We are working through a series called The Names of God. and just kind of hitting these major Old Testament names, and you are familiar with this, and yet I wanna keep reviewing it, and I might even be on a quiz later today. You hang in there, we'll see, okay? First of all, there is the name Yahweh, and that is the Lord's personal name. That's the covenant name of our God. It's generally translated all caps, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D. And again, a lot of people aren't used to thinking of that. I have a name. My name is Greg. God has a name. It's not God. His name is Yahweh. And so that's helpful for us to know. And there's compound forms. We've covered Yahweh, Rapha, the Lord our healer, and we covered Yahweh Sabaoth, the Lord of Hosts. We're going to see that one pop up. And we covered Yahweh Tsidkenu, and that would be the Lord our righteousness, and there's others. And then secondly, we covered Adonai, and that would be that our God is Lord, And normally we would see that translated as capital L, lowercase o-r-d. So in our Old Testaments when we see LORD, not all caps, but just the L is capped, typically that would be at nine. And so when you personally know Yahweh, what do you do? You submit to Him as Lord. And so we have the name Yahweh, we have the name Adonai. We have the most frequent name for our Creator God, and that's Elohim. And that's how the Old Testament introduces God. And so we have this term, Elohim, and many compounds that come off the basic form of Elohim, which is El. And so we have covered El, Elion, God Most High. And we have covered El Shaddai, I think that's a popular one, God Almighty. Last week we covered El Olam, which is the eternal or everlasting God. And tonight we have another compound form coming off of El that I'm excited about. El Gibor. You say, what does that mean? Our warrior God. God is a warrior. You say, what does that word mean? It means someone who's courageous, someone who is strong. It means someone who's a man, like a real man. That's God, okay? I'm gonna set this up with an illustration. If you were really wealthy, really just kind of super well-to-do, maybe military connections, political connections, business connections, you would have a bodyguard. I think you know that, right? These really wealthy athletes, they always have someone just a couple steps away, somebody who is paid to do nothing but to keep them safe. If I were anywhere near the border of Israel there and I would want a bodyguard, if I were a very wealthy person, the kind of person that maybe somebody would try to kidnap or something like that, I would want a bodyguard. And if you said, Greg, what kind of bodyguard would you want? Just me personally? Give me a Navy SEAL. That's what I would want. I've read a number of biographies on Navy SEALs, and these guys are warriors. I mean, guys who just back down at nothing. I get all the different ones. I remember reading of a guy, he's in a fight, and some kind of device goes out, and he basically, the gun's blown out of his hands, his right hand is basically blown off. He doesn't stop, he just grabs his weapon with his left hand and keeps fighting. You don't mess with these guys, right? You learn that, again, in certain parts of the area where there's bars that they hang out at, you're careful about who you mess with. Because there's a lot of good old boys who like to fight, and then they come to a Navy SEAL, and then that's it. And it's over, because when you fight them, you lose. And that's just the way it is. I would want a warrior That's that word gibor, okay? So we're going to look at mighty God, but first let's introduce this word gibor. Gibor in Hebrew means strong or courageous. It describes mighty warriors. You say, people like who? People like Nimrod. You know, back in Genesis chapter 10, I'll put the verse up, Nimrod was a mighty hunter. It says in Genesis 10, eight through nine, he, that is Nimrod, became a mighty one on the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord. Therefore it is said, like Nimrod, a mighty hunter. I mean, we got three times in two verses. He's a mighty guy, okay? So I'm thinking if we could see Nimrod, he would be a strong person, a courageous person, okay? I think we'd look at him and we'd say, that guy's a man. That's the word mighty describing Nimrod. It's also the word that describes King David, and his warriors. We read many times in the Bible about David's mighty men. And the fact is, you don't mess with David's mighty men. And he's one of those in certain contexts, right? 2 Samuel 17 rather than getting into the discussion and what's going on here is related to Absalom and such, but the main point It says in 2 Samuel 17, 8, you know your father David and his men. They are mighty men. That's our word. They are fierce. Like a bear robbed of her cubs in the field, your father is an expert in warfare. You don't want to mess with David and his mighty men because you're going to be sorry that you did. Because these guys are men. They know how to fight. You better be careful. They're warriors. That same word describes the Lord in Psalm 24, verse 8. A number of places, but in Psalm 24, verse 8. Who is the king of glory? The Lord, Yahweh, strong and mighty. There's our word. The Lord, Yahweh, mighty, gebor, in battle. So Yahweh is a warrior, he's strong. Now that's not a name, that's just that word in description of Yahweh. So our first point is this word Geborah means strong and courageous, describing a mighty warrior. Secondly, this word is used in a compound form as a name of God. The Lord is El Gibor, our mighty God. And that's clear in Jeremiah 32, 17 through 18. It says, Ah, Lord God. Pause. Let's have a quiz. Ah, Lord God. This is for everybody but Ward. What's unique about the word God? It's all caps. Why? Who can tell me? What word is that? Yahweh. Very good. Very good. You say, but wait a second, Greg. I thought Yahweh was all caps L-O-R-D. It is, except when? Except when? When it follows Adonai, Ah Adonai, capital L-O-R-D, the translators don't want to say Ah Lord Lord, so they put God in all caps to let you know that's the name Yahweh following Adonai. And I thought, man, I wonder if anybody's gonna remember that, and you did, so you encouraged me. Ah, Lord God. Behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm. What a strong arm. Nothing is too difficult for you, who shows loving kindness to thousands, but repays the iniquity of fathers into the bosom of their children after them. Oh great, and there it is, mighty God, El Gibor. Our God is a mighty God. And then it says at the end, the Lord of hosts, Yahweh Sebaoth, is His name. We serve El Gibor. We know El Gibor. He's a warrior. he's a mighty God, there is nothing that's too difficult for him. Again, the kind of thing, just to stay with that illustration of a seal, you say, hey, do you think you could do that? It's like, no problem, we got it, we can do it, okay? Just that kind of a courageous, strong warrior, that's El Gibor, our mighty God, and thirdly, That term is descriptive of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our mighty warrior God, the Lord Jesus Christ, will return. He will destroy his enemies, and he will rule with a rod of iron. And you know this is maybe like a great Christmas verse, Isaiah chapter nine, verse six, we know Handel's Messiah. For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us, and the government will rest on his shoulders, and his name will be called. And again, because of Handel's Messiah, we tend to think wonderful, you know, comma, counselor, comma, which is fine, but probably pairs. Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. And that second pair, Mighty God, that's El Gibor. And that is a reference to the coming Lord Jesus Christ. And what's it going to be like when Jesus comes the second time? Revelation 19.15, it says, from his mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it he may strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron, and he treads the winepress of the fierce wrath of God. That's a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ when he returns as a mighty warrior as El Gibor. Now, a lot of people might think, okay, so that's how Jesus is going to return, but how about how he came the first time? Well, again, many people would say we may have a less than biblical view of Jesus' first coming. because we tend to think of him as somewhat feminine, maybe, really soft, if you will. I mean, that's just what people think of when they think of Jesus. They don't think of a guy that looks like a Navy SEAL. But I read not long ago, I'm actually behind on my Bible reading. I was struggling a little bit in the end of Ezekiel. I say that to encourage you. Just in case some of you struggle in your Bible reading and you think, do guys like Greg ever struggle? I do, okay? I hit John and it's like, yeah, and I'm loving it. And I just slow down because I wanna, it's like, no, I don't wanna finish this chapter. I want to go super slow and I just love every verse. I just read John 2 recently. I should have read it last week. And it talks about Jesus cleansing the temple. And I was thinking about El Gabor, and I was thinking about Jesus cleansing the temple. Money changers make their money taking advantage of other people by changing their money in the temple. And Jesus walks up to them and takes the tables and just throws them over. Money everywhere, and no one messes with him. Guys, if I did that, I'd be up against a wall in a second, right? I mean, all of these people losing money, they would be on me, and they would be on you. And Jesus walks in, and he does that, and no one messes with him. They look at him, and it's like, wow. Maybe the kind of respect you'd give like a seal kind of guy, I found that so interesting as I thought about that. Even in His first coming, I don't want to think of Jesus as overly feminine and sweet. Real men aren't sweet. Real men go to war and fight and lead battles and take care of women. So for you ladies, you're thinking, what do you... You ladies know what it's like to be young and to read stories of knights who protect women and fight the bad guys and care for them. That's... Al Gibor. That's our Lord. I hope it encourages you no matter what kind of fight you're facing. It's not like you're walking around without a bodyguard. There is a God, and His name is Al Gibor. He's a mighty warrior, and if your faith is in Jesus Christ, He's always with you, and He'll never leave you. And I hope that'll be a great encouragement to us all tonight. Let's pray.