Finding Shelter in God

and that is, After the first five books of the Bible, you have Joshua Judges and then roof.

and we're going to read chapter 2 today, and I realized After I looked at chapter 2, of someone else, read the scripture next week because these chapters are long to read, but it's good to devote ourselves to the public reading of scripture. Amen. And that's one of the things that the Apostle Paul told Timothy was devote yourself to the reading of scripture, so that's why we read the scripture before before the message, but Ruth chapter 2, if you need a church Bible, we have those in the back and raise your hand if you need one. And we can get you, one Ruth, chapter 2.

And we'll read the the whole chapter. It's a it's an exciting sighting scene. And one person has said that it occurs in three short little bits of dialogue. So the first The first three verses are Ruth and Naomi conversing. And then the next set of verses are Boaz & Ruth conversing. And then the last the third set of verses is a Ruth and Naomi conversing again. So those are the three scenes that are in this chapter.

Now Naomi had a relative of her husband's a worthy man, of the clan of Eli Malik, whose name was Boaz. And Ruth the moabite said to Naomi. Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain. After him in whose sight, I shall find favor. And she said to her go, my daughter. So she set out and went and cleaned in the field after the Reapers. And she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz who was of the clan of Eli Malik. And behold Boaz came from Bethlehem and he said to the Reapers, the Lord be with you and they answered the Lord bless you. Then Boaz said to his young man who was in charge of the Reapers, who is young, woman is this. And the servant who was in charge of the Reapers answered, she is the young moabite woman who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab. She said, please let me glean and gather among the sheaves after the Reapers. So she came and she has continued from early morning until now, except for a short rest, Then Boaz said to Ruth. Now listen, my daughter do not go to glean in another field or leave this one, but keep close to my young women. Let your eyes be on the field that they are reaping and go after them. Have I not charged the men? The young men not to touch you and when you are thirsty go to the vessels and drink with the young men have drawn, then she fell on her face down to the ground and said to him. Why have I found favor in your eyes that you should take notice of me since I am a foreigner. Hobo has answered her all that you have done for your mother-in-law. Since the death of your husband has been fully told to me and how you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before. The Lord repay you for what you have done in a full reward, be given you by the Lord, the god of Israel under whose wings under whose wings, you have come to take refuge. Then she said, I have found favor in your eyes. My lord for you, have comforted me and spoken. Kindly to your servant do I am not one of your servants. And at mealtime Boaz said to her, come here and eat some bread and dip your morsel in the wine. So she sat beside the Reapers and he passed to her roasted grain. And she ate until she was satisfied and she had some left over. When she Rose to glean Boaz instructed, his young men saying let her glean even among the sheaves and do not reproach her. And also pull out some of the bundles for her and leave it for her to clean and do not rebuke her. So she gleaned in the field until evening, then she beat out what she had gleaned and it was about an ephah of barley. And she took it up and went into the city or mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned. She also brought out and gave her what food she had left over after being satisfied. And her mother-in-law said to her, where did you clean today? And where have you worked? Blessed. Be the man who took notice of you. So she told her mother-in-law with whom she had worked and said, the man's name with whom I work today is Boaz. And Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, may he be blessed by the Lord, whose kindness has not forsaken, the living or the Dead. Naomi also said to her. The man is a close relative of ours, one of our redeemers. And Ruth the moabite said besides he said to me, you shall keep close by my young men until they have finished all my Harvest and Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law. It is good. My daughter that you go out with his young men left in another field, you be assaulted. So she kept close to the young women of Boaz gleaning until the end of the barley and wheat Harvest. And she lived with her mother in law. This is God's word. Thanks be to God. Heavenly Father, we come to you now. Well, I know you all woke up this morning and thought, I need to understand what an e-file is. That's why I came to church to figure out how much green roof collected. Well, we'll get to that little bit through the message. But the professor that I had at Trinity Seminary, who taught the introductory Hebrew class? I was a man named Katie Lawson younger, but he wrote this. He wrote a commentary on the Book of Judges and Ruth who wrote this. If this book teaches us anything, it is that the Lord is in Sovereign control. He often protects Us in ways that are completely unknown to us. Why we are called to live, our lives in accordance with his word, it is the Lord who providentially supplies our needs and orders our lives for good. God, super intense in the details of life. If you were a follower of Jesus, if you were a disciple, those who bow to Christ as Lord, there is a massive difference. Think of the, one of those deep crevasses, that the climbers have to go across when they're climbing Mount Everest. You know, you have these huge caverns of ice in the glaciers that go hundreds of feet down, there is a massive difference. If you are a follower of Christ between the sovereignty of God and his Providence, which is an older word that we don't use as much anymore Providence. But there's a massive difference between the sovereignty of God and the concept of Karma. Now, karma's a buzzword in our culture. Right now, you have a saw this one sign above a is real, don't steal. What's the implication? If you steal, something karma is going to come, get you. If you do something bad, something bad's going to happen to you. Apparently, John Lennon wrote a song called Instant Karma and Justin Timberlake what goes around comes around. and you've heard, you know what happens if you play a Country Song Backwards, The man gets his wife back. He gets his truck back and he gets his dog back.

Yeah, his truck. Yeah. Karma, it refers to an inexorable chain of events. That is going to happen cause and effect and in Eastern religions in Buddhism and Hinduism you have this idea that life is recycling. Just like The Lion King, The Circle of Life, right? That's the idea. It's recycling over and over. But that is a massive difference between the idea of Karma, and God's Sovereign control and Providence over the universe because in an Eastern religion, that mindset that you're going through these cycles of reincarnation Buddhism is essentially an atheistic religion. You realize that, right? There's no, there's no concept of God. You're just trying to, to follow the path to Nirvana, to where you can can escape these endless cycles of reincarnation.

God's sovereignty says. There is a beginning and there is an end to which God is directing the world. Amen. We are on a linear timeline. Not straight. Exactly, as you know, thinking of no, no rollercoaster bumps along the way, we all have roller coaster bumps but God is directing history to his glorious end. History is not an endless cycle of repetition. And of course, we think of karma, you know, there was the Coca-Cola commercial, where the guy insults his friend, and then he sits down on the couch to open the Coca-Cola, and he opens again. You know, spray is right in his face and it says Karma right on the screen that was a few years ago. But our culture's operating principle is what goes around comes around. You bring positivity into the universe, the universe will bring positivity to you positive things to you. You can manifest things if you think about them enough, and if you believe them enough, you can manifest things.

Karma is a Sanskrit word, which means action, meaning MN implied cause and effect. It is a cosmic impersonal Force which returns action for action. And there's a massive difference between that and God's sovereignty. So here's some here, basically, three distinctions, if you want to drop these down. And the reason I'm saying this is because you can look at Ruth and you can look at Naomi and you can say, well, roof did the noble thing. She did the good thing. She was devoted to me. I mean, she follow me back to Bethlehem. And, and it says, right in there, the Lord reward you for what you have done. Doesn't that mean that you do good things, God returns, good things back to you.

Well, Joe had a different story than that. Do realize God is Sovereign no matter what. You never job never found out that God had the agreement with Satan to test him. The reader knows that joke doesn't know that. So, here's the differences between God's sovereignty and, God is personal involved in every event of Our Lives. He has personal, he is transcendent, he is over all creation. He is separate from creation. He is not, he is not overlaid with his creation. We're not pantheists or pan envious where we think God is in every tree or God isn't every plant or every animal. There's a sense in which God is omnipresent, but God, God doesn't imbue in an in and out with animal things. God is personal, he's transcended but he's also imminent. He is with us Eminem anent. In the sense of his presence. God is directing all of history to a final judgment in the book of Acts. When the apostles are preaching, they say God has appointed a day when he will judge All Mankind through the one that he has chosen. Jesus Christ. And thirdly, God is the final judge. We are responsible to him for our choices. We are responsible for him for our choices, the final judgment. They will culminate in the Lake of Fire. The final end of history, for believers is the new heavens and a new Earth. There are consequences to our choices The doctrine of karma says, well, yes, there are consequences to your choices, but, you know, you just do the right thing and it comes back to you. Do God's sovereignty is different than that. He is the final judge. We are responsible for him for our choices. No choice of ours is outside of God's scope. That's comforting. That's comforting. No choice of ours. Any choice that we make in life. None of those choices are outside of God's scope.

But the scripture does say that we can reject God. And so there are consequences to that yet we are called by God to act in faith step-by-step day-by-day. I meant we are called to act by faith, we are responsible. So how do God's sovereignty and our human responsibility fit together? I'm not sure, it's kind of like where you look at a long set of railroad tracks. And in the distance, your eye brings the tracks together, right? And you can't see it, you know? The tracks don't come together, you know, 20 miles down but you look down and you see the two lines. We're not sure if our finite Minds can cannot comprehend how God's sovereignty and our responsibilities of human choices fit exactly together. But the Bible teaches both of them, but it's not the same as karma.

And why do we need to clarify this? Why? Because karma appeals to our sin bent mines,

If someone else receives Bad Karma for mistreating us, how do we feel? If we see that person who cut us off on the road or pulled in front of us, and then they get stopped at the next red light and you're right behind them. And I feel that little sense of satisfaction ahead of me or well, if it's a Tesla, they didn't waste a ghastly. But, you know, they, they, they pass you because you're not going fast enough and then they get stopping you. Do you know? We like a god who helps those who help themselves.

Is that what the Book of Ruth is about? I mean in one sense, you could look at it that way you can say well Ruth you know she she went out there she she she Carpe Diem. She took the opportunity.

No one was obligated to have roof. Glean in their field.

The opposite way of thinking is formed by the spirit of God. Is that we fear God, and we keep his Commandments, no matter the results. Because he loves us and we desire to know him more as we trust him with our decisions.

The way of thinking underneath God's sovereignty in light of God's already, informed by the spirit of God within us. Is that we are to fear. God, not in a, not in a terrifying sense, but in a sense of awe and reverence wanting to please God because he loves us and we desire to know him more and more as we trust him. Religion says you obey. Therefore you're accepted. The gospel says you are accepted and loved there for you obey. Those are two very different things. God Delights to give shelter to those who come to him in desperate need. And that's the main point that I want us to see today in the text that God Delights to give shelter to those who come to him in desperate need. He gives provision, he gives rest and he gives ashore future. That's what we see Boaz, giving Ruth but it wasn't just bail as it was the Lord showing that Tessa that, kindness that word for steadfast love in the scriptures.

And so, we need to remember that. God is not just the emergency shelter when we lived in Florida, there was always the hurricane preparedness announcements on the news, right? And before, when did, when did hurricane season start, I forget when exactly it started. Maybe Midsummer or late late spring always have that that threat of a hurricane and kind of September October. So they would tell you got to have your hurricane emergency preparedness kit. You got to have these things ready if you need to evacuate or if you need to shelter for a couple of days at your house, will do we treat God like an emergency shelter. I mean, Emergency Shelters are good but you don't want to hang out an emergency shelter for more than like 3 or 4 days. I mean, they don't, they don't have Starbucks, you know, they don't have Dunkin Donuts, you know, they don't have all the good things that were used to, but I'm not an emergency shelters for an emergency, but some of us treat, dog like that because we run to him when we were in a crisis. But then as soon as the crisis lives, then we go. Oh well, I remember when my life is going pretty well, I can just default to those behaviors again.

God wants to give us shelter when we come to him in desperate need and he wants us to stay there. He wants us to abide in him. Amen. He wants us to know him more. Let not the wise man. Both in his wisdom to let let not the strong man boast in his strength. Let not the rich man boast in his riches. But let him who boasts boast in this that he understands and knows be and I am the god. Who Delights in Justice righteousness and steadfast love? Jeremiah 29, 23 and 24. He wants to us to stay with him and abide in him. So that's what I hope we understand today is that God. Desires this for us. God offers this to us and that the idea of Ruth and Naomi coming back to Bethlehem illustrates is a foreshadowing of the Salvation that would come to us through Christ. Who by the way spoiler alert roof gets married to Boaz has a child. The child's name is Obed, who was the father of Jesse who was the father of David, right? So God, it's so after the Book of Judges, where all hope is lost and it's like the Israelites have messed this thing up beyond beyond. I'm forgetting the word now Beyond Beyond. God is still keeping his promise to bring people to himself. Keeping the promise he made to Abraham through. You all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

God Delights to give us shelter through Christ.

I mean, think of all the passage of Psalm 23 that I may dwell in the house of the Lord forever

All right, so three reminders. Three reminders of that mean truth, that God Delights to give shelter to those who come to him in desperate need. and obviously, in Cary and this area, our mindset is one who has desperate needs. I mean, we have really nice bushes along Cary, Parkway that that block, the view of the traffic lights and and we have all sorts of nice parks and everything that our wonderful we have all night, that's what I mean.

I see the proliferation of fancy breweries, okay? Is that the highest expression of culture that the God calls us to? I mean, it's nice to have fancy breweries and all that. But you know, the song We Sing, The Best of human wisdom is nothing compared to God. that's well, that's another sermon but I just I just think Lord is, is that the thing is that the target were shooting for? Is to have nice food. Nice houses, nice playgrounds nice dog parks.

Is that the end goal know the end goal is to dwell with God forever. Amen. The end goal is to reach people who don't know God, My friend Greg says he said, he says what's the only thing we will not be able to do in heaven. We will not be able to evangelize. Because Luke chapter 16, there is a fixed Chasm between where the rich man was and we're Lazarus was and no one may cross from one to the other.

There is a hell where people will spend eternity without God in conscious torment. And God calls us to reach others. He calls us to set aside. The Earthly concerns, the worldly concern not that they're unimportant, but that in rank of priority we put God first.

I mean, I started off this year, I thought 153 years old, got to get my eyes checked, got to get my hearing checked, got to get a cavity filled and got to apply for a new life insurance policy. Cuz my 20-year life insurance policy came up when Muriel turn 20, I'm thinking, you know, I have these goals. I want to get through these things. I want to be prepared.

But that's what those those things are. Are this important to Eternity?

Okay where was I? All right, are you okay reminder 1 are Steps of Faith to honor Christ in any and all decisions are set in the background. The backdrop of the fathers sovereignty, you ever watch someone painting a landscape picture, you know, they're putting in the background first, usually or the sky or the outline of the mountains or the outline of the trees. And then then later on, they put in the, the, I can't even think of the word painters, would have a paint brush with the brush Strokes. They put in the little details of the foreground, but our choices are always against the backdrop of the father Solomon. T, she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz verses 3 and 4. It literally says they're her chance chance. Perchance chanced. Now usually in the Hebrew if they repeat a word twice or they have a word that is a noun and a verb and it, they're paired together like that. Kind of like, you know, Mom can I have a cookie while cooking, you, you know, using a noun like a verb but two words together, the same thing, her chance chance that we would say and it just so happened and it just so happened. The reader knows that, but Ruth doesn't know, that doesn't know that Boaz is filled. She didn't know that. It was his field, the kinsman-redeemer one of the kinsman-redeemer

By happenstance, she had no idea who would allow her to glean. She says to Naomi her mother. She says I'm going to clean and whoever's field. I might find favor At the end of verse to let me go to go to the field and glean among the ears of grain. After him in whose sight, I shall find favor. Now Naomi maybe she's still a little dejected, she doesn't go and follow Ruth. Maybe she's unhealthy, we don't know, she's obviously older than Ruth. The truth makes her choice in the backdrop of God's sovereignty. Now you have to realize how big of a risk of this is for Ruth. She's taking a risk because what does the overseer refer her to her as the young moabite woman? Who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab, you know, if a person's an outsider, don't we find clever ways to refer to them as Outsiders, you know?

So she's known as Ruth the moabite. And she's taking a huge risk because she is the Foreigner. Now, let's take a step back. How did God tell the Israelites to care for widows live? It against 19 and Deuteronomy 20:4. The print maybe a little small here cuz I tried to fit two scriptures on one screen. Leviticus 19. When you reap the Harvest of your land you shall not reap your field right up to its Edge. Neither shall you gather the gleanings after your Harvest? And then it says the same thing about the grapes in the vineyard, you shall leave them for the poor and for the Sojourner, I am the Lord, your God. So when they harvested their fields, they weren't specifically not Harvest all the way to the very edge. So that the poor in the Sojourner could come along and have something to eat and then in Deuteronomy 24, when you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheep in the field. So this isn't leaving some along the edge. This is hey, you're just going along and you leave 11 pile behind you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the Sojourner, the fatherless, and the Widow that the Lord, your God May bless you in all the works of your hands. So, God is pleased when Instead of saying I've got to go back and get that because I want to get as much as I can. God is pleased when we leave that. For the Sojourner and the fatherless.

So on an annual basis and every third year, tithe, the people were commanded to allow the poor, the widows and the foreigners, the sojourners to glean the field that is to harvest to let them Harvest what was left behind so that they would be provided for this was God's social welfare system for his people. He wanted them to treat others with Grace, why remembering that God brought them out of Egypt by his grace. And when they didn't do that, the Bible talks often about how God was angry with them.

Deuteronomy 27, and Isaiah 123. I think we have a one of those scriptures up. This is Isaiah 123, your princes are Rebels and Companions of Thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring Justice to the fatherless and the Widow's cause does not come to them. Now, what's the Widow's cause Well, the Widow's cause was she was allowed to glean in the field. And so if landowners were not allowing widows or not allowing orphans to glean in their field, then God was upset with them because they had been commanded to show kindness. That been commanded to show that kindness. That type of generosity.

And one thing this is just a side going, but one thing I think all of us need to think about is when God gives us an abundance, And yet we list in our mind reasons not to care for the poor. God is not pleased by that.

I mean, they're at their, is I read an article one time on the, all the misshapen food that's thrown out, you know, the carrots that aren't quite straight, you know that maybe they're a little crooked or something, or the potatoes that don't really look like potatoes. Tons, and tons and tons of food that is just not put in grocery stores. Why? Because, it doesn't look like the nice Red Tomato that were used to.

I don't know if the NFL former NFL player still has the the farm up in lures. Lewisburg, but he was a player for the St. Louis, Rams, I believe, I think. Yeah. And his whole life, and most of his farm, is, is dedicated to sweet potatoes for a food. Pantries, gave up millions of dollars worth of salary future salary. In the NFL said, I want to, I want to help help people. With food. And I think you can, I think there are Church groups that go up there and help with the with the Harvest. So we need to think about that. And the New Testament talks about, you know, take care of the widows and and family members take care of of your own family member, so that the church then can spend time on the widows have who have no family members to take care of them.

So for Ruth this was this was a distinct possibility that she could be physically harmed or harassed or slandered or prevented from harvesting at all. And so this was a bold step. And you think well, I don't know. I don't have the courage that Ruth has I mean, she's one of those people in the Bible. She must be one of those special people. Ruth was just like any of us. Eugene Peterson, who wrote the the message paraphrase, he put it this way in his introduction to Ruth. He said, sometimes we talk this way. Surely, there's no way I can have any significant part in God's plan that to ourselves. Sometimes we look at bible people in the Bible he says, but the story of the widowed impoverished alien Ruth is proof to the contrary, she is the inconsequential Outsider. Whose life turns out to be essential for telling the complete story of God's ways Among Us.

Here's an outsider a woman who is outside the Covenant Promises of Israel who comes to know the true God. Yahweh the Lord And she turns out to be the one who is specifically used by God to tell his story. That, that could be anyone of us. I think Janet put in the newsletter this month, the story of the, the Sunday school teacher, who is a Sunday school teacher of and end then of Dwight L Moody and then a couple Generations later, Billy Sunday, the Evangelist, and then a couple of generations later Billy Graham. Edward Kimbrell, Kimball Edward Kimball

Nobody remembers his name but he was the Sunday school teacher. Who said, you know what? I'm going to challenge each student in my class to follow Jesus and to make sure that they know who Jesus is and if they want to follow him, if they want to confess their sins and follow him. We never know how God might use us.

Here's a helpful thing that That Joe sent to be this week, you say this is what we say, and then this is what God says. So I think we have a chart here on the next slide. You say it's impossible. God says, all things are possible. You say nobody really loves me. God says, I love you. You say I'm not able God says, I am able

You say I can't forgive myself. God says I forgive you. You say I'm all alone, God Says, I Am With You. There's about eight more of them. I just put 50 on there.

So my point is this that are our choices by faith each day are in the backdrop of God's sovereignty. Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God who works in you both to Will and to work for his good pleasure. So taking shelter under God's Wings is not hiding and staying. Put and saying, we'll God's going to do what God's going to do. No, taking shelter. Under his wings is making choices day-by-day step-by-step to honor him knowing that he is with us and knowing that he is Sovereign somebody put it this way they said will you know God brings the wind to push the sale but he gives us the responsibility to put up the sail. Supposed to go anywhere without the sale being up. We live everyday before the face of God coram.deo. We live everyday before the face of God in Christ by faith depending on his spirit.

Now, the story gets interesting where Boaz greets his workers. The Lord bless you. He was a wealthy and influential man description of his character, he was, he was a nobleman in Hebrew. I think it's Gabor high-heel. He was a Gabor high heels. So if you have a daughter, you know, tell her that you went, you went to her to bring back a good bore high heel for a husband.

But basically, it's a statement of his character.

The overseer is unnamed, but his words imply that this Ruth may be gathering a bit too much. She is the Young mobile woman who came back from nail with Naomi from the country above. She said, please let me glean and gather among the sheaves after the Reapers. He's he's she said she's going to clean the overseer says she says. She said, let me clean and gather so he might be he might be adding to her words a little bit. She came and she has continued for early morning until now except for a short rest that phrase there except for a short rest means just a little bit of sitting down essentially. Until the overseer is, hey, couldn't this Foreigner? Go somewhere else? And the drawing water. Why do The Details Matter about that? The drawing water was that it was customary for women to draw water for the men and four non Israelites to draw water to serve to the Israelites until Boaz is granting. Her extravagant favor by saying to her You can sit down with the young men when you are thirsty. Go to the vessels and drink. What the young men have drawn. So he's reversing the cultural order by saying, I've instructed my young men to give you water. I mean you remember I think it was

I forget which one it was Moses or Abraham, where he sends one of them to the well and then they were chased off by the, by the other men who were at the well, I'll remember that right after the sermon but it was Moses. So it. So the idea is that that a woman going to draw water from the well, with a bunch of other men around who are feeding their flocks. That might not be the safest thing.

And so he instructs the men's to serve her. He gives her extra at meal time. It says she was satisfied twice until she was satisfied, verse 14. And then after being satisfied, when she came back to Naomi Verse 18, how much was an ephah? It was about 20 l. 20 l. So I think I just think of a 2 L soda bottle. 10 of those. Now she was able to harvest one of those every day for the next 7 weeks, 6 days a week because that's how long the wheat and barley Harvest was then that would be 42 days of harvesting 840l.

So, we're talking months and months and months worth of food.

That's the favor that Boaz shows to her and that's the second reminder is God's grace. God's grace to us in Christ is completely beyond our own self, estimation more forgiving and more loving than any person's noble character. Again the hero isn't just about as the hero, who says they hear it all points to Jesus. It all points to his ultimate kindness to us. Why have you shown favor to me? Ruth says,

Both our statements about God's grace Ruth question and Boaz response. He says, all that you have done for your mother-in-law. Since the death of your husband has been fully. Told to me, the Lord, repay you for what you have done, and a full reward be given you by the Lord, the god of Israel under whose wings, you have come to take refuge to Boaz realizes that she has sought shelter under God.

he realizes the spiritual implications that is not just his kindness, It's not just his material means that are helping her

God's grace is so much more than our own estimation and so much more forgiving and more loving than any person's noble character. Because God Delights in giving shelter to us when we come to him in desperate need when we are at the end of ourselves.

All right, we'll save point three for next week but I just want to close with this Romans 5:20 again, all of this points to the Redemption that we have in Christ. Romans 5:20 in a couple different versions. Oh, that is kind of small. Is it the Earth's not that small on there? Okay. All right. In the easy English version.

God gave his law to Moses to show more clearly that people were doing wrong things, but when people did more and more wrong things, God continue to be kind in more and more ways. Never have a little child. That's trying to describe something and they just they just say it was big, it was so, so, so so, so so so so big more and more, and more, and more. The authorized Standard Version says this, the law came in besides that, the trespass might have bound but where sin abound a great grace did abound more exceedingly.

The Voice translate. I didn't know there was a voice translation. Maybe it was a recorded translation. It says this, when the law came into the picture. Soon, grew and grew, but where ever seen grew and spread God's grace was there. Fuller in Greater measure. No matter how much sin crept in there was always more grace.

God's grace to us in Christ is so much more than our own estimation. And so much more loving and forgiving and cleansing than any other person can provide because God the lights, when we come to him in desperate need

Psalm 57:1. Says the same thing that it says in roof.

Be merciful to me. Oh God, be merciful for in you. My soul takes refuge in the shadow of your wings. I will take refuge till the storm's of Destruction pass by

God commands us to repent and to take refuge in Christ. And so I would urge you. To do that in your heart, if you have not done that, if you've never done that publicly, I urge you to do that. Do that now, Repentance is simply sang, Lord. I see my sin. I'm going to turn away from that and I'm going to trust you Jesus. I'm going to trust you to be my righteousness, to be too to save me from my sins, and to send your Holy Spirit to live in my heart, so that I can follow you.

He calls us to trust him day by day. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we at least when I read this passage, I think of the the other things that I try to find refuge in

whether it's just sitting at home and saying, oh, I have an hour to relax by myself or Just sometimes it's trying to escape into different hobbies, and, and things that occupy, my mind that that they give me a mental break. But Lord, ultimately you want us to find refuge in you, And to give you thanks and to remain in you and to abide in you, you are the vine. We are the branches. And so we cannot bear fruit apart from you. And you Jesus said you are in me and I am in you.

May we trust you more deeply, step by step? As we follow you in faith. We ask these things in Jesus name. Amen.

About amethyst. And we want to sing one more song with we going about her.

Just like Jim mentioned in the message up Boaz to good stewards of what you have entrusted to us because we know that it all belongs to you may we walk in faith this week and powered by your spirit to take faith-filled risks. And see you at work. And look to you in prayer to hunger for you. The hunger, Lord. For righteousness.

And knowing you day by day in faith. We thank you. And we praise you in Jesus name, amen. Amen. Please greet one. Another in the Lord and in Fellowship together, Jesus Messiah.