I don't know if you can see it. So, Okay. so so Yeah. Good morning, Old Providence Church. And to those visiting us on live stream, as you begin to find your seats, we'll take care of some administration things, some announcements. Foremost, in case you did not receive it on the one call, on Friday morning, our congregant, Lena Mae Kugler, passed away. And there's some details that was not on the one call, It appears that the visitation for Lena Kugler will be at the Henry Funeral Home on Tuesday from 6 to 8 p.m. He's going to be returning on Wednesday for her funeral, so on Wednesday at 11 a.m. at Mount Carmel. A graveside service only will be held, and Patrick will conduct that. So for Liam and Mary. Other announcements. Not so important, but you don't want to miss them. There is no youth group tonight. Happy Independence Day to everyone for that. the church office as well as closed tomorrow in recognition of Independence Day. And as I've already alluded, Patrick's not with us here today, which is why I'm conducting the worship service. I thank you for being here today in the Lord's presence. In his absence, in Patrick's absence, you're welcome to call him. But we advise his cell phone in an austere location is probably spotty. You may not receive him. If you need to get a hold of someone at the church, you can feel free to call Stephanie, or certainly myself, or an elder, and we'll be happy to assist. Did I miss anything of import, announcement-wise, from anyone? We'll be dismissing Children's Church at the end of the first hymn, but I think I have that on my notes, so if I miss it, though, just be aware, Children's Church gets dismissed. Okay, let's begin our worship service then, shall we? so so so so Our call to worship this morning is from Psalm 114. It's a sort of Independence Day psalm, telling of Israel's freeing Exodus by the hand of God from the national clutches of Egypt. This psalm reminds us that nothing can stand in the way of God. No foreign powers, however great they may be, not nature, despite its immensity, and not Satan. His armies, his intellect, and his purpose 24-7 aim on destroying the character of God. Nothing can lay claim to that which is the Almighty's. Psalm 114, the word of God. When Israel went out from Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language, Judah became his sanctuary, Israel his dominion. The sea looked and fled, and Jordan turned back. The mountains skipped like rams, the hills like lambs. What ails you, O sea, that you flee? O Jordan, that you turn back. O mountains, that you skip like rams. O hills, like lambs. Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob, who turns the rock into a pool of water. the flint into a spring of water. Amen. Let's pray. We come before you, Lord, with a heartfelt sense of reverence. Heavenly Father, we acknowledge that you are supreme, and our invocation this morning is that your name be extolled by our worship, that you're lifted up in our singing, and that you're thanked by our gifts, and that you heal our souls with the balm of your goodness and with your truth, instill in us a humble confidence to trust you, to trust you for our lives both now and for eternity. We pray these things in the name of our Lord Jesus, who taught us to pray by saying, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts not into temptation, but delivers from evil. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. The Apostles' Creed. If you believe these truths of the Christian faith, I welcome you to join with me and your fellow brothers and sisters, both in person and on the live stream, declaring this creed now aloud together. I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. From thence he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Christian Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen. And please, as has been our tradition since the COVID pandemic release, let's continue to remain seated while we sing together to the glory of the Lord, hymn number 213, Crown Him with Many Crowns. Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! I love you. I'm going to be you. of the Lord Jesus Christ shall in heaven embrace. His Church shall know the way, and all His Churches be. The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Ghost When you know the grace of the things we have done, We give you all the glory to live in the place of thine. All will be made aware, for thou hast died for me. Let's go before the Lord together in prayer. Heavenly Father, our worship service this morning is but one hour in the grand course of your history, yet you've promised to work mightily in response to our prayers and that you will use them to affect the course of our lives and the lives of others. We believe this, and thus we pray knowing that you will work through these prayers to accomplish your purposes. So please hear us now as we silently pray to you. Our Father, the heavens declare your glory. The vast nature that surrounds us, it testifies to your majesty. And the consciousness within each of us makes us aware that you are God, our creator. These general revelations are clear to us. We wake from sleep because you've willed it, because you still give us breath. We live because you gifted us life, beating hearts and blinking eyes, hands that work and minds that create the ability to desire and to have affections. We consider that you caused the sun to shine upon us and the rain to fall upon our crops. that you designed the universe and moved celestial bodies in space and time, the moon and tides to perfectly cooperate, Lord, so that life upon this earth, that it may thrive. All creatures benefit by your gracious love and care. But we've opted to go our own way. Since Adam, we humans, we've decided that you're not who you say you are. that you don't tell the truth, and that somehow we're superior to you, that our wills are better for us than your will, that we're more right than you, or that somehow you won't call us to account for these prideful, foolish, sinful thoughts. Lord, even as we confess this, the ridiculousness of it is beyond description. And Father, we need your forgiveness. We haven't offended you like mistakenly stepping on your toe. No, we've purposely committed treasonous acts against the king so severe that they're crimes against the holy of holies, worthy of eternal death. We've hated the one who loves us. We've rebelled against the one who protects us. We confess to you that we've rejected your life and we've said, get away. I can do this myself. We've joined with Adam and all who have come in the falling under your verdict of death. That's what's fair. That's what we deserve. Father, help us to repent, to see you for who you are. Restore us unto life so that we live. Thank you for providing and for specially revealing your word to us, teaching us the blessed doctrines about man and yourself. We would never know otherwise without your special revelation. Father, your son's atonement's never fully comprehensible, but we know that he took our guilt upon himself. He suffered the agony of your wrath that was stored up for humanity, an eternity's worth of that wrath. When we fail to thank you for the bread that you put on our table and our ability to eat it. When we get jealous of our neighbor's thing and wish we had more. Or when we wallow in self-pity because others have better kids, seemingly, or perhaps more grandkids. or when we hit the unhealthy internet button. Somehow thinking that cyber entertainment's what satisfies, how foolish. God, we're kidding ourselves, and in doing so, we are our own worst enemy. Your son faced every temptation in its fullness and yet was perfectly faithful to you, and by your mercy in providing him as our atonement, By his suffering and death, and by his victory over sin, evidenced in the resurrection, we plead for your forgiveness. We rest on him alone, not only for salvation, but for righteous living today. Thank you beyond our ability to express. Thank you for our Savior, Jesus. And lastly, Father, we are a needy people. You created us with desires and we asked that you would provide opportunities to fulfill them, projects and resources for our creativity, friends for our relationship cravings, and that you provide meaningful employment for those who are out of work. We look to you to supply right educational systems for our children so that they're taught truth and to how to think rightly Father, we raise up to you the sensitivities of childless parents who would like to have families, but for some reason, they seem unable to be parents. Would your blessing be upon them to provide for their longings? And Father, the ongoing health issues of our congregational members is before you this morning, but there are also new medical concerns that have arisen since we've last met. Give us patience to await healing in your time, but please don't tarry too long, for we're suffering and we look eagerly to be refreshed. Father, while this prayer has been longer than usual, we've barely scratched the surface of our adoration of you, and also for the things that we need. Ultimately, we ask that you provide, in your timing and in your way, all that's good for us, enough so that we're satisfied and thankful, but not too much whereby we might forget you. Bless the rest of this service, we ask, and pray all these things in the name of your Son, Jesus, the Christ. In the spring of 1940, England was at war with Germany. After having invaded Poland, the Nazis easily pushed west through the Netherlands and Belgium. In an effort to keep Hitler on the European continent and off of their kingdom's doorstep, England sent troops to France. However, they were no match for the Nazi war machine, and they got pushed back from Belgium and into the northern border of France. The British army was at full retreat. But they had a geographic problem, and that was the English Channel, the coast. 350,000 allied men, some of whom were French, but most of whom were English, were pinned between the sea and the Nazi superior forces in a little French port town called Dunkirk. Kind of reminds me of the Israelites' exodus from Egypt. You'll recall that after fleeing Pharaoh, they came up against the Red Sea. They were essentially stuck on the beach with the Egyptian chariots bearing down on them. You also know the rest of the story, that God intervened by parting the waters for the Israelites to continue journeying on their way to the promised land. Okay, back to May, 1940. The situation was dire, and historical British records revealed the expectations of many that they were going to perish on that beach. But God and at least one naval officer had other things in mind. This naval officer sent a three-word cable to London, which reached the ears of the newly elected Winston Churchill. Those three words, but if not. What these conveyed was clear to the British high command. It was clear because the people of that day, they knew their Bible. But if not, it said this, this situation is dire. We're trapped. We need a miracle to save us and all odds are that Germany is going to defeat Britain. But wait, it says more. And we on this beach know that God can work this out. But if not, if he chooses to not save us, then we will accept his will and we will do our duty. We will fight to the bitter end. All that with just three words. But if not, was recognized as a reference to the Old Testament story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. In Daniel chapter 3, these three young men were given a choice. They could bow to Nebuchadnezzar's pagan idol, or they could be thrown into a fiery furnace. They courageously chose the furnace rather than just obey God's commandment not to bow down to idols, but to serve them. Exodus 20 verses 4 and 5. That naval officer and the people who received his message, they knew Daniel 3, specifically verses 16 through 18. Which I'll read now. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the burning, fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of your hand, O King. But if not, be it known to you, O King, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up. These Old Testament men, they were resolved to obey God, whether or not he chose to save them in that circumstance. They knew he wasn't obligated to help them, but they were willing to be obedient and to be used by God, even to their personal harm. These words, but if not, borrowed from the Bible's book of Daniel, were instantly recognizable to the British people who were accustomed to hearing scriptures read in church. The news of their boy's plight reached the ears of Britain's sailing and its fishing community. Anyone with a boat, fishermen, yachtsmen, tugs, large and small, they were all scrambling to commute across the English Channel to rescue as many of their soldiers as possible. and now the miracle, or at least divine intervention. Inexplicably, at least from a tactical military perspective, the German command issued a halt order. Hitler even approved this, thereby pausing the Nazis' pursuit for three days. This was just enough time for the British army to be rescued by their civilian countrymen. Without that cable, and more so without the knowledge of scripture, Germany would have likely won World War II before the Americans, Japan, or the Russians even entered it. Knowing scripture literally helped save the nation. As we go to God's word, our scripture reading, let's bow for a brief word of prayer. Heavenly Father, as we look to your infallible word together, delivered through a fallible man, and heard by fallible ears, we ask that by your gracious revelation, we'd understand its truth, and that we'd be drawn to you as its author and perfecter, and that we would live joyfully under it. Amen. Our scripture reading this morning is from chapter nine in the Gospel of John. As you locate that, you may find it interesting to learn that scholars generally view John's Gospel as broken into four parts. Part one being a prologue or introduction, followed by signs or miracles revealing who Jesus is, and then thirdly, the glory or exaltation section, and finally, an epilogue or a conclusion. John's chapter 20, that falls into the conclusion section. And it's 30th verse is really a summation of the entire gospel of John. It's his thesis, or it's purpose statement. It tells us that Jesus performed many signs. And that these have been written so that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. And that by believing we may have life in his name. We find one of those signs in Jesus' healing of a man who was born blind, which, as we'll see in a moment, is not just a story about the power of Jesus to supernaturally heal, but also to help us understand that blindness is a very real spiritual condition, and like restoring sight to dead eyes, only he can restore sight or life to dead souls. If it's not too much trouble at this time, I'd like to invite you to stand with me as we read aloud from the Bible. The Word of God, John 9, verses 1-14. As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind? Jesus answered, it was not this man who sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it's day. Night is coming when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud and said to him, go, wash in the pool of Siloam, which means scent. So he went and washed and came back seeing. The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, is this not the man who used to sit and beg? Some said, it is he. Others said, no, but he's like him. He kept saying, I am the man. So they said to him, Then how were your eyes opened? He answered, The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, Go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed and received my sight. They said, And where is he? He said, I don't know. They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. Now it was the Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. May the Lord bless to us this portion of his holy and fallible word. Please be seated. As you've already figured out, this morning's message is part one of two. That second part will be preached, Lord willing, on the first Sunday in August, August 1st. That sounds like a long way off, but if my childhood is any indication, the summers always flew by. And August 1st will be here before we know it. As my wife, once an actress in college, would remind me, it'll be here before you can say, red leather, yellow leather, three times really fast without getting tongue-tied. If you're trying that now, don't move on here. This story, as we just read in John chapter nine, is one of a series of miracles. It's contained in the gospel that's been traditionally recognized as those teaching about the person and the work of Jesus. In addition to the blind man being healed, the others are Jesus' turning water into wine at the wedding of Cana, his healing the royal official's son at Capernaum, his healing the paralytic at Bethesda, the feeding of the 5,000, Jesus walking on the sea of Galilee's water, and the raising of Lazarus from the dead. Each of these seven miracles, they demonstrate the power of Jesus, and they show us his mercy, compassion, and goodness. but they also inherently declare him to be divine, and they teach us something about our spiritual condition. They all have a physical aspect to them, but at the same time, there's a deeper spiritual meaning, something we certainly should not miss, and that's actually the much bigger point of these miracles. In defeating the 5,000, Jesus revealed himself as the bread of life, that life given by the Father to offer his flesh for the life of the world. In the raising of Lazarus from the dead, he disclosed that his resurrection, he's the life. That miracle's far more about Jesus than it is about Lazarus. As we just read in the account of Jesus' healing the blind man, he is also the light of the world. And as we'll especially see in part two, oh, how that darkness despised its illumination, his exposing light. All right, verse one. In verse one, we find the disciples walking with Jesus. Now, rabbinical methods in Jesus' day were not the type that taught in a classroom. If a man was to learn from a rabbi, then he would probably live with them. This included eating meals together, sleeping under the same roof, and as we see in chapter 9, walking around together. This is what's known as peripatetic teaching, walking around from place to place, teaching and learning as you went. Our text this morning picks up from chapter eight, of course, wherein Jesus had a major run-in with the Jewish leaders. You'll recall he's in the capital city of Jerusalem, and he started off the morning by teaching in the temple. It was not an easy start to the day, as the Pharisees and the scribes, they had paraded in a woman whom they had caught in adultery, no doubt using her merely as a pawn to trap Jesus in a no-win situation. a clever catch-22, where either answer to their petty test would condemn the Lord. Well, after putting that situation to rest by exposing their hypocrisy, shortly thereafter, Jesus explained to these Jews that they were not children of Abraham. For if they were, they'd be doing what Abraham did, living in faith. But instead, Jesus said that they were children of Satan, didn't go over very well. And it so often happens when words fail to make an argument, as rationale and logic collapse, they resort to calling Jesus names, demon possessed. They tried to kill him, in this case with stones. But in the sovereignty of God's timing, Jesus was not to die on this day, and we're told that he hid himself. and then he went out of the temple later. Perhaps Jesus was a pragmatist in his humanity, one of his two natures, and he simply holed up and waited until things had settled down. Anyway, after these events, Jesus and his disciples, they're walking around Jerusalem and they came upon this beggar. Now, Even if you know nothing about marketing, you'll appreciate that the beggars aren't going to position themselves in some off-the-beaten pathway away from the crowds. They wouldn't get any handouts in a back alley. I bring up this point to let you know that we can safely assume that the spot where Jesus met this beggar was a populated thoroughfare where foot traffic was evidently regular. People who frequented this section of road, or perhaps a square, they'd be very well acquainted with this man. Now look, he was born blind, and he's now an adult. So this guy had been sitting there day in and day out for years. They knew him. Verse two, Jesus' disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents? That question is not as odd to the first century Jews as it sounds to our 21st century ears. Many Jews believed, as did Job's friends, that misfortune was God's punishment for specific sins. Since this beggar's blindness existed from birth, the disciples assumed that this guy's parents had sinned before he was born, that he was suffering blindness because of them. But even stranger, or even stranger, maybe he had committed some prenatal sin while in the womb. Who's responsible for this guy's blindness? His parents or him? Well, that's a false dilemma, and Jesus solves it. He offers an alternative explanation, that God had caused such blindness, not as a punishment, but as an opportunity, this very moment's opportunity that God's glory would be displayed. Let me take a moment to have a brief sidebar with you on this. Bit of a tangent. I'll be at a related one. Please, do not ever assume you know why someone is suffering. You may be right, or you may be wrong, but the certainty is that you don't know. It's never a good idea to peanut butter spread your ideas, your experience, or your situation onto someone else's circumstances. and don't apply some wise saying or proverb which only may be generally true. People suffer for many reasons, and it's unwise to presume that you know the intentions of the Almighty, and it's uncharitable to presume that you know that their misery is somehow punitive. The truth of the matter is, yes, God does sometimes impose suffering as a form of discipline. Perhaps as a wake-up call to get a person back on the rails of holy living, or as sanctification. But he also might be using that person's suffering to teach those around him or her how to appreciate blessings, or how to deal piously with hardships. Or, it could be suffering for your benefit, as good examples of how to deal with difficult circumstances. In this case, before us this morning, God imposed this man's suffering so that God himself could be glorified. And then, there's the reason only known to God. The reason that he purposes, but never reveals. Job was never informed of the reason for his misfortunes. Never. So if I may offer a suggestion, as someone you care about, as suffering, as your first step to helping, Don't offer advice or wisdom. Just sit with that. Simply be there. Somewhere along the way, we have lost our art of silence. It's also probably not a good idea at this time to trot out Romans 8.28, telling them that all things work together for good. Just share in their grief and mourn with those who mourn. This is selfless love and action, Romans 11. Okay, back to John 9. We read what Jesus did next. This physical action may accompany the miracle, but it's not the cause. Spit has no power. Even the woman touching the Lord's cloak in Matthew 9, she was healed not because of the cloak, but because of the faith, her faith in the one wearing it. Of course, Jesus didn't need to make mud to heal this man's eyes. Remember, he had spoken the universe into existence out of nothing. He didn't need to employ a prop or use a visible sign to heal this guy, which leads us to the idea that Jesus may have had something else in mind in the visible way that he healed this blind beggar, something perhaps for the bystanders or for us today. One of my prominent influences, perhaps one of yours, the late R.C. Sproul, he once speculated, and I think he's onto something here, that not all creation comes out perfect in this fallen world. It's an obvious observation, right? There are birth defects. But he goes on to surmise that maybe Jesus is demonstrating, to some extent he's sort of saying, let's start again as we made man. Let's start again with dust. Now whether or not that's a collateral point Jesus was trying to make, I'd like us to notice that Jesus seemed to purposefully go out of his way to provoke controversy. He deliberately healed people on the Sabbath whose lives were not immediately at risk. He openly associated an ape with the ritually unclean in ways that scandalized the Pharisees, and he touched a leopard to heal him when speaking could have sufficed. He was admittedly a little bit in your face about it. But the common thread message in all of these, Jesus' point, is that only He could claim that one greater than the temple is here. Matthew 12, 26. So signifying cleansing, Jesus directed the blind man to go wash the mud off. And note that He wasn't told to go home and find a cistern to wash in. No, instead, He was specifically told by the Lord to go to the pool of Siloam. Our author, John, is kind enough to interpret the Hebrew Siloam for us as meaning sent. This is significant, as it ties directly back to verse 4, wherein Jesus says that we must work the works of him who sent me. The man is being sent to the pool of sent by the son of the sender. I can say that again, so let me put it another way. Jesus is telling the man and the disciples in his hearing that God will heal his eyes, imaged in the physical cleansing of washing off mud. And that the man actually has to have faith to go to the pool and do this. But as the story progresses, we discover this as a shadowing, a foreshadowing event, pointing to the spiritual cleansing that's eternally necessary. That spiritual cleansing provided by God, the Son, the Savior of the world, in whom is all power and all authority. I hope you're beginning to see how this is tying together. Jesus is demonstrating that He's the fulfillment of the Old Testament's predicted Messiah. And He's using this man's terrible physical condition to expose a far worse spiritual reality. the reality that we are all blind, and that He, Jesus, is the only one who can fix it. So now we come to an interesting piece of drama, that of the neighbors. Evidently, the man, he did what Jesus commanded him to do, and now he has really good vision. This gent can see. Imagine this, he's never seen anything, anything, I don't think the Lord cured him with 2200 acuity. It would have been helped by a good pair of bifocals. No, this guy could see. He was excited, and rightly so, and he couldn't keep silent. He's returned to the scene of his begging, and people who previously knew him as indigent were now befuddled. Some of them, they didn't even recognize him. Perhaps because his transformation was so total, or because their unbelief In that unbelief that such a transformation could even occur, they said, this simply cannot be him. I have to believe that this guy's dried, unused eye sockets, maybe having been bleached by the covering over with patches or a cloth of some sort, his eyes were now bright and lively. And you know that this beggar's countenance was now changed to one of joy and smiling. He's surely now walking with a spring in his step. By all appearances, this guy's a new man. By all appearances. That is, externally. We'll get to the internal changes in a few weeks, but for now, he's adamant to the neighbors. I'm that man, he persists, exclaiming his identity. Oh boy, but now begins the interrogation. Okay, they said if you're him, how did this happen? He tells them plainly, this man named Jesus, he put mud on my eyes and he told me to go wash it off at Salome. Instead of rejoicing with this man and with his parents, they do what Herod did upon learning the birth of Jesus from the wise men. They pretended to care. Where is this man, they asked. Their concern was nefarious, or at least it was disingenuous. I don't think their interest in Jesus's whereabouts were altruistic at all. For the next thing we read is that the neighbors had hauled off the man to the authorities to be questioned further, in an effort, no doubt, to expose the rabbi Jesus for some legal impropriety. Right, they were nitpicking. Remember, the Lord had just escaped from their having tried to kill him at the temple, but he slipped away, he slipped their grasp. Ah, they say, where is this Jesus healer? Verse 12. These Jews, they were ignoring Deuteronomy 22.4, which they knew very well, which says, you shall not see your brother's donkey or his ox fallen down by the way and ignore them. You shall help him to lift them up again. God in their midst. Incarnate Jesus, who just four chapters earlier at the pool called Bethesda, he had demonstrated that he has both the power to heal physically and spiritually, telling the lame man in John chapter five that his sins are forgiven, and to get up and walk. The pool of Bethesda and the pool of Siloam were both in Jerusalem. They were less than a mile away from each other. the distance between what I would consider to be, I don't know, a long five-part, maybe three five-parts. That's how far they were away from each other. For those of you who don't golf or appreciate that maddening and wonderful game, I'll put it in our language. It was probably no longer than the fire truck parade at Ralphine's Carnival. It was long, but it was short. They knew of it. These Jews had seen Jesus do this. where they'd certainly heard about it. Yet they have zero understanding that the bridegroom is with them, Mark 2 9. And that the Sabbath was made for man, Mark 2 27. They didn't care about this impoverished beggar and the inexplicable joy he's experienced. And ironically, it is they who are blind. Of course, there was nothing preventing Jesus, either morally or legally, from healing on the Sabbath. And the Jews knew that. But the truth is that He simply exposed their sinfulness and He threatened their comfort zone. And for that, they couldn't stand Him. When we pick up next time in the text, we'll find the blind man healed and before the Pharisees. This is a wonderful story. It's an example of how one can be a simple yet powerful witness to the Lord. Today's sermon, it opened with an historical World War II account of a British naval officer. and the people who knew their Bible. As a result of this familiarity with the word, a nation was able to act en masse and help save their sons and husbands from destruction by an earthly army, Adolf Hitler's Nazis. But more than mere head knowledge of the scriptures, these Englishmen demonstrated faith in the omniscient wisdom and sovereignty of God. Just like the three young men who were Jewish captives in Babylon living under a pagan dictator, they remained faithful in submission to the king of kings. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they also knew God's word, His law, what they called the Torah. and they submitted themselves to his authority as revealed in it. Of course, none of these men wanted to perish, either on the beach at Dunkirk, France, or in the furnaces of Babylon, modern-day Iraq. But to their personal harm, disadvantage, and discomfort, even to their death, they trustingly placed themselves in the hand of the Almighty. In their cases, he rescued them with stark divine intervention. But you know, and I'm sure that you can think of some examples. There've been plenty of faithful men and women who have suffered greatly under Christian persecution. Our author John is, our author John, excuse me, and most of his fellow apostles are just the beginning of that long list. Of course, even the sinless, the divine son of God, Jesus, died for the truth. Remember the word I spoke to you, says Jesus in John 15, 20. A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. But the story doesn't end there. Thank God, literally. Jesus is our atonement. the death of Jesus as our atonement for our sins and our rebellion, as the substitution for us, as the substitution for our warranted death, and His resurrection as evidence of that, we have eternal life in Him. In the meantime, in this little while while we have on earth, we learn to love Him and we learn to obey Him. and we learn to strive to conform to his spirit. Maybe no one's casting you to the lions, but no doubt that God's calling each of us every day in the hundreds of decisions that we make throughout that day to die to ourselves, to put away the old man, so to speak. The Puritans called this mortifying the flesh. In this way, we agree with Philippians 2.12, working out our own salvation, praying that his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Look, our model for life and death is Jesus himself. It's the Lord. And even Jesus prayed to the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane for something he wanted, specifically, something that he wanted to be taken away from him. the cup of crucifixion, the cup containing the Father's judgment and wrath. Nevertheless, but if not, thy will be done." Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Your Word is eternal and is precious. Indeed, it's the very foundation upon which we've restored relationship with you through your son, who is that very word. Thank you for allowing us the privilege to commune with you this morning and with each other. As we go forth to our homes, our work and our travels this week, we ask for your protection and that we live with an awareness and an intentionality regarding our faith, walking in your spirit and according to your truth. Our second hymn this morning is the first tune on page 135, Fairest Lord Jesus. ♪ Fairest Lord Jesus ♪ of us. you. to you. you. Our benediction. And now let's go in peace with the comfort of God, given through Moses to his brother Aaron, available to us in the book of Numbers, chapter six. The words are up on the screen together. I'd like us to read it aloud together to each other as a mutual blessing, please. Numbers six, verses 24 through 26 in unison with me, please. Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen. 2A 3.30 (-0.66')