All right, let's take our Bibles and turn to the book of Judges in chapter number 1 this morning and we're going to continue this study through the book of Judges. Judges chapter number 1 is a very interesting chapter and we won't get through the entire chapter today. But one of the things that you see in the book of Judges chapter number 1 is that Judges 1 is a foreshadowing of things to come. When we read through Judges 1 we find a brief look at what is going to happen through the remainder of the book. The key thing is the beginning of the verse in chapter number 1 or the beginning of the book in chapter number 1 and it tells us after Joshua died. It says, now after the death of Joshua, what is going to happen when the leader of the nation of Israel dies? What we're going to see is going to happen is there is a leadership void so to speak. There is not one man to lead. There is a group, a tribe of Israel that is to lead. And we know that because of that arrangement it seems like that everyone turns into individuals. And as individuals everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes. And because of that it caused Israel some difficulty. Also we find as we look in the book of Judges in chapter number 1, we find that the justice of God is enacted. The justice of God is not something that we typically like to look at. A lack of mercy, a lack of pity. God says to have no pity upon the Canaanites as you go throughout the land. There is the justice of God. And even though it's not pleasant maybe for us to think about, there is a time when the justice of God is going to be enacted on this earth. The days of long suffering and the days of mercy are going to be over and God in His holiness and His righteousness is going to speak in justice and justice will be brought upon this earth. All wickedness will be removed from God's creation. It will be cast into the lake of fire which is also the creation of God. But we're going to see the justice of God and the justice of God enacted throughout the book. So let's begin reading Judges 1.1. Now after the death of Joshua it came to pass that the children of Israel asked the Lord saying, who shall go up for us against the Canaanites first to fight against them? And the Lord said to Judah, and the Lord said, Judah shall go up. Behold, I have delivered the hand, the land into his hand. I'm having a lot of trouble reading today, so be patient with me. And Judah said unto Simeon his brother, come up with me into my lot that we may fight against the Canaanites and I likewise will go with thee into thy lot. So Simeon went with him and Judah went up and the Lord delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand and they slew of them and Bezek ten thousand men. and they found Adonai Bezek in Bezek, and they fought against him, and they slew the Canaanites and the Perizzites. But Adonai Bezek fled, and they pursued after him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his great toes. Then Adonai Bezek said, Three scores and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table, as I have done, so God hath requited me. And they brought him to Jerusalem and there he died. Now the children of Judah fought against Jerusalem and had taken it and smitten it with the edge of the sword and set the city on fire. And afterward the children of Judah went down to fight against the Canaanites that dwelt in the mountain and in the south and in the valley. And Judah went against the Canaanites that dwelt in Hebron. Now the name of Hebron before was Kirjath Arba. And they slew Shishai, and Haman, and Talmai. And from thence he went against the inhabitants of Debar, the name of Debar before was Kirjassifer. Now let's jump down to verse number 16. And the children of the Kenite, Moses' father-in-law, went up out of the city of palm trees with the children of Judah into the wilderness of Judah, which lieth in the south of Arad. And they went and dwelt among the people. with Simeon his brother, and they slew the Canaanites, then inhabited Zephath and utterly destroyed it. And the name of the city was Hormah. And Judah took Gaza with the coast thereof, and Ashkelon with the coast thereof, and Ekron with the coast thereof. And the Lord was with Judah, and he drove out the inhabitants of the mountains, but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron. And they gave Hebron unto Caleb and Moses. And he expelled thence the three sons of Anak. And we will stop right there. You know we skipped a few verses, but we're going to go back and talk about Caleb next week. So we're just going to talk about those verses that we read. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, as we come to you today, we come thanking you for your word. And we come thanking you for the direction we find in your word. And we come knowing As we studied last week, what we find in this story is your faithfulness. When your people are unfaithful, you remain faithful to your people. And Lord, we are thankful for that today. Lord, help us to keep that thought in our mind that what we see through the book of Judges is your faithfulness. Lord, I pray that as we Take just a few moments to look into your word that you will calm our spirits, that you will open our hearts and open our minds that we may receive your word. God, I pray that you will move our hearts to serve you more faithfully as we read your word and study your word today. And we do thank you for Jesus Christ, the one who's going to come and bring righteousness the one who's going to come and establish your kingdom. We thank you for the eternal life that he gives us because he bare our sins in his body on the tree. It is in the name of your son Jesus we pray. Amen. Important thought now after the death of Joshua. I want you to think about that. What happens when the leader dies? If you remember, Joshua took over for Moses. And one of the things you read if you would go back and look at Joshua and who he is, you will find out that Joshua was with Moses. When Moses went up into the mountain to receive the law, Joshua was with him. Moses mentored Joshua. And when it came time for the leadership of Moses to end, Joshua was there. He had been trained by Moses. And he knew what to do. He knew how to lead. And so it was really a natural transition for Joshua to take over for Moses. And really the leadership in Israel didn't skip a beat. Because there was someone there to take the place of Moses. There was someone trained. There was someone who had been with Moses. And there was someone that was as dedicated to God as Moses was. And so it was natural for Joshua to be the leader that would take the place of Moses. But now we come after the death of Joshua. Who's the leader? Who's Joshua's right-hand man? Who has been following after Joshua, learning how to be the leader of the children of Israel? There's no one there. There's a leadership void. There's a leadership vacuum. And when you have no leadership, the people falter. And that's what we find here. You might recognize that this is one of the reasons that I'm trying to mold men into being leaders of the church and teachers inside the church is so that there will not be a leadership void inside the church. But someone knowing, a group of men knowing what it means to be a leader inside the church and that there would never be a leadership vacuum. Really, we would never face what Stevens Branch and Riverside are facing now. If there's someone ready to step in place, you'll not have a time when there's no pastor. There are several churches across the United States with no pastor. Why is that? There's no man ready to take the place, no man ready to step in and fill. The church is languished because there is no pastor and that's exactly what happened here in Israel. There was no leader. There was no man ready to step up because he had not been trained. And the children of Israel find themselves with a vacuum of leadership. the children of Israel had been accustomed to have the man of God to lead them according to the word of God yet there was no man there. Now we know and if you hold your place there Joshua 1 and you don't have to turn with me I'm going to turn quickly to Genesis 49 and read to you that God has a plan God has a plan for the leadership of the children of Israel and God has designed where the king of Israel, the tribe from which the king of Israel will originate, that's found in Genesis 49 verses 8 through 12, when it says, Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise. Thy hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies. Thy father's children shall bow down before thee. Judah is a lion's whelp from the prey. My son, thou art gone up. He stooped down. He couched as a lion in an old line. Who shall rouse him up? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet until Shiloh come. And unto him shall the gathering of the people be. Binding his foal unto the vine, and his asses cold unto the choice vine. He washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the grapes of his wrath. His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk. We understand that God designed that the nation of Israel, that Shiloh should come through the nation of Israel. That is Yeshua that is to come. The one that would crush the serpent's head. That is to come through the tribe of Judah. Judah is the royal line. Judah is the line through which the King of Israel should come. That's the design of God. But we're not there yet. We have the conclusion of the Mosaic Covenant. We have the children of Israel fulfilling the Abrahamic Covenant as they are going to possess the land. But the Davidic Covenant has not happened yet. The time when the line of the tribe of Judah would come to lead his people, we're not there yet. And so we have a gap. We have a gap in leadership. We have a gap in time when there is no clear leader in Israel. I think I said Egypt a while ago, sorry. There is no clear leader in Israel. And so we have everyone doing what is right in their own eyes. and everyone following their own understanding. And because of that, they face difficulty as a people. Judah, it tells us in Joshua 1, now after the death of Joshua, it came to pass that the children of Israel asked the Lord saying, Who shall go up for us against the Canaanites first to fight against them? And the Lord said, Judah shall go up. Behold, I delivered the land into his hand. And so the tribe, this is not Judah an individual, this is the tribe of Judah is to become the leaders God has designed for the children of Judah to be the leaders of the children of Israel. And so Judah begins to consult God and begins to ask the Lord, for leadership and Judah begins to go out and to fight the battle. So we do see at this point freshly after the death of Joshua that the children of Israel are going up to God. They're asking God for leadership and God is giving them their leadership. And as Judah leads the children of Israel into battle, we see all of the victories that Judah was able to win because they trusted God, because they followed God, and because they depended upon God. God gave them great victories. And as we remember, as we read in Deuteronomy chapter number 7, and you can also read in Exodus 23, that God told the children of Israel that He would drive the Canaanites out of the land little by little. Now the interesting thing is as we get into the book of Judges as we go we're going to see, we're going to recount some of the victories that the children of Israel had won during the days of Joshua. So we understand that during the days of Joshua the children of Israel are going into the land of Canaan and they are conquering the land of Canaan, the promised land that God had given them. And as they went and walked with God, God gave them the victory and they were wiping out the Canaanites. Point here, and we'll see it as we read the scripture in a little bit, but there is a reason why God told them to wipe out the Canaanites. The Canaanites are the source of pagan culture in the day. The Canaanites are full of idolatry. And so God is bringing upon the Canaanites the justice that is deserved because of their idolatry, because they are not worshiping Him as the one true God. And so the justice of God is being enacted upon them for their rebellion against God. And we will see that as we read a little bit later on. So during the days of Joshua, the children of Israel had great success in removing the Canaanite out of the land. But the Canaanite, we want to remember, was resilient. You think in all battles, in all wars, you know that there's a time that one army fights and gains some territory and then the enemy will put up a resistance and maybe capture back some of the land that they had given up and then there'll be another battle that will be fought to push the lines a little farther. And that's exactly what the children of Israel were going through. They were going through this time of battle when they were fighting against the Canaanite The Canaanites not giving up their land easily. Even though they had been defeated, they would come back to fight for their land. This is the enemies that Israel is facing as they are expanding their land. And again, we understand that the children of Israel are trying to remove the Canaanite from the land to destroy idol worship, to destroy false worship. And one of the things we read as we go through is that, and we even see it in this verse, as you look at, in this chapter, look at verse number 19, it says, and the Lord was with Judah and he drive out the inhabitants of the mountain, but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley. They're coming in to Israel's victories. And we'll find out why in just a little bit. But the children of Israel were to move into the promised land and they were to establish the kingdom of God and they were to establish the righteous rule of God in the land and they were to establish the laws of God and the land of Canaan, the land of Israel was to be the place where God ruled in righteousness, in holiness. And they were unable to do that. They were unable to do that because of their own sin. They were unable to do that because of their own lack of trusting in God and depending upon Him. But that teaches us. It encourages us. That we know that we need a Savior. We need a Savior to come and to deliver us from the power of sin. When we can't establish righteousness in our own life, when we can't establish walking according to the law of God in our own life, we need a Savior. We need one who can. And that's exactly what the nation of Israel needed. They were called upon of God to go and defeat the land of Canaan and to establish the righteous rule of God in the land of Canaan, but they were unable to do that. And so they needed another deliverer. This shows us that the power to establish the righteousness of God in this world is not within us. We need a Savior. We need a Deliverer. We need One who has the ability to crush the serpent's head. And so that's what we see as we see the inabilities of the children of Israel. It shows us that it's not by the power of man that the righteousness of God is able to be established upon this earth, but it's only through the power of God. And that points us to the One, Jesus Christ, the One who will come, the One who will reign, the One who will establish righteousness and equity upon this earth. It points us to the coming Messiah. Remember, that's the one thing that we always look for as we read through the Scriptures. This book has one central character in it. This book, the 66 books of the Bible, has one central theme, and that is the coming Messiah, the Son of God, the one who will bring righteousness into this world, and this book teaches us to look for the one, not to look for human power, not to look for human deliverance, but look to the one who brings complete deliverance, and that one is Jesus Christ. As we go and we look at this, it tells us in verse number 3, And Judah said unto Simeon his brother, Come up with me into my lot, that we may fight against the Canaanites, and I likewise will go with thee into thy lot. So Simeon went with him, What we see here, the interesting thing is in one of the messages I listened to on Judges chapter number 1, it tells us that we find here a picture of how the church is to work in 1 Corinthians chapter number 12. When it talks about the necessity of each one of the members of the body and how that the stronger are to help the weak. Judah being the strongest of the tribes of Israel. And Simeon being the weakest or the least, they work together to accomplish the will of God. And folks, that's exactly how the church should operate. You that are spiritual, you that are strong, you're to help the weak. You that are stronger are to mentor the younger. That picture of two working together to accomplish the will of God, we need to understand that picture is given throughout the scripture and it's something that we should continue to follow ourselves. But as we read throughout those passages of scripture, we read all of the victories that Judah was able to accomplish. He and Simeon, verse number 4, it says, and Judah went up And the Lord delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hands. And you go on and it says in verse 17, And Judah went with Simeon his brother, and they slew the Canaanites that inherited Zephath and utterly destroyed it. And Judah took Gaza, in verse 18. And we read how the Lord was with Judah. As Judah went to the Lord and sought the Lord's leadership, the Lord gave him the victory. God gave him guidance. The Lord was with Judah. He was with them as they went and fought their battles. And as long as they depended on the Lord, they expected victory and they achieved victory. But there came a time when Judah quit following the Lord. There came a time when Judah stopped looking at the power of God and they began to look at the power of the enemy. They forgot to think about the Lord God omnipotent who reigns, who is sovereign over the whole earth and they began to look at, uh oh, they have chariots of iron. Remember Israel is a recently redeemed people. They had been in Egyptian captivity for 400 years. And so they were not able to develop a war machine like Pharaoh had. They were not able to develop a war machine like those that inhabited the valley. They were behind on the construction of weapons and tools and so forth. But they forgot that God was on their side. And so when they looked at the chariots of iron that the Canaanites had, they could not drive them out. They forgot that God was on their side. Well, let's remember something. Let's remember, again, they looked out. They could not drive them out because of the inhabitants of the valley. But let's remember what we read earlier in Deuteronomy chapter number 7. Let's go back there real quick. What did God tell them when they came into the land? What did God tell them? Deuteronomy 7 verse number 12. Wherefore it shall come to pass if you hearken to these judgments and keep and do them that the Lord thy God shall keep thee, keep thee, keep unto thee the covenant and the mercy which he sware unto thy fathers and he will love thee and bless thee and multiply thee. He will also bless the fruit of thy womb and the fruit of thy land, the corn and the wine and the oil, the increase of thy kind and the flocks of the sheep and the land which He sware unto thy fathers to give it to thee. So if you will trust God and you will be faithful to Him, then God will remember you when you go into the promised land. You'll be blessed above all the people. God will take away sickness. Notice 16. And thou shalt consume all the people which the Lord thy God shall deliver unto thee. Thine eye shall have no pity upon them, neither shalt thou serve their gods, for that will be a snare unto thee. Keep a hold of that in just a minute. If thou shalt say in thine heart, these nations are more than I, how can I dispossess them? Thou shalt not be afraid of them, but shalt well remember what the Lord thy God did unto Pharaoh and unto all Egypt. God will deliver them. What did God do unto Pharaoh? How did God defeat the chariots of Pharaoh? When Pharaoh was pursuing hard after the children of Israel at the Red Sea, what did God do? When it looked like the children of Israel had no place to turn, there was a mountain on the right, there was a mountain on the left, the Red Sea was in front of them, and Pharaoh was pursuing from the back, what did God do? God opened the Red Sea. God gave them passage across the Red Sea. And then when Pharaoh pursued, what did God do? He closed the walls of the Red Sea and Pharaoh and his army was destroyed. God delivered the children of Israel from the army of Pharaoh, even though the army of Pharaoh was far greater than the nation of Israel. And the children of Israel should have kept that in mind. They should have understood that even though the inhabitants of the valley have the chariots, if they would depend upon God, God would deliver them also. But they began to look at their circumstances. And when they looked at their circumstances, they forgot that God was on their side. They forgot the promise of God that God would deliver them and that God would give them the victory. And they did not drive out the inhabitants of the valley. Oh, because they had chariots of iron. My dad used to tell me, son, a porch uses better than none. I'm not going to listen to your excuses, son. God feels the same way. God, oh no, they got chariots of iron. And God says, they're destroyed. But the children of Israel chose to look at their circumstances. Hearing is another lesson for us. How often do you look at your circumstances and lean upon your own understanding and forget who God is and forget the promises of God and forget what God can do and what God will do and you allow your circumstances to cause fear and anxiety to come in your heart into your life and you forget God and you forget that God can deliver you and you look at your circumstances and circumstances bring fear and fear brings defeat. How often do we do that? How often do we forget the promises of God You see it was this lack of confidence in who God is and the lack of believing the promises of God and a lack of listening to the Word of God that caused the seeds of disobedience to grow in the heart of the nation of Israel. That's a warning to us not to lean on our own understanding. not to look at the circumstances and thinking that the circumstances rule and forget who God is. Let's remember who God is. Now we also see in this book that Judges is a book of justice. You see that seed of disobedience that we find beginning in Judges 1.19 is what's going to carry us throughout the book. That disobedience is going to grow as Israel begins to be unfaithful to God. They don't follow what God says. And we'll see that throughout the book. But now we see the justice of God. Remember we read in Deuteronomy 7 that there were to have no pity on the inhabitants of the land. No mercy. And again, the reason why God is bringing judgment upon the nations of the Canaanites because of their disobedience, because of their idolatry. God is removing idolatry. That's His goal, to remove idolatry so the Canaanites are getting exactly what they deserve. When God wipes them out, the Canaanites are getting exactly what they deserve. They deserve judgment and God is giving them judgment because of idolatry. The children of Israel, I have no pity upon them. As a matter of fact, it's interesting. Well, let's read there again, verse 4, and the Lord delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand and they slew of them and Bezek ten thousand men and they found Adonai Bezek in Bezek and they fought against him and they slew the Canaanites and the Perizzites. But Adonai Bezek fled and they pursued after him and caught him and cut off his thumbs and his great toes. As the leader of Bezek, the Lord of Bezek, Adonai Bezek is a great warrior. And he is captured and they cut off his thumbs and his great toes. His days as a great warrior are over. How great of a warrior was he? Notice 3 score and 10 kings. He had defeated 70 other kings but now his days are over. He can't hold a sword with no thumb and he can't run into battle with no great toes. But how did Adonai Bezek feel about that? Verse 7, and Adonai Bezek said, threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table, as I have done, notice, as I have done, so God hath requited me. And they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died. Adonai Bezek knew that the justice of God was being enacted upon him. He knew, as I have done to these other kings, God is doing to me. He is not complaining about the justice of God. He recognizes that he deserves exactly what he's getting. The justice of God being enacted. And how sad sometimes that we who profess to know the Word of God don't understand the justice of God and understand that there is coming a time when the justice of God will be enacted. We always want to be merciful. We always want to be pitiful. We always want to, oh, but listen now, we shouldn't be so hard on those, you know. We shouldn't. Listen, isn't there room for all of us just to get along? Can't we all just coexist? Can't we all have our own place? No. Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. There aren't multiple ways to get to God. There's only one way, and that's the way of Jesus Christ. We can't condone sin. It's sin, and we need to see it as that. And when God brings judgment, We need to understand that sometimes God's going to bring judgment into this world and he's not going to show pity and everyone is good. Someone may receive the just recompense of reward for their sin. We always want to excuse it. Oh, well, now that's not the justice of God. Well, it might be. Remember what Paul said to the Corinthians that some of you are sick and some of you are asleep. Or in other words, some of you died because of sin. We need to recognize that sometimes death comes into someone's life because of sin. Now, it's not always, but there is a time that if you commit a sin that it's going to cause death. It's possible. Adonai Bezek recognized that. He recognized that I got what I deserved. As I have done to others, I am receiving. done a disservice to people by telling them that sin, you know, there's no consequences to sin. You know, we want long suffer mercy and no, there's consequences to sin and sometimes God decides to enact it. And that's what we're going to see in the book of Judges that there comes a time when God decides to enact a judgment upon sin and His arm of justice is revealed. And there's coming a day when there will be no pity at all. There will be no mercy. When we get to the great white throne judgment bar of God, there is no mercy. The day of long-suffering, the day of the mercy of God will be over. There will be a time when men will stand and give account for their sins. And if their name's not written in the Lamb's Book of Life, they will be cast into the lake of fire forever and ever and ever. No mercy, no pity, only justice. Why is that? Because God is holy. And when you sin against God, you are sinning against His holiness. And one day He will require justice and give an account. So Adonai Bezek understood the justice of God. And we need to also. Yet today is the day of salvation. which means today is the day when God gives mercy. Today is the day when God is being long-suffering towards sin. And today, if you will hear His voice, today, if you will turn to Jesus, today, if you will repent of your sins and put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, you will be saved. God will forgive you of your sins if you will believe in Jesus today. But there's coming a day when that day will no longer be. There's coming a day when the longsuffering of God is going to end. There's coming a day when the mercy of God is going to end. So today should be the day that you believe in Jesus Christ. And turn from your wicked ways and turn unto God. Because God is the God of justice. And that justice will be enacted one day. And then we go down to look at Joseph and the house of Luz. and as we read and we study and we see. Verse 22, in the house of Joseph they also went up against Bethel and the Lord was with them and the house of Joseph sent to decry Bethel. Now the name of the city before was Luz and the spies saw a man come forth out of the city and they said unto him, show us, we pray thee, the entrance into the city and we will show thee mercy. And when he showed them the entrance into the city they smoked the city with the edge of the sword but they let go the man and all his family and the man went into the land of the Hittites and built a city and called the name thereof Luz which is the name thereof unto this day. What had God told the children of Israel to do? When you go into the city show no pity but wipe them all out because they are all idolatrous. As they go to fight against this city the the spies send and they find a man who is willing to show them the entrance into the city and when Israel, it says the house of Joseph goes in to fight against this city, they are able to defeat this city except for one thing, they let this man go. And we may think sometimes, ah, it's just one sin, it's not that big a deal, we can let that go. Well, first of all, It's rebellion against God. It was just one man. Why is that any big deal? Because that one man went and reestablished the Canaanite culture, the Canaanite culture of idolatry, the Canaanite culture that was contrary to God. He went into another place and established that culture. What seems like a little insignificant event to the children of Israel only grew. We may look at our own lives and think, well, that's only one sin. That can't be too big a deal. You know, I can let that alone, except the only thing is that sin is just a seed, and that seed grows, and that seed that grows produces fruit. And the next thing you know, there's a whole heart of rebellion. What we see in this is the necessity of following God's Word completely. We can't follow our own agenda. God has reasons for the principles that He has in His Word and we can't say, well I like this one but I don't like that one. I think it's okay if I go ahead and do this and don't follow the Word of God completely there. We see that only breeds more sin later on. The other thing that it does is that it hardens the heart. If you allow sin to continue on and you allow sin to go on unrepentant of, that will cause the hardening of the heart. We also need to think about being merciful and having pity when we should not be. There comes a time when God says judgment or action needs to take place and we allow it to go on. I mean, there is church discipline. If we allow actions to go on without discipline, we're having mercy and pity in a place where we shouldn't have. and it's only going to cause damage later on down the road. If a sin deserves chastening or if a sin deserves discipline, then we should act in discipline. But we see the beginnings in chapter number 1. We're laying the foundation of what it's going to be like in the nation of Israel as we move forward in the book of Judges. And as we said in our prayer, The one thing we want to remember is we want to remember that this book is full of the faithfulness of God. We see the children of Israel, they're unfaithful to God. They do not follow Him wholeheartedly, yet God is faithful to them. We see this over and over and over again. The children of Israel sin against God. God brings judgment upon them. Then God sends them a deliverer. And when God sends them a deliverer, they are delivered. God is faithful to His people. This also reminds us of what we can do if we will walk faithfully with the Lord and we will follow His word. We see what can be accomplished when we are faithful to God. But we all see throughout this, if we believe not, yet God is faithful. We also see the inability of the people of God to usher in the kingdom of God. And this is why we need Christ, because he is able to establish righteousness and equity in this world. We need Jesus today. So today as we look at this book of Judges we pray it's an encouragement to you both of all to understand what God is doing and understand the need for repentance and the understand the faithfulness of God to his people. Let's pray. Heavenly Father Lord we thank you for this day. We thank you for this opportunity we have to learn from your word and we pray God that you will encourage us to be faithful to you because we recognize that you have been faithful to us, thankful that you have given us your righteousness and showed us the path of life. Help us to follow it today. In the name of your son, Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.