this morning. Dear Gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you so very much for your Son. We thank you so very much for your Word. We ask that you would keep us close to your Son and close to your Word. We ask that as we look at your Word this morning, that you would be honored and glorified by everything that is said, thought, and done. and keep us focused on your word is reality and truth, and everything else outside is dangerous, very dangerous for us and for our souls, for our church, for our brothers and sisters. And so, Father, we just ask that as your word is expounded, may it be correct and may it lead your people to Christlikeness. We thank you and love you in your son's name, amen. Now I'm sure that all of you are familiar with the great literary classic, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. There's a sequel, probably some of you didn't even know this great literary work, If You Give a Moose a Muffin. There's more. You can ask my kids, they'll probably, If You Give a Pig a Pancake. And here's the last one, you ready? If You Give a Dog a Donut, there we go. Great literary classics will go down in Western canon as some of the greatest writings since William Shakespeare himself. If you don't know the story, shame on you. It's a great story. There's this mouse that inexplicably is dressed like a human and walks like a human and walks into the house and it just says, if you give a mouse a cookie, he's gonna want a glass of milk. And from there, there is this crazy narrative of where this stupid mouse keeps asking for more stuff. And the idea is, is that once you concede in one thing, then it starts to concede in another and starts to concede in another. And I don't want to ruin the sequels for you, spoiler alert, but if you give a moose a muffin, the same thing happens. If you give a pig a pancake, same thing happens. If you give a dog a donut, guess what? The same thing happens, yeah. Yeah, there's these little concessions that are made that leads to bigger and bigger and bigger concessions. We laugh at that story thinking how cute it is. Of course, if you give somebody a cookie, they're gonna want a glass of milk. And if you give them a glass of milk, of course, they're gonna want a napkin. Of course, they're gonna want a straw. Of course, they're gonna want books to stand on so they could drink out of the straw. But there's a reality here about our sin. If you make a small concession with the flesh, guess what? There's another concession. And then what happens? Then another concession, and another concession, and another concession. And then there's this whole crazy long story of you start with something small and now you go to something big and serious. And it's always devastating. If you give a mouse a cookie, the worst thing you're out of is a glass of milk and a cookie, right? Maybe a napkin and a straw. You concede to sin, you're out a lot more. And it's serious. It's very serious. It's the most important thing in your life right now. is your battle with sin, and not to give in, and not to concede an inch, and to walk like Christ. That is your biggest struggle. That is the biggest concern. I don't care what's going on. I guarantee you, this is the biggest battle. This is the fight. Most important thing. And so, guess what? Solomon deals with this. He deals with the momentum of sin. He deals with this idea that sin grows. It's like mold, right? It grows, it's dangerous, it's harmful. And we're gonna see this in Proverbs 29. Starting in verse 12, Lord willing, we'll get down to verse 16. And I wanna show you that sin grows. You give it a little concession, it gets bigger and gets bigger and gets bigger and gets bigger. And Solomon, in a sense, deals with the reason of why it grows. It's not very complicated. And then he kind of ends this section with an interesting note. It's an interesting way of ending it. So in verse 12, what we're going to see is the reason that sin grows is because we follow the wrong ideas. We listen to the wrong advice. We listen to the wrong stuff. We follow the wrong thing. That's bad. That's bad. And when you follow the wrong thing, guess what happens? That gives free reign to sin. But then there's something else. Not only is this person actively following the wrong thing, what we then see in verses 13 through 15 is this rejection of the right thing, right? So it's the following the wrong thing and then rejecting the right things. And then in verse 16, what we're going to see is this. Even though sin may increase, we may see sin increase in our country, in this world, there is this triumphant note that's really important in this discussion. In the end, the righteous win. Now that's important, right? Sin grows, yep. And I'll be honest with you, the only way that we can stop it is by God's intervention. And guess what? In the end, he wins. And if we're in Christ, we win. We'll talk about this. I'm a little excited about it. I might give away a little bit of the ending of the sermon here, but I just wanna let you know this before we go on as we talk about the subject. Realize this. When we talk about spiritual warfare and the battle and temptation and the growing sinfulness in our society, guess what? It's not, this battle isn't like, oh man, all we gotta do is just one more convert and then we might change the tide of the war and we might win. We might win. No. We have already won. The battle's already won. Jesus already won it. The battle's done. We're the victors, right? That's it. We're in the midst of this weird time of waiting for that to become a reality, but we're already there. It's already a win. We're already winning. Sometimes, We see the growth of sin all around us, and we think, we're losing, and things are going bad. But what we're gonna see in this text is no, no, no, no, no, no, the righteous win in the end. Jesus wins in the end. In fact, right now, he's already the victor. And if you are in Christ, you right now are already the victor. That's it, the end of story. We're fighting not from a position of, I hope we win, We already won. So let's look at this. Let's look at this concept that sin grows, okay? So let's go to verse 12, and remember that the idea that sin grows, why? Because we listen to the wrong things. So notice what he says in verse 12. If a ruler listens to falsehood, all his officials will be wicked. Now, this section also could speak of governments and rulers, and it is obviously true that if a ruler listens to falsehood, that's a bad thing for the country, and it would seem that if you would listen to falsehood, what do you do? You surround yourself with advisors who are wicked. Now, do not think falsehood here is just simply listening to lies. That is not what falsehood is. In this context, falsehood is all of those ideas which go against God. All those ideas that promote something that goes against the nature of God and the will of God, okay? So a falsehood is Not just, okay, I believe lies. It's believing these wrong ideas. And when it says that this judge or this ruler listens, this is much more than he just turns on a podcast and he hears all these crazy ideas. It's that he listens, he takes them to heart, he takes them seriously, he weighs them out, and then he goes, this sounds good. This sounds right. Now this morning, Greg covered this. We're going to go over it again because it's absolutely what we need to talk about in dealing with this falsehood. By the way, I would encourage everybody to come to the Sunday school class. Not only do you get to hear Greg and I play instruments, which is fun for Greg and I, But also, we're going through the book of Colossians, and so let's go to Colossians chapter two, great study, great study, great focus, he's doing a great job, causing us to focus on Christ, think about Christ, who's Christ? Christ, nothing but Christ. But in Colossians chapter two, it deals with this falsehood, these falsehoods that might come about. And go with me that Colossians chapter two, verse eight, By the way, in Colossians chapter two, Paul really gives four warnings, and Greg touched on it this morning. There's this word that is used a couple times of watch out, watch out. There are blinking red warning signs with bars across the road going, there is danger and hazards ahead. Be careful. Be incredibly careful. In Wyoming, when you drive through Wyoming, they have those across and they say, do not cross this barrier because if you go out into the great unknown, you may not ever come back because of how bad the weather is. That's what this is, is that blinking sign. Watch out, watch out. And he gives four of them. We're gonna focus on the second one, but it's important for you to see all four. So the first one is, do not be deluded, right? So you see that kind of in the beginning part, in the first, what is that, first five verses, do not be deluded. And notice that the delusion comes from these plausible arguments, meaning that they're arguments which, as Greg put eloquently this morning, make logical sense. They make sense to us. Yeah, they sound good. I really can't see anything wrong with the argument, right? The argument sounds good. It sounds true. It sounds correct-ish. Yeah. It seems plausible to me. Then the second one, starting in verse eight, the second warning would then be, do not be detained or do not be held captive, right? Because of all these plausible arguments. Then in verse 16, then he says, Do not be disparaged. Do not let those false ideas change the way that you act as a believer. You're in Christ. You follow Christ. You stand firm in Christ. Don't let those other people make you think that you're doing something wrong when you are actually following Christ. And then lastly, he says, do not be disqualified. And at the end of the chapter, he talks about that disqualification. That disqualification would be following those things which have the appearance of wisdom. So this deals with that falsehood. So notice in verse eight, where Paul says, see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit. So there's two streams of bad water that comes in, right? Be careful of these things. And it's philosophy and empty deceit. And notice the headwater of these bad, bad streams. It's according to human tradition. That's the falsehood. So if a king listens to these falsehoods that come from human tradition, and the philosophies that come from it, the worldviews that come from it, the ethics that come from it, the advice that comes from it, we could say the rotten gospel that comes from human tradition philosophy, if we buy into that, Be careful, because it sounds plausible, because there's things in our culture that we kind of automatically agree is true, even though we haven't tested whether it's true or not, and they use that, and we go, well, yeah, no, that sounds reasonable. That's where this comes from. It comes from human tradition, and just flat-out lies. Just flat-out lies. They just lie. People lie. Sinful people lie all the time. And they just talk about it as if it's true. And we would like to think that we're really good at catching people in lies, right? We think we have a really good lie detector. We don't. Are you kidding? No. Do you know how many lies we believe all the time? We believe lies all the time, right? This morning I said, do I look fat? No, I don't. That's a lie. I believed it. You didn't have to laugh at that one. No, I'm joking. No, that was a joke. You're meant to laugh. Not too hard, though. Okay, so notice that it says it's according to human tradition, and then notice that it's according to these elementary spirits of the world, right? So it's built on all this stuff, all this human tradition. One guy said one thing, and everybody quotes that guy, and then another guy says another thing, and they quote that guy. So there's all this human tradition, all this philosophy, right? And this whole stream, this whole stream and avalanche. But notice what it's not according to, Christ. Now if we go back to Proverbs, it talks about a ruler listening to falsehood. He's listening to all of this garbage and he's accepting it. A good ruler would accept the things that are found in God's word, right? But notice what happens in verse 12 of Proverbs chapter 29. It says, if a ruler listens to falsehood, then it says, then all of his officials will be wicked. So you see how it grows, right? So one thing happens, then another thing happens, because it grows, because it makes sense that if the leader falls into this, then everybody else falls into this. You see it? You see the growth of sin? You see the growth of bad ideas? Why does sin grow? Because there are falsehoods, and we had stopped those falsehoods. These things about God, things about his nature, things about his will, we adopt those. And when we adopt those, it's easy for sin to grow, because there's nothing to counteract it, right? The great power that stops sin is Christ and his word. And when we start believing lies and start supplementing God's word in Christ with some of these other things, that weakens our ability to fight sin and temptation. And friends, that sounds to me like the perfect plan that Satan would try to employ to tempt you, that your great temptation that you're gonna face throughout all of your life is to diminish the word, to diminish Christ, to diminish God. That's where the temptation lies. That's the fight. So if we listen to the wrong things, well then sin grows. By the way, just by exegetical comment here, it would make sense that a wicked ruler would only listen to those who are wicked and affirm already those falsehoods. So this would also be another thing of advice of be careful who you surround yourself with. Make sure that you are listening to God's word, you're listening to Christ, and you're around people who care about God's word, right, and will encourage you to live for Jesus. Now, there's something else that happens in this text. Not only is it those who follow wrong ideas, but it's those who also reject good ideas. So notice verse 13. says the poor man and the oppressor meet together, and the Lord gives light to the eyes of both. If a king faithfully judges the poor, his throne will be established forever. The rod and reproof gives wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother. Now you see that, you see in the first part of that, there's three things that are really good. Three perspectives that are absolutely essential for every Christian mind, right? Has to absolutely be embedded in our minds, right? But notice that how he ends it with, but a child left to himself, right? This lack of discipline, this lack of correction, this rejection of wisdom leads to shame. So you see how there's like this, here's a lot of good things, but man, there's people that reject this, and when they reject this and let it go unchecked, it leads to shame. So let's just look at some of these important things that are true that Wicked, foolish people reject. And we see this in our society. So notice verse 13, incredible truth, says the poor man and the oppressor meet together. This is a strange sentence. Because you don't normally think of a poor person who's being oppressed to want to have a meeting with his oppressor, right? And the idea here of a meeting is that they come together on equal ground. They come together to do business together. They come together as friends. They come together to join, to join together. So it's a strange image, right? You would go, well no, the type of relationship here is one that's oppressing, the other one is being oppressed, The inclination is they don't like each other, right? The one is using the other one for selfish gain and the other one's being oppressed and can have this bad view and anger and resentment towards the oppressor. But where do they meet together? On this one truth, the Lord gives light to the eyes of both. Now that is an important statement. If you underline in your Bible, this is one of those ones you probably should underline, this is an important statement. This idea of giving light has two nuances. The first nuance is that the Lord gives life. He's the one who gives life, he animates life. The idea is that both the one that's oppressed and the oppressor are both made in the image of God. and therefore both of them deserve to be treated as if they're made in the image of God. So notice, we're not involved in this. We're seeing these two people and we look at both of those people and we say, both of them are made in the image of God. Not one, not the other. Now in society, in the past, even in this own country, what has happened? You have some people who oppress others and then say, this person is not really a human. He's sub-human. Wrong, sinful, right? This proverb condemns that. That's absolutely sinful. Every single human being, regardless of where they're born, the color of skin, their parents, what side of the tracks they're born on, any type of thing that you could try to dice up humans and categorize humans, all of them are made in the image of God and therefore are deserving of respect. So we look at this and we go, wow, this is heavy stuff, right? Because the poor man who's being oppressed, he's made in the image of God, and so we desire for him to be treated with respect. But then we also look at the oppressor who's doing some bad stuff here, and we go, well, he's also made in the image of God. The same dignity that goes to the one has to go to the other. See, this is why I realize that the Bible's true, because it doesn't show partiality to one or to the other. It doesn't show partiality to the poor man. It doesn't show partiality to the rich man, right? It demonstrates that everyone is accountable to God, which is the second idea of this idea that the Lord gives light. It's this idea that the Lord is the one who holds them accountable, and there is enough withinside of creation that each of them can say, there is a creator, and I am accountable to that creator, right? I'm accountable to that one. And so, both are held accountable for their actions in the midst of it, even though both of them have this dignity of being made in the image of God. That's an important truth, right? That's an important truth. When we deal with people, that idea that every single human I come across is made in the image of God and is therefore worthy of respect and dignity, that's revolutionary, right? I look at people and I might say, I don't, huh, made in the image of God. And guess what happens if somebody's made in the image of God? What's the one way that we show respect to them? We share the gospel with them, and we realize that anyone, at any time, God can open their heart, and they can repent, and they become our brother and sister, right? That's the truth, that's the reality of this. So even the poor man could become the brother, and think about this, even the oppressor This bad guy, he can repent if the Lord works on his heart. So then notice then the next part, verse 14. So if a king faithfully judges, what would be that basis of his faithful judging? Would it be God's word and the theology and the correct interpretation of it that all people are made in the image of God and therefore what God's word says is true and I need to judge based off of this truth. When he judges, and he's faithful when he judges the poor, now, first of all, you would go, well, why doesn't he judge the oppressor? Right? Like, why does he say the poor? That seems strange. This shows the level of commitment to justice. Justice for all. What's right is right. What's wrong is wrong. Doesn't matter. Of course the oppressor will be judged. along with the poor, there's no partiality, right? It's fair, it's biblical, it's following God's law. When this happens, notice what happens, his throne will be established forever and for a long time. That's important, that we should not show partiality when we deal with people, right? Think about the book of James. What's James dealing with in the book of James? You have this huge partiality. You have the church catering to one and neglecting the other, right? Poor people come in and the church goes, ah, sit over there. Sit at the poor people section. the rich people come sit at the good section, right? Come sit up on stage, rich guy. Yeah, cool. Look at the rich guys up on stage. Look how powerful and influential we are. Poor people, you sit at the feet, right? You have things happening inside of the church that James is just appalled at, that you have rich people employing poor people and not paying them. And the church kind of going, cool, yeah, that's fine. And James goes, what's wrong with you? That's not consistent with the gospel. That's not consistent with what we see in the scriptures. So it's a call to repent and not show partiality. That's good, right? That's a good thing. I wish all of society had no partiality, right? I wish the church had no partiality. I wish I had no partiality. Not showing favoritism. By the way, since I am partial, if you really wanna get on my good side, I like chocolate chip cookies. I'm joking. Then notice the next good thing that happens in verse 15, the first part of verse 15. It says, the rod and reproof give wisdom. That's a good thing, right? Parents disciplining their children, right? This discipline that happens to anyone, really, of this Here's what's right. Here's what God's word says. I'm going to encourage you to live according to this. And sometimes what is needed is a stern rebuke and sometimes even a swift hand to the seat of knowledge, right? My dad, when I used to get SWAT said, I'm going to take the board of education to the seat of knowledge. I hated that. Now I appreciate it, right, as all discipline. It's not fun at the time, but then you look back at some of those things that you had to learn, those hard things, and you go, I'm so glad. that somebody took the time to care for me, to teach me, to say, this is how you're supposed to act, this is how you're not supposed to act. This gives wisdom, and when it's done in a biblical way, right, where it's seeking that the child grows and becomes wise so that they're able to handle themselves and their affairs and do it in a way that honors the Lord Jesus Christ, oh, this is great, right? But guess what happens the next part of the verse? But a child left to himself. By the way, I couldn't think of anything more hateful to a child than to let a child just do whatever a child wants to do. I couldn't imagine parents that hate their child more than this. Parents, we need to be praying for one another, encouraging one another. Grandparents, praying for your kids, all of you who are adopted grandparents and aunts and uncles in this congregation, pray for us. Pray that we love our kids, we're faithful and are disciplined to our kids, and that it's according to the admonition of the Lord. That's what's needed. That's good, and we should applaud that amongst each other, and we should encourage one another to do that. I've been in situations where I've seen parents try to discipline their kids, and people inside of the church try to stop it. Not good, right? Because notice what happens when you do that, when you let a child go to himself, be left to himself, left to his own. By the way, this term for left for his own is like the idea of like a wild animal, like you captured an animal and let him out of the trap, right? So it's like a little ferret on espresso running out of a cage. That's what it's like, right? And that's what a little kid's like, a ferret on espresso. And there's nothing done to curtail that. Notice what it only brings. Notice what it ultimately brings. It ultimately brings shame to his mother. Well, it brings shame to everybody, but it brings shame to the mother. The mother is filled with grief and regret. People talk about their kids and you sit there and go, I know, I know it's bad. I know it's bad. Trust me, I know what they're doing is sinful. I don't like it. Man, children, you want the best gift to your parents? Walk in the admonitions of the Lord. And make your mama proud. Right? That's the idea. Love Jesus. Be obedient. Walk by the power of the Spirit. You'll make Mama proud, right? That's a good thing. That's a good thing when Mama's proud and happy and says, that's my kid. It's a bad thing when Mama goes, that's my kid. Right? But notice. when there's a lack of discipline and that sin's let to go by itself, it grows like wild weeds. Because notice, notice then the next part. It says, when wicked, when the wicked increase, transgressions increase. Of course it does. Of course it's like an avalanche. Of course it builds momentum. Of course where there's one concession, there's another concession, and there's another concession. And we can say, where did that start? That started way back when, when it was let go. when there was this rejection of God's wisdom. Now I know that we look at our culture around us and there are a lot of things, there are a lot of things in our culture that we go, I don't like it, amen. There's a lot of sinful things that happen in our country, right? And some of us look at it and we go, it's like it's building momentum. Well, that's exactly what this proverb says, right? Sin builds momentum. There's things that are happening right now that I'm not proud about. In fact, there's even times where I walk around and people say, well, where are you from? I say, Oregon. And they go, well, you know, Oregon does. Yeah, I know what Oregon is allowed as law. I'm not for it. I'm against it. I'm for what the Bible teaches on human sexuality, on sanctity of life. Of course I'm for those things. The Bible is. Sometimes, I know, we look at the news and we go, it's hopeless, right? We're like on the Titanic. It's sinking, half the boat's underwater. We've lost, we've lost, everything's lost. And sometimes what happens, and I've seen believers do this, is they either do one of two things. They either, one, stop living for the Lord altogether and become hermits. I do nothing. I can't win, therefore I do nothing. I'm not gonna be obedient, I'm not gonna talk to anybody, I'm gonna live in my house by myself, and Costco's gonna deliver groceries. The other thing, and probably the more prevalent, is we go, as long as I'm not as bad as the culture, I still am righteous. Think about Samson for a moment. Samson, in the book of Judges, was one of the godliest people in all of Israel at the time when he was a judge. And if you read what Samson does, you go, he doesn't look righteous. It's because everything got so bad that he was like the best one. And so I think we slip into that. As long as I'm not as bad as my neighbor, I'm good. Both of those are really bad solutions. There's some that say, well, let's fight it and let's burn the whole thing to the ground. That's not good either, right? We've already learned in this passage that following God's word doesn't mean that I go burn everything to the ground. So what do we do? What's the solution then? Well, what does Solomon say? but the righteous will look upon their downfall. By the way, this look upon downfall isn't just that we observe it, the righteous observes it with this cold stoicism and goes, told ya. This is a position of victory. This is like a general overlooking a battle of an enemy that's been defeated, and it looks at the downfall and stands victorious. Essentially, this is what it is. Wickedness will grow and grow and grow and grow and grow. The wicked, or the righteous, will win. It will happen. We will win. Jesus wins. At the end, Jesus wins. Right now, Jesus is the victor. So for me as a believer, when I look at this, what do we do? We do what Jesus asks us to do. That's what we do. We do what Jesus asks us to do. We follow his word. We become passionate lovers, outspoken lovers of Jesus Christ, right? We work on ourselves and walk by the power of the Spirit, and when we're given an opportunity to be obedient, we take that opportunity by the power of the Spirit and say yes to what is right and no to what is wrong, realizing that I'm already the winner. I'm standing in a position of victory. Let's go to Colossians again real quick. I wanna show you something in Colossians. Chapter 2, verse 9. So we kind of started off by, you know, don't listen to falsehoods. Paul warns us not to listen to falsehoods. But notice what Paul says. Verse 9, he's carrying the thought. So don't be captive by these things that come from human tradition. The implication is, but be captured by Christ. right, be enslaved to Christ, be passionately sold out, faithful to Christ. And then notice what it says in verse nine, for in him, the whole fullness of deity dwells in bodily form. And you have been filled in him. You're in him. God in the flesh, that's who Jesus is. So you have God, who's the majority by himself, in human form, says, follow me, and then we're filled, we're established, we grow in him, and then notice what it says, verse 11, and in him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. by the putting off of the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ. So we're now in Christ, we're identified with Christ, right? That's what I think the image is. We're all identified with Christ. Just like circumcision identified you with the promise of Abraham, you now have this spiritual circumcision that you are now identified with Jesus. That's your identity. You're in Jesus. When people say who you are, the first thing should be I'm in Christ, right? And then notice what it says, and having been buried with him in baptism in which you were raised with him, so I'm united with him in the likeness of his death, I'm united with him in the likeness of his life, the one who came and died on the cross and rose again on the third day, I'm identified with him, that's me, right? If you're in Christ, that's you, you're in that, that's your position. And it says, through faith in the powerful working of God who raised him from the dead. And remember this, and you who were dead in your trespasses and uncircumcised of flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses. We used to be in this gross cycle of sin growing and growing and growing, and God stopped it. He stopped it. He made us alive. You didn't make yourself alive, he made you alive. He sovereignly said, live, and you live. And we apprehended that by faith. And that power that's working in us is that same power that rose Jesus from the dead and has now placed us in him, and we're now united with him. I now walk in this newness of life. Okay, so you're trekking, right? And then it says, and with him you also have the forgiveness of all our trespasses. If you're in Christ right now, you are forgiven. You're forgiven. That's it. You're forgiven. You've been pardoned. That sin that grew and grew and grew and grew, you're pardoned. Now this doesn't mean that we stop sinning. We do still sin as believers, that's not good, and we are to confess our sins to make sure that our relationship is right with the Lord. But from a judicial standpoint, you are forgiven, the end, period. You are now with Christ, perfect. You are declared righteous because of what Christ has done. That's you. All of this is who you are right now. And then notice this next one. It says, and by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands, he's nailed it to the cross. So the cross is the thing that dealt with that thing, right? So there was this legal thing that said guilty, guilty, guilty. He says, no, you're not, because it's put on the cross. And then notice this. Verse 15, and he disarmed the rulers and authorities. By the way, remember, these rulers and authorities tempted us to have that sin continue to grow. So he's disarmed them. So think of this, at the cross, he's disarmed the enemy. What do you call that when one army disarms the other army? That's called victory. That's what that is, right? If the enemy doesn't have any weapons, what danger are they to you? And then notice what it says, and he says, put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. You're victor right now, right? This has already happened. This has already happened. You're already victor. So as I think about this passage and I think about the danger of sin, even the life of a believer, that if I walk by the flesh and I start listening to all these things that are not found in God's word and I lose sight of Christ, it's possible that sin can grow, right? It's like if you give a mouse a cookie, if you give my flesh an inch, It's gonna take a mile, and when it takes a mile, then I'm getting on a plane, and when I'm on a plane, I wake up, and I'm handcuffed, and when I'm handcuffed, then it's gonna beat me until I'm submissive, and then when I'm submissive, then it's gonna make me swear allegiance, right? That's what happens with the flesh. But I don't have to, because I'm already a victor in Christ, and because of the Holy Spirit, I can say, no, I'm in Christ. And as we look at the culture around us, of course we should weep for the sin and the consequences of sin. Yeah, we should. But do not think for a moment that we're in a losing position. We've already won the Super Bowl before the season starts. That's it. Yep, the culture's getting worse. But guess what? You are in Christ. You are the victor already because you're in Christ. So what's the solution then? Let's make much of Jesus, right? If the victory's won in him, and the culture's going downhill, then guess where the victory lies? In Christ, pointing people to Christ. I found this passage very encouraging to me this past week, and I hope that this idea is very encouraging to you as well. that we are in Christ, and let us not forget our position of who we are in Jesus, and let us not forget that Jesus has already won the victory, and let us not forget that we are princes and princesses of the King. That's who we are, and nothing can take that from us. And so then, the motivation would be, if this is who I am, by birth in Christ. If this is who I am and this is what he's given me, then why would I subject myself to those falsehoods? Why would I reject his word? Why would I reject Christ to then let that mold grow on me that then leads to death? May the Lord give us both the will and the ability to do all that we heard today. Let's go ahead and let's pray. Father, we thank you so very much for your word. We thank you so very much for the things that are said here. Oh, please help us. We know that you do help us, but as we realize more and more that we need you more and more, we ask, Father, that we would follow your word, we would Look to your Son, Jesus, that we would stay focused on him, that we would be very cautious of things that are not found in your word, that we would be, we would not let the flesh have a beach head, but Father, that we would walk by the power of the Spirit and that we would honor and glorify you. We just thank you and love you for everything you've given us. In your Son's name, amen.