The title of the sermon message this morning is Do Not Boast of Your Tomorrow. Do Not Boast of Your Tomorrow. And we will be specifically in the letter of James, chapter four, verses 13 through 17. James four, 13 through 17. To what do you attribute success or failure? And the way you answer that question, I would say, reveals much about your worldview. For many, success is a matter of who you know. It's a matter of connections. For others, success is a matter of hard work. Sometimes this has been called, maybe not so much anymore, but it used to be pretty common. It was called the Protestant ethic or the Calvinist ethic. And that term was first used by a pioneering sociologist by the name of Max Weber, who wrote a book in 1905. And in that, he connected the rise of capitalism in the Western world to the reformed tradition in Christianity, trying to make that connection. Of course, Max Weber was not a theologian. It was not his interest to examine anything theologically, but rather from a sociological viewpoint. But it's interesting to see that. This idea of success and failure is a hot topic in the church even today when we are in the area of church history and especially what we call textual criticism, which really looks at the origins of scripture. What were the original manuscripts and what did the original manuscripts say? And scholars in both fields argue over what they call orthodox Christianity, which we would see as true Christian faith. Why did orthodox Christianity grow? Why did it succeed? And the opposite of the Orthodox, which we could call the heterodox or the heretical Christianity, why did that diminish? Why did it fail, so to speak? So there's scholars you can divide generally into two groups. There's one group that are called critical scholars. we have this idea of something that is critical or criticism as being negative towards something. Well, that's academically, scholarly, that's not how the term is used, although I would say, practically, it does seem to work out that way. Critical scholars, much like unbelievers or atheists, Their viewpoint in their academic work when it comes to theology is that you have to rid yourself of all presuppositions when you study a certain thing. Just like the atheists who you might be sharing your faith with who will say, well, convince me of God or convince me of Jesus as your Lord and Savior without using the Bible. Same sort of idea. But anyway, these critical scholars attribute the success, so-called, or to use that term, of Orthodox Christianity to human power and organizational skill. That is, that the early Christians, what they often call the proto-Orthodox, because they see a human struggle for what the faith will be in the first century. They see the Orthodox as tagging onto the social power of Jewish tradition. and getting to Rome first, as they say it, or in other words, obtaining political power, and developing church hierarchy, in other words, organizational power. And you can see how this is all about a power struggle. And in their scholarship, because they're critical scholars, they do not, in fact they would say they cannot, give any consideration to God's will or to the Holy Spirit's work in these things, because that is outside the realm of academia. So really, we're talking about a humanistic viewpoint here that is strictly secular, and really, and my point in this is, this is how most people in general approach everything in their life and in this world. So the question to ponder, what I want us to think about here, is how deeply has this view infiltrated the church? is we see in James's letter in chapter four, verses 13 through 17, that this was an issue in the first century church as he wrote this letter. So let's open our Bibles and turn to chapter four of James. And I'm going to read verses 13 through 17, so please follow along with me as I do so. And this is what James has to say. Come now you who say today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit, yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that. As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is a sin. Now in this excerpt that we're looking at this morning, In verse 13, James uses this idiomatic phrase, come now. And we could translate that as us saying to someone we're in conversation with, listen to what you're saying. It's kind of like, wait a minute, reflect on your words here that you just used, my friend. And then, as he says, you know, come now, listen to yourself, he repeats back these words that sound like a conversation amongst believers. We can imagine that they are two or more men in the church who are merchants, who are businessmen, who say today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit. So we get this impression that James is overhearing a conversation, which is, he uses it for purposes of illustration to help us understand what he's talking about, and that he knows, as a matter of fact, that these sorts of conversations are taking place in the first century church amongst the spread out churches that he is writing to. And these men, whom we are overhearing, are giving no consideration, no thought to God at all. They're assuming that whatever they plan will come to pass, that their lives and their wills are what rule their lives, even though they're Christians. Now I would say, to have this mindset, this worldview that's being exemplified here, People such as this are living their lives, even though they claim to be Christian, as atheists. They are what we could call practical atheists. For all practical purposes, they are living the life of an atheist. And in fact, really, we must admit that that's the state of most people in this day and age, in our day and age, that claim to be Christian. We all know people who say they're Christian, but there's no sign in their life, in their attitude, in their beliefs, in their worldview, that they know much, if anything, about what the Lord teaches in his word, or how he wants us to live our lives. They're not living as the faithful people of God, but as the faithless people of the world. And I think this is particularly true, and I think it's a danger, and this is kind of what ties into James' illustration here, that's especially problematic in the world of business. The humanistic mindset can easily overwhelm a believer. in that sphere compared to, and we're talking first century here, this is who the letter's going out to and the time it's being written. Let's compare that to, say, a farmer or a stockman, one who raises cattle or sheep. Now the farmer and the stockman know that there's much involved in their industry that they have absolutely no control over. They cannot control the weather. They cannot control the rain. They can't control if there's a drought, if there's pests, if there's sickness among their cattle. The farmer and the stockman knows no matter how hard he works, no matter how skilled he is, An act of God can undo all of that. His livelihood, this man laboring in the fields, depends on things that he recognizes daily are beyond his human control. They depend on an important factor besides his shrewd business skills. Which of course, anyone in that sphere of work also needs to have business skills to run a business, whether it's farming or cattle or what have you. And he knows that important factor is the will of God in his life. The will of the creator over creation. And the first point I wanna make this morning is this. God's will neither succeeds or fails. God's will neither succeeds or fails. For God to fail would be a denial of his Godhood. A failed God, by definition, is not God. We know that, we can see that easily. But here's the thing that I want us to think about and consider. Since God cannot experience failure, that is anything that is in opposition to his will, then I would say God cannot experience the opposite of failure, which is success. God does not experience the tension of success or failure as we do. Say you're embarking on a business enterprise. There's tension there. Am I going to succeed or am I gonna fail? There's so many factors that go into whatever your particular business, industry, occupation is that you're constantly weighing these things in your mind. Will it work out or will it won't work out? My point here that I want you to understand is if we say that God always succeeds, which he does from a human perspective, we must admit logically that there is a possibility of failure in what God does. And we know that's not true. So if God's will neither succeeds nor fails, then what is it? What state is it in? How can we think of it properly? God simply is. There's no variation in his being. Likewise, his will simply is, because he's absolutely sovereign. This is what we must recognize. Whatever God decrees will come to pass in the manner and in the time that he ordains that to come to pass. It's not a matter of waiting around to see if God succeeds or fails. I know none of you, before daybreak, go out and stand in your driveway and watch to make sure the sun comes up. And as it starts to peek over the horizon, yes, God succeeded again today. Thank goodness I can go about my day. We know that God is good and that these things he has created function properly. There's no tension between success and failure. God is... He cannot fail. He's infallible in himself. God alone possesses what theologians call a seedy. which is a Latin term, comes from two words which means from one's self. Nothing can add, nothing can take away from God. God is God. He's complete. He has, as you may have heard, we describe him as simple. Now this is confusing because We cannot possibly understand all of God, and to say he is simple is like, well, I should understand something that's simple. But comparatively speaking, we are complex. There are things that make us up, right? We have a body, we have spirit, we have mind. God is not divided into those categories, and this is what we mean theologically by that, that he is complete in and of himself. And this is an important point when we talk about our faith, is this idea of God being complete in and of himself separates him from his creation. The creator is separate from the creation. We look at other religions, especially Eastern religions, where this is wiped away and they end up being pantheistic. Everything is God, or panentheistic. Everything, God is in everything. This is not the Christian religion. God is not dependent, derivative, or contingent upon anything else. Remember what he told Moses in Exodus chapter three from the burning bush? How did he, what was his name that he gave Moses? I Am. That's who God is. He just is. On the other hand, us, we have to compare ourselves here. We are fallible. We're subject to failure. We know that. We as creatures are then derivative. We're dependent and contingent ultimately upon God. And this is where I'm going in this to work out in our heads that everything flows from God. The problem we have is that as fallen creatures, we sinfully think otherwise. We think of ourselves as independent from God, as being the masters of our world. The Lord God revealed to the prophet Isaiah this taunt that he wanted him to write against the king of Babylon. And as we read this, I'm gonna read a short excerpt from it. We think of Satan because the King of Babylon here is functioning as a type for Satan. And this is in Isaiah 14, verses 13 and 14. You said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven. Above the stars of God, I will set my throne on high. I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the most high. Now this statement of hubris applies to a spiritual creation, such as Satan, and it applies to a mortal, such as the king of Babylon. Both are attempting to exert their will above that of the Lord God. And back to James, in verse 14, James counters this proud hubris of the practical atheists. He reminds them of an inescapable, undeniable fact. In the first part of verse 14, he says, yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. These men talk about what they will do tomorrow and what profits they will gain after a year of trade in such town. Now, these men are undoubtedly, as we talked about before, as we entered into looking at James' letter, these men are undoubtedly Jewish Christians. The church is primarily made up of Jewish Christians at this early point. And as Jews, they should have been familiar with the book of Proverbs and Proverbs 27.1, which James quotes from. Proverbs 27.1 says, do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring. And these men boast not only about their tomorrow, but for their entire next year. This is pride and arrogance speaking. their boasting is based on what? It's based on themselves. It's based on how they view their business skills. And perhaps thrown in because we are dealing with a world that is largely pagan, even then as it is now, they're also talking about fortune or luck. And they think that luck and fortune will be on their side. Point number two that I want to make is this. Relying on something other than God is to forsake God. Relying on something other than God is to forsake God. Now I would say this is a good working definition of practical atheism. This does not mean that we as Christians should distrust everything and everybody. We're not to say to our spouse or to our parents or to a very good friend, I do not trust you, I trust only God. This is not the point. This is to misunderstand what we're saying. But this principle, like all biblical principles, is relational to God. Our trust and reliance is based ultimately on what? On God, in God. And all else is contingent upon that trust in God. Just like we can trust the sun to come up tomorrow. That in our godly marriages that we can trust our spouse because the Lord has given us a spouse. And that our spouse is also a believer. is dependent upon the Lord. That makes quite a bit of difference in a relationship, whatever the relationship is, maybe a working relationship. How different is it to work with other committed believers compared to working with people that are atheists? Perhaps you find a bit of a difference there. So who can answer this question that James is answering regarding what tomorrow will bring? Can you answer that question about what your tomorrow will bring? I cannot. We may have a hope or a wish or a desire for what tomorrow will bring. I don't have to worry about the sun rising. I know that will happen tomorrow. I hope I will awaken upon the sunrise tomorrow, but that's in God's hands. That's the will of God right there. The only one then that can answer this question about tomorrow is God. He alone knows what tomorrow will bring because he has decreed whether or not you have a tomorrow. and what your tomorrow will entail, and how it's going to work out for you. This is why Paul writes to the Corinthians in his second letter, 2 Corinthians 10, 17. Paul tells them, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord. Yes, amen to that, brother Paul. He's drawing on Old Testament scripture here. He's drawing upon a revelation that the Lord God had given his prophet Jeremiah. And Jeremiah says a little bit more fully what Paul is saying, Jeremiah 9.24, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord. And even in our failure to trust God, and we all have those periods in our life, we all have those experiences where our trust fails. Not only in God, but in other things. No matter that, God is faithful. And his steadfast love never fails. And we see this when the Israelites doubted God's providence in the wilderness, and they were in open rebellion against the man that the Lord God had chosen to lead them, and they were in rebellion to the circumstances of their delivery from bondage. They spoke against God, they spoke against the Lord God. Well, the psalmist took this and he made lyrics of it, of the Lord's response to this in the 78th Psalm, and I'm just going to read verses 21 through 24. First, we're going to look at verse 21 and 22, and this is what is said. Therefore when the Lord heard, when he heard the grumblings and the rebellion of the Israelites, he was full of wrath. A fire was kindled against Jacob. His anger rose against Israel. Now that's the Israelites as a whole, not two individual men, but against all the Israelites. Because they did not believe in God and did not trust his saving power. The Lord God would have been perfectly justified in striking them all dead at that point in time. But the psalmist goes on in the next two verses, 23 and 24, and tells us what the Lord God's response was to these rebellious people. Yet he commanded the skies above and opened the doors of heaven and rained down on them manna to eat and gave them the grain of heaven. That's amazing. They rebel against the Lord God and he gives them the grain of heaven. What does that remind you of? Have we not been given the bread of heaven? The Lord Jesus? And what was our state before we received that bread? We were in rebellion, every bit as much as the Israelites in the wilderness. And God had every right to be angry against us, yet he loved us and sent us the true bread of heaven. Now the second part of James verse 14, he asks this question, and I think it's a rhetorical question. What is your life? And then he answers that. So yes, it's rhetorical. His answer is, for you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. What is your life? This is me talking now. Think about your life. Is your life short? Is it long? Is it happy? Is it sad? Isn't that difficult for us to judge? We may judge in the moment, When we get to a certain age and we get up in the morning and everything hurts, we realize, I've had a long life. Or in the moment, we're excited about something. We have a happy life. So it's difficult for us. But it's very easy. And we often do this. We judge the lives of others more easily. Someone passes away. Someone dies. And we often hear comments about that person, about maybe a life well lived. but someone's making a judgment call upon a life, or a life wasted. Again, a judgment call. But it's a different story when we are living our own life out. And that's the point James is making. Don't look at these people, look at yourself. Think about yourself. Think about what you're doing. Many people, seem to think, and including these first century Jewish merchants, Jewish Christian merchants, they're thinking this, they think they are the exception to death. Yeah, in a year I'm gonna be making all of this money. And the Bible, both Old Testament and New Testament, makes very many illusions, illustrations, comparisons to the shortness of our life. to the shortness of human life. As James did here, comparing our lives to a mist. We've all seen those misty mornings where a mist comes up from the ground and as soon as the sun is up high enough, the mist is gone like it was never even there. Our life is compared to a breath. How long does a breath last? It's very short. been compared to smoke, drifting smoke. Comes up and then goes away, no evidence that it's there. Grass which blooms one day and is beautiful and we gaze upon it and wander at it and maybe even take photographs of it, maybe even paint paintings of it and the next day it's gathered up and thrown in the furnace, it's gone. Such is human life, brothers and sisters, friends. The Soviet Union, the USSR under Stalin, implemented intricate and often grandiose five-year plans. And this is the origination of that term, a five-year plan. I'm not speaking against five-year plans in general. We talked about them at our business meeting. There's value to them. But these five-year plans much like the merchants James are addressing, were extremely optimistic. They entailed the the goals of the production of industry and agriculture in the Soviet Union. And they were set arbitrarily. And many historians say that Stalin himself set the goals on how much wheat was going to be harvested, how many tractors were going to be produced, where he has no knowledge whatsoever of what goes into that process. He just sets these numbers. And what's ironic about this is that the workers, the bureaucrats that are tasked by Stalin on setting up these five-year plans are like these Jewish merchants. They have no idea if they're going to be around at the end of the five-year plan. And in most cases, they were not. because they were executed, many of them, most of them, either that or sent off to the gulags in Siberia, especially when the five-year plan didn't come about. So imagine that, if your task was to come up with an economic forecast, a five-year plan, just like we did this morning, and you're told what to write, and you know this isn't going to work out. I know the Moscow tractor factory cannot make five million tractors in five years. That's not going to happen. So I know that I'm either going to face a firing squad or I'm being sent off to Siberia, maybe to starve to death or be worked to death, but it's not going to work out good for me. Few can outdo the practical atheism of a godless state. And this is what we do when God is not involved in our tomorrow, in thinking about our tomorrow. So recognition of God's sovereignty over the length of our days is not an excuse for fatalism either, like many of man's religions. We are not to say, well, it's in God's hands, therefore I will do nothing. I don't have to do anything. If God wills it, it'll happen. I'm not even getting out of bed. If God wills it, that my paycheck comes in on Friday, it'll happen. I don't need to go to work. Or whatever the case may be. That is not what scripture teaches us. That is not how we are to live. We are to plan and to organize. But we do it with the recognition that it is God who grants us this ability to plan and organize. And in verse 15, this is what James instructs. He gives some practical application here. Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that. Now, this should not be, cannot be what we call a pro forma statement. A statement just said for the sake of it. Like this is just what Christians say, if the Lord wills. Because this is not a magic incantation that rolls off our tongue. This is not something that a pagan would say to a pagan deity to appease the deity. This should be revealing the essence of our human heart, that this is how we feel, that we recognize and acknowledge that the Lord's will is sovereign in our life. and that he grants us the ability to do whatever it is that we want to do. What we do tomorrow or the next year or the next decade is certainly important. It will be according to God's will, but we are intimately and actively involved in our life's activities every step of the way. The Christian life, as you, beloved, know, is a very active life. It's not a matter of sitting and waiting for the Lord to act and seeing what he will bring us. If these merchants that we overhear talking were granted a year in such and such a town by the Lord, but at the end of that year, they did not realize a profit, what then? How do we handle that? Well, I want to give you an example. Going back to the 16th century, the 1500s in England, there was a Puritan pastor by the name of Richard Greenham. Now, Pastor Greenham, he shepherded a church in a very small town that, if you've heard of it, I would really be amazed and very impressed. This town was called Dry Dayton. Now, I don't know if there was a wet Dayton, but there was a dry Dayton. And it was close by to Cambridge, just a few miles from Cambridge. But in the 1500s, far enough where it would have been a good distance away. Now, this pastor was exceptionally hardworking. Even for a Puritan, who were hardworking people by and large, he arose at 4 a.m. every morning to study. Every morning. He preached a sermon every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, four days a week. He's preaching workday sermons before daybreak because his parishioners are farmers and field hands. So he preaches the word of God to them before they go out in the fields. I am not going to start preaching at daybreak. I would if anybody else would be here, but JR and I, we did that once at another church, and it was only JR and I for a long time. We thought, well, for the men that are on their way to work, you're going to lose 15 minutes of sleep. They're not doing it. So he preaches four days a week before daybreak. Then at the end of that, he goes back to the parsonage to take a nap? No, to study. Then in the afternoon, he goes out and he visits the sick people of his congregation. He finishes these sick calls, then he goes out into the fields and he talks to his parishioners as they're laboring, ministers to them there. And you're thinking, I know you notice that he doesn't preach a daybreak sermon on Thursdays. Oh, that's his day off, right? He probably goes golfing, you know, like, no. He catechized the children of his parish on Thursday mornings. He had a school for them. And on the Lord's Day, he preached two sermons. Those of you that have preached, I'm sure are amazed, like I am, of the amount of work that this man poured into what he was doing. And besides this, he established a well-known reputation for being a very loving and biblically-minded counselor. Many people from outside his parish listened to him, and he mentored many, many pastors. And they say when Pastor Greenham preached that his shirt would usually be as wet with sweating as if he'd been drenched in water. And before he went to the pulpit, though, he said he often experienced what he came to believe were satanic attacks, being assailed by, as he put it, very sharp and trembling fears in the flesh. And many pastors through the ages experience this. Paul attests to this in 1 Corinthians 2, 3 and 5. Paul says, and I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling. And my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. Now see how different Paul is from these merchants that are saying, tomorrow we're gonna go to such and such a town, we're gonna spend a year there, and boy, we're gonna rake it in, we're gonna make all this profit. And Paul is like, I am not worthy to do this, I am not worthy to preach to you, it is only the wisdom of God that you are hearing, and I preach in halting, stumbling speech, and I'm nothing to look at, and everybody is disappointed when I show up, like, you're Paul, we've read your letters, and boy, they are deep, but you, my friend, are not much to look at and not much to listen to. Those of us that preach, are very thankful that Paul experienced such things because we can reflect on it. But back to Pastor Graham, Greenham, excuse me. He served 10 years in this parish from 1570 to 1590, 10 years. And at the time he left and he was replaced, succeeded by another pastor coming in, this is what Pastor Greenham said to his replacement. I perceive no good wrought by my ministry on any but one family. The labors of this faithful man of God for 10 years and he saw it effective with only one family. But if you're old enough and you remember Paul Harvey, that's not the end of the story. Few of us have heard of Richard Greenham today. He died in the late 1600s. Excuse me, late 1500s. And in the 1600s, the 17th century, he became, this is after his death, he became the most famous pastor in England. He impacted so many other pastors. He was recognized as the man who turned the tide of the English clergy, which gave birth to the Great Awakening. And he thought his labors accounted for little. And this is my point to you, point number three. The profit of your life may not be apparent to you. And honestly, beloved, I would be surprised if it is apparent to you. We have such a limited horizon. And I know without a doubt in my heart that a great many of you At that time, when we are together in glory with the Lord, we'll be amazed at the impact you have had, what your faithfulness has resulted in. As you think that you've just stumbled through this life, not accounting for much, not impacting much, you're gonna find that it's very different, that your faithfulness will have accounted for that which is far beyond you knowing. There was this 20th century Baptist minister named Vance Havner and he's quoted as saying this, visible success has never been the proof of Jesus or his followers. And that is very true. That is something that we should remember. And it's verse 16 of James chapter four. He says, as it is, you boast in your arrogance, all such boasting is evil. James repeats his admonishment from earlier in this chapter, verse six, where he says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. A quote from Proverbs 3.34. So human boasting, what he's pointing out here, is not only worthless, it's evil. It gives glory to man instead of God. This reveals a disobedient attitude and rebukes the proud, arrogant spirit that is found in the practical atheist, the one who lives with no apparent thought of God and God's will in his life. This is the spirit that the Lord Jesus rebukes in his letters to the churches when he addresses the letter to Laodicea in Revelation 3, 17, and part of which the Lord says this to them. For you say I am rich, I have prospered and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. Who has prospered? The Laodiceans. The Lord, of course, is the one who prospered them. But they give credit to themselves. If they had profited physically, which they did materially, they are destitute spiritually, is what the Lord's saying to them. They'd shut Christ out of their lives. He called to them in this letter to come to him and purchase that which he alone could offer to them, a purchase that would cost nothing. And he says, as we go on in that part of the letter, that he's knocking at their door and is asking them to open it and he will come in and dine with them. So these professed Christians had closed the door of their lives on the Lord Jesus Christ and were not in communion with him. They were not in fellowship with him. That's point number four. Last point, fellowship with Christ is to be desired above all earthly wealth. Fellowship with Christ is to be desired above all earthly wealth. There's extreme danger to a Christian to live as a practical atheist. One may harden their heart, towards Christ through a ritualistic approach to religion. And these men, James addresses, they sat perfunctorily through church services while their minds, their hearts, their spirit were on their business and their profit. And if you find yourself going through the motions of religion without a heartfelt focus on Christ and his Lordship in your life, then repentance and prayer for a renewed spirit of worship is needed. Just as the Lord provided manna to the ungrateful Israelites in the wilderness, he'll feed you with the bread of heaven and refresh your spirit and become real to you again. The last verse, verse 17. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is a sin. What James is talking about here, we have two categories of sins. We have the sins of omission. This is a sin of omission. If you know the right thing to do and you don't do it, you know what the Lord desires of you and yet you refuse to do it. This sin of omission is as bad as a sin of commission, something you actively do. We're held accountable for that which we know is right, but yet fail to do it. Paul, in his ministry, had occasion to visit Athens, Greece, and he goes to this place called Mars Hill. This is where all the philosophers in Greece hung out and chit-chatted and argued all day long. And Paul witnessed to them, and he said to them in Acts 17.30, this is recorded, he says to these men, the times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. We, least of all people, should not act as if we're ignorant, as if we are the sole determiners of our days. So do not, beloved, live your life as a practical atheist. Live your life as a child of God, as a follower and a disciple of our Lord Jesus Christ. So we live in an age now of ease for the Christian faith, really, in our country. We have to admit that. As much as some Christians want to play up the fact that Christians don't get as fair a shake as other people, and there's truth to that, but let's compare what's gone on over the ages. And by doing this, I think it is valuable for us. It helps us to refocus what's important in our life. If we live a life of ease as we do, it becomes very easy to take our faith for granted. There's churches every place. There's never an issue as to whether our doors will be open and we'll be able to meet. We will, you know it. So that makes it easy. I don't know, what's today? Today something big's happening. Maybe it's time to whip up the guacamole and all this other stuff, because there's going to be this big event. Yeah, just one day. The Lord understands. Yes, certainly the Lord does understand. Maybe it's not good that he understands. But faith in Christ comes at a price, and it has always come at a price which In God's providence, we do not bear that price now. There's this letter that was carried to Rome by this guy by the name of Irenaeus. And Irenaeus oversees churches in Gaul, which we call France today. This is in the second century. He has in his possession what we call the letter of the martyrs of Vienne and Lyon. And we don't know who wrote the letter. Maybe Irenaeus wrote it, but we're not sure. But he took it to Rome to be read there. We have this letter because the first church historian, Eusebius of Caesarea, includes it. He copied it down and wrote it in his church history, which is readily available. It's called Church History. Sometimes it's called Ecclesiastical History. But it's fascinating to read. I would encourage, if you have the time, to read it. At least read this letter. It's short. Even slow readers could probably read it in a half hour. Some of you faster readers, 10 minutes, you could read about it. It's book five of church history, or it means chapter five, it's not an entire book. And it tells a story about these Christians in these cities in Gaul, of Vienne and Lyon, which are close by one another. And a terrible persecution arose in this part of Gaul. They're persecuted locally, not imperially yet. Irenaeus writes this about 175 AD. And he goes into detail. the author of the letter goes into detail as to what these Christian martyrs experienced. And it's difficult to read at points, but it is, it's humbling. And what is most impressive to me is a demonstration of the Holy Spirit's work with these martyrs as they faced these things that I will not describe to you in their days of tribulation in the arena. For most of them, it was not very quick. Compared to those who abandoned their faith, who were brought to the arena, charged as Christians, and it wasn't the fact that they were Christians that was the crime. The crime was that the Christians in general were accused of murder, incest, and cannibalism. You think about the Lord's Supper. Well, the rumor grew that these Christians are eating flesh. And they call one another brother and sister. They are involved in incestuous marriages. Men call their wives sister. Women call their husbands brother. It's a crime against the state. So those are the charges against them. And there were some people, some Christians who recanted, who recanted that they were no longer Christians. Once they saw what was happening, or once the first implement was applied to them, they gave up. their faith, but yet they were not released because they'd committed murder, incest, and cannibalism. So it wasn't the fact that they were followers of Jesus that they'd done these unspeakable things. They suffered greatly, those who rejected Christ, according to the letter that was written by Irenaeus, I believe. Those who were faithful, there were some men and some women. There's one slave girl, Blandina, who's spoken of. Pay attention to her name if you read this. Their answer to every question under interrogation, under harsh torture, was, I am a Christian. Do you sacrifice babies? I am a Christian. No, I do not do such things. Do you do such and such? No, I worship Christ. I am a Christian. The love of Christ's people for the Lord and his love for them is readily apparent in this heartbreaking letter. It would be well worth your time to read it. In those times when you feel that you need, that your spirit needs replenishment. We've been there, all of us. We understand that. Join me in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for this time that we can look at your word wrestle with these issues that face us. Father, I find myself without words at the end of the sermon talking about the brethren who've gone before us. Father, just finish the sermon for me in the hearts of my brothers and sisters here that we may take away from this. what you would have us see. Father, I pray for faithfulness. I give thanks for the lives that we have, the new lives that have come about. Father, I pray for our ladies who are expecting babies. Father, I pray for the life that is growing within our precious sisters. I pray for those children that are yet unseen as they nestle in their mother's womb. Father, I pray for our little ones who are amongst us today. Father, I pray for blessings upon them. I pray for safety. I give thanks for them. I give thanks for my brothers and sisters and ask for your blessings upon them in the week to come. In Jesus' name, amen.