Joshua chapter 10. We'll go ahead and get started. I've got good news for you this morning. If you have messed up and you have failed, there is hope. There is hope. I'm reading through Joshua and I think, Jericho, what happened? They marched around, the walls fell down, God took care of it all. Then they got a little self-sufficient and AI. They go up against Ai, sin in the camp, they fail, and yet eventually God gives them a plan where they actually look pretty good. And of course they win a great battle there. Now you have the situation where the people of Gibeon, they've made a league with them, and you'd think, well, it's all over because now they have... failed in a way that they cannot fix it. I mean, they gave their word. Joshua and the leaders of Israel gave their word to the men of Gibeon, and now that group is among them. God had told them to wipe everybody out. Well, they can't do that now. In fact, when Gibeon gets under attack, as we're going to see this morning, they have a responsibility to go there and protect him. And so they do. And yet, you're going to see one of the greatest days in all of human history, apart from the death of Jesus Christ, the birth of Jesus Christ, and everything revolving around Jesus. But as far as a man goes and how he asks God to intervene in the affairs of man, You're going to see something great. He's going to ask for the sun to stop. Stand still. Now some say he should have asked for the earth to quit rotating because it would have been more scripturally right. I mean, think about it. Lord, would you stop the earth from rotating? And really, that's what Joshua should have done if he was going to be scripturally correct. But from Joshua's perspective, you know what he wanted? He wanted the sun to stand still. And you know what the sun did? The sun stood still. How did it happen if the earth's rotating? Well, obviously God might have stopped the earth from rotating. But the Bible says He made the sun stand still. Isn't that weird how you'd think God would be more scientifically accurate. But He was. From man's perspective, when the sun stopped, when the earth stopped, the sun stopped, so the sun stood still because people didn't see it moving anymore because that's our perspective. People get so caught up in the conspiracy theory that They lose track of reality. From my perspective, if I said, God stopped the sun and he stopped the sun, I would probably think he stopped the earth from rotating. You say, well then everything would have been chaos. It's possible for God to stop the earth from rotating and keep everybody okay on the earth. He said, well, what about the laws? What about the laws? I mean, think about it. God's the one that made the laws. He makes the rules. He can break the rules, and He did break the rules. But how could everybody stay on the earth if there's all that... You know, the earth's supposed to be rotating, and that's what keeps all the natural pattern in order. Yeah, Mother Nature. Father God! Let's go to Joshua 10 now that I have that off my chest. Now it came to pass when Adonai Zedek, king of Jerusalem, had heard how Joshua had taken Ai and had utterly destroyed it. as he had done to Jericho and her king, so he had done to Ai and her king, and how the inhabitants of Gibeon had made peace with Israel and were among them." Boy, that's key right there. Among them. Not supposed to be like that. "...that they feared greatly, because Gibeon was a great city, as one of the royal cities, and because it was greater than Ai, and all the men thereof were mighty." Now, I have a note in my Bible like America, but I don't know. We're getting a few less mighty men here in America, I'm afraid. Limp wrist and all. You say, that's mean. No, that's real. This country's changing, and I'm afraid that it is a concerted effort by the left, the right, and those in the middle to destroy it. And there's no excuse for it. This is a great country. And it's going to dissolve from within because we can't be politically correct and say the right thing and make everybody happy and everybody can come to our church and make them feel welcome. Listen, you're welcome here. But you can't bring the world in with you. You know, you want to live like the world, that's your choice. But you're going to get The devil preached out of you. And that's the way it's supposed to be. So it's not really America anymore. That note was probably written in there some time ago. But I think about Gibeon, a great city. This is a great country, but listen, we're losing our moorings and our foundation. Verse 3, "...Wherefore Adonai Zedek, king of Jerusalem, son of the Hoham..." Boy, I'd hate to have that name. Hoham. King of Hebron. and unto Piram king of Jarmuth, and unto Japhia king of Lachish, and unto Debar king of Eglon, saying, Now it's southern Canaan. Come unto me and help me that we may smite Gibeon, for it hath made peace with Josh and with the children of Israel." By the way, any time anybody joins up with the people of God, you can expect persecution. Verse 5, "...therefore the five kings of the Amorites, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmath, the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon, gathered themselves together and went up, they and all their hosts, and encamped before Gibeon, and made war against it." Now, from my perspective, I'd be looking at that going, Well, okay. We'll just let them wipe him out. If we can't wipe him out, we'll let them wipe him out. But that's not the way it works with men of character. See, Joshua had a responsibility to keep his word even if he was tricked into giving his word. You can't justify the actions you take based on what others do. That's justifying sin because of... what do we call it? Circumstances. Circumstantial... what's it called? Situational ethics. I knew I had the answer out there somewhere. I was just trying to get some input. Man, I've got to ask more questions. Situational ethics. Listen, that's not us. That's not Christianity. That's not Israel when Israel's following God. That's not Joshua, man of character. Verse 6. Well, verse 5, "...therefore the five kings, the Amorites, who they are, they went up and all their hosts, and camped before Gibeon, made war against the men of Gibeon, sent unto Joshua to the camp to Gilgal." Now, you have to understand, Gilgal, that's when they crossed Jordan, they encamped in Gilgal, which is east of Jericho. And that's where they stayed. They didn't travel from battle to battle. Evidently they stayed in Gilgal and then they went out and they fought from there. But they sent a Joshua to the camp bed to Gilgal, saying, Slack not thy hand from my servants. Come up to us quickly and save us and help us, for all the kings of the Amorites that dwell in the mountains are gathered together against us." Boy, I'll tell you, that's the way the world is. They'll turn to the Lord for help. 9-11, God bless America. You know, we had prayer at some football... I went to a football game, a high school football game, and they got up and they said prayer, but that didn't last more than a couple of weeks. They had people complain, and just a few, just a few. But that's what people do. They'll look and they'll say, well, you had all these shootings. Where's God? I'll tell you where He is. He's where He's always been. But he's not in the schools because we kicked him out, so to speak. You kick the Bible out and you kick prayer out and you basically kick God out and bring evolution in. And then when the monkeys act like apes and shoot everybody up, then you're going to blame the guns because it's got to be the guns that caused it because you got the police outside protecting you. Or do you? So take everybody's guns because who should have guns beside those protecting us? And who's going to give up the guns? Only those that are law-abiding citizens will give up the guns. And the rest will have to face the consequences. Listen, this isn't an insane asylum run by the inmates anymore. That's America, today's society. Today's mentality. Listen, Joshua is a man, a character in verse 7. So Joshua ascended from Gilgal. Listen, it's uphill basically most of the way to get to where he's got to go here at Gibeon. And all the people of war with him and all the mighty men of valor. And the Lord said..." Now, why is the Lord saying? Because you're not given everything that's going on here. Evidently, Joshua prayed. "...And the Lord said..." See, the mistake that you have is thinking that you've got the whole dialogue in the Bible. You don't. There are gaps that you have to fill in, and God answered. Frequently, what you'll have is you'll see they answered, they answered, He answered. And then, you know, like Jesus, when He's talking, Jesus answered. But wait a minute, what was the question? You're not given the question. You're just given the answer and you don't know what the question was other than He answered the question. All the books in the world couldn't hold the history of God and the history of what He did. And the Lord said unto Joshua, Fear them not, for I have delivered, past tense, them into thine hand. There shall not a man of them stand before thee, That just means nobody's going to stand before Him. It doesn't mean they're going to wipe them all out because later on you're going to see some of them flee into the fenced cities. So this doesn't say He's going to kill them all right then and there. Not a man will stand before Thee. They're delivered. But listen, Joshua still got to fight. You can't, well, you know, God said they're delivered to me, so we're going to go back to Gilgal and we're going to sit on our haunches and do nothing. That's not the way it works. Jericho, you march around. Ai, you bring them out. You have this trick that you're doing and this ambush that's going to go on, and that's the way it's done. Here, what you see is he's going to stop the sun from moving and do a miraculous thing. But after that, it's going to be, and they went to another city and they fought. They went to another city and they fought, or another people group, and they fought, and they fought, and they fought. Because now I think they've learned the lesson. It's God doing the battle, but we still have a responsibility as Christians to be in the fight. We're to be good soldiers of Jesus Christ. Paul said, I have fought the fight. Listen, that's the way it's supposed to be. Too many times we think, well, it's all up to God. We become Calvinistic in our actions and think, well, what will be, will be. Listen, that's not the way it works. You and I have to do what we're supposed to do, and then God works through us, but He has to have us to work through. Why? Because that's how God chose to do it. Do you know the Bible says that if the people didn't cry out in Jesus' day, the rocks would have cried out? What? Because God could make the rocks cry out and say what the children were saying about Jesus, but He chose the children to do it. He chose the people. He chooses us. We have to get, and I think I said it last week, I must have, engaged. We have to get engaged in the thing. That's what Christianity is. Look at what he says here. Verse 9, Joshua therefore came unto them suddenly and went up from Gilgal all night. So mostly the cover of darkness, mostly uphill. And the Lord disconfitted them before Israel and slew them with a great slaughter, Gibeon, and chased them along the way that goeth up to Beth-horon and smote them in Azekah and unto Makedah. Boy, I tell you what, that was a rough one. Makedah. And it came to pass as they fled from before Israel and were going down to Beth-horon, that the Lord cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Asca, and they died. There were more which died with hailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew with a sword." Almost like a body count. I mean, God did something miraculous here. He's got these hailstones coming out of heaven and just killing more people than they're killing. Do you realize how politically incorrect that is to think that's a good thing? We should not think that this is good. God's killing people. It's just the way it is. In Revelation 16, 21, he's going to have great hail come out of heaven during Daniel's 70th week. You say, well, I don't like a God like that. Listen, He knows people. He knows what's in their heart. He knows they will serve their gods and they will cause the children of Israel to turn to their gods and become like them. And so God says, wipe them out. You know what you do? You wipe them out. Verse 12, "...then spake Joshua to the Lord. In the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, He said in the sight of Israel, Son, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou moon in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. is not this written in the book of Jasher, so the sun stood still in the midst of heaven and hasted not to go down about a whole day?" Boy, God hearkens to the voice of a man who himself had hearkened to the voice of God. Can you imagine? Sun stands still. But you know, when Jesus was on this earth, He said a similar thing. When He said in Matthew 21.21, say to this mountain, be thou removed, cast in the sea, Not doubting in his heart and it shall be done. So I don't know about that. I do. You know what our problem is? We don't believe. Now I'm not talking about name it, claim it, because that's what it's become. I mean, we control God because we name it, we claim it, and by faith we believe it, and therefore we're controlling and manipulating God. We don't control and manipulate God. That's not what it's talking about. It's talking about faith to do what God wants you to do. Not my will, but thine be done. But I don't know. Maybe we need some more God-sized prayers. I mean, what's a God-sized prayer for us? It's not numbers. Numbers aren't that important. Although, the more you have, the more you can do. But listen, more is not always better. I mean, we could fill up the pews with a little electric guitar stuff. Little frowns out there. Yeah, man. Bring the young people in. And then take a poll. Find out what the people want. And then when you find out what they want, design the church around what the goats want. Then when they come in, we can save them. That's not the way it's working. I've been to some of those places with me putting in earplugs. I mean, it's terrible. Terrible. And listen, some good comes of it. There's some people that get saved. But I'd hate to stand before God and think, well, you know what, God? I had ten times as many people saved. We took your Bible and we threw it out and replaced it with a pole because the people said they wanted this. And your Bible was a little too stringent for what we thought we should do in this 21st century environment. It's not the way it's supposed to be. He said, the sun stands still. There just weren't enough hours in the day. Huh, Brother Ray? Our biggest problem is we just don't have enough time to get everything done. It's also a picture of the second coming. Jeremiah 32, 21, I think it is. Is there anything too hard for me, God asks? There is nothing too hard for God. Nothing. So it's impossible for God to stop the rotation of the earth and things to remain intact. By Him, all things consist. It's impossible for a positive and negative to attract each other, not implode the atom. It's impossible for us to even exist if God didn't hold us together. The whole world would implode. Nothing's impossible for God. Can God make the sun stand still as far as man... I can't even say it now. I feel like I'm scientifically incorrect. Because of all the people out there going, well, you know, Really, the earth doesn't rotate. The earth stays still and it's flattened. The sun goes around it. I don't know how, when it gets down here to the bottom part, that it gets to the top fast enough. It must go like this. In order to come up the next day on time. Crazy stuff. Nothing is impossible for God. Elijah, asked for fire to come down from heaven. Guess what happened? Fire came down from heaven. He put water on that altar, water around it, and the fire licked up the water. Why? It's God. God wants to show himself real in Elijah's day, in Joshua's day, in Jesus' day, in Paul's day, but not today. He wants to show Himself real in our lives. So how does He do that? I think it's an individual thing. You draw as close as you can to God. You submit to Him on a daily basis. Every morning when you get up, you say, not my will but Thine be done. And you keep drawing closer to Him and closer to Him. And you keep your focus on Him. And you keep giving Him the glory. And listen, by the time you get done with the day, you'll realize He was there. There's a story that I read in a book about Joshua. It was about World War II. There was a guy named Tom. He was in a platoon of men. And they were stuck in a valley, and the Germans were over on the other side, and they were just putting the rockets down right on them, putting the mortars down right on them. If they'd get up, they'd get shot. The guy named Joel was writing this to his mom when everything was declassified, and Tom snuck out of his foxhole and assessed the situation, realized that the 50 men in the platoon weren't going to be able to escape. No way. So he went under a tree and he prayed. He said, Lord, I don't know what to do. There's no way that I can reach them. Can you help us?" And this is a true story. This has been documented. And a fog or a mist came in between the German and the American army and the whole platoon escaped. They went to the next city and there was a church there and they went in the church. And they looked at that young man and they said, would you lead the service? And he led the service. And you know what the conclusion was? That man is one of the most respected men in our platoon now. A Christian who prayed. He prayed a God-sized prayer. You know what our problem is? We don't pray God-sized prayers. We think, you know, well, I want this. That's not what prayer is about. God, I want you to do this. That's not what prayer is about. Prayer is saying, I don't want what I want. I want what you want. What do you want, God? And then I want to get out of the way. I want your will done. I don't care what it costs me. I don't care what it takes. I don't care the pain, the trial, the tribulation I have to go to to reach the end. I know that once I get there, and you're there waiting for me, and you're there bringing me through, it's all worth it. And that's called life. Life. You know what we want today? Name it, claim it, baby. I want my Cadillac. I want my big house down here. I want my money. I want this. I want that. And I want good health. And I want to live on the easy side of life. I don't want any problems. I don't want any trouble. I just want, want, want, want, want. That is what most prayer is today. You have prayer meetings in churches on Wednesday night. Pray for so-and-so, she's sick. You realize that if we got all our answered prayer on Wednesday night, there'd be nobody sick in the world? Is that wrong? If that's the focus of what we think prayer is all about, that's not prayer, that's not God. God is not... it is not to try to get what we want out of God. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. That's true today. That's true today. Hezekiah, remember he wanted the shadow to go back ten degrees. That's impossible. It's impossible. Science will tell you that's impossible. Science will tell you you can't stop the Earth's rotation for about a day. We got a big God. People praying God-sized prayers. Anything's possible with God. You say, can we have revival in this country? Yes. Why not? That looks pretty bleak. Could we? We can. Will we? I don't know. I wish I had the faith to believe to ask it and do my part. Here's the key though. Do my part. Regardless. Let's go on. Verse 14. There was no day like that, before it or after it, that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man. For the Lord fought for Israel, and Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, unto the camp to Gilgal." See, now they're back there near Jericho. And it's not really understanding here, because verse 16, these kings fled and hid themselves in a cave at Machedah. It was told Joshua, saying, the five kings are found hidden in a cave at Makeda. That was probably better saying it that way. And Joshua said, Roll great stones upon the mouth of the cave, and set men by it, for to keep them. And stay ye not, but pursue after your enemies, and smite the hindermost of them. Suffer them not to enter into their cities, for the Lord your God hath delivered them into your hand. came to pass, when Joshua and the children of Israel had made an end of slaying them with a very great slaughter, till they were consumed, that the rest which remained of them entered in defense cities. And all the people returned to the camp to Joshua, at Metkida in peace." Now notice this next part. This is good. This is really good. None moved his tongue against any of the children of Israel. Now that could be one of two ways. That could be all the people in the world, you know, that are around there. Or that could be amongst the children of Israel. Remember how they were murmuring against Joshua because he made the league with Gibeon? And you know what it probably was? Hey, we're finished now. We were supposed to wipe everybody out. You guys made a league with those among us. God is never going to bless us. It's hopeless. Let's just give up on life. Let's just forget it. We don't need to go out to battle again. God will never bless us. Guess what? Nobody, nobody moved his tongue against the children of Israel. Not only could that be they had the testimony among those around them that they shut their mouths, but it also could have been all those that were murmuring back there in chapter 9 verse 18 stopped. And listen, that's the way we are. What we do is we look at a situation and we just think, it's hopeless. Who caused it? Throw them under the bus. And generally, regardless of who it is, it's going to be the pastor thrown under the bus because he's the one that's in the limelight of the thing. He's the one that's most obvious during the thing. So we throw him under the bus because it's all his fault. And we don't have any grace, we don't have any compassion, we don't give God a chance to work the thing out, we just give up on God and give up on God's man. Listen, that's not the way it's supposed to be. Verse 22, then said, Joshua, open the mouth of the cave and bring out those five kings unto me out of the cave. Joshua 10 verse 23. And they did so, and brought forth those five kings unto him out of the cave, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, and the king of Egalon. It came to pass, when they brought out those kings unto Joshua, that Joshua called for all the men of Israel, and said unto the captains of the men of war, which went with him, Come near, put your feet upon the necks, of these kings and they came near and put their feet upon the necks of them. Isn't that just mean? I mean, can you imagine that today? We're over there in battle with some Muslims and we catch some of them and we have them there. We put our boots on their necks and we say, tell us, what were you going to blow up next? What's your plan? I mean, that's so politically incorrect to treat your enemies like they're enemies. Yeah. That's what we'd be doing. That's today. Or more... Terrible. You know, all this pictures A Christian or the world, too, really. If you go through here and you see this, I mean, let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies. And you look at this thing and you can see a picture here that I won't get into unless we have time at the end, which I don't think that we will. But let's do this. Let's move on. Look at verse 25. Joshua said unto them, Fear not, nor be dismayed. This is Joshua 10.25. Be strong and of a good courage. For thus shall the Lord do to all your enemies against whom ye fight." But you have to fight. You see that? What's getting ready to happen is Joshua and the men are getting ready to fight. And God isn't going to send the hail down. God isn't going to stop the sun. God is not going to... make the walls fall down in the city again. What he's going to do is say, Joshua, you need to get out there and fight, but you've got to realize the battle is the Lord's. 2 Timothy chapter 4, verses 17 and 18, the Bible says, the Lord strengthened me, talking about the Apostle Paul. Verse 26, "'Afterward Joshua smote them and slew them and hanged them on five trees.'" Now it just got worse, didn't it? "'They were hanged upon the trees until the evening.'" Boy, that is so politically incorrect, inhumane, to kill them like that. You hear what I said? It's inhumane to kill them that way. That's about like the death penalty is inhumane. You know, because he didn't die quick. I mean, they generally don't put people to death that didn't have a cruel killing on their hands or 2 or 3 or 10 or 12. But we gotta be humane in the way that we put them to death. Goodness. What a weird, weird world we live in. Country. Verse 27, it came to pass the time of the going down of the sun, Joshua commanded, and they took them down off the trees and cast them into the cave wherein they had been hidden. They laid great stones in the cave's mouth, which remained until this very day. Boy, there you go. And if you're looking at the spiritual application, the old man's still there. They bring him out of the cave. It's like the old man. They kill him, crucify the flesh, and then they throw him back in the cave. He's still in that cave. You roll that rock back off, he's still going to be stinking in that cave. That's the old man. Verse 21, "'And that day Joshua took Makeda and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof, he utterly destroyed them and all the souls that were therein.'" I did some cross-reference on that today, the souls that were therein. Did he really kill souls? No, souls interchangeable with people in the Old Testament many times. "'The soul that sinneth, it shall die.'" That's talking to Ezekiel about the individual Not the literal soul in the body. He said, "...he let none remain," in verse 28, "...and he did to the king of Makeda as he did unto the king of Jericho. Then Joshua passed from Makeda and all Israel with him unto Libna and fought against Libna. And the Lord delivered it also." Who's doing the fighting now? It looks like Joshua's doing it, but the Lord delivered it. And you always have to realize, if God does something in your life, you have to give Him credit. I don't walk around all the time and go, well, the Lord did this, the Lord did that, and the Lord... It becomes counterproductive. Because it means nothing. It becomes vain if you just say it over and over again. You know what the key is? The key is, do you know it? Do you know it was God that's worked in your life? Do you know that it was God that did such and such in your life? And if you did, don't worry about what everybody else thinks. Listen, they're going to judge you anyway. If you say too much, you said too much. If you say too little, you said too little. If you say too little, it's too much. If you say too much, it's too little. And if I could repeat that again, I would. It doesn't matter what you do. You're condemned if you do and condemned if you don't. The Lord delivered it also, verse 30, the king thereof into the hand of Israel, and he smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein. He let none remain in it, but did unto the king thereof, as he did unto the king of Jericho. And Joshua passed from Libna, and all Israel with him, unto Lachish, and they camped against it, and fought against it. And the Lord delivered Lachish into the hand of Israel, which took it on the second day, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were there, in accord to all that he had done to Libnah. Then Horeb king of Gezer came up to help Lachish. Joshua smote him and his people until he had left him none remaining. And from Lachish, Joshua passed unto Eglon. Remember, the king of Eglon was already slain, in verse 26. And all Israel were with him, and they encamped against it, and fought against it. And they took it on that day, and smote it with the edge of the sword. And all the souls that were therein, he utterly destroyed that according to all that he had done in Lachish. Joshua went unto went up from Eglon, and all Israel with him unto Hebron." Remember, the king had already been slain in verse 23. They fought against it, and they took it and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof, and all the souls that were therein... Wait a minute, I thought he already slew the king. That's the problem with people in Bible study. They don't think that a king is ever replaced. You see how that works? He slew the king. Well, wait a minute, there can't be a king then. He had a boy. He had another boy. He had a brother. It doesn't matter how it works. Just believe the Bible. He left none remaining according to all that he had done to Eglon, but destroyed it utterly and all the souls that were therein. I want you to get a picture here. He is doing what God told him to do. In our mindset, we have a tendency to think that's unfair, wrong, or... Listen, God knows these people. God knows what they are. We think of Muslims today and you think, well, just bring them in the United States. We need to... In order to understand them, we have to be surrounded by them. That has not worked well in any country that they've become a 10% holder in. You know that, right? But that's what they're thinking. God knows these people. You can't let them come in. They're going to want sharia law. They're going to want control. And they're going to want to dress like they do. They're going to want everything to be according to their eating habits. There is no winning this thing by intermixing with them. I'm saying give them the gospel. If they don't take the gospel, don't invite them into the country to become part of you. Do you know when people were allowed to come in this country, they had to assimilate? They had to agree to learn the language. They had to agree to become an American. That's what the problem is. Verse 38, "...Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to Debor, and fought against it. And he took it, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof, and they smote them with the edge of the sword, not only destroyed all the souls that were therein, he left none remaining, as he had done to Hebron, so he did to Debor, and to the king thereof, and as he had done also to Libna, and to her kings. So Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, and all their kings. He left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed." By the way, you know who the souls are? It's defined right there. All that breathed. That's the souls. So it isn't talking, when it's talking in the Old Testament about souls, many times it's talking about all those that have breath. As the Lord God of Israel commanded. Joshua smote them from Kadesh Barnea, even unto Gaza, and all the country of Goshen, even unto Gibeon. And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because the Lord God of Israel fought for Israel. Joshua turned all Israel with him unto the camp to Gilgal. Remember, that's over there on the east side of Jericho. Even when we do the fighting, it's God that's doing the fighting. We have to get God involved in our lives. Every day and in every way. We submit to Him. We give glory to Him when it's done right. That's why you see people and you hear people and they say, well, glory to God. If it wasn't for the Lord Jesus Christ, I couldn't do that. Now listen, I don't know about scoring a touchdown that that's really how God works. I have found out God doesn't care a whole lot about sports. except giving Him glory. But I don't think He gives a touchdown. I think He'd rather you get tackled and break your leg and hear you give God the glory. Really, I do. I think sometimes we think, well, I'm going to give God the glory. I scored a touchdown. Well, when you get sacked, why don't you do that? You know, praise God. Because we think it's only God when it's good. That's not true. Listen, He might want you sacked 50 times so you'll learn to give Him the glory. Maybe He wants you out of football because you're no good. And then He's going to use you to do something really great for Him in the world. You don't know. Many times we look at our sports personalities and think, well, I want to be just like them. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be like them. I want to be what God wants me to be. And you know something? All this comes after a bad decision. That's the encouraging thing of the whole lesson. He went to Gibeon and he covenanted with them when he shouldn't have done it. The people murmured. And then he had some of the greatest victories. He wiped them all out. He did everything that God told him to do, plus some, and it stopped everybody's mouth. But you know what happened first? People did what comes natural to people. They complained, they murmured, and they griped. You say, why do I preach on that so much? I think because the Bible just emphasizes it over and over again, and because we're all guilty. You know what my natural tendency is? To gripe. To complain. To murmur. You know what God says? Stop. Don't do it. Stay true. Stay strong. Give Him the glory. You're dismissed.