you open your bibles to the eleventh chapter of the book of judges this is a very interesting chapter will analyze it into expositions will be looking tonight at this first series of verses and the first twenty nine verses and then next sunday night lord willing will look at this uh... bizarre uh... promise that uh... jeff the makes to the lord now we're gonna be reading the text as we go through it tonight so before we begin our journey let's bow and look to the lord in prayer our father what an amazing god you are what an amazing text we have tonight before us we pray that we will be transformed by the grace that's revealed in this passage we pray for the word of god tonight wherever it's faithfully being taught We ask that thou would bless it all over the world. And we ask that you would bless us here tonight. And we pray that in Jesus' name, amen. I love stories of some down-and-out person who didn't appear to be much of anything, who rises up to become a great champion or hero. Years ago, there was an English boy who was called Carrot Top. His childhood was unhappy. He hated school. Some of his teachers at school said he had very little chance of ever succeeding at anything. In fact, he was ranked third lowest in his class. One of his teachers wrote these words about him. The boy is certainly no scholar and has repeated his grade twice. He seems to have little or no understanding of his schoolwork. At times, he seems almost perverse in his ability to learn. But old Carrot Top would grow up and prove everyone wrong because he became a man who held most of the high offices in Great Britain. He was a member of Parliament for 16 years. He served twice as Prime Minister. His name, of course, was Winston Churchill. I love stories like that because it gives the rest of us hope that even though we didn't come from an elite background of the rich and famous, or we don't have an Ivy League education, or we don't come from some highly respected family background, we can still be greatly used by God. You don't have to be a prisoner of your past. You can be a victor in spite of your past. God can take boys and girls and men and women who come from a checkered past of a loser and turn them into a champion winner. One of the most amazing stories in the Bible and biblical history of this reality is the story inspired by God tonight that we're going to look at. It is the story of Jephthah. Now Jephthah is a real rags to riches story. He overcomes emotional scars and handicaps. He overcomes a terrible background to become one of the great leaders for God. And the lesson you see when you go down through these verses is God uses people from terrible backgrounds to accomplish wonderful things when they trust Him and His Word. Now this book of Judges certainly teaches us that there's no such thing as a stereotype hero for God. Many believers live life with some inferiority complex thinking God could not use them for much of anything because they're worthless. Nothing could be further from the truth. God is in the business of saving people and God is in the business of using people who don't fit the mold. We're not some automobile factory that cranks out an assembly line of similar vehicles. To God, each person is special. Each one of his children are special and they're different. And this is the story of Jephthah. To most in society, he was a social misfit. To most in society, he was an unacceptable loser. In fact, as you'll see tonight, most wrote him off, and some ran him right out of town. He came from a real dysfunctional family. You talk about dysfunctional family, he comes from it. But he is God's choice. He becomes God's champion. And there are 11 historical realities I want to point out from the text tonight as we work our way through it. First of all, Jephthah was a man nobody wanted, not even his own family. I'm reading from Judges 11-1. Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a valiant warrior but he was the son of a harlot and Gilead was the father of Jephthah. Gilead's wife bore him sons and when his wife's sons grew up they drove Jephthah out and said to him, you shall not have an inheritance in our father's house for you are the son of another woman. So Jephthah fled from his brothers If you drop down to verse 7, then Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, did you not hate me and drive me from my father's house? It's interesting how verse 1 begins, Jephthah the Gileadite was a valiant warrior. This is what he's going to become. This is what God's going to make of him. This is what God's going to do with him, but the path for him getting to that point is not going to be easy. We learn from verse 1 that Jephthah's father was Gilead, his mother was a prostitute. You talk about a degrading background and childhood, that's about as bad as it gets. But I'll tell you, God ordains life. God ordains the birth of any baby. And God has big plans for this baby. He has big plans for his life. Now according to Numbers chapter 26, Gilead was the grandson of Manasseh, the great grandson of Joseph. According to Hosea 6, Gilead was in a city of wrongdoers. It became a rendezvous place for wicked men. And when you get a city that's known for wickedness, you have prostitutes that hang out there. Just look at New Orleans. Just look at Las Vegas. It's known for immoral activity. And that's the way this area was looked upon. Gillian hooked up with one of these prostitutes. She got pregnant. There was a son that was born. They named him Jephthah. It wasn't the child's fault. But as is often the case, the child grows up with a stigma of the sin of the parents. The father did not marry the mother, and the child grew up feeling like a second-rate nobody. According to verse 2, Gilead must have had only one wife, and Gilead's wife bore him several legal sons. Gilead apparently did take Jephthah in. He supported him as far as when he was growing up, but as he grew up, his other sons hated him. They made fun of him. They told him that he would never get anything of their dads. He wouldn't get one thing from the father's inheritance, and they actually chased him out of his own home. Now you just think about that for a moment. You're a young boy and nobody wants you. You think of the stigma on this young boy. This was the only home Jephthah had known. This boy had nobody who loved him. This boy had nobody who cared about him. He grew up in a family who made him feel inferior. They didn't even want him around. So he ran away and left. He was all alone except for God and God's grace. Perhaps some of you can relate to that. When you go to visit some of your relatives, they make you feel like an intruder. You pull in there and it's almost like you're not wanted to be there. Jephthah's entire family treated him that way. Nobody wanted him. Now when you read this story, you would never think God's providential sovereignty can be here. When you see a story like this, you'd never dream God's mysterious sovereign will is actually being worked out. But most assuredly it was, because Jephthah is God's choice to become a valiant warrior, even though for many years he looked somewhat like a loser. But ladies and gentlemen, this teaches us an important principle. We must not ever minimize any baby ever born. Don't you ever make any little child feel inferior because he doesn't come or she doesn't come from the nice Christian Homer family. I don't care if the mother was a prostitute and the father's a drunken derelict. We must be careful never to think lightly of a little child or treat a little child lightly because you just don't know what God's sovereign plan is for that life. You just don't know what God intends to do with that child. One of the most influential preachers and biblical scholars from Scotland, who became pastor of the largest and most influential church in Scotland in the early 1900s, was a minister by the name of Alexander White. When he preached this text in Judges on Jephthah, he preached it with great passion because he had been born an illegitimate child in Scotland. In all of his young life, as he was growing up, as Gary Phillips said, he was the object of whispers and scorn and rejection. But his mother committed her life to Jesus Christ. And even though he grew up poor, he grew up with a mother who taught him to love the Lord. And he grew up with a mother who taught him to serve God. He became one of the great Bible teachers of the world. You just don't know what God's going to do with a little child that nobody else wants. Which brings us to the second reality, Jephthah moves to Tov and becomes the leader of worthless men. Verse three says, so Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tov and worthless fellows gathered themselves about Jephthah and they went out with him. Jephthah was not accepted in the high society of social norm of the family life. So he moved to Tom. The precise location is not known. Somewhere in the vicinity of Gilead. Most believe it was north of Gilead in perhaps Syria. And Jephthah became the leader of some worthless men. As one writer said, he became a desperado. He became the leader of a militia of mercenaries. By the way, that word worthless we've seen before, it's exactly the same word that was used to describe the thugs that had been hired by Abimelech to kill the sons of Gideon. What this means is these men were vain, proud, empty, wicked men. These were the men who had no morals. These were the men who had no scruples. As one writer said, this group was a group of lawless rabbles. It must be that Jephthah developed somewhat of a reputation as a bad guy, tough guy, who had leadership qualities because these criminal types seemed to be drawn to him. He probably survived by some form of predatory thievery. I kind of like what Gary Phillips said, Jephthah's reputation was somewhere between that of Robin Hood and Al Capone. But before we move on, let me say that you may know someone in your family right now who's hanging out with the wrong crowd, and you know it. You may be here tonight and you think about those that are in your family and they're hanging out with people that you would consider to be fools and losers. You may have a son or daughter or other family member that's running with the wrong group. Don't ever give up on them. Don't ever stop praying for them, because you never know what God's doing in their world tonight, and you don't know what God intends to do with them in the future. Because in the midst of this context, God was developing Jephthah in a bizarre environment. Which brings us to the third reality, the Ammonites were fighting against the Israelites. Verse 4 says, it came about after a while that the sons of Ammon fought against Israel. Now the Ammonites were picking a fight with the Israelites. You'll remember last week when Judges 10 ended, the Ammonites were camped in the region of Gilead. Israel is looking for somebody to lead them. They were asking God, would you send us somebody who can be our leader? And you'll remember that they finally faced their sin of idolatry. God's heart went out to his people, even though they were caught up in evil. They're asking him, would you please raise up a leader? And obviously, to this point, it hadn't happened. The text is very clear to say it came about after a while, which means we have a good gap of time between the events that took place with running Jephthah out of the town, and now they are in this desperate situation. A gap of time had passed. Things had intensified. The Ammonites were in a fighting mood. And the Israelites needed a leader. And God and His sovereignty had just the right man. Because His timing was working behind the scenes in all of this. He was using this situation to bring His man to the forefront. Which brings us The fourth reality, the Israelites go to Jephthah and ask him to be their leader. Notice verse five, when the sons of Ammon fought against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob, and they said to Jephthah, come and be our chief, that we may fight against the sons of Ammon. Now the elders of Gilead, some of whom probably are his brothers, because of what he'll say to them, and you'll see it in a moment, Some of the same guys who hated him, some of the same guys who kicked him out of the house, some of the same guys who said, you'll never get anything from us, now go to him and ask him, would you lead us? They ask him if he would be willing to become their chief leader. They travel all the way to Tob to find him. More than likely, word spread that he's a tough man. He runs with a tough crowd. He's surrounded by tough desperados. And Jephthah had not filled out a resume. He's not looking for this job. He's not filled out applications to get this job. He's not solicited to become Israel's leader. He hasn't negotiated for this job at all. This job opportunity is coming his way because it's coming straight from the hand of Almighty God. The sovereign God was at work. And as Michael Wilcox said in his commentary, this was God's call on his life. And I'm sure that no one saw the hand of God in Jephthah's leadership of worthless men. Who would have guessed that God could be developing the skills of a leader when you're involved with worthless people? But I believe, ladies and gentlemen, God's sovereignty is involved in every aspect of a person's life, the good and the bad. No, you can't blame God for a person's sin choices. But you can't remove God's sovereignty even when those sin choices are made. Now just think about this for a moment. Jephthah has been run out of his home. He's hooked up with worthless men. And God is developing him in that context. He's developing him in a context to do a great work for him. Sometimes people don't realize that God calls people to do different things. and their past that may be lousy plays a big part in what God is calling them to do. Sometimes we can view our pre-conversion days as a vast wasteland that means nothing. But when we're living life in a wasteful way, God is still sovereign and he can mold us and he can oversee things so he can eventually use us for his glory. Gary Indrig tells the story in his commentary on the Book of Judges about Dr. S. Lewis Johnson. Now Dr. Johnson has had somewhat of an effect on my life because when we were in Dallas, Texas, when my brother was there in seminary, we went and sat under his ministry and he was a manuscript preacher. I first got the idea of manuscript preaching by sitting under Dr. S. Lewis Johnson. He tells a story about Dr. Johnson. Dr. Johnson, long before he came to faith in Christ, was at a university as a student and he loved to play golf. In fact, he wanted to play on the golf team. And the only way that he could do that was to find some course that fit his schedule so he could get the credits he needed to graduate. And the only course that would fit his schedule was a course on classical Greek. He didn't want to study classical Greek. He had no interest in Greek. He wasn't even a Christian, but he loved to play golf. And he needed to have a credit that met the hours that he could take the course, and so he signed up for Greek. Well, he went on and he graduated. He went into business. He started selling life insurance. Classical Greek was of no value to him when he was in business selling life insurance. But God, in his amazing grace, had him get under the ministry of Donald Gray Barnhouse in Philadelphia. And in the amazing sovereign plan of God, God saved him. So he decided he was going to go to a school to learn the Bible. He ended up with a remarkable ministry. You'll never guess what he taught. New Testament Greek at Dallas Theological Seminary. Those pre-conversion days of his life didn't appear to have any meaning at all to him when he was playing golf. But those pre-conversion days were actually being used by God to bring him to the place where he wanted to use him in another way. That is exactly what God did with Jephthah. Don't ever think that God can't do something with you and don't ever think that God can't do something with a person who comes from a checkered past. God can do great things with people of a checkered past who come from bizarre backgrounds. He took Jephthah's leadership skills over worthless men and he's about to put him in charge of Israel. Which brings us to the fifth reality. Jephthah wants to know why they want him to lead them. You'll notice in verse seven, he responds, then Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, did you not hate me and drive me from my father's house? So why have you come to me now when you are in trouble? Now let's face it. The last time he left the land of Israel, he thought there's nobody there that loves me. There's nobody there that cares about me. Why would you want me to be in charge now? He forces them to face the truth. Aren't you the same guys that hated me? Aren't you the same family members that drove me out of my father's home and now you want me to be leader? Why? Which brings us to the sixth reality, Israel's leaders telling they need him. They need him to fight for them. In verse 8 we read, the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah for this reason, we've now returned to you that you may go with us and fight with the sons of Ammon and become head over all the inhabitants of Gilead. What they basically say is, look Jephthah, we've come to you, we've changed our minds. We've had a change of heart. This is so mind-boggling because of all the potential candidates that they could have selected to lead Gilead, God had sovereignly worked in the minds of these people that ran him out of town to go get him and ask him to be their leader. These brothers are humbly asking him to fight for them. These brothers are asking him to lead them because they need him. They need his leadership skills. They need his ability. They need his fearlessness. This is an amazing turn of events. It's like a pastor friend of mine who lived in community, and I've told you about him before. He was considered to be a bar brawling loser. He would tell you if he were here tonight, I used to like to go into bars on weekends, get drunk and get in fights and end up in jail. And God saved him. He went to the Grand Rapids School of the Bible and Music. He got a theological education. Then the same people of the same community that thought he was a loser called him back and said, will you come pastor our church? And some of the policemen who used to lock him up in jail now want him ministering to people who are in jail. That's an amazing turn of events. That's the same kind of scene you're seeing right here with Jephthah. There are some people that would jump at the chance to help, to minister, if only somebody would say, we need you. And that's what they said to Jephthah. We need you back. Which brings us to the seventh reality. Jephthah agrees to go if God is in it and all the people agree to it. You'll notice what we read in verse nine. So Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, if you take me back to fight against the sons of Ammon and the Lord gives them up to me, will I become your head? The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, the Lord is witness between us. Surely we will do as you have said. Then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead and the people made him head and chief over them. And Jephthah spoke all the words before the Lord at Mizpah. This man is a strong man. He is a ferocious fighter, but he is a gracious man. And what you see in his heart here is this is a man who's willing to forgive and forget. He could have dug his heels in and said, nothing doing. You didn't want me the first time. I'll have nothing to do with you again. But that's not Jephthah. He's ready to do a work for the Lord. And what stands out about these verses is he had some pretty deep spiritual convictions about God. Even though he had come from a bizarre background, either his father or mother talked to him about the Lord. Because Jephthah says, look, I'll do this if the Lord is in it. I'll do this if God is going to give me victory. I'll come back and be your leader. And the elders said, the Lord is our witness. That's the way it'll be. So Jephthah went back to Gilead and the people made them their leader. And Jephthah spoke all his words before the Lord. He realized all of this is of the sovereignty of God. I have seen before and after pictures. A vehicle or tractor that looks like it belongs on a scrap heap That is taken into the shop of a skilled restoration mechanic and When they show you the after picture, it's unbelievable. What has come out? It looks like a piece of junk when it goes into the shop when it comes out of that shop. It looks beautiful That is what God did with Jephthah His life, in the first part, looked like it belonged on a scrap heap. But when you look at him now, standing tall for God, it is beautiful. In this month's edition of Newsmax Magazine, Paul Bond wrote an article called, Jane Rose Steps Out. In 1973, the United States Supreme Court legalized abortion, in its Roe versus Wade decision. Back then, the country knew the plaintiff as Jane Roe, but her real name was Norma McCorvey. What's so ironic is that Norma never did have an abortion. She ended up giving up a child for adoption. But she was the one who started fighting for the right for a woman to have an abortion. Now here's the odd thing. She's now a staunch pro-life advocate. In an interview, here is what she said. I spent more than half my life fighting for the right to choose, and the last part, fighting for the right to life. And she's now appearing in a pro-life movie, and in that movie she said, children are a miracle, a gift from God. Now, who in the world could change a woman who's known in history as the woman who spearheaded abortion into a woman who now fights against it. Who could change that life? A life that looked like it belonged on the scrap heap is now a life that's beautiful and useful. That's the story of Jifta. Which brings us to the eighth reality. Jephthah sends word to the Ammonites and asking them why they want to fight for Israel's land. Notice verse 12. Now Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the sons of Ammon saying, what is between you and me that you have come to me to fight against my land? Now, I'm convinced that probably most of the people of Gilead believe that Jephthah would immediately take his troops and go to war as a ruthless bandit. However, this is all being led of God, and the first thing he's going to try and do is solve this another way. Jephthah is no arrogant hothead, and before he's going to go to war, he's going to try diplomacy. That's what good leaders do. Every good leader will always try to negotiate peace long before they declare war. Jephthah is not afraid to go to war, but he doesn't want war. But I want you to notice carefully there in verse 12, the presentation of the message that he sends to the Ammonites, he makes it clear, this is my land. In other words, in his mind, we don't promote peace at any cost. Israel needs a good dose of what Jephthah's thinking is here. She needs the same resolve he had. Palestine is Israel's promised land. It's her land. It belongs to her. And I hope Mr. Netanyahu will stick to his guns on that point. We don't give up the land God's given to us. Which brings us to the ninth reality, the Ammonites send word to Jephthah, it was originally their land, and Israel taken it from them. Now notice verse 13, the king of the sons of Ammon said to the messengers of Jephthah, because Israel took away my land when they came up from Egypt, from the Arnon, as far as the Jabbok and the Jordan, therefore return them peaceably now. Now I'm gonna tell you something about Jephthah. This is very, very important because had he not known biblical truth, had he not known what the scriptures teach, then it would have been an opinion that would have been up for grabs. Those people would have been saying, this is our land that isn't your land. Had he not known what the scriptures taught, he would have been at a loss as to what to say to them. But the beauty of Jephthah is somewhere along the way he came to terms with Biblical truth. And once he knew Biblical truth, he's not about to back down from it. He knows much Biblical history. He knows books of the Bible as near as I can determine from Genesis to Joshua. And he's about to lay out information that's going to back them into a corner. Which brings us to the 10th reality. He presents a series of arguments to show the Ammonites, you don't belong in this land. Now, Jephthah is a brilliant, strategist, and I must assume, we must assume that when God and His sovereignty put His hand on him, and God called him to be this leader, God gave him the wits and the enablement to lead Israel. And there are four major arguments that he presents to these Ammonites who are trying to say this is our land. Jephthah does not argue from a position of probability or possibility. Jephthah argues from a position of reality. And ladies and gentlemen, before we look at the arguments, let me say that that's the way the early church operated. The early church did not operate or change the world by sharing their opinions or experiences. They taught the truth of God. That's what Jephthah does here. He just teaches the truth of God. We need to get back to the basics. of what this world needs. It needs to be taught the truth of God. You stand your ground on the word of God and don't you back down. That's what Jephthah does. And there are four arguments he presents to them. This isn't your land, he says. Argument number one, the argument of secular history. Notice verse 15, And they said to him, Thus says Jephthah, Israel did not take away the land of Moab, or the land of the sons of Ammon. For when they came up from Egypt, and Israel went through the wilderness to the Red Sea, and came to Kadesh, then Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, Please let us pass through your land. But the king of Edom would not listen. And they also sent to the king of Moab, but he would not consent. So Israel remained at Kadesh. Then they went through the wilderness and around the land of Edom and the land of Moab, and came to the east side of the land of Moab, and they camped beyond the Arnon. But then they did not enter the territory of Moab, for the Arnon was the border of Moab. and Israel sent messengers to Sikon king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon. And Israel said to him, please let us pass through your land to our place. But Sikon did not trust Israel to pass through his territory, so Sikon gathered all his people and camped in Yehatz and fought with Israel. Then the Lord, the God of Israel, gave Sikon and all his people into the hand of Israel, and they defeated them. So Israel possessed all the land of the Amorites, the inhabitants of that country, so they possessed all the territory of the Amorites, from the Arnon as far as the Jabok, and from the wilderness as far as Jordan." Jephthah says, my first argument to you boys, this isn't your land, check your history books. He said, we didn't take any land from the Moabites at all, or from the Ammonites. He said, I'll tell you how we got this land. We captured this from Saccone. Saccone was the king of the Amorites. And he tells them what happened. We left Egypt. We specifically avoided violating any territorial rights of the Edomites and Moabites or the Ammonites. We did not come to fight, but they were hostile toward us. We requested that they let us safely passed through the Amorite lands and they attacked us. And when they attacked us, God gave us victory and God gave us this land. We didn't get this land from you, we got it from them. His second argument is the argument of biblical theology. Notice in verse 23, since now the Lord, the God of Israel, drove out the Amorites from before his people Israel, are you then to possess it? Do you not possess what Chemosh, your God, gives you to possess? So whatever the Lord, our God, has driven out before us, we will possess it. Jephthah says the only reason we have victory here is because our God gave us this land. And Jephthah is very careful to give the credit to God. God's the one who gave us this land. We're not going to surrender what He gave to us any more than you would surrender what your false God gave to you. And then he says in verse 25, now are you any better than Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he ever strive with Israel? Or did he ever fight against them? He said, even Balak, the son of Zippor, the king of Moab, who represented a false god, he never attacked Israel over land disputes. This land has been given to us by God. His third argument, that this is our land, not your land, is the argument from chronological history. In verse 26, while Israel lived in Heshbon, and its villages, and in Aror, and its villages, and all the cities that are on the banks of Arnon three hundred years, why did you not recover them within that time? Jephthah says to him, what have you been doing for three hundred years? If these are your cities, if this is your land, not one time did you try to take it. So now you're coming to us telling us you have some native land claim on this area. Your argument is ludicrous. Your statue of limitations have run out. If you really had some claim on this land, you'd have been here long ago. And his final argument is the argument of personal integrity. Verse 27, I therefore have not sinned against you but you are doing me wrong by making war against me may the Lord the judge judge today between the sons of Israel and the sons of Ammon he said we haven't sinned against you We haven't wronged you. You've wronged us. We didn't come here looking for a fight. You've come to us looking for a fight. Here's what old Jephthah's doing. This kid who was kicked out of his home, he's standing on the word of God. He's laying it out. He said, here's the word of God and here's where we stand. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where a believer always must stand on the truth of the scriptures. which brings us to the final reality, the king of the Ammonites rejects his message. Notice verse 28, but the king of the sons of Ammon disregarded the message which Jephthah sent him. It's evident war is coming and you'll see it come, Lord willing, next Sunday night. Now when you go through this text of scripture, there are four parting thoughts that I think we must think about. First of all, We need to treat every person, every baby, every child with love and respect regardless of their situation or background. Because here's the thing, God's sovereignty is in that child's life. And you and I don't know what that plan of God is for that child. So in this church, we need to treat any child who comes into this church, no matter what they look like, no matter what their issues are, we need to treat every child as a special child. We need to go out of our way to make him or her feel welcome. We need to go out of our way to make him or her feel important because you don't know what they're living with at home. You don't know the chaos that's going on in their world. At least when they come to church, they should say, those people love me. Those people care about me. Jephthah had nobody. Secondly, no matter what your past background, you may be greatly used by the Lord. You may be sitting out here tonight thinking, man, if you only knew my past, it is bizarre, and God can't use me for anything. Well, you think again. You purpose to get serious about knowing the scriptures, just like obviously Jephthah did at some point. You get serious about obeying the word of God and see what God will do with you. God's sovereignty has existed in everything of your life. You need to know this. You've never been out from under the umbrella of the sovereignty of God. You may have done bizarre things. You may have been involved in a bizarre past, but you put God in charge of your life and watch what he does with those pre-conversion sinful experiences. See if he doesn't turn that around for his glory. And finally, As believers, we must always stand our ground on the Word of God and never back down when we're threatened. We're at war with this world. What this world needs to know is there are people who will stand on the Word. I'm not talking about standing on opinion, probabilities or possibilities. We will stand on the Word. And when you stand on the Word of God, you don't tickle ears, you open, cut open hearts. May we pray. Now perhaps you're here tonight, boy, girl, man, woman, and you think nobody cares about you, nobody loves you. Listen, I want to tell you about a God who loves you and has been watching your life since day one. He's had his hand on you. Things that have happened to you aren't just coincidences. You've got a God involved in your world. And if you want to know this, God, it starts by faith in Jesus Christ. You believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved. But then, as we said this morning, you pray tonight, God, here's my life, you take it, you use it. Our Father, we thank you so much for the word of God, how rich it is to analyze a story like this. We relate to it, all of us can in one way or another. And I pray that you would just allow your precious word to simmer in our minds and hearts, do wonderful things in our own lives as individuals and also in the life of the church. In Jesus' name, amen.