Good morning, if you would, turn with me to the book of Deuteronomy. We'll be looking at Deuteronomy chapter 25, verses 5 through 19. Deuteronomy 25, 5 through 19. Now, except for one more chapter on required giving to the Lord, we have come to the end of this section of prohibitions and case law. Now, the law in Deuteronomy is described as righteous. And Paul confirms this in Romans 7.12 when he writes, the law is holy and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. And for us to understand the importance of the law, it might be helpful for me to read to you a portion of our constitution that is the Westminster Confession of Faith on the law of God, paragraph six, the first sentence. Although true believers be not under the law as a covenant of works to be thereby justified or condemned, yet it is of great use to them as well as to others in that as a rule of life informing them of the will of God and their duty, it directs and binds them to walk accordingly. discovering also the sinful pollutions of their nature, hearts, and lives, so as, examining themselves thereby, they may come to further conviction of, humiliation for, and hatred against sin, together with a clear sight of the need they have of Christ and the perfection of his obedience. In short, God's law on this side of the cross We don't obey the law to justify ourselves and to gain salvation. We see the law because it convicts us of our sin and our need for Christ. And then when we come to Christ, we see God's desire for us to live lives worthy of our calling in Christ by obeying that law. And so with that in mind, I want to remind you, yes, law is tough. We like to hear grace. But until we know the holiness, goodness, and justice of God's law, we have no idea how great our sin is and how wonderful God's grace in Christ is. It is with joy that we seek to follow the law out of our gratitude to the Lord for rescuing us from its curse. With that in mind, we come to this last portion of case law and so forth. beginning at verse five in chapter 25. If brothers dwell together and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the dead man shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband's brother shall go into her and take her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her. And the first son whom she bears shall succeed to the name of his dead brother that his name may not be blotted out of Israel. And if the man does not wish to take his brother's wife, Then his brother's wife shall go up to the gates of the elders and say, my husband's brother refuses to perpetuate his brother's name in Israel. He will not perform the duty of a husband's brother to me. Then the elders of a city shall call him and speak to him. And if he persists saying, I do not wish to take her, then his brother's wife shall go up to him in the presence of the elders and pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face. And she shall answer and say, So shall it be done to the man who does not build up his brother's house. And the name of his house shall be called in Israel, the house of him who had his sandal pulled off. When men fight with each other and the wife of the one draws near to rescue her husband from the hand of him who is beating him and puts out her hand and seizes him by the private parts, then you should cut off her hand. Your eye shall have no pity. You shall not have in your bag two kinds of weights, a large and a small. You shall not have in your house two kinds of measures, a large and a small. A full and fair weight you shall have, a full and fair measure you shall have, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God has given you. For all who do such things, all who act dishonestly, are an abomination to the Lord your God. Remember what Amalek did to you on the ways you came out of Egypt, how he attacked you on the way when you were faint and weary and cut off your tail, those who were lagging behind you, and he did not fear God. Therefore, when the Lord your God has given you rest from all your enemies around you and the land that the Lord your God has given you for an inheritance to possess, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. You shall not forget." As we consider this portion of God's law, his word, let us bow briefly in prayer. Father, this is your word. Parts of it are tough for us to digest and tough for us to understand. We pray that your spirit would be amongst us, that you might give us ears to hear it and hearts to understand it, that we might be grateful to you, we might learn about you, and we might apply these things to our lives. Lord, I pray that if anything is said, thought, or done here inconsistent with your way, your word, your will, let it pass away never to be heard from again. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Well, at Thanksgiving, I took some time off from my family. And at the beginning of that particular vacation, I traveled with my daughter up to see my aunt that lives near Pittsburgh and is currently in a residential facility because of some health issues that she had. So I talked with her, particularly about her finances, because due to her health condition, I had to take over her finances to help her out. I was able to verify for my aunt that she did not have a loan on her car. And that was very important because I found out as I was taking this over from the month of August that she had a 200 and some dollar charge monthly on her debit card that said vehicle plan. Now, I had assumed, because she's on Social Security and so forth, that she had taken out a loan to purchase her last car, and she assured me that that was not the case. Of course, illness and a stroke had put her in the hospital at the beginning of August, and in the middle of August was the first charge that said vehicle plan. Now, of course, in all of this situation, I began to get a little alarmed, because if you're on Social Security and that's the only income you receive, and they're taking $200 a month out of your bank account, that's a significant portion of your money. And so in December, after I had talked with my aunt and she assured me there was no loan on the vehicle, and of course she was incapacitated in the hospital after her stroke and unable to agree to any type of vehicle warranty plan, Then what I did is I went down with my bank, the branch of the bank, her bank here, and I said, hey, I want to stop payment on this particular charge. And of course, the bank people were very nice with me, and they said, well, have you considered filing a dispute? And so I did. I filed a dispute with this so-called warranty company when there was no paperwork to suggest that she had ever agreed to this charge. And they assured me that they would investigate, and lo and behold, I've been able to recover three out of the four months that she was paying that money for her account. Now, why do I mention all this? It's because so many in our society are being preyed upon, vulnerable, with scams that are increasingly sophisticated and increasingly really available to people, whether online or by phone or other things, especially with the tools that can be used for good things in artificial intelligence and so forth. These can also be used for bad things. And even scams throughout the ages and even in our generation have been seen in churches and those posing as pastors or teachers. Some of these scams have been exposed. You see, God reminds us in this word, we should be a people of righteousness and fairness, especially not seeking to take advantage of the vulnerable. In this way, God demonstrates through this law that he is first pro-family, and he wants a pro-family people of God. Secondly, he is pro-fairness. He wants a fair people of God. And finally, he's pro-respect. He wants a people of God who respect, particularly the vulnerable, but respect others. As we consider these things, let's look firstly at this section on what's called leveret marriage. It seems so foreign to us in 21st century America. This is such a different concept. Here is the situation again. This is a case, a case law. invoking what is called Leveret marriage. And here in this particular instance, Levere in Latin has to do with in-laws, brother-in-laws, and so forth. And here, this is an ancient practice written into case law. In fact, this is the only law dealing with Leveret marriage in all of the Law of Moses. Now there is reference to this being practiced before, particularly in Genesis 38, if you want to read the story of Judah and Tamar and Judah's sons and so forth. But this ancient practice seems to be something that was practiced throughout that part of the world in those days. And so Moses, when he writes this, he writes this as case law inspired by the Holy Spirit to do so. And of course, case law, again, in case you weren't with us previously in this series, case law is where he says, this is gonna happen. Here is the law in this particular situation. And here's what he says is the specific circumstance that's gonna happen. Brothers are dwelling together. One of them dies without a son. And in that circumstance, the husband's brother should marry the widow of the dead brother and begin to build up the house, the first child being in the name of the brother. So first of all, looking at this, this is an understanding that is only to be done in specific circumstances. In fact, another part of the law will tell the Israelites that they should not marry their brother's wife. Now, I think this is particularly in regarding to divorce and so forth. But in other words, it's not a normal practice for someone to marry his brother's wife. And this is not normally condoned necessarily in scripture, except in this specific circumstance. And the purpose is this. The purpose is the extension of the dead man's name. This is a reminder of how important it was in Israel to understand God's giving of the land to the people and, of course, them being the people of God connected to that land. And this is an understanding of how the land was inherited and divided up and all those things, tribe by tribe, clan by clan, and so forth. And yet the interesting thing about this law, as opposed to almost all the other laws in the whole book of Deuteronomy, is this. The man had the right of refusal. He could say, I don't want to do that. Maybe he didn't like the wife of his dead brother. Maybe for some reason there was something that he thought it would hinder something in his own life, but largely it may be because he recognizes that it would perhaps cut in on his inheritance or the inheritance of his children. You see, there would be, of course, a difference in just inheriting everything of your brother and inheriting only through that son that was given. So the right of refusal is available, but it comes with a price, doesn't it? It doesn't come with judicial punishment. It doesn't come with a fine. It doesn't come with corporal punishment. Of course, it's not a capital crime. There's no legal penalty that is given here. And it's interesting that the, Men at the gate, that is those who carry out the law, the elders, particularly of the city, they are to take that man and try to talk him out of it. And to try to talk him into following this practice of leverage marriage in this circumstance. But if he persists, in other words, if he says, I just don't want to do this, then there is a process, isn't there? Refusal brings public shame, but without judicial penalty. And that shame is demonstrated by this action. I can't imagine in our society this taking place. A legal process by which the woman is fully entitled to remove the sandal of this man and spit in his face. And then the irony of all this. Remember, the whole purpose of this is to build up the house of his brother. In other words, to restore the idea and sense of family and the importance of carrying on the family. And here, his dead brother's name then is forgotten in Israel. But his name becomes the house of him who has had his sandal pulled off. So in other words, if he refuses to follow this practice because he loves this dead man's wife and he loved his dead brother, in other words, he wants to care for her and take care of her and provide for her future, particularly with having children and so forth, since he hasn't cared about that, and he hasn't cared about anybody else, assumedly, except for himself, then he too, is considered to have a name that is not a good name in Israel. So in other words, this is all about pro-family, not just building up the name of his brother, but taking care of someone in need, of building up the house of his brother so that she is able to be provided for. And he's thinking not of himself because he's actually putting his inheritance from his brother in danger. He is actually thinking completely of somebody else and loving his own family. Now again, I don't think that necessarily the scriptures are telling us on this side of the cross, yes, you're supposed to do this, because we know in Acts chapter 15, especially when the early church was considering whether people had to follow all the law of God, they were reminded, yes, the principles of that law are important, the moral law is important, Jesus said and even expanded our understanding of these moral principles in Matthew 5 and following. But here, we're reminded that this particular law is not our burden in our society anymore. But the principles still stand. In fact, I remember over the last few months, I began to hear about this process or this idea on social media promoting dinks. Do you know what a dink is? A dink is someone or a couple who describes themselves as double income no kids. Now in this particular social media fad and craze, they are promoting the idea that this is the best thing in life. The best thing in life is to have lots of money to spend on yourself and no strings attached with all these urchins that you gotta care for. So in other words, it is wonderful to have lots of money and be able to spend it however you want on yourself for the rest of your life. Double income, no kids. And so there, this is a reminder here. They're saying there's no shame in having no children, of course. But there's no shame in just thinking that that's the best way to have it when you have lots of money. Now I agree with them in one point. There certainly is no shame in not having children. Because it's by God's design. God is the one who opens the womb and who closes the womb. And some people, unfortunately, God is designed not to have children. And some people he is designed to have children. He's in charge of granting children. But to be so selfish, as to ignore a creation mandate and to desire constant self-gratification rather than the sacrifices necessary to support a family is certainly not the fulfillment of God's design for a community of people that loves him and loves others. In fact, this is also demonstrated in the graphic nature of the next command. This is the case invoking a pitiless mutilation. This is the only case where the law commends the cutting off of a hand. Of course, again, this is case law. This is a particular or specific case where two men are fighting, likely wrestling together, and one wife seeks to rescue her husband. It's seemingly noble for this woman to say, hey, I want to rescue my husband. He's in danger and so forth. But she grabs a part of the body that she should not grab. And here, It says that you shall be pitiless in carrying out this terrible, terrible judgment against her of cutting off her hand. Your eye shall have no pity. Why? Why is this so serious? What is the situation? Well, it's because here, she's endangering two particular things. She's endangering childbearing for this man and his family, and even the woman who is married to him, and she is endangering the community. Let me explain. Of course, you know, someone who could be injured in this fashion. There was a law not too long ago that said a man who was a eunuch or a man who had certain characteristics in this area of life would be cut off from the assembly of the people. In other words, If he was injured enough in that particular situation, he would be cut off from the people of God. This, of course, is what we might have called social death. Also, it could endanger the childbearing ability of that individual. Of course, we just saw in the first five verses or six verses of this text how God takes that so seriously. Childbearing and the creation mandate to be fruitful and multiply, to fill the land, all those things are crucial. And here, it's still important. You know, we are so reluctant in our society now to have children. People don't get married. That's not necessarily the children issue. But often they don't get married. And now when a couple gets married, they say, well, you know, I'm going to wait until I have the right income, the right situation, the right circumstances, all those types of things. Is that biblical? Not that I'm aware of. In fact, the scriptures say to be fruitful and multiply. When we endanger the ability of people to have children, we're endangering them in such a sense that it's against even the creation mandate of God. I remember many years ago, a magnate by the name of Ted Turner, you might recognize his name, was not only the owner of several sports franchises and the founder of the CNN Enterprise, but he was also a big promoter of limiting the world's population. He gave all kinds of causes, and though he had five children, he suggested that in America we should limit everybody to two children. He was in favor of the one child China policy and he gave the causes to promote fewer children. Let me tell you God's Word is about. being fruitful and multiplying in the family with legitimate marriage and the basic building block of society, so much so that God is pro-family in ways that to us today seem bizarre and strange. These first two laws, when we look at them, they are so far outside the range of our understanding how that might have been done in a society, is a reminder of how far we've come from seeking pro-family, pro-family societies, and even pro-family churches. In fact, God is so pro-family that in 1 Timothy 5, when Paul writes to Timothy, his son in the faith, he writes that if people refuse to provide for their own family, that they're worse than unbelievers. Family is so very important as a basic building block, and God even often calls people through the work that is done in families of teaching and providing them the gospel of Jesus Christ. So God is pro-family in the law, but he's also pro-fairness. Verses 13 through 16, we can understand. We live in a society that was built on working hard, on prosperity, on respecting each other's boundaries and having fairness under the law. And so here we read these words. You shall not have in your bag two kinds of weights, a large and a small. You shall not have in your house two kinds of measures, a large and a small. Forbidden, it was forbidden to have two bags. Now, what is he talking about, these bags here? So of course, you know, we didn't have digital scales back then. We didn't even have the other kinds of scales, you know, when you get on the scale and the thing kind of goes back and forth and finally gets on a particular thing. No, they had the scales that we see like in a court illustration. You would put it on one side of the scale and it would push the other side up. You would put something on that side and even it out. So what they would have is they would have a bag of stones and this bag of stones was the weight or measure by which they sold and did business. So they would take this bag of stones, put it on one side of the scale and then they would put the merchandise on the other side of the scale or whatever it was they were measuring and they might take out or put in stones from the bag to determine how heavy it was. So when it says here, you're forbidden to have two bags, it's the old great and small trick. In other words, you would have one bag that was heavier, had heavier stones in it, and you would have one bag that was light and had lighter stones in it. Now they look the same, but maybe there was some mark or something where the person who had these two bags would know, and if he's selling something, then he might put the heavy bag up there. But if he's buying something, He's going to put the light bag up there. So in other words, he's going to come out on top either way. So this is just basically a way to cheat other people. The old great and small trick. And of course the other way to do this is the temptation to have two measures. The word measure here is the word ifa. Something that was used to weigh out grain or to measure grain. And it's the same concept. There was some way in which they could do it with a great way in which, you know, it was more than it should have been. And there was another way where it was less than it should have been. You say, well, boy, that's kind of underhanded. And that's the point. God says, it's not right. You shall not do this. In fact, he says in verse 15, a full and fair way you shall have, a full and fair measure you shall have. Now it's interesting. The weight here is actually the word stone. You should have one stone and one measure. In other words, you don't have one that benefits you in one circumstance and another one that benefits you in another circumstance. You have one fair measure. That's it. You don't change it out. You are completely honest in your dealings. And then these words full and fair are interesting words. The first one is peaceable. It's a peaceable standard. In other words, there's no way for dispute. There's no way that somebody can come to you and say, you know, I see what you're doing. It's not fair how you're measuring these things out. No, they can't say this because the same measure is used for every single transaction. So it's peaceable. It doesn't leave room for argument. The other thing is it's righteous. It's a righteous standard. And, of course, that speaks for itself. It's right in the eyes of God. It's something that is true and honest and good. And, of course, this was particularly important in those days because they did not have standards of measurement, you know, universal standards. A foot was not necessarily a foot, or a pound was not necessarily a pound, or, of course, an ephah not an ephah. And so because there weren't these universal standards, it was so very important that in the local economies they had one set standard and each individual proprietor would have one measure. But notice what the impact is. He says that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you. The impact is not just on that person, or on that transaction or on your neighbor who's dealing with you, it's upon the whole land. And it's an impact that impacts the promise that God has given that you may live long or have extended days in the land that God has given you. In other words, for obedience in this matter, if you refuse to obey, it might cut short those days. And of course, whether Amos or Micah or other places throughout the prophets, this was one of the base sins of the people where they called them out to repent and turn from your sins. In fact, this is so egregious that God says in verse 16, for all who do such things, all who act dishonestly are an abomination to the Lord. God doesn't use those words lightly. He calls things like child sacrifice and idolatry abominations. He calls sexual immorality abominations. And he calls this cheating other people an abomination. You know, I say that at least six to 10 times a year, probably more, the church gets a letter in the mail from a real estate company. Now they're offering in this particular document, They're offering to buy our five-acre property in Carolina Forest and take it off our hands, because of course it must be a nuisance or an inconvenience to us. And it's interesting to me that sometimes they put a price to it. And they say, we'll buy that property from you for somewhere between $25,000 and $35,000. Now, if you've been here at our church for a long time, you know that This, of course, is a very generous offer for a property worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yet, this betrays the greed that we so readily succumb to. And we look at a circumstance of that, and I say, how terrible. I even called up one of these guys, and I said, how ridiculous that you're doing this. You could be scamming somebody who doesn't know the value of their property. It's just not fair. You know it's worth much more than that. And of course, that individual said, well, well, well. And that was the end of the conversation. But lest we think it's those people out there, let me tell you that Christians, too, we fall prey to get-rich-quick schemes, don't we? We fall prey to gambling, which is one of the great difficulties and problems of our society and young people today. and is across our land multiplying with such force that this greed and the circumstances by which this is going to take place, whether it's the casinos they're talking about building in South Carolina, whether it's because the Indian tribe up north of us has gotten now national recognition to put that in here, or whether it's the lottery system. What do they do? They seek to prey upon those who are greedy, upon those who are vulnerable, upon those who have nothing. And of course, where do these types of things go? At the same time, unless we think it's just gambling or whether we think it's just cheating other people, I have to say that I've also talked to the wait staff sometimes of those who serve Christians after worship services on Sunday. Now, first of all, I'm not a big proponent of going to restaurants on Sundays. But for those that do, who come from a church, the Wade staff will often tell you the worst tippers are those people coming from church. You see, we should be a people that is not only fair, that we don't cheat other people, but we're also known for our generosity. And we're known for those who think of others before we think of ourselves. And when they look at us, they say, now that's an upright and fair person who treats honestly in all of his dealings. And he even goes above and beyond so that I see the light of Christ and the salt of the earth in that individual. Even in the way we transact business, God is pro-fairness. It's also pro-respect. Here's the last one. This is a difficult one because it ties into the thing that we so often have a difficulty with is that God at times commanded entire peoples to be eliminated. We call that today genocide. Although in this particular situation, this is a reminder, it's not that God is telling the people it's up to you to decide who to kill and not to kill. This is a part of God's judgment. They are to be an instrument of his justice because in this particular case, their sin rose to the level of which God decided their time had come, just like he's going to do to every nation on earth. In this case, it's Amalek. And he says to them, this is not case law. This is a positive reinforcement. Remember. He says, remember what Amalek did to you on the way as you came up out of Egypt, how he attacked you on the way when you were faint and weary and cut off your tail, those who were lagging behind you, and he did not fear God. He says, remember what Amalek did. And of course, the only place we can find by this point that he's talking about is Exodus 17. In Exodus 17, before the Israelites go and get the 10 commandments from Mount Sinai, Amalek comes out and makes war with them. And this is the famous war where Moses has two men stand on either side of him and they held up his arms. And as long as his arms were held up, the Israelites were winning. And as long as his arms fell down because he was tired and weary, they began to lose. And that's what you think of when you think of this particular passage. And it really doesn't give us the details that are here. We're reminded that not all of the details of exhaustive history is given us in the scriptures. So this is actually new information for us of how Amalek fought against them. And so God is particularly targeting the timing of their march on Israel. This is when they had just come from Egypt. They had marched out. They were now tired and they were weary. Notice what he says. When you were faint and weary. So the timing of the attack. The next thing is the target of their attack. They weren't going out to meet the army in all of their strength. They were picking on the people who couldn't fight. They were picking on the people either because they were aged or infirm or injured or something like that. They were lagging behind. They were the stragglers behind them. The tail. That is those who were not able to march with everybody else. And that's who they attacked. Probably the children. The young children and the elderly and the infirm. Those were the ones that Amalek was attacking. Amalek, of course, in history was Esau's grandson. And the people of Amalek thus were somehow related to the Israelites, but they didn't care. In the vulnerability of the Israelites, the Amalekites attacked even the most vulnerable and the most troubled of the bunch. And so what does God say? Therefore, when the Lord has given you rest from all your enemies around you in the land that the Lord your God has given you for inheritance to possess, You shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. You shall not forget. Wipe out the mention of Amalek under heaven. Yes, when you have rest from your enemies, and do not forget. Without forgetting, let this take place. And you know the Israelites, of course, in their obedience, actually their disobedience, they didn't do that. Perhaps one of the most important understandings of Exodus 17 is this particular judgment by God at the end of the account of that war. At the end of the account of that war, God gave a commander, actually a prophecy in a way. He says, Exodus 17, 16, a hand upon the throne of the Lord, the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. Of course, if you know the history of Amalek, You know that not only was Amalek the ones who King Saul was fighting against when he was supposed to destroy all the Amalekites and all their possessions. And then Samuel the prophet came to Saul and said, what is the bleeding of that sheep that I hear? And then you might remember that David fought with the Amalekites. And then you might even remember in the book of Esther, in the book of Esther, there was a man by Haman who's known as an Agagite. And of course, an Agagite was an Amalekite. He was the one who was opposed to the Jews even after the exile or during it. And here, generation to generation, they fought against this people time and time again. But the Lord was particularly concerned about how this people failed to respect the Israelites. They failed to respect them in the timing and the targeting of the way they fought. And I have to say, I've mentioned gambling. Some people might know I'm a very anti-gambling guy. In fact, when I was first a pastor in Tennessee, the very first year I was a pastor in Tennessee was the last year that they did not have a lottery in the state of Tennessee. I wrote a pamphlet in those days showing all kinds of scripture why lotteries are bad things and gambling is a bad thing, and I sent it to every single PCA church across the state of Tennessee asking them to consider telling their church to vote no to the lottery. Of course, it really worked, didn't it? They voted yes. Not necessarily the church, but the state. The reason I hate the lottery so much with a passion is this. It's duplicitous advertising is that money goes to education. When statistic after statistic shows that the majority of the money actually goes to the implementation of the lottery. And to all the administrative costs. Not only this, but the worst is the targeting. The facts are that there are more billboards, more advertising, and more locations to purchase lottery tickets in poor areas than there are in wealthy areas. The most vulnerable are targeted with this particular egregious form of gambling, which is one of the worst as far as odds are concerned. You're less likely to win the lottery than you are to win any other gambling that goes on. And it's legalized and condoned and run by the state. You see, it fails to respect the vulnerable people that are amongst us in society. And yet, what do we do? We all, we all, what if I won the lottery? But what about all those people who put money in the lottery who can't afford it? What about all those people who put all their hopes and dreams in the lottery and do not have the retirement that we have? What about all those who have used that as a gateway to other forms of addictive gambling and have seen their lives and their families crumble as a result? You see all of this, God is for people and for others. You see the heart of God and his character is demonstrated by this most righteous law that any nation under heaven received. God designed and loves the family as the basic building block of society, giving laws, even strange laws to protect it. He desires fairness and detests the evil of taking advantage of others, particularly the most vulnerable. How many times in scripture does it say you are cheating or taking advantage of the poor, the widows, the orphans, and the stranger amongst you? His rescue of a lowly, unworthy people from their own distress, noting that they were once vulnerable people, and of course, applying that to us. God is the one who called us out of a life destined to hell. God is the one who called us out of our unworthiness. We who are a people who are cheaters, who are despicable in our treatment of our own families, who are ones who certainly have not followed the law of God, but he rescued us by the blood of Jesus Christ. For what? For us to do that for others? No. for us then to show our gratitude to him for how he saved us by then serving as an example to others and lifting others up rather than tamping them down for our own benefits and our own gain. May the Lord cause the church to be fair, pro-family, pro-fair, pro-respect, just as God's law intended. Let's pray. Father, by your grace, and we need it, when we understand the depths of our own depravity, our own greediness, our own sloppiness, our own just love of our family. Father, as we consider all these things, and how at times we have taken advantage of others, Lord, we pray that not only would you forgive us and make us aware of your grace, and that we would love you because of the forgiveness that we have received. But Lord, help us to live lives worthy of our calling in Christ because your spirit is sanctifying us and changing us both now and Lord in its fullness in the time to come. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.