Genesis this morning, chapter 10 and into chapter 11, verse 9. So we're taking a larger section again. And I want you to notice in that last psalm, verse 6, it's really a summary of the sermon this morning. He rules forever by His might. His eyes the nations try. Let not the proud rebellious ones exalt themselves on high. And you're going to see that very thing happen today. unfold before us, a worldly leader exalts himself over God, and we'll see how the Lord responds to that and how He answers that. And so it's not an easier section to preach. There are certain texts that are easier, I think, but you'll notice there are a lot of names here, but all of Scripture is God-breathed, and every bit of it is profitable, and so that's why we preach through books, because God has something for us even in a list of names. So let's give our attention this morning to the word of the Lord. This is Genesis first book of the Bible chapter 10. These are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Sons were born to them after the flood. The sons of Japheth, Gomer, Magog, Medai, Javon, Tubal, Meshach, Tyrus, the sons of Gomer, Ashkenaz, Ripoth, and Togarmah, the sons of Javon, Elisha, Tarshish, Kittim, Dodanim. From these, the coastland people spread in their lands, each with his own language, by their clans in their nations. The sons of Ham, Cush, Egypt, Huth, and Canaan. The sons of Cush, Seba, Havilah, Sabta, Rahama, Sabtecha. The sons of Rahama, Sheba, and Dedan. Cush fathered Nimrod. He was the first on earth to be a mighty man. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord. Therefore, it is said, like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord. The beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Arek, Akkad, Kalna, in the land of Shinar. From that land he went into Assyria and built Nineveh, Rehobah, Ur, Kala, and Risen between Nineveh and Kalah, that is, the great city. Egypt fathered Ludim, Anamim, Lahabim, Naphtahumim, Pothrusim, Kalsuhim, from whom the Philistines came, and Kaptorim. Canaan fathered Sidon, his firstborn, and Heth, and the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Girgashites, the Hivites, the Arkites, and the Sinites, the Arvidites, the Zemurites, and the hamathites afterward the clans of the canaanites dispersed and the territory of the canaanites extended from sedan in the direction of gerar as far as gaza in the direction of sodom gomorrah adma zaboyim as far as lasha these are the sons of ham by their clans their languages their lands and their nations to shem also the father of all the children of eber the elder brother of Japheth children were born. The sons of Shem, Elam, Ashur, Ark-Pashad, Lud, and Aram. The sons of Aram are Uz, Hol, Gether, and Mosh. Ark-Pashad fathered Shela, and Shela fathered Eber. To Eber were born two sons. The name of one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided, and his brother's name was Yachtan. Yachtan fathered Amodad, Shalep, Hazarmaveth, Jera, Hadorim, Uzzel, Diklah, Obel, Abimeel, Sheba, Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab. All these were the sons of Yachtan. The territory in which they lived extended from Mesha in the direction of Sefer to the hill country of the east, these are the sons of Shem by their clans, their languages, their lands, and their nations. These are the clans of the sons of Noah, according to their genealogies, in their nations. And from these, the nations spread abroad on the earth after the flood. Now, the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the Lord said, Behold, they are one people, and they all have one language. And this is only the beginning of what they will do. Nothing that they purpose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down. And there confuse their language so that they may not understand one another's speech. So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off the building, the city. Therefore, its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them. over the face of all the earth. May the Lord bless this morning the hearing of his word. Well, as we come this morning to chapter 10 of Genesis, we have what is called the table of the nations. And this is a record, if you will, of how they are taking shape in the world and filling the earth. Genesis 10 is a remarkable record. Seventy nations are presented here as originating from Noah's three sons. Now, I'm not going to spend time this morning tying together all of these names with the nations as we know them. That's a fascinating study, and I'm sure you can do that in your spare time. But Genesis 10 is recognized as an astonishingly accurate record of the nations of this world, and I'm thankful the Lord gave us that. There's nothing like it. fascinating. What we're interested in this morning as we're going through Genesis is how the development of Noah's blessings and curses that we studied last time is happening in these nations. That's what our interest is this morning in Genesis chapter 10 and 11. Because at the end of chapter 9, remember, Noah had pronounced blessings and curses. Blessings and curses pronounced on his three sons blessings on shem and japheth and curses on ham and remember from these three sons it was said the whole earth was populated the big picture here this morning then is is really important for us in the last episode you remember what happened well ham was cursed and he had invaded his father's tent he had walked in there with complete hatred if you will for his father and mocked his shame and his nakedness and we saw that this was a whole repeat if you will of the fall event that this is exactly what the devil had done the serpent and coming into the garden, trying desperately to bring Adam and Eve into a state of shameful nakedness before God. And so this is what we saw play out. The first thing that God did was curse the serpent. The first thing that Noah does is curse Ham, who is a son of the serpent. So that division we saw was still there. There's the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. and there would be this hostile opposition. The flood event did not eradicate that. The flood event did not solve that. And so the first thing God had said, remember through all of this and even with Shem and Japheth that he had desired to cover Adam and Eve. And what a beautiful picture we had when Shem and Japheth walked backwards and they take the garment and they fling it over their father. And they wouldn't even look upon his shame, declaring through them that this was God's intention for us, that God does not delight in looking upon our shame, but desires to cover the sins of his people, and that we, as we looked at last time, as his people should share in that mission. We don't delight in people's sins, and so this is the love of God covering a multitude of sins. So this is what we studied last time and it's important because in the blessing, what's the first thing that God said in the blessing? Well, Shem's name means name and God blessed that name and said, that's where my name is going to be. That he would raise up from Shem one with the name and if you trace that, we see that Shem traces right to Terah who goes to Abraham, who goes to Israel who goes to the Christ, the one who would be given as the banner of the nations in the fullness of time, who would assemble the outcasts of Israel and gather together. Think of Isaiah 11. The goal of the gospel, the goal of Christ would be in the fullness of time to gather the dispersed nations to him. Very important for this morning. From the four corners of the earth, It was always his goal to bring in. That's why Japheth is blessed as being enlarged. He would be brought into the tents of Shem. This was God's purpose. This was his evangelization program that he was ready to undergo and ready to get started. But there would be a delay until this time. There would be a delay until this time. The world had to wait for that king to come. And when that king would come, he would be given the name, remember. And this is what we celebrate today. At the name of Jesus, every knee should bow and every tongue should confess, he's Lord, he's the name, he's Shemite. And that was prophesied for years and years and years and years that they would come together and dwell in one tent. Well, that's the first thing God said as they exited the ark. The first thing he said was, then I want you to go and be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth. I want you to disperse throughout the earth until the fullness of time when I gather you under my head in my city. Here's the problem this morning. The Hamites don't share in that vision at all. In fact, what this section shows us is how hostile that kingdom is to God's kingdom and the evangelization of the world. And it shows us how rebellion develops in the earth and what happens in kings and kingdoms of this world. And so what we have in chapter 10 is Moses proceeding to show us then how this all plays out and develops into the world. And so he begins with Japheth. Let's just briefly go through Japheth and then we'll get to what I believe is the heart of this. In verse 5, he says with Japheth of chapter 10, that from him where the coastland peoples of the Gentiles were separated into their lands. And if you were to go through the names of Japheth here, you would have what are known as the Indo-Europeans, which tells us ultimately that Japheth is our ancestor. He's our father, if you will. Japheth's descendants filled what we know as Asia Minor, part of Asia Minor, and Eastern Europe. But here's what strikes me about the list. Here's what really strikes me about the list. There's nothing impressive about it. It's a list, really, at this point in history of nobody's. This is a rather boring list, if you will. Moses knew nothing of these people. Moses had no really knowledge of these kinds of people spread out to the ends of the earth. And from a biblical standpoint, there's no real prominence here. They're nobodies. They're little people. Shapheth meant to enlarge. And one day, God was announcing that he would enlarge Shapheth and they would be brought into this tent. And wow, did that enlarge. I mean, look at how many peoples J-Peth would one day represent. And it's really exciting when you look at it from this standpoint. What would that look like? You're provoked at this point. What would it look like when J-Peth is brought into the tents of Shem? How glorious would that be? And when would we expect that? And how would that look? what would that look like? How would we know? The Old Testament kept talking about this. The Old Testament kept talking about this. Isaiah talked about this a lot. I read from Isaiah 60. The coastland peoples will wait upon me, says the Lord, and in my arm they will trust. So there's this exciting question mark here over the first part of Genesis 10, a sort of holding pattern, if you will. The Gentiles shall come into your light and everyone should ask the question, because it's you, when? When's that going to happen? I mean, that's going to be really exciting when that happens. And so that's where we pause and put that on hold and come to what I believe is the real focus of chapter 10 in verse in the first part of 11 it is what the sons of ham this is an impressive list did you notice that as i read through the sons of ham chapter 10 that section there and into chapter 11 this is an impressive list list egyptians babylonians assyrians canaanites philistines everyone mentioned here who were the the powerful warrior nations of the earth the strong nations of the earth the most notable nations of the earth would come from here all of which were bitter enemies of israel weren't they all of which at some point throughout history became objects of God's wrath because they assaulted his nation. And boy, we can learn a lot from this this morning, but I always like to stand back from these genealogies and see that the Holy Spirit is focusing in on something. And when you read the genealogies, you can't help but see that he's telling you, I want you to look at one major figure here in this genealogy in the line of Ham, because that is where I want you to think for a minute. Who is it? Nimrod. Nimrod. Look at verse 8. Cush begot Nimrod. He began to be a mighty one on the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord. Therefore it is said, like Nimrod, the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, Erek, Akkad, Kalna, in the land of Shinar. Now, it's important to say that this is the first time the word kingdom is found in the Bible. The very first time. Here's the beginning of Nimrod's kingdom. Fascinating, isn't it, that the Scriptures phrase it this way? His kingdom was this. His kingdom was this. And you'll notice here that Moses describes him as a mighty hunter before the Lord. If you were to read Luther on that, he never believed that he was a mighty hunter of game and animals. He was a hunter of men. This was a mighty, mighty man. Whatever the case, he was known as a tyrant and a warrior in the earth. Everyone feared Nimrod. All the peoples of his day, there was no one like Nimrod on the face of the earth. Powerful. And you stop and you say, well, why is God telling us this here? Why is God showing us this? Well, the key to this this morning is to see that the beginning of his kingdom is Babel. Babel. And Revelation is going to pick up on this. This Babel, Babylon, which is where it would extend to, is all over the Bible. And the text is telling us something. I mean, we're looking at spiritual realities here. It's interesting that I notice when you come over to chapter 11 that we have this building of the Tower of Babel. It's really good when you come to Nimrod and it says his kingdom was the beginning. His beginning kingdom was that of Babel. You should interject the Tower of Babel event right there. Nimrod was the builder. And so notice in chapter 11 when we come to verse 1. Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, come, let us build a city and a tower with its top in the heavens. And here it is. and let us make a name for ourselves lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth. Now, I want you to keep in mind for a minute that the Lord said with Shem, my name's there. Shem means name. I am placing my name there. The name will come from there. And from him the Deliverer will come. And so here in contrast, notice what's happened here. Notice the contrast that is drawn out. From this mighty king, this mighty babble, comes a desire of them to make a name for themselves. And what does Nimrod's name mean? We shall rebel. Fascinating. What do they say? Lest we be scattered over the face of the earth, let us make a name for ourselves. We don't share this program of Shem. And so we read, just like Cain at the beginning, journeying from the east again. Remember, the story's now repeating itself. We're seeing this play out. Everything that's happened before is now happening again. The story's repeating. You had fall, you had blessings and curses, and now what's happening? They go out, they're building a city, just like Cain. And so, notice what this is inspired by. Shinar was the land of southern Mesopotamia, better known as the land of the Chaldeans, or later Babylon. And inspired by rebellion, they come together in an autonomous spirit, probably about 100 years after the flood, wanting to soar what is above, soar over what is being viewed as entrapment by God. now i suppose it's important to remind us in this place that god had just made a covenant of the bow remember and god set a bow in the sky and god had a gracious common grace covenant we call it that was made and he made promises that were remarkable that never again am i doing this again when man revolts never again there's going to be seed time and harvest there's going to be summer and winter. You're going to have seasons. I'm going to feed the earth. I'm not going to let the whole thing spin out, out of control, so that people are not fed and provided for. And I'm going to institute justice in the earth. I'm not going to let it turn lawless. And he instituted a death penalty, if you will. And he blessed advancement, cultural advancement, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth. Now, what spirit do you have here? Imagine the speech of Nimrod, if I could just think about it for a minute in terms of how he must have talked with his cabinet. That curse on Shem, I mean, that curse on us, that is a shame to our name. Who's Shem? We're going to make our own name in the earth. We are not servants of Shem. Remember it said, you will be a servant of Shem. We're not servants of Shem. We're not going to be servants of Him. You watch the fear I'm going to bring on this world. You watch the name I'm going to create for myself in this world. What would you call Him throughout history? How does the Bible designate somebody like this who assaults the name? He's an Antichrist. He's an Antichrist. and lo and behold they go and they build a city a center of rebellion against god and this would be the rival to the true city the city that has foundations whose builder and maker is who god not nimrod this is what babylon was throughout history this is what babylon represented throughout history it represented a competing city and so what did he construct it wasn't just some lofty tower it was an ancient staircase mountain called a ziggurat which was a massive solid brick structure that winded itself right up like a giant porch as high as they could go into the heavens boys and girls they tried to reach as high as they could with the building in the ancient world you discovered these a lot these other ziggurat structures one named larsa there was one called the house of the link between heaven and earth and they would have these great brick making ceremonies to pride in their accomplishments of what they had accomplished in the earth at babylon later their structure would be called the house of the foundation of earth and heaven now what's that trying to overcome at the top of these structures would be a shrine it was painted blue and it was a house for the gods to come down they would build it up and they would meet together so in a spirit of human autonomy they're trying to overcome the curse to get to god himself again and believe that they're powerful enough to accomplish it. This was Cain. They have gathered in revolt, and now it's worse than before. I mean, this is worse than Cain City. And the achievements, their abilities, their advancements, their technology had all divulged into turning into something that would defy the living God. In the ancient world, this was a common thought of the day, that you could become your own God. That's the spirit behind this. And you see this language in verse 4. Notice verse 4. Let us make a name for ourselves, lest... Notice how the defiance of God is right here. Lest we be scattered. What did God say? Fill the earth. No, we will not be scattered. They want an immortal name, and they want to be rulers of their own fate. They want to be their own gods and build a powerful city structure that idolizes them. Now, do we have this problem? That Titanic? Unsinkable. That thing can't go down. Did you know that? Where does it sit? You had ever told Moses, hey, Moses, one day we're going to fly up to the moon. We're going to go up to the moon. Now, what was the spirit behind that? We want to study God's creation. We want to show that nothing can be withheld from us. I mean, we could keep going with cloning and everything. The Spirit is everywhere. The Spirit is in us to some degree. The Spirit pushes in on us from this world. If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish what? Fill it in. Anything. You know how many times I've heard that in my short life? That's not true. I can't accomplish anything. But we believe that. We don't realize this, but that behind the kings and the kingdoms of this world, even though God uses them and God tells us to recognize that he rules through them to maintain justice, we need not forget, we can't forget that behind the kings and the kingdoms of this world, there is a spirit of Antichrist that is working itself out. And every spirit, Jesus said, that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world. That spirit, the stuff of the Antichrist, it's been here. It's been here a long time. And you've got to know what it looks like. You've got to know what it sounds like. Did you hear the spirit of Nimrod last week? I did. On the Lincoln Memorial, our leader stood up and said this. The March on Washington teaches us we're not trapped by the mistakes of our history. We are masters of our own fate, but it also teaches us that the promise of this nation will only be kept when we work together. And I believe that spirit is there, the truth force inside of each of us. That's where courage comes from. When we turn not from each other or on each other, but towards one another. Same spirit of Nimrod, gather. And we find that we do not walk alone. That's where courage comes from. Change has always been built on our willingness. We the people. That's the promise of tomorrow. That in the face of impossible odds, people who love their country can change it. That when millions of Americans of every race and every region, every faith and every station can join together in the spirit of brotherhood, then those, listen to this, listen to what he did, then those mountains will be made low and those rough places will be made plain and those crooked places, they're going to straighten out toward grace. Let me summarize. When we stop all the division, we can become masters of our fate. With the truth inside of us, inside of us, with the American spirit of brotherhood, we can make the mountains low. We can make the rough places plain. We can make the crooked places straight. Now, anyone who knows their Bible knows that that is said of who? Jesus. Isaiah says when He comes, every mountain is going and every hill shall be made low and the crooked place is made straight. And He will level the ways, make a highway for our God. There's only one name given that can accomplish that. In the language of Nebuchadnezzar, is not this my mighty kingdom which I have built by my power? And then He was eaten with the beasts, wasn't He? you know just to be fair this is not a foreign spirit to any of our leaders ronald reagan said the same thing the u.s is a shining city on a hill in my mind when i said that he said it was a tall proud city built on a rock stronger than the oceans teeming with peoples of all kinds living in harmony and peace strong and true on the granite ridge that's what nimrod could have said see i know this is hard because i've appreciated living in a country of freedom and i'm not about to trash that but i also think that i fall and pray many times to putting my trust in earthly leader and confidence in the princes of this world when that spirit is behind it and this is what the book of revelation had to come and say to christians who were really struggling with this to christians who were finally facing persecution and they had never known that and now they're facing persecution in the first century and they're saying we can't process this notice we're in a post-christian culture now we're not able to process this that's why the kingdom debate is running wild right now we don't know how to process a country that has turned post-christian on us and so revelation was given to unmask the lie i really think revelation has to be the moment to preach because it's just answering this dilemma and you had two options revelation says you could look at rome and you could look at look at it through the lens of its own ideology you know what rome called itself a city on seven hills so it claimed better than the u.s it offered you everything and and and revelation comes to us and it says, well, you can look at it that way, or you can look at it as God defines it. And the churches were struggling. They were getting sucked into its ideology. And if they fall into the path of Babylon, because that's the name represented, that's the name that comes up in Revelation to describe Rome, if they fall into the path of Babylon, or they began to think what was called as the Pax Romana, the peace of Rome, the Roman dream is what they called it. If that's what it was about they bought into the lie and that's why the united states borrowed it and called it the american dream based on the roman dream the pax romana promised you peace wealth health and prosperity and christians were struggling because all that was getting ripped away from them and they didn't know how to process it and they had to be told that they had a different home they had a city that has foundations and their kingdom with their king cannot be shaken and that's why when you go through roman history and you look at all of the caesars and all the lords they just kept getting toppled over toppled over toppled over toppled over and the lord wanted to announce through revelation your king is enthroned he's not going anywhere and he's got a kingdom and a city and guess what's around his throne a glassy sea there's not turbulence there and he's enthroned over it all and that's your city remember herod herod comes out one day and acts on a set day herod arrayed in royal apparel sat on his throne and gave an oration to them the people kept shouting the voice of a god and not a man then immediately the angel of the lord struck him because he did not give glory to god and he was eaten by worms and died not a good ending i could wish that every king would bow before the true king i wish every king on this earth would bow before the true king and i know that it's a danger when we see all of these things and we've experienced so much prosperity to confuse that with what the lord is doing and as the city light begins to go out and as the city on the hill isn't standing so high anymore what are we doing we're doing everything we can just to hold on to it. We'll spend money we don't have to keep it. We will do everything we can to remain as that city even when we can't. Knock down the trade center, it goes back up. And this is why there's never been a king or a kingdom throughout the whole history of the world that has ever stood throughout time. They come and they go. Not one kingdom has ever stood on top, neither will the United States. And that's what the Lord's telling us to encourage you. You don't belong to it. You're mine. And so in verse 11, or verse 5 of 11, he says, and the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the children of man had built, and the Lord said, behold, they are one people, and they all have one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do, and nothing they propose to do will now be impossible for them, come, let us go down. And there confuse their language so that they may not understand one another's speech. So the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth and they left off building the city. Therefore, its name was called Babel because the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there, the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth. Boys and girls, it went like this. Are these little specks building something to me? I'm going to get on my knees and look at this. Let's go down. They're saying, let's go up. How about we go down and look at this? And he looks at it and he holds the whole thing in derision. And what does the Lord say? If I let that go, if I let man do whatever he wants to do in the earth and just keep getting greater and greater and greater, you know what's going to happen? Such a false security is going to be built up that they will begin to think nothing they do can be withheld from them. In their own self-sufficiency, in their own unity, they're going to keep exalting themselves higher and higher and higher and higher. And I've got to stop that delusion. I'm going to kick that delusion back. They need to see their need for the name. The one who is given the name above every name. So God scatters them. And I'll close with this this morning. When you go back to the last son, Shem, in verse 10. Verse 14, actually, I want you to notice. to Eber were born two sons, and the name of the one was Peleg. For in his day, the earth was divided. God scattered them. But one name is mentioned in that line that should stand out, and it's Peleg. Why is Peleg important? Because right after the Babel event, he is about ready to talk about Peleg's line. He's about ready to talk about Eber's line, from which you probably get the word Hebrews. He's about ready to focus it now, history, on this one line. That's why we don't have the Bible telling us about all the histories of the nation. He's going to focus it on one line that travels through Abraham, that travels through Israel, that one day traveled through Bethlehem. And from there came one who was born of a woman, born under the law to redeem us from its curse. and then he rises on high and what is said of him at pentecost the barrier was taken away and all the apostles heard them speak in their own language the wonderful works of god god came down one more time in his son and he didn't scatter in judgment what has he done he didn't confuse he didn't divide he is invited to the ends of the earth healing the nations of that problem at babel he is provided so that all can come and that i can preach god's word to you today in the english language fulfilling the very word of isaiah in your hearing for behold darkness shall cover the earth and thick darkness the peoples but the lord will rise upon you and his glory will be seen in you and nations shall come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising. Lift up your eyes all around. I can do it right now and I see you. You brought your children from afar and it's happened. The coastlands are hoping in the Lord. Japheth has entered the tents of Shem and they've been made one. Haggai said, once more I'll shake heaven and earth, the sea and the dry land, I will shake all nations and they shall come not to Nimrod, but to the desire of the nations and I will fill my temple with glory. So in him, there's true peace. But the Lord told us in Revelation, Babylon, Babylon, alas, that great city is fallen. It's fallen. In one hour, its judgment came and so the lord is telling us here don't put your hope in princes don't put your confidence in the kings and kingdoms of this world judgment's coming but come to king jesus and what has he promised you he's something he's promised you something so much better he's promised you a kingdom that can never be toppled and when you enter those city gates could be tonight by death could be tomorrow if he comes he tells you i will dwell with you you're going to come to me and i will be your god and you will be my people and within my wall says the lord there will be peace there's going to be nothing anymore don't you feel it all pressing in on us right now it's all pressing in on us no more of it it's kept out of my city and when you enter my city There's no death, no sorrow, no crying. Nothing that offends could ever come in and disturb your hearts. I promise you that, says the Lord. And so the Spirit and the bride say, Come. Let him who hears, come. Let him who thirsts, come. Come to him, and you will enter the city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Let's pray. O Lord our God, we are grateful that you expose what needs to be exposed. And while we're thankful to have lived in a country, Lord, where we have freedom to worship you, we should never so let common grace obliterate the antithesis that is right before us that you are constantly showing us. And as these kings and kingdoms get worse and worse, running a cycle of iniquity, as we enter a time in our country even where it's turned on us as Christians, well, we pray then that your gospel light would go out and that you would gather together a multitude that no man can number. Until that time, give us boldness and confidence, keeping our eyes fixed upon you, Lord Jesus. Never taking those eyes off of you, trusting your promises, and remembering what you have said to us, our words of peace. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.