Cornerstone PLUS

So due toonomy chapter 5 verse 1 to 22, And that's page 1 8 4. Moses summoned all Israel and said hear Israel, the decrees and the laws I declare in your hearing today. Learn them and be sure to follow them. The lord our god made a covenant with us at Horip. It was not with our ancestors that the lord made this covenant, but with us.

With all of us who are alive here today. The Lord spoke to you face to face out of the fire on the mountain. At that time, I stood between the lord and you to declare to you the word of the lord because you were afraid of the fire and did not go up the mountain. And he said, I am the lord your god who brought you out of Egypt out of the land of slavery. You shall not have, you shall have no other gods before me.

You shall not make yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above. Or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them. For I am the lord your god, I am a jealous god punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me. But showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

You shall not misuse the name of the lord your god, for the lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. Observe the sabbath day by keeping it holy as the lord your god has commanded you. The 6 days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a suburb to the lord your god. On it, you shall not do any work. Neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servants, nor your ox, your donkey, or any of your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.

So that your male and female servants may rest as you do. Remember that you were slaves in and that the lord your god brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, the lord your god has commanded you to observe the Sabbath Day. Honor your father and mother as the lord your god has commanded you. So that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the lord your god is giving you.

You shall not murder you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony against your neighbor, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, you shall not set your desires on your neighbor's house or land, his male or female servants, his ox or donkey, or anything belongs that belongs to your neighbor. These are the commandments the law proclaimed in a loud voice to your to your whole assembly. They're on the mountain from out of the fire the cloud and the deep darkness. And he added nothing more, then he wrote them on 2 stone tablets and gave them to me. And the second passage due toonomy 26, on page 2 0 3, And starting at verse 16, The lord your god commands you this day to follow these decrees and laws, carefully observe them with all your heart and with all your soul.

You have declared this say that the lord is your god and that you will walk in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees and commands and laws that you will listen to him And the lord has declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possession, and his promise and that you are to keep all his commands. He has declared that he will set you in praise fame and honor high above all the nations he has made and that you will be a people wholly to the lord your god as he promised. Thanks, Drew, for that reading. Good morning from me. I'm my name's Dean Dryden, and, I'm a family's worker at Cornerstone.

It's great to be here and welcome to Cornerstone Church, all of you. It's great to have you if you're visiting. I know we've got Denzel and his wife who are once a year, when you're over this way, so it's great to have you with us. If you are visiting and you want to be on our mailing list, please would you just fill out 1 of these welcome cards and put it in the box, outside on the welcome table, and we'll get your details and put you on our mailing list and that'll that'll be great. You can keep up with what we're doing here at at Cornerstone.

And a happy father's day to all the dads. I hope you Yeah. I mean, we always say to the moms, don't we? Hope you got spoiled today. They brought you breakfast in bed.

I don't know if you've got that or not, but well done if you did. That's great, but it's great to be together to hear from our our heavenly father this morning. Let's let's pray. Let's ask him to bless our our time and his word as we hear it now. Father god, we thank you for gathering us together today from from different parts of the world, from different backgrounds, different situations, We've all come here this morning, by your grace, and we thank you for that.

We pray that you would help us as we hear your word today Lord as as raw repaid for the the Sunday school earlier, the kids that went out, we asked the same thing. We simply asked that you would help us to hear your word to understand it and to love Jesus because of it, and we ask this in Jesus' name, amen. Great. So this is this is the second of our sermons in a series called the best the greatest sermons in the in the world ever. And today you're thinking, deuteronomy?

Really? It's funny because I every person I've said to this week, when they've asked me, what are you preaching on Sunday? I was like, oh, do you do you're on me 5? And they're like, oh, Okay. I'm like, okay, what?

So I don't know if they know something I don't, but, this is the passage I've chosen. This is what, what gripped me for this this sermon, and and it is a whopper. It's a big 1. That's why we had that reading from chapter 5 and chapter 26, that's how long it lasts. Is that what makes it 1 of the greatest sermons in the world ever, just because of its length?

Well, it's not just because of that, obviously. It's because of the content and because of the situation that it was given in. So so don't worry. We're not gonna go through all 21 chapters, but we're gonna we're we're barely gonna scratch the surface we're gonna look at, Moses's intro, the first, the first chapter of of this sermon chapter 5. But as we get into this passage, I want I want you to help me with some audience participation.

Okay? So so just to set the scene because god's people should have been in the promised land and in our reading, they should have been there 40 years, and their parents generation got to the edge of the promised land and they bottled it. That's where we are. They didn't take the land. What happened?

What I want you to do is and and I know you shouldn't ever ask ladies their age, but, forgive me. If you're over 40, I want you to stand now. If you're, I mean, just anywhere in the region of over 40. Everybody over 40 stand up. Okay?

Great. I'm standing by the way. Remember? Okay. So alright.

Alright. Now, if you're, if you're, a lady and you're obviously only 21, I understand why you didn't stand. Okay? Brilliant. Okay.

So look around everybody else. Everyone sit down. Now, everybody, everybody that is under 40 stand up. Now, everyone else is looking at you and despising you and Great. Okay.

Now please have a seat. Now, the younger generation, as you looked at the older generation, You saw who they were, were. Keep them in mind. Keep them in mind. Because don't know if you remember the story of the exodus, but let me just briefly, you know, tell it.

God chose and rescued his people from Egypt. And he brought them to his holy mountain to cyanide, which is called Horib in in deuteronomy. I mean, he made promises to them there. It was it's called a covenant. He made his covenant with them, and a covenant is like a marriage.

He gave them his law that they were to obey if they wanted to enjoy his blessings in the promised land. He told them he wanted to dwell among them as their god. And, you know, he was wanting to give them the the land that he'd promised to their ancestors, eyes, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and and he showed them how this was gonna be possible. He says I'm gonna be I'm gonna dwell among you and there's there's lots of special things that you're gonna need need to put in place. For this to be possible because I'm a holy god and you're an unholy people.

He tells his people to, as as as he's finished explaining how it's gonna be possible. He tells them to pack up and move off. And the the book of deuteronomy opens with these words in in to 1 verse 2. It says it was an 11 day journey from Mount Sinai to the place called Kadesh Barnier, which is where they where where they looked out and saw all the land. 11 day journey.

They got to Kadesh Barnet, which was on the border of the promised land They sent out 12 spies, if you remember, and 10 of them came back with reports of towering wolves and giants. Being in the land, and the people lost their courage and were faithless. And that's the technical and long winded way of saying they bottled it. They grumbled and rebelled against god and and and said god must hate us. He's brought us here to kill us.

And by doing that, they showed that they really hated God. Chapter 1 verse 34 says, when the Lord heard what you said he was angry and solemnly swore. No 1 from this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your ancestors. Only Caleb and Joshua were faithful. So the journey that should have taken them 2 weeks tops took them 40 plus years.

The generation or at least all the fighting men of that generation They they they they they they they they died in the wilderness. During that 40 year period, they all fell And so this next generation was poised to go in. But before they did, god would speak to them. Think back to, when I got you to stand up. And just think about the parallels for us today.

Everybody that stood up that was of the older generation. Imagine, you know, those those you're thinking, are you telling me I died in the wilderness? What actually, although in the story, all the people of that generation died, you who are here today of the older generation you are the the Caleb and the Joshua. You're you're you're all the people of god. And and you're all in the wilderness, you're you're standing between your salvation and the promised land, which is which is heaven and the new creation.

And you are trusting that god will take you home safely. He'll take you safely through. He'll get you through the wilderness and he'll help you to enter the promised land. All you young ones, you did you look at all of the the Calebs and the Joshua's? Are you gonna follow their example, their faith?

They're they're the ones that are displaying faith to you. You're you're gonna follow them. How are we going to see? How are we going to make sure that we don't end up like the generation that fell in the wilderness. Dads and moms, but especially dads on a day like today, how are you gonna see to it that you do your best by god's grace to set an example of faith for your children to follow.

So that they will walk with god on their own. Well, this is what I want to this is this is the the answer the question I want to answer today in this sermon. And from this passage, we're gonna see this answer. We're gonna we're gonna hear about the god of real time, of real talk, and of real love. Because I think if we know that god, then we'll make it through.

Then we'll be able to set that example that people need. So We need to know the god of real time. First of all, we need to know the god of real time. Now what do I mean by Well, think about that term real time. We get we get updates in real time, don't we?

We get, you know, live current as it happens, events. You might you might hear, a reporter on a news, say these things are happening in real time, and our reporters bringing you the report from on the ground, or, you might have that app called Waze, that that, you know, it, it, it boasts that it updates news in real time from drivers, on the road. I don't know how drivers on the road are updating traffic book. We won't go into that. But that's that's what it says.

It's real time updates. And you saw, it might have been Dan update in our reading, the page for our bible reading in real time earlier on. That's what I mean, but just look at how Moses brings the word of god to this new generation. He helps them to know the god of real time. Just look at verse 1 of chapter 5.

He says, hear, oh, Israel, the decrees and the laws I declare in your hearing today. Learn them and be sure to follow them. The lord our god made a covenant with us at Horib. It was not with our fathers. That the lord made this covenant.

But with us, with all of us who are alive here today, the lord spoke to you face to face out of the fire on the mountain, At that time, I stood between the lord and you to declare to you the word of the lord because you were afraid of fire and did not go up the mountain. You see see what Moses does? He he grabs Sinai that 40 years before and he drags it into the present. So that this this powerful word of god of the living god would hit this new generation. That it would hit them themselves.

The lord wants them to know that he is the same today yesterday and forever. He is the god who is in real time. Now, I would love to see the faces of those people that heard this and and to just to sort of see what their reaction was. It it was literally was their fathers that heard the voice from the mountain. And if they were around, it would have been, you know, they would have been babies at the time.

So why does Moses do this? Why does he why does he pull it like this? And I think the reason why is because Moses wants to bring to the people and god wants them to know that he's alive. You know, he's alive. He's a living god.

As the as the old sunday school, song used to say god's not dead. No, he is alive. He's the living god who made everything and kindly and incredibly wants to have a relationship with his people. To those who've been running away from him, all of their lives, he wants them, he wants us to know him. Immediately, intimately, intimately.

He's a father who calls lost and enslaves enslaved sons and daughters. He is a god of relationship. He makes promises and keeps them. 1 commentator is put it like this. There's an emphasis on the living reality of the covenant relationship between the people and their god that transcends the boundaries of time.

So it wasn't just about the people there looking back to a past event. But it was, you know, their relationship with the lord was was supposed to be a present reality. It was supposed to be something that was happening then. It was supposed to be their relationship with God, not their parents. It's an easy question for me to ask you.

What what is your relationship with God like? Is your relationship with the lord a present reality? Or is it the fate of your parents that you're living? Or is it, you know, you you go to the youth group and you see all the people around you you know, saying they trust god, they follow the lord, but you're just sort of there, and you're kind of living in their shadow. It's easy it's easy to happen with with husbands and wives as well, isn't it?

Or or even those in ministry or looking to go into ministry, we have to be very, very careful that it's not just the job, but first and foremost, our relationship with god should be a living reality. As I've said before, this this god, he's alive, he's living. And surely, you know, as we come together here every Sunday, that's what we come for, isn't it? We don't just come for a history lesson, we come to be shaped, and we come to worship the living god. He's he's he's given to us, he's proclaimed to us from from the Bible that was written down thousands of years ago, but he's alive.

He speaks to us because he's he's alive. We're not we're not to be just like a museum that you visit. We hear as the people of god are supposed to be living with the the god of in real time, the god of real time. Be like Peter. Yeah.

Peter, the the apostle Peter when he was asked by by Jesus. So you're gonna go away? Are you gonna are you gonna leave me? Peter's answer was this and and, you know, Peter's he he he put his foot in his mouth a lot, but sometimes he really got it right in He says, lord, to whom shall we go for you have the words of eternal life. So is your relationship with the lord a living reality?

Do you know the god of real time? Secondly, we need to know the god of real talk Right? We worship a god who talks. He he talked to his people through Moses. Verse 4 says, the the lord spoke to them face to face, which means in a very intimate way.

He talks to us today every time we open the Bible and it's preached to us and we read it. And and when I say we need to know the god of real talk, I mean that God always tells us the truth. We need to hear it and we need to fight asking god for the faith to believe the truth, even when it's difficult. Real talk is true talk, but it's not always easy to hear. He tells us the truth about himself, and he tells us the truth about us.

And we we read an example, didn't we? Of of real talk, the 10 commandments a good example. We're just going to briefly run through them to see what they say. They're phenomenal words. They teach us how to love god and love our neighbor, and that's and that's how Jesus summed them up in the new testament.

They are weighty wonderful words, but they're full of truth, sometimes with hard edges. Just listen to what they say about who god is, and think about what kind of people need to be told these things. So first of all, verse 6, He is a personal and powerful god. I am the lord your god who brought you out of Egypt out of the land of slavery. He is mighty to save verse 7 and 8, he is a unique god, he is without equal among creation.

You shall have no other gods before me, You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters below. He gets to say how he's worshiped. Verse 9, he is a jealous god. Verse 9 says, you shall not bow down to them or worship them for either lord your god am a jealous god. Punishing the children for the sins of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.

That's that's hard edged, isn't it? Now God's jealousy is not like human jealousy, it's not the green eyed monster. It's a holy jealousy. It's totally pure. In fact, god must be a jealous god.

He must be jealous for his own glory. Otherwise, He wouldn't be the highest being and he wouldn't be worthy of the highest praise. Now, maybe you got stuck on this, maybe you got stuck on the punishment of the children for the sins of the father's part. Now we're not gonna have time to fully go into it and there's there's a, you know, there's there's lots of good articles I can point you to to to sort of see how it works out in real life and and and how other parts of the Bible sort of, you know, what what it means in light of the rest of the Bible. But just here's 3 observations.

Here's here's a good example of of what I mean by saying real talk has hard edges. So it's tough. Yeah. It is tough, but it proves to me that this law, this word, wasn't made up by a human being. No human being would have said this.

No human being would have made this up. He says here he only punishes those who hate him, so don't hate him. Teach your kids to love him. You love him. In in chapter 6, verse 4 to 9, it talks about how fathers are to teach their children, the things that he said, and, you know, it says talk about them when you're on the road when you're sitting down when you're standing up.

Let your life be all about telling your kids about god, wherever in whatever situation you're in. So so there's some homework, dads, father's day. There's my breakfast in bed for you. Okay? Alright?

Don't hate him. We always want to focus on the negative, don't we? As human beings, and we magnify that the hard bit, and we ignore what is magnified in the Bible. Look at look at verse 10. It says he shows love to a thousand generations of those who love me and who keep my commandments.

He's such a gracious god, shows love to thousands of generations of those who love him. Verse 11, god's name is special. You shall not misuse the name of the lord your god. For the lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. Verse 12 to 14, he is a god of order and rhythm observed the sabbath day by keeping it holy as the lord your god has commanded you.

6 days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the lord your god. And on it, you shall not do any work. Neither new neither you nor your son or daughter nor your man servant, maid servant, nor your ox, your donkey, or any of your animals, nor the alien within your gates so that your man servant and a maid servant may rest as you do. We were made to work 6 and rest 1. And so so so were those who, of a lower station in us, or or even a different species than us.

All 7 days are to be lived in worship of him, though, aren't they? Verse 15, he is worthy of worship for his saving power. It says remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the lord your god brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore, the lord your god has commanded you to observe the Sabbath Day. We were saved to worship him.

Verse 16, he is the ultimate authority to be honored, honor your father and your mother as the lord your god has commanded you so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land that your law the lord your god has given you. He's he's the 1 who invented families so that life could be enjoyed. He's the 1 who orders the authority. Verse 17, he's the giver and taker of life. You shall not murder.

Verse 18 21, he is faithful and trustworthy in all of his thoughts and all of his ways. Verse 18 says, you shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. You shall not cover your neighbor's wife.

You shall not you shall not set your desire on your neighbor's house or land or his man servant, maid servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. He gets to say what we do with sex and what we do with other people's stuff. These these are god's This is god's real talk, isn't it? Moses restates these 10 laws to this new generation on the edge of the promised land and it was it was god's way of renewing the his covenant with his people renewing the relationship that he had. In a similar way to how a husband or wife might renew their wedding vows.

Some of you might remember a few years ago Rose and Steve did that, didn't they? They they got all dressed up and, you know, they recommitted to each other. It was a beautiful day. I've, I've got a picture here it's not a view, Rose, but it's of me when I was about 14. And my mom and dad renewed their vows.

They'd just become Christians. I thought about putting it up on the screen, but why would I do a stupid thing like that? Especially because my brother looks like he had a bowl put on his head for his haircut. But, you know, people do this, and this is what this by the way, if you want to see this, you can come and ask me later on, and I'll show it to you as long as you can tell me something that hit you from today's reading and sermon, right? But there's a price you have to pay for seeing that.

Yeah. But this is what god does with these people on the edge of the promised land. He's a living god who wants a relationship with these people, and he tells them, look, this is what I'm like, and this is what you're like, This is how we're gonna relate together. He says, I rescued you. Will you love me I chose you and set you apart.

Will you do what I say? Will you keep these commands in your heart? Will you talk about them often? That was how this new generation was gonna show their loyalty and their love and their commitment to god. And they had every intention of doing it, didn't they?

Of trying, at least, or so they said? Just just look at look at their response in verse verse 27. They're speaking to they're speaking to Moses, and they say go near and listen to all that the lord our god says, then tell us whatever the lord our god tells you, we will listen and obey. They had every intention, didn't they? You know, we we sing songs every week that have the most astounding words of commitment, you know, give me, you know, take the world, give me Jesus, you know, and, you know, we need to means you'd be very careful what we say, how we the words we've we've seen.

This is what they're doing. We we will listen and obey, but the lord knows what they're really like, doesn't he? Just further on in chapter chapter 9 verse 5, it god says of of these people, it is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you're going in to take possession of the land it was because he keeps his promises. He promised Abraham and Isaac that he would give them the land. It wasn't anything to do with their righteousness.

He says later on, you are a stiff necked people. But even back in chapter 5, we see we get the feeling that god knows that something's not right. In verse 29, says, owe that their hearts would be inclined to me. And therein lies the problem with people with the people of Israel back then and with us today. Our hearts left to themselves will either want to kick against these wonderful laws of love and and reject them, which leads to to utter disaster and despair, or we will want to kick into gear with keeping the law like a religious checklist that leads us to be, you know, to be proud of our own self righteousness.

Either way, the result is that we're crushed with guilt and failure because we can't keep up the effort or we're proud. We're we're proud of our false goodness. Jesus was the master of real talk wasn't a when he spoke to the religious and the rebel, and he called both to repent to turn away from their sin. 1, he called to turn away from the sin of their badness, of their law breaking. 1, he turned, he he he told to turn, turn away from their fake goodness.

Was just as much law breaking because they were putting themselves in the first place in god's position, not not god. So which 1 do you need to repent of? Are you the tax collector or the pharisee, the lost son or the older son? Are you gonna be are you gonna be people of of of real talk? Are you gonna are you gonna love this truth?

Are you gonna in your in your relationship with god? Are you gonna listen to him? Are you gonna love him? If we wanna if we wanna live the Christian life, yeah, if we wanna, if we wanna, if we wanna see the promised land, then we need to know who we need to know who god is, and we need to know who we are. We need to know that we need him.

We need him, you know, we need him in real time. And with all of his real talk, we need him. So that the future generations will keep embracing the, you know, this faith until the end. So which this brings me to my to my last point. How are we as a body of belief is gonna continue to walk by faith without god.

We've thought about the god of real time. He's a living reality to his people We thought about the god of real talk. He's the god of truth. But finally, we need to know the god of real love. The god of real love.

History is awash with songs, aren't they? Isn't it? That look looking for looking for love you know, we look apparently, we look for love in all the wrong places. You know, people wanna know what love is. I I couldn't get out of my head a song, this week, as I was thinking about this passage Mary Jay Blige, who who I grew up with, she is a song called Real Love, which is not the worst song in the world to have stuck in your head, actually, in my opinion.

But, you know, if you're like her searching for real love, search no longer. Because god is the god of real love. And real love is always giving. Real love is always giving. Human humans can be imperfect, and and we can be selfish.

But but god's love is is not is not selfish. It's a giving love. Now God's love is wrapped up in the first 2 points It's really hard to separate them neatly. You know, he draws near to us. It gives himself to us in real time as as he did to these people.

And that and, you know, that is that's that's him showing us, he loves us. God's real talk is him giving himself to us, in truth, and that's that's a loving thing to do. He tells us who he is and he tells us who we are. That's a very loving thing to do. That's how we know who he is, isn't it?

That's how we know we need him. But there's a few other ways, from this passage that we're going to think about, about how god shows us this real love that he's the lord of real love. So first of all, the lord gives himself to us as as a as a perfect husband. The lord's real love is unconditional. You get loved, even though you don't deserve it, and even though you can't do anything to achieve it.

Verse 6 says, I am the lord your god who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery, And he he did that when we couldn't do anything about it. We were slaves. We were in bondage, but he did it for us. If you despair of making it to the promised land, remember god can do the impossible. And if he can bring you this far, he can take you through whatever you're going through and bring you home.

That's why I I put chapter 6 chapter 26 in there, 16 to, to the end of the chapter, it was 1 it's a it's a wonderful, sort of summary of the lord's, you know, his vows to us and our vows to him The 16 says the lord, the lord your god commands you this day to follow these decrees and laws carefully observe them with all your heart, with all your soul, you have declared this you have declared this day that the lord is your god. And that you will walk with him in obedience to him, that you will keep his decrees, commands, and laws, and you will listen to him and this is amazing, and the lord has declared this day that you are his people, his treasured possession, as he promised and that you are to keep his all his commands. He has declared that he will set you in praise, fame, and honor high above all the nations he has made. And that you will be a people wholly to the lord your god as he has promised. It's like a it's like a wedding, isn't it?

He's promised to to give us as a perfect husband. This is also backed up by the fact that he gives himself to us as a perfect father. A few chapters before this this sermon takes place god says this to these people. He says, then I said to you, do not be terrified, do not be afraid of them, the lord your god, who is going before you, will fight for you as he did for you in Egypt before your very eyes, and in the wilderness, there you saw how the lord your god carried you as a father carries his son all the way you went until you reached this place. He carried them in as a father carries his son.

Father, you will fail. But the lord is a perfect father who will never fail. I don't know why I don't know why god did this. It it was painful, but he he sort of He helped me to to like get this point myself on Friday. I maybe I needed it.

It was superhero day at Luca's school, and, all the dads, some brothers, and uncles, and granddads were invited in to read with their kid for, like, a 20 minute slot, and, I totally forgot about it. And, you know, it's it's a blessing that I live and work close to the school because when I I when I remembered after 10 or 15 minutes, actually it wasn't even me that remembered. It was my wife that reminded me, so even even that shocking, isn't it? But, I booked it to the school. I, I, you know, went into the reception.

They weren't gonna let me through. I was like, come on, there was a dad's are there, you know, and they were all reading and I got to the got to the playground, grabbed Lucas and, you know, I've got like maybe 3 minutes of him. And I I felt like I was a total failure, you know, and, it was, it was, it was a hard lesson, you know, it was like, yeah, just remember your failure. Yeah, thanks. I I really needed remembering to remember that, you know, but but, you know, it was it was wonderful to, to, 1, to remember that god never fails.

He's a father that never fails, and he's our father. Yeah. And it was a it was a great opportunity for me to point Lucas to that perfect father, you know, even if it was painful. So, you know, this is real love, isn't it? You know, this is this is the love that we need to reflect as imperfectly as as we do.

So so we we need to know this god of of real love, this this god who gives himself to us as a perfect husband as the perfect father. Finally, we could be assured that he will say 1 day well done, good and faithful servant, because he also gives us his perfect son. He gives us Jesus, doesn't he? He he he gives us he gives us Jesus who never stumbled in the wilderness, who always obeyed his father's word perfectly for us. As the apostle says, the apostle Paul says, He says through the obedience of 1 man, many will be made righteous.

Jesus obeyed his father even unto death on the cross for us so that we might be 1 of his sons and daughters. We might be part of his family as perfect children. Imagine that. It's quite easy, isn't it for moms and dads and and the rest of the church to see, you know, to see this lived out. You know, we're supposed to be we're supposed to be perfect children of the living god.

But we are just like those little breaths that run around pushing stuff over and kicking stuff and fighting and, you know, When you when you do that, when you see those kids running around misbehaving, not doing what their moms and dads say, you remember that's you, and god. And he has given his son so that you can be forgiven and restored so that you can be perfect in his eyes. Do you remember verse 27 of chapter 5? Verse 27, chapter 5, go near and listen to all the lord our god says then tell us whatever the lord our god tells you, we will listen and obey. Jesus listened and obeyed everything.

God said, and he did it for us. And isn't that amazing. So what are you gonna do? As you stand on the on the edge of the promised land, as you as you as you walk the life of faith, as you demonstrate it to your children, and the church. And what are you going to do if you are, you know, in that younger generation?

Are you gonna walk with god on your own? Are you gonna know this god who is a god in real time? You're gonna open do what the song says. Yeah? God speaks.

We listen. You know, read the Bible, trust and obey. Read the bible every day. That's how we know this god in real time. You know, when when you come against when you come up with when you come up against his real talk, when when he when he tells you something you don't like, what are you gonna do?

Are you gonna listen because he He knows you, and he knows he knows the best way for you to live, he knows what you need, even before you ask, you're gonna you're gonna what you're gonna do with his real talk, and are you gonna know him as the god of real love? But if you don't, why not? Why not come to him and say I am a failure? I need your son. I need you as a perfect father and a and a perfect, you know, I want to be part of this community, this the church, which is called the bride of Christ.

Will you be will you be that that 1 who forgives, 1 who loves, the 1 who makes perfect? Well, you can do that. You can do that, especially if you, you know, we we do this every Sunday, don't we? And once or twice a month, we we have the lord's supper, where, you know, we we have the new covenant demonstrated for us, and we're reminded of the words of love that he's given us. He's he's reminded us of his of his of of his forgiveness that he offers us.

Why don't you come to him today knowing your sin, your frailty, your failure, and come to him and receive his forgiveness and celebrate that it it has happened. It it is done. You are perfect in his eyes because of Jesus. Why don't you do that? Let me finish with these words of a of a of a song As a final response, let us love and sing and wonder.

Let us praise the savior's name He has hushed the law's loud thunder, he has quenched and on cyanide's flame. He has washed us with his blood. He has brought us near to god. Let's pray. Heavenly father.

We thank you that you are real. You are you're there, you're you're here now. And you you're you're it's an amazing thing that you want us to know you intimately, personally, every day. In real time, please help us, lord, to know your the presence of your Holy Spirit help help us to know the presence of Christ help us to know your presence as as a loving father. Law, please, even when even when it's hard to hear your truth, please help us to trust you to repent and believe once more.

And help us to do this in the power that Jesus gives us by his perfect life. Well, please would you help us to to, enter the promised land, to to lord, as you as you as you will as you promise to bring us home. We asked that by faith, we would, we would be 1 of your 1 of your family, and we ask this in Jesus name, amen.