All right, well, good morning, everybody. It's very good to see all of you today. Here we are at last. the last book of our Old Testament survey. We have a new visitor who, this might be your first time to Sunday school with us, so you're catching the last book of the Old Testament survey, so a great time to join. But we are gonna be turning to the book of Chronicles this morning, so if you have your Bibles, turn there. Might be kind of hard to find, because it's not at the end of your Old Testament, but more in the middle. So go ahead and turn there, and we'll make sure that we survey a few things. Just want to note that we did start this study in August of 2024, and we have made it all the way through the Old Testament. Hopefully this has been a helpful study for you. It, in all honesty, has been helpful to me just to have to think about how do you take such a large portion of our Bibles And how do we teach it in a way that is helpful and helps us to kind of track the story of what happened in Israel's history and ultimately how it led to the revelation of the Son of God in the person of Jesus Christ, which we will evaluate as we finish our study. over the next few weeks. So I hope it's been helpful to you. Thank you all for being here. I know a handful of y'all were here on that first study. A lot of y'all joined along the way and we lost some in the process. That's just kind of how these things go. So for those of you who've been here the whole time, a way to be. All right, so as I said, we've been following the development of God's plan and redemption through the Old Testament by following the ordering of the Hebrew Bible. That's why maybe you're like, why are we reading Chronicles today whenever it's not the last book of the Old Testament? Well, it's because we've been following the Hebrew ordering, which would have been the ordering that Jesus himself would have been familiar with. And hopefully, as time has gone on, it's become clear why that's a helpful thing to do. Just puts things, even today, as we look at the book of Chronicles, I hope that it helps you understand why, when these books were written, what context, and how they were ordered can help you have a better handle on what's going on. We've tracked Israel's, you know, think about their history. We started with Adam, of course. We went through all the patriarchs, the promises, the different covenants that were given along the way. Eventually we tracked Israel's division from the northern kingdom, the kingdom of Israel, and the southern kingdom, the kingdom of Judah. And we saw Israel fall tragically to Assyria, and then Judah finally to Babylon. Now a few weeks ago in the book of Daniel we saw that the prophet of Daniel was rejoicing that the end of the exile was near. Last two weeks Jake has brought us through the book of Ezra and Nehemiah. where we begin to see the successive waves of restoration of the people returning to Jerusalem and then rebuilding and reestablishing the temple and reestablishing the security of the city found in those walls surrounding Jerusalem. And really all of that was being done at the blessing of one of God's servants, as Isaiah says, the Persian king, known as Cyrus the Great. So pretty interesting things there. And those are all recorded on sermon audio if you want to go back and listen to some of those things. Today we arrive at a book just like Ezra and Nehemiah that we looked at the last two weeks that was written after the exile. Once all the people had returned to Jerusalem. So that's a really, really important point when we think about the book of Chronicles. is when this book was put together, when it was compiled. So in this way, the book of Chronicles is going to function for us like a giant slideshow of the whole Old Testament, reaching all the way back to Adam and then focusing especially on the monarchy. So Chronicles is a deliberate retelling of the people's history. It's a grand retrospective to help us make sense of really who the people are now that the exile is over. So let's pray and then we'll begin our time. Father, I thank you for this group of people who gather each Lord's Day, come a little bit early to take a deep dive, Lord, into your word. And I pray this morning as we look at the book of Chronicles that the things that are said this morning are helpful, and Lord, that it would even spark a fresh interest to read the book of Chronicles, which is probably a book that's easy in some ways to overlook. So help us, Lord, in that endeavor, we pray. In Christ's name, amen. Alrighty. So if you think about Samuel and Kings, First Chronicles, first and second Chronicles I should say, were originally one book. They were one large history and that's how we're going to treat them today and also next week when we finish part two of looking at the book of Chronicles. The Hebrew name for the book translates to the events of the days. So it is a historical record. Now one of the early church fathers named Jerome He called it the Chronicle of Judah's History when he translated the Bible into Latin, and that title pretty much stuck. We don't know for certain who the actual Chronicle is who assembled the book. It doesn't claim anywhere in the book who did that. Tradition suggests that it was Ezra who did this. And as far as I'm concerned, that sounds like a good enough theory for me, especially just knowing when the book came together and what it's recording and what Ezra's role was, even in compiling the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. That seems very, very likely. It makes reference to events relating to the return from exile. And so because of that, the book can be dated around 450 BC. So regardless of who the author was, the historical context of when he wrote really helps us understand why he wrote. So to get a sense of context, someone turn to 1 Chronicles 9. And let's just read verses 9 through 2. I guess everyone can turn there, and I'll read it just so the recording catches it. Okay, so 1 Chronicles 9 verses 1 and 2. Alright, here it goes. So, all Israel was enrolled by genealogies. And behold, they are written in the book of the kings of Israel. And Judah was carried away into exile in Babylon for their unfaithfulness. Okay, so you see Judah going into exile, just as we discussed. Then look at verse 2. Now the first who lived in their possessions, in their cities, were Israel, the priests, the Levites, and the temple servants. Okay, so maybe a little bit of a strange verse, but what do y'all think that's making reference to? Now the first to dwell again in their possessions and their cities were Israel, the priests, the Levites, and the temple servants. Okay, what clue is that signaling to in terms of the context of this book? Yeah, after the exile, the return. They're now occupying once again the cities and the priests and the Levites and the temple servants all come back and it paints this picture of how the return from exile happened. So again, just a little nugget there to help you think about the context of when this book was being compiled and the things that Ezra, or the author, was making reference to as he was compiling this book. So there's about a 70 year gap there we know from the book of Daniel between verse 1 and verse 2 where they go into exile and then as Daniel records for us 70 years once they return. So this fact is really key to appreciating the message of the book of Chronicles. As you remember the history of Israel has really been one that's been full of hope, but also that's been full of quite a bit of tragedy. Hope of God's promise that one of David's sons would rule forever. We looked at that whenever we studied the Davidic covenant when we were reading through 2 Samuel. Tragedy as king after king failed to live up to God's holy standard and essentially put the people again and again in this place of losing so much of what was promised and so much of what was gained. Tragedy seemed to win as the northern tribes of Israel were exiled to Assyria in 722 BC, never to return. You never see really a restoration properly of the northern kingdom. And as soon as the southern kingdom was defeated by Babylon in 586, Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed and the people were exiled. So Judah, as you all remember, as we walked through that, held on quite a bit longer. They had mostly good kings, but even they fell into becoming unfaithful to the Lord's covenant. And because of that, they were also sent into exile. But as we saw, hope was not completely crushed, for a remnant was preserved even while they were in Babylon. David's line survived through King Jehoiakim. If you remember, the book of 2 Kings ends with reference to him, and it kind of ends on this hopeful note that there's still this king who is in exile, but he's given a place at the Babylonians' king's table, and 2 King records that for us, and that is, again, kind of one of these nuggets of hope at the end of a very dark period that David's line is still there, still being preserved, and there's still someone who is identified with it. OK, any questions so far? I'll try to stop and see if we're tracking everything. Just giving a big overview. All right, so the purpose of Chronicles. This is in your notes here, a little bitty section for you to jot down a lot of what I'm about to tell you. So all that I just gave you is really context. But before we dive into Chronicles, we need to answer an important question. that gets to the purpose of Chronicles. Why does the author retell a history that's already been told once in the Old Testament? Okay, that's a very good question, probably one that you've wrestled with quite a bit. know that much of Chronicles overlaps with the books of 2 Samuel and also 1 and 2 Kings. So if you're doing your Bible read-through, you read 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings, and then you get into the Chronicles and you start to see a lot of the same stories being retold. You may even have felt, as I have, that Chronicles is redundant. I've felt that way, just because, again, it's recounting some of the same type things. And I really do think that the English ordering of your Old Testament really encourages this misrepresentation about the book of Chronicles, that it's really a redundant book, that probably if we were to lose it in some sense, we still have most of it recorded in 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. Yes, sir? Yeah, that's a really good point. That's exactly right. It's being told for a different purpose and it's actually the opposite. Chronicles by first appearance looks to gloss over some of the sins and some of the failures of particularly Solomon and David. So that's a really good point and that's exactly where we're going to go. So very observant. So the point is obviously Chronicles is not redundant. Do what? Yeah, that's right. Yep, that's right. Yep, so if you're not careful, the English ordering of your Old Testament could encourage this misrepresentation. And evaluating the book after all the history that we've covered so far helps us to see how Chronicles really is distinct from 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. So as our friend here just said, the answer is that Chronicles was compiled with really a different theological purpose, one of encouragement, And Ezra, as he pulled this together, you know, wanted to communicate a message a little bit differently than what the one who, I guess Samuel, who pulled together, was it Samuel who did 1 Kings? Do we know? Maybe we don't know who wrote 1 and 2 Kings. Anyways, the author of those books. So Kings was compiled during the exile. So the main concern is to show that God didn't break His promises when He allowed the exile. So that's the timing of when 1 and 2 Kings was being put together, was they were in exile. And so a lot of that book is to show that God doesn't break His promises even though He allowed the people to go into exile. For the Chronicler, though, the exile is over. His aim is to remind the people that faith in God, to remind the people of faith that God still has a future for them. So, what's interesting about Chronicles is he leaves out many of the stories that were very prominent in the book of Kings. And he features some content that the Kings lacks. So he's got a different end in mind. So that's important to know as you read through the book of Chronicles. He has a different purpose, he has a different end in mind. So what is his purpose? Well, whereas Kings is about why the people had to go into exile, covenant and fidelity, right? Chronicles is about where their hope is to be now that they're back. Okay, so Chronicles is about where their hope is now to be that they're now back. So put yourself in their shoes for a moment. You're part of this community that has returned to Jerusalem, and you have some big questions to answer, don't you? Like, maybe, is God's promise of a Messiah that we heard about, is that still valid? We heard about this promised Messiah in the book of Isaiah, a book written again before the exile happened. There was this coming Messiah, is it still a valid promise? Are we still God's covenant people? Does God still care about us? The Chronicle's purpose in retelling their history is really to answer many of these questions. If you remember, and Jake talked about this when he went through Ezra and Nehemiah, things weren't exactly as they expected them to be as they returned. If you remember once the exile, once they returned to Jerusalem and the temple gets rebuilt, what's some of the, what's some of the, what's the attitude or what's the reaction of some of the old timers who were there who remember the old days, right? What do they do? They were sad. Things just aren't as... good old days kind of thing, very legitimately. The temple lacked some of its luster that they had known in a previous generation. The former glory of the temple, as it was in Solomon's day, is just not present. It's not there. And if you remember back to Daniel, chapter 9, And Ezra, okay, the 70 years, so when Daniel recognized it, it was reading the book of, I think it was Isaiah, maybe Jeremiah, I don't remember, but there's a prophecy that this exile will be 70 years, and Daniel very much was recognizing that they were coming to the end of that, knowing that the Lord's about to deliver them out of exile. Well, the 70 years are now over, and so the exiles are returning. But the seventy weeks have just begun, the seventy-sevens, as it records in the book of Daniel, that must pass until the Lord's anointed one, the Messiah, begins to rule." We don't really know what this seventy-sevens is, what that's referring to, but it is some, you know, period of time that the people are to, yes, be out of exile, but they're still waiting for something. Seventy-sevens, right? Until the Lord's anointed, their Messiah would begin to rule. And so while the physical exile is over, and Jake talked about this a lot last week too, the spiritual exile continues. We talked about the fact that the people, even though they were back in Jerusalem, they were having some measure of reestablishment of all of God's promises with the temple and all these things being, and the priesthood returning, and a king returning, and all these things. The people still had sin issues. There was still this spiritual exile that was seeming to continue. And that's why when the people returned to Jerusalem, They're not yet really enjoying all the New Covenant promises that we read about in places like Jeremiah 31, if you remember, that He would give His people new hearts. That no man would need to teach his neighbor, for they all would know me from the least to the greatest. These really grandiose promises that we read about in many of the prophets. Ezekiel 37 would be another one. That they're not living in that reality. Even though they've returned to the land, they've re-established the temple, they're having some measure of success, there's still not a full completion of what they've seen through the words of the prophets. There's still obviously much more that needs to be fulfilled. And Chronicles is really, the chronicler is writing to tell the people that they are not to place their ultimate hope in just the simple return to the land. As though that was the end of the story. There's more, there's more to come. but rather to place their hope in God's greater fulfillment of promises that are yet to come. So if we have a theme of the Book of Chronicles, we can maybe put it like this, and this is out of our little textbook that we're using to help format this class. But Yahweh's universal kingship and kingdom promises are affirmed. Okay, so that's really kind of what the Book of Chronicles is wanting to what He's wanting to communicate to the people and also to us. Yahweh's universal kingship and kingdom promises affirmed. Alright, so how does this work itself out in the book of Chronicles? Let's dive in and find out. So on your handout, we always make reference to the back page. And this is probably the longest outline that you've ever seen on one of these. But this is a study outline for the Book of Chronicles. And we are going to take each of these major headings, we'll do heading one today. And the next time, we'll do two and three. So today we want to look at the genealogical presentation of the tribes of Israel. Next time we'll look at the United Kingdom of David and Solomon. and then finally the kingdom of Judah down to the exile. So again you can tell we're kind of going back and we're going to use the Chronicles to kind of do this massive summary of all of Israel's history. And then think about what does recounting that history, what does it mean for the people who are now out of exile back in Jerusalem? Why does this history need to be retold to them? That's really the question that we want to wrestle with today. So let's go ahead and look at 1 Chronicles chapters 1 through 9. 1 Chronicles 1 through 9, thinking about these genealogies. So the roots of the post-exilic community. The roots of the post-exilic community. So go ahead and turn in your Bibles to 1 Chronicles 1, verses 1 through 4. And let's see where, let's just say Ezra, let's see where he begins. Alright, I'm going to read verse 1-4. It says this, Adam, Seth, Enosh, Kenan, Mahaliel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. So there you go. Literally a list of names. Now what sticks out as immediately interesting about that list of names? All three of Noah's sons were named. That's interesting. What else? Where does he begin? With Adam. He begins with Adam. Now, not to give it all away, but if you think about the way that your New Testament begins, how does it begin? Matthew 1.1. Very similarly, right? So what is it, and I'll just ask you all this, but what is it about genealogies that are important for the people of Israel? Why in the book of Chronicles, but in other places too, do we see these long lists of genealogies that the people need to be reminded of? Why is that important? We do it as a matter of historical fascination. It's fun for me to know who my great-great-great-great-great-grandfather is, where he's from, his name. It's interesting, but it's not quite the same, I think, as why in our Bibles we see so many genealogies. Why are these things important? Okay. The Messiah comes through the genealogy, through a certain line. Good. Any other thoughts? Yeah. Right. Yes. That's right. Yep. That's good. Any other thoughts? Think about the... Okay, to keep track of time, yeah. Well, that's one good point, that these are historical realities, and having these genealogies really does root these to actual people and actual events that happened, so that's absolutely true. But think about just the nature of God's promises that he gave, and the covenants that he gave, that really the only way for those to, as you mentioned, to be carried forward from one generation to the next was through, you know, through this lineage. So, you know, God's promise to Abraham, you know, Abraham's seed and his children were very much a part of that, and that continues all the way to David, where, you know, God makes the promise that you will not lack a son to sit on the throne, and all these things just continue. And so it helps, as Jessica said, it helps the people to know that they are a part of this chosen people, and that because of that, God's promises belong to them. It's a really critical thing. So if you allow your eyes to drift down in 1 Chronicles 1, you'll notice that the list of names goes on for really quite a long time. Nine chapters to be exact. Now, to modern sensibilities, such genealogies may seem irrelevant. The prospect of ending up in 1 Chronicles during your personal devotions might not seem all that thrilling. Hopefully this will recover that a little bit for you, but it can be, you know, a challenge if you're reading through these nine chapters to really find some direct encouragement, even though I think encouragement is definitely there for you to be had. But if you remember the context, we'll see how really fundamental these genealogies are to the Chronicler's purpose. He's demonstrating that the post-exilic community are God's chosen people. That's really what He wants them to see. You're not only getting traced back to David, but you're also being traced back to Abraham, you're being traced back to Noah, you're being traced back to Adam. This post-exilic community really are God's chosen people, just as much as the saints of old were. And that really comes across in how the genealogies are structured. You see there in 1.1 that the chronicler starts all the way back at the beginning of time with Adam. And as he progresses through history, the chronicler always zeros in on the line of promise. Okay, so that's where he moves the record and wants to focus on this line of promise. You see in chapter 1, verses 5 through 16, he briefly mentions, as Linda said, the two descendants of Noah, who are actually not ancestors of Abraham. But in verse 17, the account shifts to the line of Shem, Noah's son, who does lead to Abraham. The same thing happens with Abraham's son. The line of Ishmael only goes on for one generation, and then the focus shifts to Isaac, beginning in chapter 1, verse 34. So he's acknowledging all these other children of these patriarchs, but there's always this return to the child of promise, and the one that would carry these promises, this seed forward. So that's just something interesting to pay attention to as you read it. Now look at verses, chapter 2, verse 1-2. So here we have the 12 sons of Israel. Now interestingly, where does this record start? 12, 1-2, these are the sons of Israel. Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Ishachar, Zebulun, Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad and Asher. So there they are listed. But what happens in verse 2? Judah. Okay. Just again to highlight the point. Why is Judah significant in that whole list of names? The Messiah comes through Judah. Who else comes from Judah? David comes through Judah, right? Judah's line is going to be the one that we watch for the coming King David. And beyond David, the Messiah. David appears in chapter 2, verse 15. And if you look over to chapter 3, you'll see the list of David's sons. Okay? Now, amazingly, if you read through David's lineage, it's traced all the way through to the other side of the exile. So we're talking a long list of names that's going to carry through all the way through the other side of the exile. And verse 19 mentions a man named Zerubbabel. Zerubbabel. Zerubbabel. Okay, has anyone ever heard that name before? Okay, where do we hear that? Minor prophets? Ezra, Zerubbabel is one that comes back to Jerusalem. What are some other things that Zerubbabel did, Jacob? He helped rebuild the temple. Yep, that's exactly right. So you have this heir of David returning to Jerusalem after the exile. So that's, again, just a remarkable thing that the Lord, even through all that Israel has gone through, He has preserved this line. So he's the Davidic descendant who's governing Jerusalem after their return from exile. So we heard about him last week in our study of Ezra and Nehemiah. So it's really as though the chronicler really can't wait until the end of the book for him to say, look, we're back from exile, and Yahweh's promises are still very much intact. That really gets to, again, that whole purpose of what the book of Chronicles is for. So moving ahead, chapters 4-8, they contain the genealogies of more of Jacob's sons. The point here is to show what happened to the north because of their unfaithfulness. Unlike those who returned to Jerusalem, the northern tribes of Israel were largely lost in exile. Still, if you turn to 1 Chronicles 9, You see this summary statement, and this is towards the end of the genealogies here. You see this summary statement. So all Israel, now that's an important phrase. So all Israel was recorded in genealogies, and these are written in the book of the kings of Israel. So that phrase, all Israel, is one that the chronicler repeats about a dozen times throughout the book. So yes, as we've seen, he's mainly concerned with Judah because that's the line of promise that's so important for the people to understand that this is still alive, these promises are still alive, they're still there, they're still operating. But his inclusion of most of the northern tribes here and his emphasis on all Israel also tells us something. It tells us that the spiritual core of the people isn't necessarily limited to the national identity of the southern kingdom, but rather, but in the promises that Yahweh made to David. Okay, so I'm going to say that again. The inclusion of most of the northern tribes here in this genealogy and his emphasis on all Israel, it tells us something. It tells us that the spiritual core of the people isn't limited to the national identity of the southern kingdom, but in the promises that Yahweh made to David. So these promises are for anyone in Judah or Israel, right? who would repent and believe. You think about this idea of remnant that shows up again and again and again throughout your Old Testaments. So the promise is tied more to the promise he made with David, not so much as though it's only owned or only possessed by the southern kingdom of Judah. Okay, and I think that the chronicler, as you read through this, and his use of all Israel, all Israel, all Israel, is really making a reference to this broader reality of true Israelites who are scattered, not just in Judah, but also in what remains of the people scattered throughout from the northern tribes there in Israel. So just an important thing for you to think about as we proceed. So one final point on these genealogies, because this is a unique genre of literature and scripture, it often gets misinterpreted. So what's an example of how genealogies might get misinterpreted? There's one in 1 Chronicles that probably a lot of you have heard about. Someone turn to 1 Chronicles 4. 4 verse 9, y'all know where I'm going with this as soon as I read it. Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, and his mothers named him Jabez, saying, Because I bore him with pain. Now Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, O that ye would bless me indeed, and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from harm, that it may not pain me.' And God granted him what he requested." Who's ever heard of Jabez before? How have you heard of Jabez? The Prayer of Jabez. Remember that little book? That little book probably made like two or three people extremely rich. But yeah, there was a little book maybe like, I don't know, 20 years ago or something that came out called The Prayer of Jabez. And the author took that little section of scripture and developed this whole argument, right? That this is yours. This promise is yours. This thing that the chronicler is describing here can very easily be yours if you pray this prayer, God's gonna bless you just like he blessed Jabez. So obviously it's easy to read through the genealogies and to pick things like that and to misinterpret them and misapply them. And I think that's just one example of how that can get done. So obviously the point is be very leery, weary, be leery of this kind of interpretation. For one, it really brushes aside the differences between the ways that God worked in the nation of history, in the nation of Israel, and the ways that he's working in the church today. So it brushes that distinction aside, that difference aside, and it also brushes aside the author's main intent of including this material. which is again to record a genealogical history of the promises of God passed through and how He worked in the lives of these individuals for a very, very long time. The main point that Ezra wants to get across is that the people are still connected to God's promise and that David's line is still intact. To be valid, And a secondary point will have to line up with that main point. So any other type of interpretation, it needs to keep in mind what Ezra is trying to communicate here, which is that God's promises and that David's line is still very much intact. That's why the Chronicler includes this long and rich genealogy. Any questions? If that's your favorite book, I'm sorry. Come talk to me after Sunday school. Yeah, that's a really good question. I'd have to go back and see what he's likely, maybe someone in here knows, whenever Paul discourages people from endless genealogy doing, what exactly is he referring to? It's kind of similar to how whenever Paul discourages against philosophies or these, I mean, there's an appropriate way to leverage philosophy, there's an inappropriate way to leverage philosophy. There's an appropriate way to understand the role of genealogies. there's an inappropriate way to leverage that. And so, you know, I think about the Gnostics that were very prevalent in that day, and this could be part of it, who, you know, very much were, I heard this word, this new revelation, and received it. So there was that kind of connection through them tracing down new revelation that they were receiving outside of Scripture. Could be those kinds of things. Does anybody have any idea? on what Paul is referring to there. Is it 2 Timothy? 1 Timothy. I think that makes a lot of sense to me, because they were boasting in this. So it very well likely is that Paul is addressing these people who are wanting to boast in the fact that we actually have Abraham's line. We can trace our line through this. And what Jake's saying, what Linda's saying, is that in Christ, What now matters is a spiritual reality of circumcision of the heart. It's not generation through the normal means of you being born into this lineage that will secure you a place in God's kingdom, but rather it's through the nature of the new birth, which cannot be traced, despite what maybe some of our other friends and other traditions might say. It can't be traced through this genealogical manner. My parents were believers this fleshly manner. Therefore, I am that as well. That something new is introduced under the new covenant. And it's the work of new birth through the work of the Spirit and circumcising the heart. Yeah. It's fiery. I like it, Linda. It's a fiery statement. No, it's good. So I think that really is probably the best answer, just us working it out in this way without really looking into it deeply, but it is a good question. Anything else? Good stuff to think about. All right, well, that was the end of our study today, finishing just on time. And then when we come back, we'll open this handout out and walk through the rest of it. So let's go ahead and pray, and then we will conclude. Lord, we are thankful, thankful that in Christ, Lord, we have been, the ability to boast in our heritage, to boast in our flesh, to boast to our parents, or our grandparents, or our great-great-great-great-grandparents are, that this becomes a matter of great terms of spiritually, maybe even irrelevance, what ultimately matters, Lord, because of who Christ is and what He's done, is, Lord, that we are united to You. And being united to You, we are united, Lord, to the promises, Lord, that You have given Your people for a very long time. So we're thankful, Lord, for that reality. Help us, Lord, to and never boast in ourselves, but always to boast in you. And Lord, we thank you. Thank you as we look at this book of Chronicles, and as we continue next week, I pray that you would continue to teach us and continue, Lord, to help us just to see the glory of what it means to be a child of God. Pray these things in Christ's name. Amen. Thank you all very much.