You're gonna need it. Now what this is, what this is, if you're looking at it, you'll see it's got a number, okay, so look at the top line, number 28, and this is key to your book. Okay, so 28 is number 28 in your book, in the subject matter, Jesus' first cleansing of the temple, and that's page 85 in the book. Okay? Right? See? Got it? Got it? No, you don't got it. That's item number 28 in your book, but it's on page 85. Okay, so I gave it to you both ways. Now, here's the scheme of this, and you'll notice it goes 28 to 44, 45, 47, 48, jumps to 87, 88, 89, jumps to 112. All right, so what I'm doing here is my end goal is to get to the last one on the second page, number 165, Judas agrees to betray Jesus. Now that's the kickoff of the Passion of the Christ. All this is me picking through there and following the trail of what happened with Jesus right up until the time Judas betrays him and leads us into the Passion Week of Christ. If I had timed this better, we'd be doing the Passion Week before Easter, but there's too much in here and I didn't want to skip some of these. You've just got to keep in mind that that's where we're going. All of this is the trail that leads to the Passion of the Christ. And I've skipped over some stuff, but these are the major items that you get to. So, starting with number one, number 28, Jesus' first cleansing of the temple. What does that have to do with His Passion? Just thinking about it, what do you think this was? Okay, so number 28 is Jesus' first cleansing of the temple, and just guessing, what do you think that contributed to our end goal of the Passion of Christ? Passive. How did the cleansing of the temple contribute to the Passion of Christ? symbolic of God's wrath? Well, okay, I'm looking at more this on a temporal plane. What do you think happened there? This is when the Pharisees decided they had to kill him. Yeah, I mean, we're looking at this at a surface level of what was all the animosity about Jesus? Why were these people so angry with him? What led to the fact that they were willing and actively trying to kill him? So that's kind of what I'm doing here. This trail that leads to the Passion Week are just me picking through this and saying, OK, that's probably the first domino right there. Jesus goes, well, let's read it. But what happens here, this is early in Jesus' ministry. Okay, so, you know, MacArthur is timing this into the late 20s, so it's early in his ministry. And this unknown person, a nobody, okay, famous line from The Natural, a nobody from nowhere. If you've ever watched, you watch The Natural, right? Okay, that's a famous line, he's nobody from nowhere. That's Jesus. And he goes in, and under the authority of God, under the presence and the working of the Holy Spirit, now remember, he's clearing the temple. It's not like he's clearing this, or even this church building. I mean, the temple was huge, and the temple grounds were set up. They were slaughtering sheep. by the estimated hundred thousands. I read yesterday 225,000. Right, there you are. Okay, that estimate seems to be pretty good. This massive operation and Jesus goes in and drives them out of the temple. See, this is where you got to read between the lines a little bit. Where does all this animosity come from? Where does all this hatred of Jesus come from and we're looking at it on a temporal plane and I'm picking Jesus first cleansing of the temple. Okay, I'm on page 85. Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand. Jesus went up to Jerusalem and he found in the temple those who sold oxen and sheep and doves and the money changers doing business and When he had made a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen. Okay, let me stop there. Now, can you imagine the mass chaos of this? I don't herd cows or sheep, but I mean, if you've got thousands and the people involved, chaos. Drove them out of the temple with the sheep and the oxen. He poured out the money changers. I'd be upset with that. Elizabeth, go first. Money changers overturned the temples. He said to those who sold doves, take those things away. Don't make my father's house a house of merchandise. And his disciples remembered that it was written, zeal for your house has eaten me up. So the Jews answered and said to him, what right, what sign, Do you show us, since you do all this?" Jesus answered and said to them, "'Destroy this temple in three days and I will raise it up.'" Okay, now this is why I say this is a contributing factor, because that comes back to haunt Jesus. And the Jew said, it's taken 46 years to build this temple. You'll raise it, you'll build it up again in three days. But he was speaking of the temple of his body. Therefore, when he had risen from the dead, his disciples remembered they had said to them, and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had said. Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name. And when they saw the signs, which he did, but Jesus, did not commit himself to them because he knew all men, and he had no need that anyone should testify of man, for he knew what was in man." Let's chat about this a bit. As Steve made the point, this whole thing about Passover, where does Passover come from? That's an important feature. So this is a test. You're trying to get ordained in the PCA. One of the standard questions is, what do you think the major message of Exodus is? You get one answer. What do you think a major emphasis of Exodus is? Steve? Steve? Come on. Major emphasis of Exodus is? You've already said it, Passover. That's exactly right. But you can't believe the number of times I've been in Presbytery and guys just sit there. Say this, say this. It's Passover, come on. It's Passover. Okay, do you see why? It's Passover. Because that screams the sacrifice of Jesus. just screams the sacrifice of Jesus. So putting this in context, you've got Jesus going to this first Passover, and they're adulterating what He's going to do for the sake of their commerce. So you start to see this. Boy, they really were missing the point, and in particular were defying the grace of God Jesus was going to participate in. You kind of see that in a broader picture. I mean, this is awful. And Eva made the point about, she was watching a program where Jesus was walking through the desert in the 40 days of his temptation. I had a, and she was, how difficult it was for her to kind of watch Jesus struggle through that. I'm having the same reaction doing this, doing this study. watching this happen to Jesus. Because this study has a devotional aspect to it, it's drawn me into this person of Jesus. My personal reaction to it is, it's making me see Him not as a figure, but it's making me know him. I'm feeling... I don't want to overplay this, but I mean, I'm kind of there, and I'm walking with him in this, and I'm feeling what is going on with him, and I'm finding myself getting really angry at the way they're treating him. So I'm going to say to you, let the emotions of this work on you. It's probably worth it. OK. So what you have here is the very first note that MacArthur makes, that Jesus had, this is the last line of the first note, his passion, Jesus' passion for reverence. this, that God alone exercises the right to regulate his worship. Okay, did you notice that? Anybody have a thought on that? Again, you guys that have been through ordination here, that concept of the regulative principle of worship is very important, very important in Reform circles, but what is it? What is this thing that we do? Why do you, so when you walk in here, every Sunday, every Lord's Day, you see a pattern to everything that goes on in our worship. What decides that pattern? What decides how and what we are supposed to do? Say the regulative principle of worship is doing and giving worship to God as he has ordained it. Now, how do we know that? I mean, can you go to a verse and it says, okay, you are to worship this way, but you can't do that, okay? I mean, it's difficult. Okay, you can go back, you can work backwards, and you look at the pattern of worship with the Old Testament folks, the singing of the Psalms, the praying, the teaching, You see a pattern in how they handled their worship that God was, in fact, pleased with. So He establishes the limits. He establishes the limits and the pattern of the way we are to worship Him. Now, do you see that in modern worship, or what is supposed to be modern worship? I mean, we're making up all kinds of stuff. We're doing lots of different stuff, and we're calling it good, and it defies the regulative principle of worship. So we get new members all the time. We take in new members all the time. And one of the questions that typically comes up is, why do you do What do you do? I mean, why don't you do this? And why don't you do that? And why don't you do skits? So we get lots of suggestions of what we ought to do to make, this is terrible, but... Be serious. I hear that a lot. Yeah. Yeah. They're too serious. Too serious. We're too serious about it. I hear that a lot. And they want skits and they want some dramas. Interpretive dance. And we're not going to do any of that. I think you hear a lot of preaching and not teaching these days. Good, that's a good point. We are to teach the Word of God. And I was listening to somebody this morning, I'm sitting there thinking it's all emotion and it's not really getting down to the nitty-gritty of what the Word of God says. So the point here is that God has right and has established his right to regulate the way we worship him. So this concept, this idea that you can approach God on your own terms, is totally false. It's totally false. You cannot do that. Isn't the Old Testament, from start to finish almost, just what you're saying, God talks about, I am God, I am Almighty God, and He'll do it my way, so to speak, time after time? Yeah, you do. You see that a lot, and people get offended with that, Versus the mindset that when you come to Christ, you say, I'll do anything. Right? I don't care what you ask me to do. I'll do anything. Or, well, if you do this, I'll do that. Well, if you do this, God, I'll do that. You know what I mean? We make deals with God. As a former Catholic, we kind of got used to that idea that we could make deals with them, and if I hold up my end, he'll hold up his end. I mean, it leads to such faulty thinking that we can manipulate God. Okay, so that's the regulative principle of worship. MacArthur's second point is that we see evidence of three passovers. in the ministry of Christ. Now that number is not necessarily significant. Passover was held every year. Jesus, as an Orthodox Jew, would have gone to Passover every single year. And if he saw the same thing he saw on the first Passover, there were probably three whippings. We don't have evidence of two. I'm just guessing, okay? But if he saw in the second Passover what he saw at the first Passover, there was probably the driving out of sheep and ox and turning over the tables. They probably got the same thing, okay? Now, the Scripture doesn't say that. Was Jesus first Passover when he was 12 and he stayed back? Well, that's a good point. I mean, he was there, yes. But this is referring to him as an adult and participating. Okay, I mean that's not significant except to say this is not a single occasion. Okay, look, and this is the last note on 85. Those who sold, it starts out, those who sold the sheep and oxen and doves and the money changers, okay, so this is just a technical point of what was going on here, and there was only one temple, and if you were going to attend Passover, you had to go to Jerusalem to the temple. So this was also the time, once a year, that the sheep were offered for the sake of your sin. So if you, being an Orthodox Jew, wanted your sins forgiven, you had to take your perfect sheep to the Passover and submit it for inspection to the high priest. The high priest would say whether or not he accepted it, whether it was without blemish, and then they would sacrifice your sheep for the sake of your sin. Okay, you got the idea with this? And if you couldn't afford a sheep or didn't have sheep, there were dogs. Jesus' family was poor and so they offered a dove, so that was an option for the poor to do that. If you didn't want to drive your sheep, if you came too far, you could buy a sheep at the Passover. Now, I don't mean this in any way of sarcasm, but this is right with corruption, is it not? You're going to sell these sheep. You've got to have a sheep in order to get your sin forgiven. You don't have a sheep. I've got sheep. I'll sell you a sheep. It was worse than that. They also had to have the right kind of money. So they had the money changers. Okay, the money changers is what Elmer is saying. is that if you come from, well, okay, Galilee. Galilee had their own money, type of money, and it wasn't acceptable for the temple payments. All right, so what did they do? Being enterprising Jews, they would take your Galilean coins and they would give you temple coins, and that was an exchange rate, right? Well, what kind of exchange rate do you think I mean, hopefully, considering the nature of this, that it's worship, it's the Passover, okay, the significance of the reference of this thing, that you would have a standard exchange rate for everybody, and it would be fair and above board, and, well, you know, that's not what Jesus sees here. He sees the cheating. like Deuteronomy and all that, did it actually make provisions for Jews to buy another sheep in replacement of them not bringing their own? I mean in the sense it's like, okay don't bring your own, which I can get, it's a long trip, but in a way it's kind of like you're buying this one over here, was that really acceptable? Is that really what was laid down originally? That's a good point, because that defies the original intent of it, didn't it? Because the rules were, you raised your own sheep, you kept it in your house for a week ahead of time, and then after you got all cuddly with your sheep, then you sacrificed it. You slaughtered it. That's a really good point. So what happens here, in their traditions, they start expanding the rules. Now, did they have the authority to do that? I wouldn't think so. You wouldn't think so. That's exactly right. You wouldn't think so. Which has probably led to the corruption of this. Now, again, these are the religious leaders making these rules. And they're the ones getting the money out of it, too. Well, let's see, they have a lot at stake here, don't they? Okay, so what I'm saying to you is that's the first thing that Jesus gets debited to his account. He goes in and he upsets their whole enterprise. for the sake of the reverence of God. It so speaks of his courage and his steadfastness, you know, that he couldn't be corrupted. You know, Jerry, when you think where he came from, all glory, all perfect, no sin, fellowship. And that's what Judah said last week. Crazy. Oh, he did? He was talking about that. No, no. It's worth saying. Say it again. And then he comes. Yes. God's temple should be a reflection of heaven. Right. When he gets here, it's defiled. Yes. Can you imagine his heart? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. I mean, he was heartbroken. Of what? it had become. Yeah. Yeah. And so we would be too, if we worshipped in a place that we recognized this worship is not of God. You know, when we go maybe this day, let's say you're on a trip. Yeah, sure. And you say, I feel no presence of God in this place. You know, they're dancing to cymbals. You know, and you think no, no, no. But I can't imagine his heart when he saw what was happening. The dung that's there in the temple, you know, we call it poop, but it's the smell, the lack of glory. Yes. It hurts. Well, it hurts. Yeah, it does. MacArthur's comment here in his last sentence is, after all this, religion had become crass and materialistic. Now again, let's put this in context. The Passover is the event of the year for the Jews. Okay? The event, and for us, the Passover in fulfillment with Jesus is the event for us. And this is what man does with that. All right, so let's move to, let me move to page 87. I'm on page 87. So Jesus says this, on the top of page 87, Jesus answered and said to them, they're asking for a sign. Jesus says, okay, I'm gonna give you a sign. Here you go. You destroy this temple, and in three days I'm going to raise it up. There's your sign. And of course, they totally missed the message, right? Thinking temporally, not spiritually, not assessing whether or not he was telling them the truth. And then it goes on. This is the last paragraph in the scripture. Now, when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name. So they see what's going on. Typically, he is healing people everywhere he goes. He's speaking the truth of God. Okay, so he's pulling people to him. So many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he did. But Jesus did not commit himself to them, because he knew all men. He had no need that anyone should testify of man, for he knew what was in man. Do you think one of those signs was the raising of Lazarus, or has that already happened? That hadn't happened yet. That's later, and we're going to look at it here as one of the things that I think led to his crucifixion. That's what we're doing. We're making the case. If you're a prosecutor, you're laying out your evidence as to, I hate to say this, why you would sacrifice the Christ. So these guys are laying out a case. And this is just the first one. Well, he wrecked our Passover in 27 AD. So all this enthusiasm for Jesus, enthusiasm, they see signs, they see raisings, they see things going on, and people are getting whipped up to believe in Jesus, and Jesus is dismissing their enthusiasm. And in fact, he's saying, don't tell anybody that I'm the Christ. Don't even say it out loud. Because that enthusiasm is not what I'm after. see what's happening here, we operate on a totally different...we're trying to whip up enthusiasm, right? Don't we do that kind of typical, you know, whip it up and get people's emotions? Who mentioned the dancing, the static dancing and all this? Okay, you watch it, you're purposely, pastors, are whipping up the emotional aspects and treating it as if it is the in adherence to the regulative principle of worship. And you can get excited, okay? I mean, you can get excited about the Word of God, certainly. You know, you read the miracles of God and what goes on. Yeah, I mean, you can get excited and you should be enthusiastic about it, but You don't want to say that that is an acceptable form of worship. Your dancing is not regulative. I mean, you've got to stop that. You've got to quit the dancing. I really take issues with that a little bit. In a lot of ways, it's an expression of people's faith. Yes, and I'm not trying to say that you sitting there with the Holy Spirit burning you, because you've heard the truth, that you should purposely try to quell that. That's not what I'm talking about. But what I am saying is whipping people up to get them out in the aisle and dance up and down the aisle and expect that to be acceptable to God. Okay, so it's really not the primary. because, I mean, people are so funny and they do different things, you know? You know what I mean? Everybody you meet's different. Everybody. And I really, I'll be honest with you, I know that all of us have gone through charismatic churches. And sometimes I say, I wish you wouldn't do that, because I know it's distracting at this point for me to do that. And sometimes I think they do it because it brings to the worries of themselves. However, sometimes I think it's very genuine, you know? You know what I mean? I mean, very genuine. Some people just can't express themselves. I mean, they just, I don't know, it's almost like they can't help themselves. For certain, I'm not going to say it. Thank you for saying it. You don't get it. I'm not going to tell them that. And I don't mean to be saying you can't have any emotional reaction to it. I am not saying that. Okay, I mean I see lots of times when John's, Dr. Jacobs is preaching that tears are running down people's faces. Truth has hit them so hard. I'm not saying that's wrong and false. Okay, don't hear that. Okay. People are so different nowadays. Yeah. I think it depends on whether it's coming from within that, you know, if a person's responding from what comes within them versus someone trying to manipulate their emotions or their response in terms of worship. I mean, I would say if the preacher is trying to whip it up, that's not a form of worship. But if you yourself as an individual in a worship service are convicted of something or just respond in a glorious manner or whatever, then I think that that is not wrong. Because that's coming from within you. I totally agree. Jerry, the hard part of that is when you're watching it, and it distracts, like Kilty said, if that distracts you, and we're supposed to be aware of what our actions are doing around us. how many people you know say amen, you know, I mean just a moment, a burst out of amen, and that's fine, but you know, when it becomes something that, you know, it's like a, you know, agreement up and down the aisle, and we kind of wonder is that, it's drawing attention to them and not to God, in other words. Yeah. No, and I'm an amen-er, so I do the same thing, and I want to say other stuff. when Dr. Jacobs was preached. I want to say to him, do that again. Say that again. And that was a benefit of being able to see him on tape, you know, when we had that closed down. Watch him on tape. I could pause him, you know, and say, OK. And I could run it backwards, and I could listen to it again. Yeah, I mean, that's what I want to do. I want to pause him. him that's special to you. I mean, I have one that he's going to do at my funeral. And it's one where, if we sing it here, I'm going to raise my hand. I'm not talking about your personal reaction to it, we're talking about a choreographed clapping. And the harder you clap and the louder you get and the Scripture says this, you know, don't pray with many words and static utterances and all that. That's not the way to communicate with God, and yet that's what we see. modern Christianity trending to. So let me say it that way. But the principle I want you to come out of here with is it is called the regulative principle of worship that we do what we do because of those standards that come out of the Scripture. We are not making this up as we go forward. So if you ever wonder, or if people ever say, why don't you ever do some skits? Okay, let me say, there's never going to be a skit. Why do you serve bread and wine? Grape juice. Communion. This is famous R.C. Sproul. Somebody said, why don't we serve Coca-Cola and Cracker Jacks? And, I mean, Sproul just came out of his shoes, and he said, because, and what his comment was, because that's not what Jesus did. That's not what Jesus used. Okay, so let's move on. All right, number 44. So go to number 44, which is on page 121. This is our second stop. Our second stop, 121, number 44. All right, now, what does this have to do with the crucifixion of Christ? We're gonna keep, I'm gonna keep asking that question. So we see the cleansing of the temple, what happened there, why they got up so upset with him, okay? Well, what does, I mean, healing a lame man, that looks like a good thing, doesn't it? After this, there was a feast of Jews, Jesus went up to Jerusalem, Now there is in Jerusalem but Sheep Gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water. Now this should be in parenthesis. For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool, stirred up the water. Then whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was made well of whatever disease he had. Most of your Bibles have that in parentheses because that was kind of the mystic side of this. That's in there for explanation. Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity 38 years, that is significant. When Jesus saw him lying there, knew that he had already been in that condition a long time, he said to him, do you want to be made well? Which seems like a silly question, doesn't it? Do you want to be made well? The sick man answered, Sir, I have no man to put me in the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming down, there are no steps down there before me. I am trying, is what he says. I'm working at it. Jesus said to him, Rise, take up your bed, and walk. and immediately the man was made well, took up his bed and walked, and that day was the Sabbath." Uh-oh. The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, said to him who was cured, it's the Sabbath. It's not lawful for you to carry your bed. He answered, he who made me well said to me, take up your bed and walk. Then they asked him, what is this man who said that you take up your bed and walk? But the one who was healed didn't know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn a multitude being in that place. Afterward, Jesus found this man in the temple. This is the second time Jesus goes to him. He found him in the temple and said to him, see, you've been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you. There are worse things than being paralyzed, is his point. D.A. Carson made that point. The book we studied one summer, How Long, O Lord. D.A. Carson made the point, there are worse things than death. And his point was, dying without Christ is way worse than dying. That's what Jesus is saying here. The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. For this reason, the Jews persecuted Jesus, sought to kill him because he had done these things on the Sabbath. They were building this prosecutorial case against Jesus. And here's one more. So Jesus is going to make it worse. You ever notice that? He never tries to wiggle out. He always makes it worse. But Jesus answered them. My father has been working until now, and so am I. Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was his father, making himself equal with God." Why did they want to kill Jesus? So we're working through this, and this was a big one. I mean, on page 122, this is the second note. Why did Jesus pick that guy? Why did he pick that guy? The word implies supernatural, not that Jesus knew. Now, we established, Luella very eloquently said last week, that all the things that Jesus did was by the Holy Spirit. So if Jesus knew something, it was by the Holy Spirit. So Jesus knowing something about this guy is by the Holy Spirit. So the word implies supernatural knowledge of the man's situation. Jesus picked the man out from among many sick people. The sovereign initiative was his. This man did not chase Jesus down, Jesus chased him down. The sovereign initiative was his, and no reason is given as to why. What do you mean, that he was trying? He saw that he was trying? I don't know. Now you say, what? their choice, not our choice. We don't know. And it was probably because everybody knew that he had been that way for years. And when he got up and walked, they would know that that was not some kind of a fake deal. It was the real thing. Because he didn't go in the pool. OK, now think about this in a broader context. And the scripture doesn't talk about this. OK. So Elizabeth has been bedridden for three weeks. And I'm seeing what's happening to her just trying to get up and walk after being bedridden, okay? That's three weeks. 38 years, okay? 38 years. He could have been this way since birth, in fact. The atrophy, the weakness, the lack of development, I mean, just let your mind go crazy on this, okay? I mean, he was probably just a bag of bones. And Jesus says, get up and walk. Right now, again, you're reading between the lines of the scripture and you can get yourself in trouble, but I'm asking you, what would that have looked like for that guy to get up and walk? He would have had all of a sudden muscles he never had before. in coordination he never had before, vitality as long as he never had before, and he gets up and I would well expect, reading between the lines, he probably got up and started dancing. There you go. He was probably jumping around. My personal heresy, but I'm thinking, wow, this is great. And if you ever watch the shows, that's what he does. Okay, well I haven't seen that, but yeah, the natural reaction to it would be, I would think, would be just, I don't know, ecstasy. It also, though, showed his trust. Sure would be. Just saying, because he had to believe that he could get up. And we don't really know if, quote unquote, there was bodily changes before he got up, whether he had faith enough to get up in spite of the fact that his legs were weak. And you know what I'm saying? I'm thinking more like it could have just been totally, he doesn't really sense a change at the moment, so he really has to believe that Christ has done this without him seeing any, like, all of a sudden his legs get, you know, pumped up with muscles. I don't know. Okay, now I'm gonna, yeah. Are you gonna say Lazarus? No. No. He didn't even know Jesus. Go ahead, Steve. What I was gonna say was, key words were immediately. Yeah. That is an excellent word. What does it mean? Immediately. There was no hesitation. Immediately, typically in the scripture, is not a time reference. And then you're giving that guy credit for his salvation. If you're saying that he had faith and he believed and that helped. They didn't know yet who Jesus was. See, immediately typically means, when they're talking about this, it's immediate or mediate. Creation was immediate. Let there be light. Without God using anything else, things happen. Mediate is where second causes come in, where he might use us as a mediator, for example. So in this case, Jesus says, get up and walk. But if God the Holy Spirit said to you, get up and walk, you wouldn't be able to do anything but get up and walk. See, I think that's the aspect here of the sovereign initiative of God and the immediate reaction of the man to do exactly what Jesus said to do. See that? Dolores, I appreciate the fact you're reading between the lines. Let's do that, we'll talk about that. I don't know if, so you're saying that really it was not the choice of the man, it was strictly the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen, that's exactly right. All right, all right, I'm gonna put it on a different plane. This is what I thought Steve was gonna say. But there are people, we're gonna get to Lazarus. Okay, so you'll hear me say this again. We're gonna get to Lazarus, And the free will side of Christianity says that when Jesus stood in front of the tomb and said, Lazarus, come forth, Lazarus had to decide whether he was going to come or not. I'm telling you, I've heard that. I heard that. I have heard that. I heard that. I about came out of my chair. Well, I wouldn't expect a dead man to make that decision. But at this point, this man was alive. So what I'm saying is the authority and the power of God. Okay, so how about you? Let's make this personal. God said guilty. Believe. What happened? Well, the guy keeps going there every day. He must be Still hopeful somehow. You believed. You said Ray Berry believed. I assume he probably was a Jew, probably a Jew. See, this is the action, the authority, what you're looking at here is the authority of God to do everything he intends to do regardless of whether you are willful in it or not. I mean, you are not the determining factor in a lot of these things. Right? I was just going to say, it seems like if he's healing their bodies, then he's healing them spiritually as well, not just their body. Okay, so you see what Jesus goes to them a second time. He said, look, here, this is not the worst thing that can happen to you, pal. Don't be a sinner. It's an interesting thing. All these healings, I never, you never see the religious leaders rejoicing with this person. 38 years later. There you are. There you are. Isn't that awful? This guy has been laying there 38 years. You'd think they'd be rejoicing with him. Instead, they're saying, you're carrying your pallet on yourself. And a rule that they had made up. OK, honey, we need to stop. All right, so are you getting the idea of what we're going to do with this? We are laying out the case as to why Jesus got crucified. We're going to follow this. This is going to be our pattern. I'm going to have to pick up the pace, probably. So anyway, there's there's a lot here to talk about and you know, we want to talk about okay Lord, thank you for the power of the Holy Spirit The fact that you know, he overcomes our stubbornness and we can we can each probably attest to to how you overcame our ignorance and our stubbornness to cause us to believe. It's the only answer we have for the fact that we do believe. Thank you for your mercy. In the name of Christ, we pray. Amen.