God has told us in Psalm 136, as we will be reading today in the response of reading, And we see in the rest of that Psalm 136, the refrain is, We understand that grace is a mercy. It's not something we've earned or that we deserve if we thank you for it. So I pray that that would give us gratitude in our hearts and that that would renew our gratefulness if we don't have any, because Lord, all throughout scripture, thou got very upset for those that were not thankful and grateful for what thou gave them. And today we thank thee, Lord, that we'll be looking in the service at the gifts and to be thankful for all the gifts that thou has given us. And as we see where we stand as Christians here at Pilgrim Presbyterian Bible Church, thou wilt lift our hearts up and just encourage us in thy word this morning. And to remember that to be grateful to our Lord God Almighty is a great blessing. And there's so many things that we can count our blessings. For those that are on their way, pray that thou wilt keep them safe and bless them. I pray for our churches around our Presbytery and other churches that are meeting with Bible believing pastors today. Thy church glorious here in the United States of America, where we're losing, we have been losing freedoms, but we still have the freedom to go into our churches. We thank you so much that we can worship and bless us. Pray for our prayer requests, a great list of them from Wednesday evening, a great many that are hurting, that have physical needs and many other needs. We pray for them as well. And I ask, Lord, as we go forward this morning, that that would give us a greater understanding of thy word, that we'll talk together and have a wonderful time of discussion. In thy name we pray. Amen. So this morning in Hebrews chapter 11, let's look at verses 13 to 16. And I think that one of the words here that we're going to be looking at this morning is a very familiar word because it's what our church is called. And I think that's important that we can look at that. So in Hebrews chapter 11, and we'll look at verse 13 in a minute, we're going to be looking at what a pilgrim is. And we're going to see the foundational principles. We have some verses that we can all read together. And since this is a Thanksgiving Sunday, I figured we would look at that and we'll talk about it. So in Hebrews chapter 11, as we've been studying basically in Wednesday evening prayer meeting, we looked at those clouds of witnesses that are gone before us and they're basically referred to here as pilgrims. Isn't that amazing? What a connection. Verse 13, it says, these all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off and were persuaded of them and embrace them and confess that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is in heavenly, whereof God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city. Think about that. That gives us some real liberty in our hearts for a lot of reasons. And the question is, and I have bits and pieces of parts of Thanksgiving messages that I put together every year, and I just kind of piecemeal and puzzle them together, because I kind of work at them through the year, and I hear comments, and I hear different things, and I write them down. I'm like, wow, this would be awesome to share with the congregation and us to learn together. And I put it together, and so basically, there's several, and this is part of one that I've worked on. And the question is, what is a pilgrim? That's a good question. It's the very first word on our sign at the end of the driveway. We're Pilgrim Presbyterian Bible Church, but what is a pilgrim? Anybody have any idea or any clues or maybe some like similarities to pilgrims you've heard of or anything like that? Matthew. Right. Kind of. Yep. Sojourner. That's great. Yeah. Charlie. Yes, that's the essence of what it's all about. We're strangers in a strange land, aren't we? That's what Peter says. And here Peter, after all of the Ups and downs he had in his ministry comes back and he writes and he says we're strangers in a strange land Think it not strange when strange things happen to us. I think that's extremely a Very that's very profound anyone else. What is a pilgrim? There's a famous actor that used to love to use that word is anybody remember who that was the Duke right He would say, whoa, take her easy there, pilgrim. Does that sound familiar? Strangers in a strange land, even in America. Boy, we're really starting to feel a lot more like pilgrims in America now, aren't we? Lisey. Yeah, it reminds me of 1 Peter 1, which is one of these verses. Sure. It says, when we call on the Father, Right in fear and there's there's so many verses like that where it's been identified that Christians they They have a dual existence kind of like and do this dual existence is one that loves his country and and is patriotic to it. And I have to say, well, I like to try to like cross over the messages with some modern times because everything that's here locks into so much of everything of what we see today. And I saw the camera and the reporter and he's, He's actually, I don't know his name, but he's a young guy. And I was watching Fox News Live. You guys ever see that? Not a big fan of Fox, but Fox News Live shows a lot of detail. And this young guy comes on at 11 o'clock at night, and I just hit the button. And he all of a sudden has this picture. And there's President Trump, Zewan Mandami, which he literally called Trump because he wanted to talk to him. And this young man says, what is wrong with this picture? And I looked at it hard, and I noticed what it was. He goes, what's wrong with this picture? And the first thing he says, young guy, we have a communist sitting in our White House. And look over his left shoulder. His left shoulder, there's a statue of George Washington. And he was like, boy, this is a problem. And George Washington wouldn't have allowed these things. He wouldn't have. Remember, you have to read that book about the Barbary pirates with Thomas Jefferson, and he spoke about the problems with protecting our borders and all. And when I see that, and I think to myself, there's so many people in our country that can really, really call themselves true patriots. that love their country, that want to do what's right, true Christian patriots that don't want to hurt people, but they want to protect the people in their land, that everyone has their own place. And in this land, people worked and died, and if you come in, you become a citizen, you do it the right way. But today, Christians now are starting to really feel like pilgrims, even in their own country. And this is basically a connection, basically what Israel was like. Think of the minor prophets and the major prophets. Don't ever think minor prophets means they were minor people. They were just smaller writings and all, but they were major. And you look at how Jeremiah, why was he a weeping prophet? Why? He was a patriot. He loved his Israel. Even though he was a stranger in a strange land, he loved it, and he never turned his back on his country. He loved his nation. He loved his God, and he knew that his nation was found because of the biblical principles. And that's what we have today. but we still feel like pilgrims. Anyone else have anything to say about Pilgrim? Pilgrim is not just a historical name. It's not just a claim to the new rival, to Plymouth, Massachusetts. We're strangers in a strange land, and here in America, this is a biblical word, the word pilgrim. In Middle English, from the Anglo-French, it means pelerine, pelegrine is what it's named. And from the Latin, pellegrinus, which means one, like Charlie said, one who journeys into foreign lands, basically, or is looking for another land. We see here that this is a very important word and it pops up very profoundly during Thanksgiving because of the pilgrims. And we see the pilgrims, we see the peanuts, the Thanksgiving peanuts. Don't you love that? And they're all sitting around and they have their black hats and they're dressed like pilgrims. Doesn't that warm your heart to see that? Well, we have an inheritance that is heavenly and it's not earthly. I guess I think that if we thought that our only destination for the rest of our existence would be here in America the way it is, and we had nowhere else to go, that would be kind of a scary feeling as a Christian, wouldn't it? But when you know that you love the Lord, this is not our ultimate destination, is it? This world is not our home, we're just a passing through. Obviously, I mean, I'm talking very fundamental, very elementary things. But we know that we're here for a short time, and that there is an incredible, incredible place we're going, that the Lord has prepared for us, John 14, 6, in my Father's house or many mansions. but we're pilgrims. We see some pilgrims here. I love how scripture not only talks about what these words mean, but gives us details about them. We see in our Christian patriarchs listed here in Hebrews 11.3, through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. But why? Why are they heavenly? We need to trust God in things we can't see. Faith is very substances. And do we have faith? Do we have faith to know that there is a better land for us? Do we have faith that we know that beyond all of the trials and the hardships and all of the bullets we're always dodging every day, that one day the bullets are going to stop flying at us? One day, finally. One day, we're going to be in a land where Our Lord Jesus Christ reigns. The only replacement or the only manifestation of this world is going to be the holes in His hands and His feet to show us how much that He loves us. It's amazing how incredible some of the sayings from the old founding fathers are out there talking about that place and this world not being our home and one day being with the Lord. There's so many wonderful sayings that are out there. The evolutionists swear us and sadly by God that God's name doesn't even exist. That basically, basically we let life existed millions of years ago. That's not what we're taught. Although it's very sick and demented today, the prevailing belief in our culture is that something came from nothing millions and billions of years ago. There's no empirical evidence of it, but people believe it more than they will God because they hate God. Why? When the Lord offers us such a wonderful landing place when we leave this earth and we're pilgrims, why do people want to believe this? It's incredible. But we have clouds of witnesses that proved to us that there was a creation, there is a real God, that we didn't come from nothing. They didn't believe they came from nothing. We see back in Hebrews 11, by faith Noah, verse 7, by faith Noah being warned of God of things not seen, as yet moved with fury, prepared an ark to the saving of his house, by the which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteous, which is by faith. Back in Genesis chapter six, verse two, and God looked upon the earth and behold, it was corrupt, but all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. Then verse 13, and God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me, for the earth is filled with violence through them and behold, I will destroy them on the earth. He was a major, one of the first clouds of witnesses we see. And how do we know? I mean, we can put some of these names together. How do we know? Why do we know that they were pilgrims? I mean, think about what some of these people went through. Why was Noah a pilgrim? Anyone? Stranger in a strange land? Lise. Yeah. Right. Right. I remember a pastor once saying that word unto actually doesn't mean looking unto, it means looking off unto. Right. Which means you have to look off of something first in order to look unto Jesus. And that's what those people did. Right. I just, I see this situation here with Noah where if you're going to be, you're speaking the word, you know, it took him a hundred years to build his ark, so this wasn't just a one-time shot of sharing the gospel with somebody and then just moving on. This was an ongoing thing for decades and decades and decades that he did. And he had to leave behind, it's sorrowful, his family knowing that a lot of people that he knew came through here. Amen. Well, the manifestation of his pilgrimage was what? Pretty big item. The manifestation of his pilgrimage was what? Huh? The Ark. And they think they found it. Do you see the pictures they've got? They've got these margins set on this drone, this satellite, and they think they found the silhouette of the Ark finally on Mount Ararat. That would be kind of cool. I mean, I don't know if it's true or not, but they sound like it's very possible. But the manifestation of his pilgrimage If you think, if you ever get down and depressed or upset, you know, and I do, I do. Why do we only have, I mean, I'd love to have more people in the church to contribute and love the word and to do, but why are we like this? Why is it like this? Look at his congregation for a hundred years. The people hated him. I love down there at the Creation Museum, they have an absolute replication of Noah. And you look at it, and I remember the kids were down there years ago, and there's a replica of Noah. And you think he's going to have this real happy look on his face with his hands up praising the Lord. Whoever did the artwork is incredible because he's got this horrible, depressing look on his face. And what it is, the inscription is there, is that the floods are coming. He's watching his family that would not come to the Lord and they're drowning. That was hard. And that's what it's like when you're preaching the truth to people that don't want to hear it. They don't even know it, but they're drowning. He's a pilgrim because he was willing to build that ark when there had never been a drop of rain. They'd never seen a drop of rain. They'd never seen a flake of snow. And all of a sudden the Lord said to do it. And today, every time I think of Noah, I think of the aircraft carriers that are out there in the ocean. Do you realize that their dimensions are based on the ark? Because those boats are so big, the primary dimensions that they go by, if you take it by the percentages of how it's built and the buoyancy and the way that they built that big enough to hold all that weight comes from the ark. And it had so many animals in it. And look at the faith walk that Noah had. What an incredible pilgrim. He had to leave his land. He literally had to leave the earth. The physical dirt of the earth, he wasn't on it for 40 days. The whole earth was covered with nothing but water, and he wasn't even touching his feet on the ground. He was in the ark all that time. And that's what a pilgrim, he was willing to be in that ark and serve the Lord, and it was incredible how the Lord himself shut the door of that ark. Can you imagine that? They didn't have any pulleys. They didn't have any forklifts. They didn't have a bunch of slaves or whatever, building all these, like, scaffolding, and, all right, we're going to lift it up, and then they all drown. No, all of a sudden, that door was open for anyone to come in that would trust the Lord. And not only would they not trust the Lord, they wouldn't even walk on the ark. The doors are open in Bible-believing churches every Sunday, and people won't even walk in the front doors to go hear a biblical message. The Ark was a sanctuary. Think about that. What's that Dave? Well yeah, they're getting ready to tailgate and all that today. And the Ark door was open and the people wouldn't even walk in it. Can you imagine if somebody would have just said to their family, You know, that ark's there. Why don't we go ask Noah what's going on? And he gives them the gospel and they go, Oh, Lord, forgive us. And they go in. They would have never drowned. They would not even walk in the door of the ark. They hated the Lord so much. And talk about faith. Noah, the Lord put that faith there. The Lord put it there. See, look about Hebrews 11, verses 8 and 9. Go back to Hebrews 11, verses 8 and 9. Maybe start with Noah. Could you read that? Noah. We got Noah. Hebrews 11, verses 8 and 9. Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and he walked with God. His generations were perfect, and he walked with God. I always love that. I mean, that's Genesis 6 and 9. Read Hebrews 11, verses 8 and 9. We'll look at another pilgrim here. Verse eight and nine. You're good. Go ahead. They are of the same promise. Don't you love that? The same promise. Do you ever think about that? They were all of like faith. And isn't that today? You see a Christian on television. All the years we've been listening to Charlie Kirk. all the other people that are on there that we listen, that are true born-again Christians that we see giving. I mean, you can watch all these things with Ray Comfort and John MacArthur and John Piper. You can look at Pastor Sproul and all these other pastors and some other ones actually. You can look at some actually local pastors. You can watch Adam Eshelman in a different way. Adam Eshelman's a wonderful pastor up there at RBC. He's very well... He's very well taught in Reformed theology. And our kids sometimes go up there on Sunday nights once in a while, and he does a great job with them. And I'm telling you, you've got pastors that you can listen to, and it's amazing, no matter what, they are preaching those things. that are of the same promise. Isn't it all? It's not wavering. As you go to James 1, verses 6 and 7, it talks about, James says something to the effect of how wavering is like a wave being tossed and fro in the sea, and those that waver will not be able to ask the Lord for anything. The Lord will not hear them, those that waver. It's amazing when you meet Christians how they are of like faith and they believe in the cross. They believe in the blood of Jesus Christ. They believe Abraham and Noah had the same promise and they knew that salvation was basically their resting place and their pilgrims. How do we know that? Go back to Genesis chapter 15. And we see verses 10 through... I'd like if somebody could read Genesis chapter 15, if you could help me out here, and read verses 10 to 15. Okay? and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another, but the birds divided them not. When the fowls came down upon the carcasses, Abram drove them away. And when the sun was gone down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and lo, a horror of great darkness fell upon him. And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger to the man, that is not theirs and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them 400 years. And also the nation whom they shall serve. Will I judge? And afterwards shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace. Thou shalt be buried in a good old place. Thank you, Teresa. Look at the pilgrimage there. Now, if you were paying attention, is this pilgrimage only talking about one little Abraham? Look at this. Abraham's already leaving his town. He's leaving. He's a pilgrim. He's leaving us. He's leaving it. And there, at some point, he stands there with Lot, and Lot looks down on Sodom and Gomorrah. He wants to go to Baltimore City. Lot wants Baltimore City. Abraham wants Whitehall, Maryland or Westminster. He wants to be out. He doesn't want to be in the city, and there's a lot. He wants the action. He wants the baseball team. He wants the casinos. He wants all the fun. You know, I'm just talking kind of stupidly, but he wanted to be with all the action was, and it just happens to be Sodom and Gomorrah. Isn't that amazing? And what happens in Sodom and Gomorrah. And what I don't understand is here I've been watching for the last couple of weeks on and off all of these things about these different... there was these different reels and things that are on television and stuff about these pastors all coming out and then they marry two pastors and they're throwing the rainbow flag in the face of the Christians. Because the Supreme Court just shut down the bill to turn over overturn overturn Same the same-sex marriage act and then they're doing all of this and there's these pastors telling them all about I think it's Deuteronomy 1822 Deuteronomy 1822, that's great But nobody talks about Genesis 19 Genesis 19 is the foundational principles of what happened to the sodomites. I don't think people even understand what it means. I I don't. I never hear that. Genesis 19 talks about how Lord sent that fire down and do you know that there's been two archaeological digs and they have pulled up these beams from down under the dirt by the Black Sea where a hundred feet down they excavated it and they found the charred remains of the beams They go back thousands of years. They're still there, petrified, but they were burned. I mean, this is true stuff. This is big stuff. And here we're talking about Abraham leaves us. He goes, he takes Sarah. They're wanderers for years. following the direction of the Lord, and then the Lord has this incredible, sacrificial, sanctified moment where He says, whatever you do, as Teresa just read, do not walk down the middle of those severed animals. Don't you go down there. I believe that if He'd have done that, I bet He'd have dropped dead just like Uzzah when He touched the testimony, or the Ark, the Ark of the Covenant. And He says, you stand back and you watch this. I don't know about you, but if I'm standing out in my backyard in the middle of the night, which I had a big campfire yesterday, got all this old wood to burn, and I'm standing there looking, it's kind of a cool sight though, isn't it? When you get up to your house and you've had like a little bonfire in the back and there's this little beam of light still back there, like in the middle of it, pitch black, and it was dark last night. It was really dark. And can you imagine standing in the dark and all of a sudden a smoking flax and a burning lamp appears? and it's levitating and it's going right down the middle. Nobody's holding it, no smoke and mirrors, no strings, no scaffolding above, but it's just there. And that's what Abraham was watching. And now he's standing there and the Lord's telling him that the severed animals, you are going to be having strangers in a strange land. Thousands and millions of them are going to be pilgrims. They're my people. They're going to be as the sands of the sea, as the stars of the sky. They are going to be in captivity, but there in 430 years, they're going to be delivered. And that's what it's about. And the Lord says, if my prophecy is not what I say it is, you can cut me up basically like those severed animals. And that's why they were there. They were there for a reason to show, to prove and to be an absolute symbolic confirmation that his prophecies are perfect. So what are the chances of all these prophecies coming up perfectly? What are the chances of that? You want to be a prophet? Everybody owes their prophets today? Oh my, there's this big movement today in all these big non-denominational churches where now they've got a... I was reading they're coming up with a new form of government and they're going to have five-tier system. They're going to have women pastors, they're going to have apostles. They want to have apostles. And I just would love to sit and debate in one of their session meetings, who is picking these apostles? And are you even beginning to think about the three criteria of an apostle? An apostle is an extension of an Old Testament prophet, basically. And a prophecy, you want to be a prophet? You don't have to be a technical prophet where you're healing people. You can't do that. You want to have prophecy, you read Scripture. Scripture tells you what's going to happen. Not one time has the prophecy ever been wrong. I'm a prophet. Very simple. Oh, that sounds stupid. Well, how do you know that you're a prophet? Well, I'm basically giving a prophet. I'm not saying I'm an actual prophet. I'm saying I have the ability to have some of the extensions and some of the manifestations of a prophet by being just to say, Jesus Christ is coming back a second time. That's a prophecy. You think that's not going to happen? He came back the first time, didn't he? He talks about the destruction of the earth. Al Gore is right. I'll give Al Gore one time, a blind squirrel finds an acorn every now and then in his life. He says that there is global warming. Oh, he's right. He doesn't know how right he is. Because it's going to be a fervent heat that's going to burn up all the filth that they've created, and it's coming. It may be tomorrow. It might be a thousand years from now. We don't know. But I know this, here's another prophecy. Another thing you can prophesy is what's not going to happen, is whenever somebody gives a date that Christ is coming back, they're always going to be wrong. Because the Lord says, no man knows the time or the day. And Christ in His humanity even said, I don't even know. He said that the Father knows. And He made that very clear as a manifestation of giving all of the credit to the Father. So we see here the second one, we see how Abraham is a pilgrim. He's a stranger in the strange land. And he was a pilgrim most of his life, wasn't he? Isn't that incredible? Abraham trusted in the Lord to be a stranger in a strange land. And this account of God's covenant with Abraham was incredible. He passes through these seven animals, and it was the glory of the Lord in a smoking furnace and a burning lamp, a revulgent glory, and Abraham trusted in the Lord. Abraham saw Christ by faith. Faith is substantive. I love in John 8, 56, you read, your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day. Oh, the Lord Christ had, he had the Pharisees over a barrel in this one. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and he was glad. He could prove that. What about Christ's doctrine? What about how Christ himself was a stranger in a strange land? Did you ever think about his doctrine and what he preached? Did you ever think that people thought that he could manifest the same absolute foundational principle that he could literally go before the high priests and the high priest could stand there and ask him of his doctrine and then he could actually manifest the fact that everybody heard it. Do you ever think about that? Can you imagine how many people heard that doctrine? Can somebody look up John 18 and read verses 20 to 22? I love this statement Christ makes it if you have a Thomas Thompson chain or whatever you'll be in red letters It'll be only two verses. I think it's actually I think it's verses 20 and 21 or 21 and 22 But it read verses 20 to 22 if you have it Research Why ask Thou me? Why ask them which heard me, that I have said unto them, Thou knowest what I have said? And when he had thus spoken, the theologians, which stood by, struck Jesus with the palm of their hand, saying, Answerest Thou the High Priest so? Thank you, Matthew. Doesn't the truth hurt? They struck him in the face. The high priest, if you go back to verse 19, says, tell us of your doctrine. Yeah, this is a little bit of a rabbit trail. Think about that. Christ is a stranger in a strange land, but he's given the absolute truth about heaven. How many times did he give the absolute truth about heaven and how it was manifested in the parables? It was manifested in his preaching. And you know what I hate about this? What you're watching here at verse 19 is woke liberal politics. The high priest knew what he said. They had scribes watching him like they were human drones. Wherever he went, they stood there at the tomb of Lazarus. They stood there on the Sea of Galilee. They tried to have him forced over a cliff. They were there every single time he preached and they knew exactly what he said. And there stands them trying to placate and trying to cater to the Roman Empire to act like he's an insurrectionist because he did not manifest his doctrine the way that he said he did. They called him a liar. And he says, what are you saying? Ask those. They heard me. They know what I said. They know about my doctrine. He said I spoke in the synagogues and even in the temples where all the Jews always resort. He said they're always there, basically, whither they always resort. Ask them. Ask them if I'm lying. Isn't it amazing? Not one person stood there and spoke out against him. He's incredible. I mean, the fact that things that he knew that were only manifested in a few books of the Bible, that alone should be enough. I mean, it was incredible what he said. That his doctrine is real. And this is the promise we're talking about. The same promise as Christians that we all love together as Christians. And he brings that together. Well, we see here also Moses. He had a great transition in his life. And here's the extension, that promise, that's melded in between Moses and Abraham. And look what happens here. We see here that Moses, he is in an incredible part of his life. And, oh, I'm so sick and tired of hearing about how elderly people have no place in society and they have absolutely nothing to contribute. Let me tell you something. You look at some of the presidents we've had, and you look at the fact that Ronald Reagan, he didn't even really take office and become what he did when he was in his 70s. That's incredible. Look at Donald Trump. He's incredible. That man's got more energy at 79 years old than most of the 20-year-olds put together today. Look at him. How old was Moses, what we're talking about here? How old was he? Now I'll give you a hint. Aaron was 80. If you don't remember, he's three years older. He's 83 years old. 83 years old! And people are not living to 300 and 400 and 500 years old anymore now. He's 83 years old and the Lord's now got him in the schoolroom and he's saying, you are going to fulfill the prophecy back given to Abraham. Strangers in a strange land. Boy, when was Moses not a pilgrim? I mean, when you're an Israelite and you're trained and you're raised and you're actually given a Harvard education in the University of Egypt, let me tell you something. You are a stranger in a strange land. And you're definitely a pilgrim when your mother takes you in a little ark and sails you down the Nile River and you don't get eaten by an alligator. He was starting off real early being a pilgrim, wasn't he? I mean, I don't know about you, but I don't remember going through that when I was less than one year old. That's incredible. We see here in Hebrews chapter 11, verses 23 to 27. Who can help me with that? Can somebody read Hebrews 11, 23 to 27? Moses gets an awful lot of coverage in the Hall of Faith here. St. Moses, when he was born, would take three months at his parents' because they saw he was a proper child, and they were not afraid to use cancer. By faith, he would come to years refused to be called the son of the married's daughter. Choosing rather to suffer affliction for the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, escaping the purge of Christ's greater riches and the treasures of Egypt, for he had respect unto the recompense of the reward. By faith he pursued Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king, but he adored and esteemed him. Thank you, Lisa. Wow, pilgrims, strangers in a strange land. Look at that. These pilgrims we've mentioned, they had not received their promises. When these pilgrims who, let me read this, who we have mentioned, had not received their promises, yet they sure enough saw them from afar off. They believed them, even though when they were not experiencing the benefits. See, we're always looking as Christians, and today we live in a real religious movement. It's always looking for benefits. Always looking for accoutrements. Always looking for all the big stuff. I love that thing that's out there that I've seen. It's a big sign. I've seen it. It's a big sign and I've seen it actually taking pictures of it online and different things. And there's a picture of a guy with beautiful black hair with big glowing white teeth and he goes, He goes, I should be prosperous. I should have everything. I should have this. I should have that. I said, you should do this and you should be prosperous and all. And it's this whole line of things that he says, you know, I'm talking about. And then there's this picture of ruddy old Paul, the apostle, which they've done a drawing of him. And it says all it says is, oh, wretched man that I am. And that's what Moses thought of himself. He had the promise. And there he is. It says, look what it says about recompense, Teresa. What it gets to me is that Moses, I know that his mother nursed him and all that, but it's so evident of God's prominence because truly, you know, you take a child that young and put him in an adopted home. Right. Some liberals or whatever. He's not going to know. Right. He's not going to know his, say the mother was a Christian or whatever. He's not going to know that as he grows, as he's taught. Right. The providence of God turned him right over to his mother, raising him. Right. And and it was the daughter of Pharaoh. The daughter had her father's heart and she wanted that baby to be protected. Remember, he had all the criteria of being thrown into the Nile River. He was a firstborn son and they were supposed to be murdered. The babies were supposed to be murdered. He was not supposed to live. And it shows what an incredible, incredible miracle that was. That's a great point, Teresa. Think about it. What an incredible happening there, where that baby, all the way out of the womb, he was supposed to be killed as the firstborn. His mother was supposed to kill him. That was the edict from Pharaoh. The women on the birthstools, remember the midwives, were supposed to kill the firstborn Israelite babies. Male. He should have died back in the house. He didn't die there, so the mother makes him an ark. I don't know about you, but I can tell you right now, I would not want my infant child to ever sail in an ark that I built. Never. And she makes this ark, immediately puts him in it, tiny little ark, and he sails down the Nile River, which has more crocodiles, alligators, snakes, and vermin than probably any river on the face of the earth, makes it all the way down there, And of all the people, it wasn't one of Pharaoh's soldiers that intercepted him. It was the daughter. I mean, all the way down, you can see the Lord working through his life, all the way up. And if that's not big enough, look at what he works at him at 83 years old and puts him in front of Pharaoh. He releases down his rod and it turns into a snake. You know the whole story, but look how incredible this is. And you read this, this is part of the prophecy, the promises that all come together. And we see another pilgrim, a stranger in a strange land. That man never was settled for hardly ever. Now, there is a Bible verse, and I believe Stephen, it's during Stephen's... I don't have it in front of me. I wish I did. Going back to what you said, because that's a very profound thing you said. Here, Moses is being directed of the Lord, and I believe it is Stephen when Stephen is giving his oration as he's getting ready to be stoned. And there's Saul of Tarsus holding the cloaks. He speaks about what happened there, about him killing that Egyptian, that it was actually a righteous judgment. It was not murder. I've heard pastors saying it was murder. The Bible doesn't call that murder. He was defending, and it shows how we defend. We are not supposed to watch somebody killing someone else and just stand there and let them do it. He was defending the life of that Israelite who was being tormented. And the problem was what turns around and puts a wax nose on that situation, the Hebrews, Israelites, they were so indoctrinated in the Egyptian call that they actually cried out against Moses. and they basically blamed him for murder when he buried that Egyptian. He was defending him but he had to run and that was the Lord using that as a way of getting him out of Egypt and getting him out of his comfort zone and getting him out into the wilderness. Then he sees his father-in-law out there and he's with him with the cattle. All that time, all those years, probably for probably a good 40 years he was out there in that wilderness and he was with his father-in-law. Another manifestation of a pilgrim. A couple more minutes and we'll stop. These pilgrims we've mentioned so far, they had a lot that they had to put on their whole armor of faith there. Why is it so difficult? Where is our faith? Why are we so worried all the time and frantic when things don't feel the way they should be? Where is the hope? Where is the faith in our own lives? And life can be really tough. But our Lord Jesus Christ has overcome the world. Psalm 34, verse 4 says, I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all of my fears. A couple of verses. Let's look up and then we'll finish here. We're winding down already. But look at the expectations. Look at the spiritual, the incredible spiritual persuasions that are out there about this pilgrimage. Somebody turn over and read chapter Hebrews 13 verse 14. I have three verses. We'll do them one at a time. And this is actually under the heading of pilgrimage. Hebrews 13, 14. All right, think about that. Now look at the other two verses and let's talk about this pilgrimage. Can someone else? Thank you, Dave. 2 Corinthians 4.18. That's 2 Corinthians 4.18. 2 Corinthians 4.18. Anyone? Amen. How do we see the things which are not seen? Faith. That's right. Faith. It's the substance. It's substance. Faith is the hope, substance of things hoped for, of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report. But how else do we see it? King David made that very manifest all throughout Psalm 119. I love Psalm 119, 176 verses. Think about it. This. Don't forget about this, Scripture, that incredible Bible where David, I'll say it again and again and again because I love it and I love it and I love it. He regards Scripture as his heritage, his remembrance, his testimony, his judgments, his law, his words, his counselor. All the way down the line, over and over, he says, it's my remembrance. Why? Because we're always forgetting it. We have to remember it. You've never driven to some place so many times that for a few years you don't go there and you try to drive and maybe have a couple of questionable roads and you miss that road and you forget about it. You know, you have to read that map over and over and over again to get those roads straight. And basically, you know, in order to be able to find that, that's the way to heaven. It's getting in Scripture. It's your remembrance. It shows you these things. It emboldens you. It strengthens you. And we always have the short notion, because of our carnal wickedness that we're born in, We always tend to forget that this book here is an incredible, powerful book that has the Holy Spirit, that has the power, as Martin Luther said, it has arms, it has legs, it has movement, it can move you to salvation, it has the power of salvation in it. And that is how we have that faith, and it's how we see through these things. You know, you have to remember, we have this blessing, Moses didn't have this. And the apostles in the New Testament, they didn't have the New Testament. They had certain writings of the Old Testament. But we have the whole thing. We don't have much of an excuse, do we? So we see here what an incredible job Moses did. We see that Abraham and there's so many more we could look at. There's so many other ones, even some of the prophets. Christ himself, of course, but we see here We're strangers in a strange land because the world is not our home. As the hymn says, I'm just passing through. And Psalm 119, 54 to 56 says, thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage. That's back in Psalm 119, of course. I have remembered thy name, O Lord, in the night and have kept thy law. This I had because I kept Thy precepts. Thou art my portion, O Lord. I have said that I would keep Thy words." There's some of those names for Scripture right there, just in a few verses. So we see here that when Hebrews closes in this credible hall of faith, we see here in chapter 11, verse 32, "'And what shall I say more? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthah, of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets, who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword out of weakness, were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. Women received their dead, raised to life again. And others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. and others had trials of cruel mockings and scourging, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword. In fact, I read that basically Isaiah was the one saw in a sunder with a wooden saw. They were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins. John the Baptist being destitute, afflicted and tormented. And here's what I love. Of whom the world was not worthy. What a beautiful statement. They wandered in deserts and in mountains and in dens and in caves of the earth. I think of the Nigerians right now, what's happening to them. and how horrible that is. And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, receive not the promise, God having provided some better thing for us, that day without us should not be made perfect. That's incredible. And basically these clouds of witnesses, and you know, can you imagine if there was another part of the scripture read today, the names that would be in those clouds of witnesses that have gone before us? Now, you're going to have to, since you're in this church, you're going to be able to maybe snicker with this with me, but I just heard another saying, I haven't put it out yet, I want to put it out, but it came from George Whitefield, and I just heard it two days ago, and guess what he said? He goes, and paraphrasing it a little bit, he's saying, we were all born Arminians, but by the grace of God, we have been conformed to be Calvinists. He kind of loved that. You know, I think Calvin would be of that hall of faith. I think that Whitfield would. I think that Jonathan Edwards would be, Martin Luther, you know, Melanchthon, and some of these wonderful men of the Reformation. They would all be part of that, part of the Reformation and all, and part of the Great Awakening. There are many other pastors, so many of the Puritans. John Bunyan, think of him. Think of Pilgrim's Progress. Talk about a stranger in a strange land to a pilgrim. Reading that, that's an incredible, incredible, wonderful allegory about this world not being our home as a pilgrim. So we'll finish there, and I think I'll ask, say maybe, Greg, could you close us this morning? Thank you.