot was not it. Imagine somebody coming to Abraham and saying, Hey, Abraham, how is lot doing? And Abraham would simply have to say, Ah, I don't know. Last time I saw him, he was heading in the wrong direction. Lot drifts, his drifting is really nothing but compromise, and here's the thing is that Sodom had so much to offer, business connections, political connections, the opportunity to make more money, and you could imagine Lot just saying, this is, what a life, okay, I don't like the morals of the city in which I live, but after all, I am a witness for Yahweh here. Ian Duguid says, Lot never totally identified with the world in which he lived, yet at the same time, he was unwilling to leave it behind. Well, what about Lot's family? You know, if you think about Lot's family, when Abraham raises Isaac, and Isaac is of marriageable age, do you know what Abraham says? He says to his servant, You need to go back to our family because I don't want my son marrying a Canaanite. Right? Lot's daughters are engaged to two Canaanite men from Sodom. Somehow, the Bible doesn't say this, but somehow, compared to Abraham's wise and righteous decision when it comes to his son marrying, you have to look at this and you have to say, what was Lot thinking? What was Lot thinking? Those girls are, once they get of marriageable age, Uncle Abraham has lots of people in his family now, and he's got servants who know the Lord and serve the Lord, and yet what he does is he is so inculturated that they were engaged to Sodomite men. Where does Lot find his wife? He didn't move to Sodom with her. He married a Sodomite woman who, by the way, loved Sodom. So much so that when she's supposed to be running for her life, she longingly looks back and is destroyed with the rest of Sodom. Winlot is in the cave, by the way, with his daughters. The stain of Sodom is on their souls and it's an indelible stain. What you see in that cave with Lot and his daughters is nothing less than the cultural imprint of Sodom upon their morals. At the end of the day, Lot raised a family that loved Sodom. They absorbed it. They breathed in its air. They soaked in its morals. They got enculturated into Sodom. Ian Duguid again says, you can take Lot and his daughters out of Sodom, but it's a lot harder to take Sodom out of them. Which, by the way, young people, is why the Bible tells us, do not be deceived. Bad company corrupts good morals. Watch who your friends are. Watch who you hang out with. If you walk with fools, you'll become a fool. Well, what about Lot's witness? Angels are in Lot's house. Who do you have here? Well, I've got two daughters and two future sons-in-law, and warned them to flee. And so Lot, and I don't know the logistics, maybe they're staying in the house, maybe their house is close enough to Lot's, I don't know. Lot goes to these two young men, and what does he do? He warns them to flee from the coming judgment. He warns them actually that God's wrath is coming upon this city. We need to leave and we need to leave now. And Lot's future sons-in-laws look at him and think he's joking. Ask yourself, why would they think he was joking? If you started talking to somebody about eternal punishment in a place called hell, and they looked at you and started laughing at you and thought that you were joking, maybe it would be because there was something about your life and your words that never gave a sense of credibility that that's what you really believe. They laugh. A life which actually has the mantle of compromise all around it is hardly convicting when they try to get serious. Do you understand that? A.W. Tozer used to say, you can't be both a prophet and a clown. Could it be that Lot had actually never even told them? that there is a judge who will judge all of the earth and he always does right. Why would they laugh? One commentator puts it like this. Having seen his life, they couldn't hear his words. His life had no influence for good. Another one says his words carried no weight. His faith was not followed and his God was not honored. Boy, you talk about convicting parents, your kids actually just see compromise. You got a Bible, you go to a Bible-believing church, and yet what those eyes see is compromise. What those eyes see and what those ears hear is a willingness to tear down other people, or to dishonestly take advantage of somebody, or to gossip. or to use foul language, language that you would never dream of using in front of a fellow church member, and yet the words come out so easily in front of your children. And then, then you turn around and you say, now, it's really important that you know you need to believe in Jesus. You understand, most of our kids who end up rejecting the faith, they don't end up rejecting the faith because they've judged it intellectually and found it wanting. Oftentimes, what they do is they look into their parents' lives and evaluated its power and found it wanting. Oh my. Quiet. You understand that as parents, we'll never do everything right. And as parents, we will sin. Oh, but my goodness, at least let our children know that that imperfect parent of mine who is a sinner actually has a savior whom he loves and adores and will follow to death. Lot's influence on his family was nil. And so what in the world had Sodom done to Lot? No influence on his family, no influence on his community. And then ironically, do you know where the Bible leaves Lot? In a cave. This man is so conflicted. Please let me stay in Zoar. I get to Zoar. I can't stay here. I got to go to the mountains. And then to have daughters that are so morally confused. No influence on his family. No influence on his community. You see, I have no doubt that Lot believed wholeheartedly that what he was doing, he was doing for the sake of God and for the good of his community, but at the end of the day, the proof was in the pudding and there was nothing positive coming out of Lot's life. The Bible never tells us that he went back to Abraham. He'd lost everything. He didn't have any more herds or flocks to water. And yet he never goes back. And his story is a story of unbelievable, tragic loss. On the one hand, yes, a righteous man. But I remind all of us here today that a righteous man is not exempt from the consequences of bad choices. One commentator says, so he ended his days in misery and depravity, a sorry shell of what he once was. You're probably thinking, you know, I come to church to feel good. Well, if you come to church to feel good, I think you might need to look for another church, because there's something more important than feeling good, and it's actually hearing God's truth. Make no mistake, Lot is no Abraham. Lot is no Abraham. He's a righteous man, as we've pointed out, but he's no Abraham. What you need to grasp today is that Lot had made a series of concessions, and a series of bad decisions, and a series of compromises, and he ends up just drifting. Here's the thing about drifting. You don't know what's happening when it's happening. Drifting is imperceptible. Drifting you only know that you've drifted when you look up and actually see how far from the shore you are Nobody nobody being lulled in the boat says I wonder if I'm drifting they just think lovely day at the sea And then they wake up He drifted And when he wakes up, he finds out how far he's drifted because he finds himself in a cave with his two daughters, drunk and D based. Those daughters, moral compass, of course, radically confused by the Sodom influence. And here's the legacy of lot. He'll have two grandsons, Moab and Ben-Ammi. Moses is actually careful to tell us Lot's legacy. Do you know Moab and the Ammonites? Moab and the Ammonites will in fact, from this point onward, be the traditional enemies of the people of God. The Moabites and the Ammonites actually are going to be those who continually persecute and oppress the people of God, demonstrating that they themselves are outside of God's covenant love. Now, I do have to tell you that there was this one Moabite who happened to become the great grandmother of King David and ends up becoming a part of that royal messianic line. And her name was Ruth. What does that tell you? It tells you that God is still in control. God is sovereign over our bad choices. But again, let me just tell you, Lot dies a long time before he ever knows what becomes of that certain Moabitess. This is his legacy. As people look back on Lot, you know what they looked at? They looked at the guy that barely got out of Sodom. As they looked at Lot's legacy, you know what they looked at? They looked at a wife that turned into a pillar of salt. They looked at future sons-in-laws who were consumed with the other Sodomites. They looked at two daughters that were so unbelievably confused that they get their father drunk in order to bear offspring. And then they look at these two peoples. You feel like Lot? Well, let me remind you of something else this morning. Lot received mercy. in spite of his lingering. Do you know who does that? God. God. Who is a pardoning God like Thee? Who has grace so rich and free? And I want to point something out here, and that is that it is absolutely precious that Lot escapes the judgment through the mercy of God. Lot escapes the judgment of Sodom through the mercy of God, but Lot would not escape that indelible influence of Sodom upon his soul. So sad. Spurgeon puts it like this. Lot was slow when he should have been fast, backward when he should have been forward, trifling when he should have been hastening, loitering when he should have been hurrying, cold when he should have been hot. Lots of cautionary tale, is he not? The apostle Paul could write in 1 Corinthians 10, these things happened so they would be an example to you upon whom the ends of the age has come, so that you would not be idolaters, so that you would not be adulterers, so that you would... So we have Lot as a cautionary tale to us. And the first thing that Lot's life says to us is this, stop lingering over your darling sins. Stop it. This is a one-way path to degeneration. Stop lingering. We get so surprised because we get caught up in sin and sin that overtakes us. And the sin that overtakes us is so awful. And we think to ourselves, how could I have done that? And Lot says, you lingered. You lingered. You looked too long. You hung out too long. You put yourself in the wrong environment. You put yourself in a way in which it was too easy for you to flirt with Sodom. So don't be surprised. Lots of cautionary tale to us that says don't compromise. Don't compromise. Don't make the little moral decisions in the wrong direction because the time will come if you make enough small moral choices in the wrong direction and then you're faced with the bigger moral choice. You've already been conditioned to choose wrong. You remember the story of King David when he's up in the cave and Saul comes in to relieve himself. It's Bible talk for a potty break. And David and his men, his men are like, wow, what a blessed day this is. God has just handed over your enemy to you. He is completely unaware, take him out. And David is a man of principle. And David says, I will not stretch forth my hand against the Lord's anointed. In other words, David said, you know what? I know that I've been anointed king. I know that my kingship is an inevitability in Israel's history, but I have no right just because that's what God has promised to take this into my own hands and to violate the principles of my God. In fact, you remember what he does. He cuts off a little hem of Saul's garment. And what does the Bible tell us about David? It tells us that David's conscience smote him for what? For cutting off, really? You know what we would have done? We would have thought, I could have killed him. What's the big deal about a little piece of the garment? We're so good at justifying, justifying, justifying. David's heart was crushed with conviction. And I will tell you that it is that same David held by the principles of God and a sensitive conscience. It is that same David who years later will take a second look at a woman bathing on her roof. And it's that same David who inquires, who is that? And he hears the words Bathsheba. the wife of Uriah. Oh, every step of the way, God is throwing roadblocks for David to make the right decision. Bring her to me. And the king of Israel commits adultery with one of his loyal servants' wives. You know the story. So this degenerates so badly that when David tries to cover up the pregnancy, then what does he do? He actually tries to have Uriah killed and successfully does with a number of other Israelites. And you know what you say? Oh, how the mighty have fallen. How do you go from the guy that his conscience is smitten from cutting the corner of Saul's garments to a man who will steal another man's wife and then kill him? I will tell you that that path is not one decision or two, it is hundreds of decisions. Hundreds of decisions that go the wrong way so that when that big decision comes, we are conditioned to choose what the heart wants instead of what God wants. Saul doesn't find, or Lot doesn't find himself in Sodom just simply by accident. He finds himself there by a series of dozens, if not hundreds, of compromising decisions. So watch your heart. Watch your company. Watch your environment. Guard your heart from lingering. Guard your heart from drifting. Maintain, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, certain moral principles from his word that you will not budge on. This is a part of who I am. This is the belt of truth that girds my loins. This is what keeps me strong and I will not compromise. Maybe you're sitting here this morning and you know the Lord. But you also know that you've been making really bad choices. And you also know that if you had enough courage to peek up and look over the boat, that you've drifted farther from the shore than you'd like to realize. I have one simple word for you. Turn to Christ and turn today. Don't wait. Don't wait. Turn to Christ. Turn to the one who bore your sins in his body on the cross. Turn to the one who overcame death and hell and rose up from the grave. Turn to the one who is seated at the right hand of the Father and can give you all of the grace and all of the mercy that you need in your time of need. Turn to him. Why would you wait? And you say, well, I feel like I've lost something. I feel like the lingering and the compromise that I've lost something. I want to tell you, what you find in Christ is you find a savior who will forgive. Give us of our sins and who will restore things unto us not saying that everything is going to be the same and not saying that there won't be Consequences but most certainly saying that there is forgiveness. There's a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins Sinners plunge beneath the flood, lose all their guilty stains. Run to Christ. Run to him today. Don't wait. Don't think, well, you know what? What I need to do is I need to figure out how to move out of Sodom first. No, go to Jesus. He does moving adventures all the time. Run to Christ. You know what happened to Zach, don't you? We went into that gift shop and he didn't have a dime. I could have said, well, little boy, that's what you get for not listening to your daddy. Wow. bows and arrows, fake gold, Marshall badges, six shooters in holsters with caps. Oh my goodness. $60 would have bought all of that and more. How sad for you? I could have done that, but I didn't. I said, you can pick out one bag of jelly bellies and that's it. No. I said, what do you want? What do you want? And I bought it for him. $60 to me was not nearly as much as it was to him. I bought it for him. That's what our father's like. Run to him and you will find a God who is abundant in mercy and loyal love and forgiveness. I suspect, indeed I know, we'll see a lot in heaven. And there will be part of us that's sad, but he'll be there rejoicing with all the saints. Question is, what about you? Are you gonna get there the hard way? By the skin of your teeth? Smelling like smoke? Are you gonna get there in the abundant grace that Christ provides for his people? Let's pray. Lord, let us take this warning to heart. So much at stake. in day in and day out life. We pray that we would pursue you, that we would seek you, that we would love you above all things, especially this world which is passing away. Father, we thank you for the righteousness of Jesus Christ that clothes us. We thank you for the transforming power of the Holy Spirit that changes us. We pray that you would set our minds on things above where Christ is. Work mightily among your people, Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen. We hope you've enjoyed this message from Grace Community Church in Minden, Nevada. To receive a copy of this or other messages, call us at area code 775-782-6516 or visit our website gracenevada.com.