This is a wonderful day to be here. Not only because we get to see each other, but how many of you guys have a reasonable good portion of health? You don't know what that means? It means, can you move your arms? What about your legs? You know, do your eyes work? Yeah. Isn't that a good reason to praise the Lord? Amen. God is really good to us. I am this week has been an interesting week in that I don't know when but they're going to eventually cut open this left shoulder of mine and oh no, I'm very thankful to get rid of this pain. But also this week, my mom went she's out now, but she went to the hospital and she came out. God has been really good to us this week and so I'm very thankful when we talk about this having a reasonable portion of good health. So there is a word from the Lord today and it's coming out of Nehemiah the ninth chapter. We are continuing our series of people assembled by God out of Ezra Nehemiah and so I invite you if you're able to stand with me and turn to the ninth chapter of Nehemiah. It's found on page 475 in the Red Bibles, if you do not have one with you. I will only be reading verses 1 through 5, verses... Even though we'll be looking at verse 1 through 37. We find recorded in Nehemiah chapter 9, verse 1. Now on the 24th day of this month, the people of Israel were assembled with fasting and in sackcloth and with earth on their heads. And the Israelites separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. And they stood up in their place and read from the book of the law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day. For another quarter of it, they made confession and worshiped the Lord, their God. On the stairs of the Levites stood Yeshua, Bonnie, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bonnie, Sherabiah, Bonnie, and Shanani. And they cried with a loud voice to the Lord, their God. Then the Levites, Yeshua, Kadmiel, Bonnie, Hajabaniah, Sherabiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah said, stand up and bless the lord your god from everlasting to everlasting blessed be your glorious name which is exalted above all blessing and praise let's pray father we thank you for your word and we pray that you would grant us great clarity of thought of speech grant us a mind to understand, and to grasp, and a willingness to obey, a heart to love you, demonstrated by obedience to your word. We pray all of this to the end that you are glorified and your church is built up. In Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. The title of this particular message today is Assembled to Bless God's Glorious Name, Part One. There are two points that we find to this message in our text. The first is the purpose for assembling together found in verses 1 through 5 and the practice of assembling together in verses 6 through 37. The key point of this message of this text indeed is God's character and activities as revealed in scripture directly influence our view of him, ourselves, and our interactions with him and others. God's character and activities as revealed in scripture directly influence our view of him, ourselves, and our interactions with him and others. In his classic confessions, Augustine wrote this, Indeed, Lord, to your eyes, the abyss of human consciousness is naked. What could be hidden within me even if I were unwilling to confess it to you? I would be hiding you from myself, not myself from you. Now, however, my groaning is witness that I am displeased with myself. You are radiant and give delight and are so an object of love and longing that I am ashamed of myself and reject myself. You are my choice, and only by your gift can I please either you or myself. Before you then, Lord, whatever I am is manifest, and I have already spoken of the benefit I derive from making confession to you. I am not doing this merely by physical words and sounds, but by words from my soul and a cry from my mind, which is known to your ear. When I am evil, making confession to you is simply to be displeased with myself. When I am good, making confession to you is simply to make no claim on my own behalf for you, Lord, confer blessing on the righteous, but only after you have first justified the ungodly. Therefore, my God, my confession before you is made both in silence and not in silence. It is silent in that it is no audible sound, but in love it cries aloud. If anything I say to men is right, that is what you have first heard from me. Moreover, you hear nothing true from my lips, which you have not first told me." How could this man express such a transparent and honest confession about himself to God, especially when he had been known in his early years prior to his Christian conversion to be captivated by material things and enthralled by the quest of sexual fulfillment? The answer is that he knew and understood God. He knew God's character and activities as revealed in scripture, and those truths influenced his view of God and himself. He was thus free to express his full unworthiness and sin in the light of who God revealed himself to be and his actions to rescue and redeem his people. Our key point today is how the original audience understood our passage to mean. They saw who God is and how he acts in the book of the law of the Lord and subjugated themselves to these truths, both in theory and in practice. For they derived their identity from the sovereign creator God who created them and therefore they followed his written directions for how to engage him and others around them. Our passage is also correcting the practice of acting presumptuously, stiffening our necks and refusing to obey scripture and not reverencing God as God. And therein lies the reason for why we should pay attention to this message. for hopefully we will see in this passage a clear picture of who God is and how he acts, and how these truths directly influence our view of him, ourselves, and our interactions with him and others. The people of Israel assembled, and they experienced this very thing in our text, and we begin to see this in our first point, the purpose for assembling together. Once more, the title of this message is assembled to bless God's glorious name, part one, which is derived from verse one and verse five. This message is part one, though, because the context of this assembly continues all the way through chapter 10, verse 39. And next week, Lord willing, we'll discuss the second part of this assembling of God's people. But for right now, We see from chapter 9 verses 1 through 5 that blessing God's glorious name begins with assuming the right position both externally and internally. Now those of us who were in the real military, we recognize the phrase assume the position and know that it means to physically get into the front leaning rest position and to mentally prepare to be tortured through multiple repetitions of push-ups. Also, those of us who have a law enforcement or criminal mindset recognize the phrase assume the position means to physically turn around and put your hands behind your back and mentally prepare to get arrested. Here in verse one though, in our text, we see that on the 24th day of this month, the people of Israel were assembled with fasting and in sackcloth and with earth on their heads. These three things, they indicate the people of Israel have begun to assume the right position both externally and internally, for fasting is both an external and an internal act of humbling oneself before God. And the wearing of sackcloth, it was a typical sign of mourning and repentance. And then by putting earth on their heads, these people, the people were demonstrating the frailty of mankind before the Almighty Infinite God. But there's more. The phrase on the 24th day of this month, the people of Israel were assembled indicates that the people never dispersed from the joyous celebration of the Feast of Booths, which seems to create a presumed problem. Here's the problem. A movement from joy over being rescued from sin to sorrow over ancestral and personal sin. However, the text does not present this as a problem. Rather, the text shows that the people's understanding of God's character and activities as revealed in the scripture directly influence their view of Him, themselves, and their interactions with Him and others. For having just celebrated God's activity of rescuing His people, it was a natural flow for the people to want to respond to God's grace and mercy. This is observed all the way through chapter 10 verse 39, but also notice in verse 2 here in our text that the Israelites separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. Right away, we see that separation from all foreigners and confession of sins go together, which of course makes us ask, why is that true? Well, the first thing we must understand and remember is how God views foreigners in relation to his people. And it's not simply a difference in race, ethnicity, or ancestry. For Deuteronomy chapter 12 verse 29 through 31 records, When the Lord your God cuts off before you the nations whom you go in to dispossess, and you dispossess them and dwell in their land, take care that you be not ensnared to follow them after they have been destroyed before you and that you do not inquire about their gods little g saying how did these nations serve their gods that i also may do the same you shall not worship the lord your god in that way for every abominable thing that the lord hates they have done for their gods for they even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods this scripture gives three reasons to separate from foreigners one they ensnare god's people to live like them two they serve their own little g god and not the one true god and then three god hates their lifestyle in short foreigners were unholy they were not god's people however god is holy and in view of his holiness his people were to separate from the unholy foreigner Certainly this issue of separation from foreigners speak to us today, right? For the Apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 14 through chapter 7 verse 1. Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God said, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God and they shall be my people. Therefore, go out from their midst and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing. Then I will welcome you in I will be a father to you and you shall be sons and daughters to me says the lord almighty Since we have these promises beloved. Let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit bringing holiness to completion in the fear of god Now if we're serious about living obediently to god demonstrating our reverence for him, then this issue of separation should bring a sense of uneasiness or conviction within us if by the indwelling Holy Spirit we have immediately identified those things and people in our lives that fit the description of foreigners that God gives in the scriptures. Things that don't honor God and are clearly rebellious to scripture. Those people who don't belong to God, who serve their own little g God and not the one true God, and who are exposed by their lifestyles and the choices that they make. These things and people ensnare, entice, and taint the people of God. They draw us away from God and His ways. They have an adverse, insidious effect on us, even if we're unaware in the moment. But their effect on us shows up over time. This is why it is so insidious or stealthy. We begin thinking in ways that don't line up with scripture. But because we're ensnared and tainted, we deceive ourselves that all is well by remaining acquainted with biblical truths. But in reality, we're blinded by the darkness of our associations with foreigners. For our way of thinking is affirmed and or encouraged by the foreigners who have our ears. Now, this is not to say we must not have any contact or any type of relationship with those who clearly don't know God or who are living non-Christian lifestyles. No, we would have to go outside of the world, as Jesus says, and who will we share the gospel with if we don't interact with unbelievers? No, what the Bible, including our text, teaches is that our closest, most intimate relationships people who have our ear, those who advice we seek and or listen to on how to live and handle our life situations. These relationships are not to be with those people who live lifestyles and make life choices and step with the world and clear rebellion to God, to the scriptures. We must resist the temptation to keep or to pursue such relationships. We must resist the temptation to make the regular practice of our lives activities that are in clear rebellion to God and to the scriptures. This is not easy. Jesus acknowledges this in Matthew chapter 18 verses 7 through 9. Woe to the world for temptations to sin, for it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes. if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire. To be clear, Jesus is not teaching that we must maim and mutilate our bodies in order to please him. That's not what this passage means. What it means is that the successful resisting of some temptations requires drastic measures in order to please God. And I think that separating from all foreigners in our lives fits in this category. So what drastic measure is God calling us to? both individually and corporately. But remember from our text, that separation and confession of sins go together. And in verse three, we see two important truths about confession of sins. And they stood up in the place and read from the book of the law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day. For another quarter of it, they made confession and worship the Lord their God. Hear those two truths. One, God's written word defines sin. And then two, confession of sins is an act of worshiping God. After God made his very good creation as recorded in Genesis chapter one and two, before he gave his written word, Adam sinned by disobeying God's command in the Garden of Eden. Thus, overall, we know that sin is disobedience to God, to his word. And God's judgment of original sin of Adam's sin in Genesis chapter 3 also lets us know that sin is a problem that needed to be solved even if there is no awareness of God's written word. So, if sin was here before God's written word, how does God's written word define sin? Thank you for asking that question. Well, if we did not have the Bible, then we would not know specifically what sin is. For Paul writes in Romans chapter 7, beginning with verse 7, If it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, you shall not covet. But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetedness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. did that which is good then bring death to me by no means it was sin producing death in me through what is good in order that sin might be shown to be sin and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure in short god's word shows us the depths of our depravity our complete inability to know and to please God by demonstrating beyond measure that we, all humankind, are unable to obey God's Word on our own, and we deserve death, to be separated from Him for all of eternity. Sin is more than just an attitude or disposition contrary to God. It is the all-pervasive nature of all human beings, excluding Jesus. that is opposed to God and His ways, deserving of eternal separation from God, and agreeing with God that this is true of us, is confession of sin. This is what the people of Israel did in our text. And it led them to worship the Lord their God. For their leaders told them in verse 5, stand up and bless the Lord your God from everlasting to everlasting. But the leaders not only told the people to worship, but they modeled worship of God for them. They said to the Lord, their God, blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise. The people of Israel assumed the right position both externally and internally in order to bless God's glorious name. They stood for, they recognized God is the Almighty. that he is worthy to be praised for all eternity, and that his name is glorious, that he makes himself known and is exalted above all blessing and praise. That is, mere human words are inadequate to fully express how majestic and how marvelous God is. Is he marvelous? Is he wonderful? I know we kind of sung about it, sang about it earlier. Did you mean it or did you just like the beat? He is marvelous. He's wonderful. He's beautiful beyond description. Mere words cannot grasp how marvelous and majestic he is. Still though, the people who are assembled to do that very thing, to bless God's glorious name. And we see what that looked like in our next point, the practice of assembling together. In these verses, the writer used poetry to reveal at least six overall practices in blessing God's glorious name. Here they are quickly. Rehearse who God is in verses six through eight. Rehearse how God acts, verses nine through fifteen. Rehearse God's readiness to forgive in verses sixteen through twenty-one. Rehearse how God provides for needs in verses twenty-two to twenty-five. Rehearse how God has dealt with sin in verses twenty-six to thirty-one. And finally, relate these truths corporately and personally in verses thirty-two to thirty-seven. Now, don't worry if you didn't get them all. I'm gonna actually repeat them as we go. But before we continue, it's helpful to remember how God's people knew these things about God. It's because God revealed himself to them in the scriptures. Here's the first practice. Rehearse who God is. It's right here in verses six through eight. You are the Lord, you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their hosts, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them, and you preserve all of them, and the host of heaven worships you. You are the Lord, the God who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the name Abraham. You found his heart faithful before you and made with him the covenant to give to his offspring the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Jebusite, and the Gergesite. And you have kept your promise for you are righteous. Here we go. Verse six. Let's just list them out. God alone is sovereign, almighty, creator and sustainer of all things, and he is worshipped by his entire creation. In verse 7, we see that God chooses his people. He gives us our life purpose and he gives us our identity. In verse 8, we see that God is faithful. Therefore, he determines what faithfulness to him looks like. We also see that he is righteous. Therefore, he keeps his promises. He's trustworthy. First practice is to rehearse who God is. The next practice of blessing God's glorious name is rehearse how God acts. It's right here in verses 9 through 15. and you saw the affliction of our fathers in egypt and heard their cry at the red sea and performed signs and wonders against pharaoh and all his servants and all the people of his land that for you knew that they acted arrogantly against our fathers and you made a name for yourself as it is to this day and you divided the sea before them so that they went through the mist of the sea on dry land and you cast their pursuers into the depths as a stone into mighty waters by a pillar of cloud you led them in the day and by a pillar of fire in the night to light for them the way in which they should go you came down on mount sinai and spoke with them from heaven and gave them right rules and true laws good statutes and commandments and you made known to them your holy sabbath and commanded them commandments and statutes and a law by moses your servant You gave them bread from heaven for their hunger and brought water for them out of the rock for their thirst. And you told them to go in to possess the land that you had sworn to give them. In verse 9, this is the practice we see of God. This is how he acts. He sees the afflictions and pain of his people and he hears their cries for relief and deliverance. Are you afflicted today? any kind of way? Are you in pain in any kind of way? It doesn't have to be physical. It could be mental. Then cry out to God. If you're his, he hears you. He hears me. In verse ten, we see that God glorifies himself by humbling his enemies, shattering their pride, particularly when it's directed against his people. He glorifies himself by rescuing his people from slavery. Verse 11 tells us that he cares for and he protects his people by rescuing them, rescuing us from impossible situations and destroying our enemies. Verse 12, we see that God leads his people with his presence in every circumstance of life according to his good promise planned for our lives. Verse 13, we see that God comes to his people and speaks to his people through his word. Therefore, when we have God's word, we can legitimately say that we have God with us, speaking both by revealing himself and telling us how to truly live the good life. In verse 14, we see that God tells His people how to live in order to please Him. He tells us how to worship Him. And finally, in verse 15, we see that God provides for His people what is needed to survive. He tells His people to claim the promises He has made to them. The people do not name whatever they want and then claim that God has given it to them. That heresy, name it and claim it, you know, speak stuff into existence and everything, Satan came up with that. That is not biblical. There's only one true God, right? He's the one who speaks things into existence as if they were not, right? We don't. I mean, sit there and think about it. Has anybody ever really just wanted something? Just think about it. Okay, don't say it. You got it in your mind? Okay, now, when you go outside, I challenge you to say that thing. There's a lot of grass out there. Go out in the grass and say, there's enough room, right? If what we say comes to reality, we should have a lot full of all kinds of stuff out there after church. But we know that's a lie. Don't believe that lie. If you listen to somebody who speaks that stuff, you know, like somebody who has a million dollar smile who lives down in Texas, that's teaching straight out of the pit of hell. walk away from it. Here's the next practice. Rehearse God's readiness to forgive. It's right there. Begin in verse 16. But they and our fathers acted presumptuously and stiffened their neck and did not obey your commandments. They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and did not forsake them. Even when they had made for themselves a golden calf and said, this is your God who brought you up out of Egypt and had committed great blasphemies, you in your great mercies did not forsake them in the wilderness. the pillar of cloud to lead them in the way did not depart from them by day nor the pillar of fire by night to light for them the way by which they should go you gave your good spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst 40 years you sustained them in the wilderness and they lacked nothing Their clothes did not wear out and their feet did not swell. In spite of who God is and how he acts, verse 16 tells us that the ancestors of the people of Israel acted and behaved arrogantly. presuming upon the grace and mercy of God, they stiffened their neck, they stubbornly considered themselves right and God wrong, which is a disobedient, rebellious lifestyle. They acted like foreigners. And then verse 17a says that they also on purpose refused to obey God and that his miraculous acts among his people had no effect on how they viewed God themselves or the world he made. Instead, they stubbornly turned their back on God and turned to someone else to lead them again to live life separated from God. They wanted to comfortably live in sin without God's sovereign rule in their lives. But the overarching truth from these verses shouts infinitely louder than the rebellion of God's people. Here it is. You ready? God's grace far outweighs the sins of his people. God's grace far outweighs the sins of his people. We see this truth in verses 17b all the way through verse 21. Did you know that sin is like an iceberg floating in the bottomless ocean of God's grace? Have you ever thought about that? Think of sin like an iceberg. You see the tip of it. But we know that underneath is where the iceberg really is. Think about how large some icebergs are. Think about how vast it is underneath it. But they're all just big floating pieces of ice because the ocean gets up underneath them. It's bottomless. That's what God's grace is to our sin. His grace far outweighs our sin. Aren't you glad you had nothing to do with your own salvation? Because if we did, as deep as the iceberg goes, it reaches an end. But if God's grace is responsible for our salvation, it doesn't matter how bad we are. God is able to save us. Here's the next practice in our text. Rehearse how God provides for needs. It's right there, beginning verse 22. And you gave them kingdoms and peoples and allotted to them every corner. So they took possession of the land of Sihon, king of Heshbon, and the land of Og, king of Bashan. You multiplied their children as the stars of heaven, and you brought them into the land that you had told their fathers to enter and possess. so the descendants went in and possessed the land and you subdued before them the inhabitants of the land the canaanites and gave them into their hand with their kings and the peoples of the land that they might do with them as they would and they captured fortified cities and a rich land and took possession of houses full of good things all good things cisterns already hewn vineyards, olive orchards, and fruit trees in abundance. So they ate and were filled and became fat and delighted themselves in your great goodness." God takes care of and provides for the needs of his people. While this truth is evident throughout these verses, it's best captured in that last sentence. so they ate and were filled and became fat and delighted themselves in your great goodness family it's it's good to remind ourselves of the times in our lives when god's provision outperformed our resources right right well i'll tell you about a time in our lives there's a period of time about 19 months in which three of those months, I know exactly how our needs were met. 16 of those months, I don't know because our outgoing was here and our income was right here, yet all of our bills got paid. Sometimes on the 30th day, but they all got paid. Our credit remained intact. All of our needs were met. How? God, I have no other explanation. His provision will outperform what we have, our resources. And here's breaking news. God doesn't need your wealth, however vast or how minuscule it is, to take care of you. Oh, some of y'all surprised by that. God doesn't need us to take care of us, right? We're His. If He made us His, He takes responsibility to take care of us. You know that's what parents do, right? You have kids, you're taking responsibility to take care of them. He's our father, right? And he's better than any of us could ever hope to be. And he takes good care of us. This next practice should really grab a hold of us. You guys ready? Rehearse how God has dealt with sin. It's right there in verses 26 through 31. Nevertheless, they were disobedient and rebelled against you and cast your law behind their back and killed your prophets who had warned them in order to turn their back turn them back to you and they committed great blasphemies therefore you gave them into the hand of their enemies who made them suffer and in the time of their suffering they cried out to you and you heard them from heaven and according to your great mercies you gave them saviors who saved them from the hand of their enemies but after they had rest they did evil again before you and you abandoned them to the hand of their enemies so that they had dominion over them yet when they turned and cried to you you heard from heaven and many times you delivered them according to your mercies and you warned them in order to turn them back to your law yet they acted presumptuously and did not obey your commandments but sinned against your rules which if a person does then he shall live by them and they turned a stubborn shoulder and stiffened their neck and would not obey many years you bore with them and warned them by your spirit through the prophets yet they would not give ear therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands nevertheless in your great mercies you did not make an end of them or forsake them for you are a gracious and merciful God. Right away, we must affirm that just because God is gracious and merciful, that does not give his people license to continue to rebel against him. Rather, if God's spirit truly lives within us, God's grace and mercy will lead us to confess and repent of our sins and actively seek to obey God by obeying the scriptures. Still, what is clear from these verses is Israel, God's people, even us, can't obey God on our own. We need the Spirit of God to live Christ's perfect righteous life through us in order to please God. Indeed, that's what he desires and he will do. For he says in Ezekiel in chapter 36, verse 26 and 27, and i will give you a new heart and a new spirit i will put within you and i will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh and i will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules and then notice back in our text that the warnings in verses 26 and 29 God's prophets had warned the ancestors of God's people to turn from their sin back to God. And then in verse 29, God warned them to turn them back to the scriptures. Remember, the practice our text is correcting of acting presumptuously, stiffening our necks, refusing to obey scripture and not reverencing God as God. Here, we're given the goal of this correcting practice. God himself as expressed on our part through our obeying the scriptures is the goal. We see this very thing in verse 29, but there's something else in verse 29. Look with me there right in the middle. Do you see it there? They did not obey your commandments, but sinned against your rules. Here it is, which if a person does them, he shall live by them. Complete obedience to God's Word is the only way to experience true life. It is the only way to experience a full life with the eternal God. And there is only one person who has ever done this. His name is Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament sacrificial system, a perfect, unblemished lamb was killed to atone for sin. God had given this picture, this practice to his people as a type of picture of Christ and his sacrifice for us. For only Jesus, again, led a perfect life, unblemished by sin. And thus, only Jesus was the only acceptable offering for sin that God would and could accept. Only Jesus satisfies God's wrath towards sin. For Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures. He was buried, but He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and He appeared to many. For apart from Jesus, every human, including us, we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and only through Jesus are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. Family, this is why the apostle john writes in first john 1 9 that if we confess our sins if we agree with god say the same thing that god says Concerning sins god is faithful. He's just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness Remember that sin it's a problem that needed to be solved which god did alone in jesus Certainly this shows him to be gracious and merciful or tender-hearted towards his people. Truths we see about God in verse 31 of our text. And because he is gracious and merciful, God does not end his people. He does not break the relationship or forsake his people. He does not turn his back on his people. He doesn't turn his back on us no matter what. Remember what Jesus says over in John chapter 6 verse 37? all that the father gives me will come to me and whoever comes to me i will never cast out and family i did look up the word never and you know what never means never therefore it's not surprising that this is how he calls us to deal with one another right for paul says in ephesians 4 32 be kind to one another tender-hearted forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. What grievous sin has ever been committed against you and against me that equates to the eternally vile stench of our sins against God? None. Then why do we sometimes wrestle with truly forgiving others as God and Christ forgave us? Other than the reason Bill gave, here's the reason. Sometimes we think we're God. Remember the fruit that Adam and Eve ate which plunged all mankind into sin, darkness, and judgment? They ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Therefore, translating this to us, becoming like God in the sense that now we think that we have the right to determine the right judgment for someone's sin against us. That's what Adam and Eve did in their blame game in Genesis chapter three. It's someone else's fault, not mine, that I've sinned or I'm sinning against you, God, so judge them, not me. Now, we may not say it that way, but look at how we treat the people who have wronged us. who have sinned against us? Do we immediately offer full restoration? Or do we ration out pieces of restoration according to our feelings, whatever personal determination list we come up with? Perhaps a list that's influenced by foreigners and not God. How does such practices fit with the gracious, merciful forgiveness of God that he calls us to exhibit towards one another because that's what he exhibited towards us? That's just a personal question to lead us into our final practice. Relate these truths corporately and personally. Relate these truths corporately and personally. Starting with verse 32. Now, therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love, Let not all the hardships seem little to you that has come upon us, upon our kings, our apprentices, our priests, our prophets, our fathers, and all your people since the time of the kings of Assyria until this day. Yet you have been righteous in all that has come upon us for you have dealt faithfully and we have acted wickedly. Our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law or paid attention to your commandments and your warnings that you gave them. even in their own kingdom and amid your great goodness that you gave them and in the large and rich land that you set before them they did not serve you or turn from their wicked works behold we are slaves this day in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts behold we are slaves and its rich yield goes to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please and we are in great distress. Family, this is a prayer acknowledging God is who he says he is and that he does what he says even when his people are faithless and act wickedly. Doesn't this describe sometimes our prayers to God for the gospel lays us out bare before God and ourselves and others who have been redeemed by God. Remember the key point of the passage. God's character and activities as revealed in scripture directly influence our view of him, ourselves, and our interactions with him and others. For like the people of Israel here in our text, we know from the scriptures that God is great, that he is mighty, that he's awesome, and that he keeps covenant and steadfast love. We know from the scriptures primarily and have experienced the history of his character and activities within our own lives and situations and we've witnessed them within the lives of others. The people of Israel brought these truths to bear upon themselves and they submitted to God and they owned their sin. They acknowledge God's righteous judgments through the exile, captivity is designed to make his people seek and return to him. They affirm that God is faithful. that he is righteous in his judgment, that he always deals faithfully, that he's greatly good and he gives richly to his people. Therefore, in verses thirty-six and thirty-seven, the people cried out to God again because they were under the rule of Artaxerxes in the promised land. The people acknowledged that they were in their current slavery because of their own sin. They cried out because God had delivered before and they were counting on him to do it again, they simply fell upon God's grace. They fell upon him. They fell upon his mercy and they said, deliver us from this foreign rule. So what about us today? Are we under foreign rule? Does some stubborn sin have a hold of us? Are we connected to some foreigner that God is calling us to separate from but we find it difficult to do? Have we erected a foreign God in our hearts of our own making which we see by our continual choices to disobey a clear teaching of scripture? Family, if we see God and his activities in the scriptures, if we know and understand him, then if we are wrestling before him with any of these things, then let us cry out to God for him to rescue us from the enslavement that we're in. But if we're satisfied with mere acknowledgement of biblical truth about God with no intent to have these truths change us, If we are not seeking to be transformed by God by taking deliberate actions in response to his gracious and merciful activities toward us, then our cries for rescue are simply cries for mere temporary relief from the conviction the Holy Spirit is bringing. We really don't want God's solution to our issues. The apostle Peter's words And second Peter chapter two verses nine and 10 a are an appropriate end to this message. The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Now, Depending on our relationship with God, that verse either encouraged us or made a squirm. What was our reaction? You see, family, God has assembled us to bless his glorious name, to see him and his activities revealed in the scriptures. and to have these truths directly influence our view of him, ourselves, and others and our interactions with him and others. Amen. Amen. So, what is God's desired work for us to do in response to our text today? There are five things and we're gonna put them up on the board so that you can write and we don't wanna miss them. Not the board, the wall. Yeah. Here's the first one. Read scripture to know God and his ways with the intent to obey. Read scripture to know God and his ways with the intent to obey. And remember, if we belong to him, his spirit lives in us. So let's ask for his help. Second, regularly confess our sins in light of God's provision. Don't act presumptuously. Regularly confess our sins in light of God's provision. Don't act presumptuously. Did you guys know that the gospel frees us to be real with God and others and ourselves? We don't have to have any hangers. You know why? The gospel says we are all bad. But God took care of all of our badness. Third, worship God corporately and personally. Worship God corporately and personally. We should have increasing lifestyles that reflect God owns us. As a church, we should be increasingly acting like God is God here. In our personal lives, we should be acting like God is God in our personal lives in increasing measure. Fourth, separate from biblically rebellious people. These people, these foreigners, they're leading us away from God. Sometimes they do it intentionally, other times it's just by their lifestyle. Separate from biblically rebellious people, finally. Seek God through the scriptures. Seek God through the scriptures. Resist the temptation to simply acquire knowledge about God when you come to the scriptures. Seek him. Because if you seek him with your whole heart, He promises in the scriptures that you'll find them. Amen. Amen. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. Sometimes, Father, when we hear from you, you being a just father who loves us, sometimes your word is not exactly something that's going to make us jump up and down for joy and necessarily feel good. but you still love us. And if you did not love us, you would not give us your word that exposes us to ourself because you don't want us to spend an eternity apart from you. You want us to spend eternity drawing closer to you, getting to know you more and more. And when you save us, that starts then. we can know and understand you better today than we did yesterday. And tomorrow, if you so will, we could understand you better tomorrow than we did today. And your goal is to make us look like Jesus Christ, the obedient one. You're after obedience in our life because that's our destiny, to live lives that please you. For this glorifies you. It makes your holiness, your infinite holiness known to the world, indeed to everyone throughout all of eternity. May we be examples of your grace as we yield to you each and every day. again to the end that you are glorified in your church is built up. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. God bless.