[0:00] You'll get very far without my notes. Thank you very much. What a song to stir your soul.
[0:15] It's important to keep that in mind as we go through this. And we wrestle with where we are in the timeline of God's redemptive plan. Let me again read the parable itself.
[0:42] Jesus said, The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away.
[0:54] So when the plants came up and bore grain, the weeds appeared also. The servants of the master of the house came and said to him, Master, did you not sow good seed in your field?
[1:07] How then does it have weeds? He said to them, An enemy has done this. So the servants said to him, Then do you want us to go and gather them? But he said, No, less than gathering the weeds, you root up the wheat also along with them.
[1:22] Let both grow together until the harvest. And at harvest time, I'll tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned. But gather the wheat into my barn.
[1:37] Well, I like to have a garden. I've been enjoying the past four years. We've been staying at my dad's house and we've got a garden. I like having a garden. If you've got a garden, maybe you know what I mean.
[1:47] If you went through 2020 without a garden, then you probably know what I mean as well. I like having a garden. But I'm not a keen gardener.
[1:58] I like having grass. Real grass. But I don't always like cutting it. It's a hassle. There's always been moss in our garden.
[2:11] A few dandelions here and there, some daisies and clovers. And there's this big increase of these broadleaf plantain weeds that have been happening. It's just, they're a real eyesore.
[2:23] One of the other things, we had this bit at the front of the window, the front garden, that we kind of dug out and stuff.
[2:35] And we thought about getting some bark or some stones or something like that. And we just thought, maybe we should put some weed killer down or something.
[2:47] Don't know. We kind of dug it down pretty much. And then we put some stuff down and put some bark down. And I made a bet with Jen. I made a deal with Jen.
[3:00] We had this kind of disagreement as to how persistent weeds are. And Jen said, if there are more than 10 weeds that pop up through this, I will buy you a pizza.
[3:14] If there are less than 10 weeds, you need to buy me a pizza. If you've had any experience with a garden, you'll know who had to buy who a pizza. Because weeds just persist.
[3:28] I was thinking about this with this parable. And I was thinking there are three things in particular that frustrate me. And if you've ever had a garden, if you've ever had to deal with weeds, you'll appreciate these three things.
[3:41] So these are the three things that frustrate me about these weeds. Number one, I do not know where they come from. I don't know. Number two, I don't know why they persist.
[3:55] And number three, I just do not know how to get rid of them. I don't know. Now, regardless of what you believe in this life, those are three universally experienced frustrations of everyone on this planet with regards to sin and evil.
[4:11] We all see and feel the effects of evil in this world. We are all living in the same field together. And in this field, there are good plants and poisonous weeds.
[4:23] And so before we get to who does what and why, we need to recognize the reality we live in. We can all enjoy the presence of wheat in the field. And we can all be frustrated by the presence of weeds.
[4:38] Wheat is good for food. Darnell, which was likely the weed in question, darnell is poisonous. It's a kind of false wheat.
[4:49] It looks like wheat, but it's actually poisonous. In ancient times, it was called the plant of frenzy. And it comes from the Latin word for intoxicating drink.
[5:02] It's a problem because of how deceivingly similar it looks to wheat. Yet while wheat is good for us, darnell is not good for us. Almost every morning, Ezra, my youngest son, enjoys a bowl of Weetabix.
[5:18] It does him good. But if I gave him a bowl of Darnellibix, it would do him harm. You see, some people, some people in this life do us good.
[5:30] And other people do us harm. And more properly, what Jesus is saying in this parable is there are only really two types of plants in his field. There are only two types of plants.
[5:42] Because there are only two kingdoms. That's the reality. There are only two kingdoms. There is the kingdom of light and the kingdom of darkness. The kingdom of God and the kingdom of his enemy.
[5:54] And while we see degrees of good and evil in different people, throughout human history, people have either fallen on one side or the other. People have either turned toward God or they have turned away from God.
[6:08] People either grow in the field according to the purpose of the farmer, or they are working against the farmer's purposes. That's the reality of it.
[6:18] While we see degrees of good and bad, people are either growing according to the farmer's purpose or against the farmer's purpose. And so wheat and tares, it might not be evident for a large part of growth.
[6:32] Who is who? But in the end, when the fruit comes to ripen and bud, it will be evident whether they are righteous or not. So, just as I mentioned the three things that frustrate me about weeds in the garden, I don't know how they got there.
[6:50] I don't know why they persist, and I don't know how to get rid of them. They are like the three things that frustrate people in this world we live in about evil. Where did evil come from?
[7:01] Secondly, why does evil persist? And thirdly, how can we eradicate the world from evil? Well, the disciples, when asking about this parable, recognize that it's about weeds when they name the parable, tell us about the parable of the weeds of the field.
[7:23] And so we're going to look at this through these three frustrations. Number one, the origin of evil. Number two, the persistence of evil. And number three, the eradication of evil.
[7:39] Now, when Jesus goes through this parable, it sounds a lot like Genesis 1 to 3. If you're familiar with Genesis, it begins with a man and his field, just like God and his world.
[7:52] The man sowed good seed, just as in Genesis, everything God puts in his world is good. Yet there is another who comes in, an enemy. In the parable, Jesus says, his enemy came.
[8:10] There is an enemy that comes and does what is contrary to good, just like the serpent in Genesis. And then we read in Genesis that there will be enmity between the offspring of the woman and the offspring of the servant, and the seed of the serpent and the seed of the women.
[8:26] This is the wheat and tares growing together, the seed of the serpent and the seed of the women, people of the kingdom and people of the evil one. And so when answering where these weeds come from, where does evil come from, Jesus is telling us that the presence of weeds in his field is not because of the field owner.
[8:48] Evil does not come from God. It's not because of the field itself. It's not like there was some flaw in God's creation. And it's not because of the seeds that he sowed.
[9:02] God is not the author of sin and evil. And it's not inherent in the world that he made. Neither is it inherent in the things that he put in the world when he placed all the things that he placed, including mankind, in the world.
[9:19] Evil is not inherent to humanity in the beginning. Even though it is now infected, it's not inherent. Yet even when these weeds in the field, it is still his field.
[9:34] We must remember that. We live in this world. We know that there's evil in this world. It is still his world. It is still his field, and he is still good.
[9:46] Some people think that the problem of evil is evidence that there's no God. After all, why would a good God allow evil in his world? Either he is good but powerless, or powerful but not very good, as the argument they give.
[10:00] But Jesus gives another perspective. Evil is not evidence that there is no God. Evil is evidence that God has an enemy. That's what it is. The origin of evil is the evil one, God's enemy, the devil, the one who sowed the seeds of sin and evil into God's good world.
[10:18] Nevertheless, it's still his world, and he is in control. Now, this is a parable about the kingdom of heaven. That's what Jesus came proclaiming.
[10:29] He's talking about people who have certain expectations in their minds about how the kingdom will come. What will it be like? What will the arrival of the Messiah be like?
[10:42] And so Jesus is telling these parables in Matthew to help people understand aspects of the kingdom that they were not expecting. So the Jewish people, they would be familiar with Psalm chapter 2.
[10:56] Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? They set themselves against the Lord and his anointed. The Jews would have been familiar with that. It's about the Messiah, that Psalm.
[11:09] Yet what they wouldn't be expecting is for the people of Israel to be among that group of people plotting against the Lord and his anointed.
[11:20] They wouldn't have expected that. Acts chapter 4 concludes that that's what happened. Acts chapter 4, they're praying and they quote this Psalm and they say that is what happened.
[11:32] The Gentiles and the Jews. Pilate and Herod. You see, what this parable highlights is that evil is not merely generic in this world.
[11:45] Evil isn't just, the evil one isn't just randomly up to no good. He's specifically trying to thwart the work of Jesus. That's what he's out for.
[11:57] He's not just up to no good because he's got a grudge against you. He's got a grudge against Jesus. The devil isn't the enemy of mankind. He's the enemy of Jesus. All his schemes in the world aren't just to upset human progress.
[12:13] They're all aimed at Jesus and his purpose for the world. They're all aimed at the Lord and his Messiah. Think about that.
[12:23] It's not the name and work of Jesus more than any other, the most persecuted and offended in the world. people can generally believe in and talk about God, but to follow Jesus, to carry the name of Christ, as soon as you mention Jesus, you probably know the flack that you get.
[12:42] We can all agree on God if God is just some ambiguous, shared deity. But as soon as we narrow it down to Jesus, people have a problem with that.
[12:53] And the reason why people have a problem with that is because the devil has a problem with that. People have a real problem with Jesus. The evil one, specifically the enemy of Jesus, surely that's been evident over the past 2,000 years.
[13:10] Yet another aspect that's overlooked is that every form of evil, every form of evil is an attack on Jesus. Every form of evil. The things that degrade and destroy humans, all these things are designed to thwart the purpose of Jesus, to thwart his design, his good purposes for creation and recreation.
[13:37] Even this, you know, whatever it is, choose what it is. It's like things going on in Israel. Welcome to the club. It was that man rightly said. Welcome to the club, Hamas.
[13:48] You're standing in a long line of people who have tried to attack God's purposes for the world and for his people. And people have a real problem with the word hell.
[14:01] The fiery furnace. I said it right there. I struggle with that word fiery. As soon as I see it on the page, I'm like, fiery? The fiery furnace. People struggle with that word hell and what they think it is.
[14:14] It's not a popular word in our culture and our day. People have a real problem with this idea that they have. And it's their idea that God is somehow unjustly sending decent people to hell.
[14:27] If that's what you think God is doing, then you've misunderstood evil and you've misunderstood God. Seeing what the origin and purpose of evil is helps us to see that if there are people in hell in the end, then it's not by the design and purpose of God.
[14:42] It's the design and purpose of the evil one. You see, the weeds that were planted in the field are burned because the evil one planted them in the field. It's the evil one that causes people to go to hell.
[14:59] And we'll get to the reason why they're there in the end. But it's about this. You know, Jesus loads this parable with ancient truths and divine insight that help us understand reality in a greater light.
[15:17] When you're frustrated with evil, all the evil that you see and experience in the world and it is frustrating, it is frustrating, remember that the origin of it is the evil one, not God, not the Son of Man.
[15:33] Evil is from the evil one. Remember that he is an unrelenting enemy of the Lord who sows weeds with the intention of hindering and harming the Lord's purposes for his field and for his harvest.
[15:49] It's not random. Humans aren't really the intended victims. It's an effort to harm and hinder Christ. But remember that despite all of that, the field is still the Lord's.
[16:02] Trust that he is still good. Know that he is not unaware of this. Trust that he is still in control. When you look at the parable and what Jesus says about how the man responds to this, he has more interest in what is going on in his field than any of us do.
[16:21] Jesus has more interest in what is going on in his field than any of us could possibly realize. When we get up in arms about the evil that we see, the weeds in the world, and we think that God is not doing anything, know that he is fully aware and he is more invested than any of us.
[16:42] He's more invested than we could possibly understand. One day it will be clear. Number two, the persistence of evil. The strange thing in the parable is not just the existence of weeds among the weak, but it's the persistence.
[16:55] The expectation of the kingdom was that when the Son of Man came, evil would be dealt with immediately. Surely if Jesus is the Christ, he would put things right.
[17:09] Surely he would deal with our pesky Roman oppressors, thought the Jews. Surely he will weed out the undeserving ones right now.
[17:19] We will even help. We will help the Messiah by calling fire down from heaven, says the sons of thunder, James and John. Even post-resurrection in Luke chapter 24, the lost hope is about redeeming Israel.
[17:37] We thought that he was the one who would restore Israel. In Acts chapter 1, the question is about, is now the time you're going to restore the kingdom of Israel?
[17:47] But again, what is the expectation? What's the expectation that they have about how the kingdom comes and how the king deals with this problem?
[18:00] Do they think that evil only exists outside of Israel? Somewhere out there? Like there, the wheat, and the world is the weeds. When Jesus came, he pulled that rug from under their feet and said, that's not so.
[18:15] No, that is not so. But do we ever think the same? Do we ever think, yeah, we are the church. We are the wheat and the evil is out there.
[18:30] And more personally, I think Jesus getting to the heart of it is saying, what about you individually? Do you just think that evil is somewhere out there and that there's not a trace of it in your heart, in your own heart?
[18:42] He who has ears, let him hear, it says Jesus. Two thousand years on and evil still persists.
[18:54] What did the advent of the Messiah actually do? Do we need a better interpretation of what was meant in Matthew 3 when Jesus started saying, the kingdom of heaven is at hand?
[19:05] The experience of the work of Jesus on earth and then the experience of his continued work from heaven doesn't give us the impression that he doesn't reign or that he isn't subduing his enemies.
[19:18] Yet we also know that there are many aspects and prophecies about his kingdom that are not our present experience. This is one of the big sticking points in Israel is that the Messiah will usher in the messianic age of peace and yet, boy, are we not experiencing peace.
[19:38] And so the question is Jesus really the Messiah? We have this expectation and things aren't happening yet. Jesus brought his kingdom to earth through his presence and through his work yet it was not brought fully.
[19:53] Likewise, Jesus' kingdom is brought to the ends of the earth through his disciples everywhere, even Bell's Hill, yet it's not brought fully. The kingdom is both now and not yet.
[20:07] But why is it this way? Are you not just fed up sometimes with the persistence of evil? Are you not just at the point of being wearied and praying, come Lord Jesus?
[20:20] I know I've felt like that before. Do you not just feel like if you believe, if you are one of the sons or daughters of the kingdom, then, then, why do we need to remain here?
[20:33] Can he not just take us? Do you not just want to be away from all this? And another reason that you probably feel, if you feel like me, where you want to be away from all this, because it's not just the evil in the world, but it's the sin that clings to us.
[20:54] Do you not want to be away from that? I want to be away from the things that cling to me, a sinful and anxious mind. I want to be away from a body that's deteriorating, a world that's filled with darkness.
[21:13] Do you not just want to be away from it all and safe from it all? Why does it seem like there's such a delay in dealing with evil? Pull the weeds out.
[21:23] As time passes, it seems like delaying just gives more opportunity for weeds to arise, more opportunity for greater evils to happen.
[21:35] Why doesn't the Lord bring an end to it just now? Well, what we learn from this parable is important. It's not because he is powerless. He's powerful.
[21:49] It's not because he isn't good. He is good. It's not because the world is no longer his. The field is his. It's not because he is no longer in control of his field.
[22:02] He is in control. The field is still his. He is still good. He is still in control. This is clear because in the parable there's an opportunity to remove the weeds.
[22:16] It's his field. He has workers. They have identified the weeds. He only had to say the word and they could be ripped out. But he didn't say the word.
[22:28] So why does evil persist? Well, here's the answer. Because tearing the weeds out too soon could damage the wheat and affect the harvest.
[22:39] And he cares more about the wheat and the harvest than he does about the weeds. You need to know that when you experience evil. When you feel it pressing in, know that pulling it out too soon could damage you.
[22:55] There is a time to grow and there is a time to weed. We must remember two things when we're disheartened about the persistence of evil. Firstly, contrary to how it may look or feel, allowing evil to persist for a time actually does less damage than if it were uprooted prematurely.
[23:15] It does less damage. We see it and we see the damage it does and we think, how? Why, oh Lord? But it actually does less damage than if it were uprooted prematurely.
[23:27] And secondly, allowing evil to persist for a time actually doesn't hinder the purpose of the Lord for the wheat reaching the harvest.
[23:38] It doesn't hinder growth. God's purposes for you are not hindered one bit by evil. They're not. All the things that we struggle with when we feel weak, when we feel powerless, when we feel like we're falling apart, it doesn't hinder the Lord's purposes one bit.
[24:04] Please know that. If you love and follow Jesus, then evil will neither do more damage to you nor prevent you from reaching the harvest. He cares about you more than you could ever know and anything He allows you to go through is actually less harmful to you in the end than if He uprooted these things prematurely.
[24:26] His concern is your salvation. He is concerned that your salvation reaches fruition. The one who started a good work in you will bring it to fruition.
[24:39] And ripping things up prematurely might hinder that. And so He's not going to do it. Anything He allows to persist is because it would damage you. And He wants your salvation to reach fruition.
[24:51] He will deal with it at the proper time. But that time is not now when you are still growing and it could damage you. Me and you are still growing. There is a time to grow.
[25:02] And there is a time to weed. We cannot merely say that the wheat are the people in the church either. The weeds are the people in the world. The field in this parable is the world.
[25:14] And so the mix of wheat and tares is absolutely everywhere, in every corner. There will be tares in the church and wheat in the world. So Jesus' question is, who are you?
[25:25] Who are you in the mix of this? How do you respond? What do you really think of Jesus? How do you really respond to evil? Are you harming other wheat?
[25:38] Or are you helping them grow? Are you helping or hindering the purposes of the field owner? Because it's not really our concern who other people are.
[25:48] Jesus was constantly pressing on this when everyone was pointing the finger at someone else. But it's not our concern who other people are. Our concern are who we are. And this is why Jesus in the end of this said, whoever has ears, let him hear.
[26:05] It's not always helpful to label people. It's not our place to go about and try and identify the wheat and tares. It's certainly not our place to separate wheat from tares.
[26:17] Second Temple Israel became so strict with their laws. Second Temple Israel became so strict with their laws about cleanliness, holiness, Sabbath, separating from the non-Jews and everything that would make them unclean.
[26:37] They became incredibly strict about separating themselves from anything evil out there. And yet all the while, when they put up these fences, they didn't realize that Satan was in their midst.
[26:49] You know, they just thought, we'll put up fences. We'll keep it all out there. And Jesus says, well, you've got a problem because it's in here. They had so many fences to keep the world out, yet the devil was in their midst.
[27:05] Right in the Sanhedrin. Right among their rulers. Among their people. It's not our place to try and separate. It's not our place to try and uproot the tares.
[27:16] We do not have the insight. We don't have the insight to know that. And if we were to do that, we wouldn't have the New Testament. We wouldn't have half the New Testament.
[27:28] Think about that. Certainly we know that we wouldn't have half the New Testament if it was our place to pull out the tares. Because people would have pulled out Paul ages ago. Think about that.
[27:40] Like he was running about trying to put the Christians in jail and kill them. everyone would have said, nah, he's a weed and he needs burned.
[27:54] And yet, isn't it wonderful what the Lord can do? And Paul says that he did that for the worst of sinners as an example that he can do it for any one of us.
[28:08] You're never too far. Never too far. See, allowing a time to grow means that he can allow a time to work on some people so that in the end they are wheat and not weeds.
[28:25] And I'm grateful that God did that for me. It's not our place. Who would have thought that Paul would be wheat in the end? No one. No one would have thought that Paul would have been wheat in the end.
[28:38] Who would have thought that you and I would have been wheat in the end? I know some people from my past that wouldn't have thought that I would. I dare say that there will be people that you think are wheat who turn out to be tares.
[28:53] And there will be people that we think are tares who turn out to be wheat. And so isn't it evident that the Lord cares for the wheat? When you think of people who would have been weeded out long before they ever followed Jesus, Peter said in his second letter, the Lord is not slow to fulfill his promises some count slowness, he's patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.
[29:20] It's not just that he's patiently waiting on others to believe, while you are over here, believing yet being subject to evil and hardship. This parable tells us that he cares for all the wheat, every stock of wheat he cares for, particularly those who are in close proximity to the weeds.
[29:42] And so when you feel most entangled with evil around about you, when you feel particularly pressed in, know that he cares about you when you ask why it persists.
[29:54] Know that if it does persist, it's only because it is so entangled that to pull it out prematurely would do you more damage. When you are disheartened, know that he cares. And Peter says, cast all your anxieties on him because he cares for you.
[30:11] And if you don't yet follow Jesus, then see his great patience. See his grace. See that this delay to finally put away sin and evil is allowing us the opportunity to repent and turn to him.
[30:27] You have a time to escape the fiery furnace. Truly, you want to be weak in the end. Finally, point three, the eradication of evil.
[30:39] The parable concludes with a gloriously hopeful picture of how the kingdom will look in its fullness. Now, you might not think it's glorious when it talks about weeping and gnashing of teeth.
[30:50] I remember Mark telling me about this preacher preaching and somebody says, well, what if we don't have teeth? And the preacher says, teeth will be provided. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, but if that is what you focus on, then you missed the point.
[31:09] If you think that it's unfair that God would do this, right? You think it was unfair that God would put people somewhere where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth and a fiery furnace, then you underestimate just how terrible evil is.
[31:28] You underestimate just how destructive and continually destructive it ever will be unless it's dealt with. And you also underestimate how good God is and how faithful he is to his purpose and his promise.
[31:44] This parable is supposed to show us three things. It's supposed to show us the origin of evil. if this is his world. It's supposed to show us the persistence of evil if he is in control and finally the eradication of evil when his kingdom comes in its fullness.
[32:07] Let me assure you, there is no human government, no rulers on earth, no nation that have or can or will ever be able to eradicate evil.
[32:20] Sad, but true. No nation, no rulers, no government, no person on earth that has or can or ever will be able to eradicate evil in the end.
[32:33] It is only by the coming king. It is only by the Lord whose field it is and whose kingdom it is. We cannot even seem to deal with the problem, the problems that we can deal with.
[32:47] There are so many problems we can deal with. Poverty, hunger, homelessness, all these kind of things, so many evils that we could deal with if we really put our strength to it.
[33:02] Never mind the problems that we cannot deal with, like the problem of sin and death. Yet his kingdom has already been dealing with those things. When Jesus said the kingdom is in your midst, it's already at hand.
[33:16] know this, although it hasn't fully come yet, his kingdom has already been dealing with those things in the lives of those who are being saved. Is this not true?
[33:28] The problems of evil and sin and death, the problems of darkness, are they not already being dealt with in your life, in my life, and those who are being saved?
[33:40] And in the world, the ones pioneering at the forefront of things like health care and education and bringing goodness to society, pray for the good of your city, or the people of God, the people who trust in God.
[33:59] At the end of the age, his kingdom in its fullness will rightly and truly be completely void of any trace of sin or evil. Isn't that a glorious picture?
[34:12] You see, when Jesus says this at the end, he says, the Son of Man will send his angels and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers and throw them into the fiery furnace.
[34:24] In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, then the righteous ones, only then, the righteous ones will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father. The weeping and gnashing of teeth are not decent people.
[34:44] They're not decent men and women unfairly punished. The weeping and gnashing of teeth is everything that causes sin and all who do evil. The furnace is not for the wheat, it's for the weeds.
[35:01] The fire is for what the evil one planted, not what God planted. It's the design and purpose of the evil one that results in the furnace, but it has always been the design and purpose of the Lord for those who he planted to end up in the barn.
[35:20] That's God's purpose. That anything at all should end up in the furnace is not the Lord's design. But just as he protected the wheat, and believe me, he is protecting the wheat by not uprooting the weeds too soon, also he will protect the wheat in the barn by not allowing the poisonous Darnell seeds to mix with it in the barn.
[35:46] Do you see that? In this world, by allowing it to persist, he's protecting the wheat so that it ends up in harvest. And in the end, in his kingdom, the reason why there's a place called hell is because he needs to protect his kingdom and his wheat from anything that would be poisonous and damaging and destructive.
[36:10] Otherwise, we've just got this world on repeat forever. It's a glorious picture. The reason why there's a fiery furnace, the reason why there's a hell, the reason why there's the gnashing of teeth is because the evil one first planted weeds and because the kingdom must be free of any of that.
[36:28] Is that not the kingdom? Is that not what everyone wants? Is that not what you long for? Brothers and sisters, friends, that is where we're headed. We're headed toward a kingdom with zero trace of any sin, of any darkness, of any evil, of any death, of any destruction.
[36:48] You see, the seemingly sober ending of this parable is actually wonderfully encouraging and hugely hopeful if you understand that the separating and the judgment is the Lord's way of ensuring that his kingdom is completely free of any trace of sin and evil.
[37:07] And how glorious will it be if you trust in him, you will one day be able to say that there is no evil in our nation. There is no evil in our town.
[37:19] There is no evil in our street. There is no evil inside my house. You will even be able to say there is no evil in my heart. What a glorious day that will be.
[37:32] And that is why the Lord is doing what he's doing. You can trust that the Lord is good even when you see the existence of evil. It is only evidence that he has an enemy, yet he is protecting you.
[37:44] You can trust that the Lord is in control even when that persists. It is only because he cares for you not to be harmed but to reach the barn. And you can trust that the Lord will bring you safely into his barn.
[37:59] He will bring you safely into his kingdom and he will ensure that his kingdom is completely free from any trace of sin and evil. Amen. Let me pray.
[38:12] Our Heavenly Father, we thank you so much that you sent your Son to us and that you sent your Son to do what we could not do, to reveal what we could not understand, to show us who you are and what you are doing, and to save us.
[38:36] Lord, we pray that you would help us to trust in Jesus, that you would help us to trust when we are discouraged and disheartened by the evil around us and the evil within us, to know that you are protecting us, that you care for us more than we could possibly know, and that you are only allowing it to persist because it would do us more damage otherwise.
[39:01] Lord, help us to trust in Jesus, that he will get us safely into the kingdom, and that in his kingdom there will be no trace of evil at all, even in our own hearts.
[39:15] Lord, let us see that this time of waiting is a time of great grace and mercy, both for our salvation to come to fruition and for others to come to repentance.
[39:26] Lord, would you be glorified, and would you stir us to hope, in Jesus' name. of God, let us do attacks again, of evil at that over?
[39:40] And that will equip you to councils, and if we see that in our 30s, plus in every day, till the health of God, in part of the current salvation of all cand redistricted of virtue. If we simply are bleeding to just lets you onboard aøre your house?