Obedience Leads to Blessing

Exodus Week 2

So, one of the more perplexing, persistent, and vexing questions that we humans have, especially when there's challenging times, when there's difficulty, is, “Am I going to be okay? Am I going to have enough? Am I going to be able to take care of my family?”

And of course, when things get really bad, those things continue to happen in our mind.

And those questions that we have really show us that, deep down inside, we need something else, or maybe someone else, to give us that assurance. The way we live life on how we answer these fundamental questions of who's going to provide, who's going to take care of me, who's going to make sure that I'm okay — these are the questions that determine how we treat people, how we live, how we approach things, and all that. So, we're going to look, this weekend, at that question. We're going to look at that question of, “Who, ultimately, is going to be the one who takes care of me?”

I think we will be challenged as we go through that. So, hold that thought, and we’re going to get back to that in just a minute. But before we do, we are in a brand-new series that we started last weekend called “Exodus.” I sort of had this grand vision of being able to go back through the Old Testament, finding the story that some of us are familiar with, the story of the Exodus, but maybe aren't familiar with the nuance, the different contours, and all the different things that are going on. The different themes and the depths of that story. But to go back and sort look at that story in the Old Testament. And the reason that I wanted to do that is because throughout the Old Testament, especially when you get into the prophets and when you get into the New Testament, what you find is that this story of the Exodus is constantly being brought back up by not only the prophets in the Old Testament, but even people in the New Testament. This theme that is being reiterated over and over again, going back to the Exodus, is this: We tend to forget what God delivered us from, and what God delivered us for.

But I knew as a pastor — and I know how it is because most of us, if we're honest, don't know the Old Testament that well. And that's nobody’s fault. Nobody needs to feel bad. The name of our church is Grace Community Church. It’s not Guilt Community Church. So, I don't want you to go, “Oh, man. I feel bad that I didn't know the Old Testament. I didn't learn that part,” or whatever. That's okay, but I have a commitment to teaching all of scripture. I know that if we don't know the Old Testament, we're not going to know the New Testament very well. And here's what I know: It's hard to forget something that you don't know. So, when we go through the New Testament, and even in the Old Testament prophets, there's just the assumption that we know these stories. Well, we may not know them as well as we should, so we can't really get the impact that this particular line of thinking would give to you and I.

“Hey, I don't know what I was delivered from. I don't know what I was delivered for. So, I really can't forget that.”

So, what I want to do is I want to go back and look at those themes, and all of that stuff that's going on, so that we can listen to this. Because at the end of the day, when God delivered the children of Israel out of Egypt, He delivered them out of a whole sort of system, a whole empire of the way life was in Egypt. And in Egypt, what mattered was buildings, profits, and all of these things that many of us are aware of with any type of large empire. The empire didn't really care that much about people. They were just used to build, to store, and to do all the things that empires do. And God delivered His children out of that for a reason. He wanted them to know, “Hey, this is not the way we do it. We do it differently, as my people.”

And so, if we don't know what we were delivered from, there's no way that we can really hear the prophets, or even the New Testament, tell us to pay attention. You might just need to pay attention to what's going on in our lives, as followers of God. So, we want to look at what we've been delivered from, and we also want to look at what we were delivered for. And of course, last weekend, we talked about the fact that we were really delivered out of Egypt. We’re the people of God. We've been delivered by Jesus, we've been forgiven, we've been given eternal life so that we can extend the same grace, the same mercy, the same love that He's extended to you and me to others. We can reflect God to the world. And so, the New Testament writers and the Old Testament writers, and especially the prophets of the Old Testament, are constantly reminding the people of Israel, “You forgot. Don't you remember when you were in Egypt? Don't you remember how you were treated? Don't you remember what they did to you? Don't you remember how you felt? Don't you remember? You've forgotten it. Now you have power, now you have cities, now you have money, now you have stuff, and you're treating people the same way that you were treated.”

And this is one of the themes that runs all through scripture. So, if we don't know what we were delivered from, and we don't know what we were delivered for, we can't forget it, and we also can't really understand the depths of what a lot of scripture is telling us. Because here is the big idea that we're working through. This is what we're trying to understand. When we read scripture, when we go to scripture — I know many people we're taught that when you read scripture, you just memorize those scriptures so that you can blast the person at the water cooler at work who's not a Christian, and you can tell them how they're living wrong, and all this stuff.

“Here's the scripture here to tell them how this isn't right, that isn't right, and this isn't right.”

And when they looked at you, like, “Who cares?” you got mad. But why would they even care? They don't believe in God, so why are they going to believe God's book? You know? So, the real reason scripture was written to you, and I was for you and I to consistently and constantly be dealing with this question on our heart to let the scripture read us: Are we really living as the people of God?

In other words, have we taken the name of God in vain? To take the name of God in vain is not a word that we use as a cuss word or whatever else that we talk about. I promise you that English didn't exist back at the time that God was giving the Ten Commandments. So, that wasn't even a word, a phrase, or anything like that. Taking the name of the Lord in vain means that you have said, “I am a follower of God” or, back in the Old Testament, “I'm a follower of Yahweh,” and then not lived up to what that looked like. Scripture is constantly, when we open it up, saying, “This is the way it looks to be the people of God. This is the way it looks.”

So, we want to go back into this story, and we want to read it through the lens of the way it was written, what's going on, and to mine all of this stuff. We’re going to go through pretty much all of Exodus 1 this weekend. There'll be a couple verses, maybe, that we missed, but for the most part, we're going to work through all of that. So, we'll get out of here in about three hours, and life will be great. I'm just kidding. I'll get you out of here on time. But we're going to go through Exodus 1, and then we're going to really ask some questions. What does it mean to be the people of God?

So, to get to the book of Exodus, I need to take just a moment and put it in context to give us an idea of what we're doing. The first book of scripture, obviously, is Genesis. If you're new here, or if you have never been in church, if you go get a Bible, go to the table of contents and turn right, you'll be right there at Genesis. You'll be able to start. So, Genesis is sort of the start. Genesis starts with creation, and it ends with a coffin. It ends with Joseph being put in a coffin, dead. Which raises the question, what's going to go on? Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph. I mean, come on. Is there anybody next? Is the band over? What's going on?

And so, the book of Exodus starts, in the Hebrew language, with what, as we would use in our language, is the word “and.” It starts with, “And these are the names.”

The ancient scholars didn't call the book Exodus. That's a sort of Latin phrase, and it comes out of “to be removed.” But this Jewish scholars called this book “The Names.” These are the names. Why is that important? What's going on? But the “and” shows continuity with what came before. In other words, this story is continuing to move.

And so, we've had Joseph die. Since he's passed away, what's going to go on? How's this going to work? And so, when we come here to Exodus 1:6, we're told Joseph died. We knew that in Genesis 50, but it's picked up again.

“Then Joseph died, and all his brothers and all that generation.”

Well, that's a big deal because whenever you've gone somewhere where this person has been raised up to the right hand of Pharaoh, this person has been able to give you, as the people of God, grain, feed you, and all this stuff, and now he's no more, is it over? Many people would look at Christianity and say, “Well, it's driven by personalities, it's driven by people.”

And that's one of the questions that people will ask. You see it all the time, even with churches, like, “Well, what happens if this person's gone or that person's gone?”

Well, Christianity's not based on a person or a personality. Of course, it's based on a person named Jesus, but it's based on God and His promises. And, of course, Jesus is God. But the point is it's not based on people. It's not based on you or me or Joseph or Abraham or any of these people. It’s based on God. Which is why when Moses writes this, he says, “Joseph died, and all his brothers and all that generation,” and then what does he say?

He says, “But the people of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly.”

Literally, that is “they swarmed.”

“They multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them.”

Why does he say that? He says that because he wants you to know that God is not limited to a personality or to people. God keeps His promises. And even though Joseph has died, God has not stopping doing what He promised his people. They’re still being fruitful, they're still increasing greatly, and they're still multiplying because God always does what God says He will do. Always, in every way. Now, why is that important that Moses starts off and says, “Hey, God's keeping His promises? God's doing what He said He would do.”

Because see, he knows what you know, what I know, and what we all know. He knows that even though we know that God keeps His promises, and even though all of us would go, “Amen, Chip. He keeps His promises.”

Oftentimes in life, circumstances and situations come about, problems come about, evils come about, pain comes about, or calamities come about that make us question, “Is God really going to keep His promises?”

So, Moses says, “Hey, God keeps His promises,” because the very next verse is this sort of abrupt stop.

We're told, in Exodus 1:8, “Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.”

See, there'll always be difficulties in life. Is God going to keep His promises? Of course, he's going to keep his promises.

“Oh, no. It doesn't look like it now. This guy doesn't know Joseph.”

And honestly, when you're reading scripture, you shouldn't be reading scripture in any other way than, “Am I the people of God or am I like Pharaoh? Am I someone that doesn't really know my lineage? Do I not really know my history, as a believer? Do I not know much about anything?”

These questions arise. So, this Pharaoh, this king, has arisen, and he doesn't know Joseph. He doesn't know the story. He doesn't know how they got there. He doesn't know any of that. He doesn't care to know it. And he does what empires do. He looks out and he sees all of the people of Israel. They've come in Exodus 1. In the first couple of verses, there are about 70 of them that come, and now they're hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of men. And then there are other women and children, probably into the millions — two million. He looks out, and here's what he says. He says, “Man, these people are too many. They’re too mighty for us. There are a lot of people here. Man, we we're going to have to deal shrewdly here because if they multiply, if they continue to do this thing, if a war breaks out, we might have a war with some people that they know. And if they know those people, they could turn on us, and we would have a problem. And they might even escape. They might leave. I mean, who knows what could go on?”

See, that's what the empire's concerned about. The empire's concerned about keeping it going, making sure everything's good, making sure things are prosperous, making sure that everybody's got the provision that they need. And why is this a big deal? It's a big deal because, at this time, one in every three people that lived in Egypt were an immigrant. Pharoah goes, “Man, we got a problem. These people, they are not like — I mean, this is the way it is, man. If these people continue, we could have a problem here.”

Because the empire is concerned about the empire. It's not concerned about people. And we should read these stories, they should inform us, they should convict us, and they should push us.

What does it mean to be the people of God? We know what it's like to be Pharaoh. We know what it's like to be the empire. What does it mean to be the people of God? Well, Pharaoh has a two-stage plan to deal with his problem. The first thing he says, “Here's what we're going to do. We're going to put taskmaster over them to afflict them with heavy burdens. Makes sense. If they're worn out, they can't walk, and they just absolutely have no stamina whatsoever anymore, they're probably not going to fight us. So, work them hard.”

“They built for Pharaoh store, cities, Pithom and Raamses.”

We'll see here because this is one of those things that the prophets always say. Did you forget? Did you forget? Because Solomon, when we find Solomon in the book of Kings, we're going to find that Solomon is just like Pharaoh. He uses slaves to build things. And guess what he does? He has store cities as well.

What does it mean to be the people of God? What does it mean to be delivered from the empire? What does that mean? What does it mean to be the kingdom of God in this world? What does it mean to look like God in this world?

“But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad. And the Egyptians were in dread of the people of Israel.”

I want you to hear this because the empire has a way in which it thinks, and God has a completely different way in which He thinks. I hear people, all the time, going, “Oh, if we don't do something, we're going to lose everything. Everything's going to fall apart.”

That's empire thinking. I want you to listen to what the Word of God says. Let it pierce your heart. Hear God's Word because this is so counterintuitive to the way that we think. Listen here. The more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied. You cannot snuff out the people of God. No gate of hell, no tyrant, no anybody can keep God's people from doing what God has promised them that He will do for them. Period. We’ve got to draw strength from these texts. We’ve got to go, “That's right.”

We think, “Oh, goodness, man.”

We thought that way when Mao took over in China.

“Oh, they're arresting preachers and killing them. There's going to be no church.”

Until they found out there were 20 million underground. Because the more they're oppressed, the more they multiply. God's not going to give up on you or me as His children, no matter what comes, no matter what regime, no matter what Pharaoh, no matter anything. God is God, and He will take care of His people. Take joy in that.

So, they were in dread, and what did they do?

“So they ruthlessly made the people of Israel work as slaves.”

Well, the second plan for Pharaoh's solution was more insidious and more evil.

“Then the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah,” Who were the midwives? Midwives were usually women that didn't have families. Oftentimes, they were infertile. So, they would help women when they would have a child. They would be there to help deliver the child. Pharaoh calls in the Hebrew midwives, were told. Two of them, and we’re given their names. Shiphrah and Puah. He says, “Here's what I want you to do. When you see the Hebrew women on the birthstool, if it's a boy, kill him. If it's a daughter, let her live. I’ve got to deal with this. We’ve got to take care of ourselves. We’ve got to make sure. So, we’re going to work them hard so they can't, and we'll just get rid of the men as they come out.”

Which, if you're reading this, you should be going, “What do you do? So, we’ve got Shiphrah and Puah. They've been told by the leader to do this. What do you do? Does that make it right because the leader said that that's what you should do? What do you do? And it doesn't mention anybody else. Were there other midwives? Did they follow up?”

What the text is making you do is go, “What would you do? What does it mean to be the people of God? How should we act? What should we do?”

We're told in the text that they feared God. I'm going to tell you, as your pastor, listen to me. We need more people in our world, today, that will fear God. More than anything else.

“But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live.”

We're told here that he calls them in, and he's like, “Hey I'm not seeing a decrease. There are still dudes. Why have you done that? What have you done? Why'd you let them live?”

They say, “‘Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.’”

Now, many people read this, and they say, “Well, that's just a lie. These people lied to Pharaoh.”

No, not necessarily. Because what if Shiphrah and Puah decided to tell all the midwives, and as many women who were pregnant, “Listen to me, and listen to me well. Don't you dare call for a midwife until you have properly delivered. And that way, when we get there, we can't do anything about it.”

It doesn't mean that they lied here. They may have put together a plan in a way that they knew to make sure that they didn't do what Pharaoh asked them to do. This is just incredible.

“So God dealt well with the midwives.”

He'll always deal well with people to do what's right.

“And the people multiplied and grew very strong.”

This next passage is one of the most beautiful passages in all the Old Testament. When you understand the depth of it with the midwives. Look at this.

“And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families.”

He gave them children. It's beautiful. See, I'm telling you — we sang it last week. It's better Your way. It's better God's way. Do it God's way. But Pharaoh, what does he do? Well, he deputizes all of his people now, and he says, “Every son that's born — if you see a boy, if you hear a baby, if you go into their house and it's a little boy, take the boy from them, throw him in the Nile, and drown him. Daughters can live.”

This is the way Exodus 1 ends. What can we learn from this? What can we see from this story? How can we take this story and go, “What does it mean to be the people of God?”

Well, first of all, the people of God believe, in faith, that God is the God of history. We're not told, in Exodus 1, that God's doing this, God's doing that, and God's — we’re told what? People fear God. But God is a little silent here. But He’s not silent because, if you know, in Genesis, He told Abraham, “The people of God are going to be in Egypt for 400 years.”

So, it's like He knew this was going to happen. This isn't something that he said, “Oh, goodness gracious. How did this happen?”

What we say to this is that we believe, in faith, that God is sovereign. The text is pushing at you and I. It pushes at us a little bit to see if we really believe that God is sovereign. Because where was God when the new Pharaoh came to power? Why did You allow that to happen? Where was God when Pharaoh created the hardships of slavery? Where was He at? Did He go silent? Where was God when the children were being drowned in the Nile? Where are You at, God? Why are You allowing this?

Because see, the text is telling us God's either sovereign or He isn't. He’s either the God of history, in a way that is beyond our understanding, or He isn't. And let me tell you, as your pastor — I want you to hear me. If He’s not sovereign, if He’s not truly sovereign, then there's no way that there can be an assurance that somehow, some way, God is working things out. It would just all be random.

So, what I want to do, as your pastor, is I want to encourage you about the God you serve. I want you to listen to the text. Don't listen to me. Listen to the text of the Word of God, and you tell me if God is sovereign. Nowhere are we ever told in scripture that we have to understand God's sovereignty. We're told that we should embrace it, in faith, that He is the sovereign God of the universe. So, you tell me if God is the sovereign God of the universe.

Daniel. He removes kings and sets up kings. He does or He doesn't. He’s either sovereign or He isn't. He brings princes to nothing and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness. In fact, scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth when He blows on them and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stub.

Or how about Job?

“I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted.”

None. How about the book of Acts?

“For truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus,”

People made the choice. They gathered. They truly made the choice. It was their responsibility. They were not puppets. They made the choice to show up. Not only that, but who was it? Well, it was Herod, it was Pontius Pilate, it was the Gentiles, and the peoples of Israel.

“…to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.”

“Say what? I don't know. If God's sovereign…”

Let me tell you something. If God's not sovereign, then you really can't consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth being compared to the glory that's going to be revealed. If God is not sovereign, there can't be a glory on the other side that is beyond you. If God is not sovereign, we can't know. We can hope, we can pray, we can really just really put our passion to it. But Paul says, “We know that for those who love God, all things work together for good.”

See, this is where the sovereignty of God meets what we see. We trust that God is somehow moving this thing in the right direction. If God's not sovereign, we can't say, “I'm sure, I'm confident of this, that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Nothing can. Why? Because He is the God of history. And whether we understand how that works or not, it does not matter. He is the God of history. And if He’s not sovereign, then we cannot confess that there's going to be a holy city one day.

“…the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying: ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man, and He will dwell with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God.’”

Listen.

“‘He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,’”

Let me tell something. There's no way He can wipe away the tears unless what we learn because of what He was doing is so much better than the tears we cried in the moment that we realized He was doing something so grand, so beyond us, that it takes the tears away because He’s sovereign.

“‘And death will be no more and neither shall there be mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.’”

I'm going tell you exactly what Charles Spurgeon said, and it's absolutely the truth. When you're going through a trial, the sovereignty of God is the pillow upon which you lay your head. The people of God realized God is. I don't know how it works. It didn't seem like He was there, but He was because He told Abram, “There are going to be 400 years in Egypt. I'm doing something, I'm working something out. There's something that I'm doing.”

We don't have to understand it. But once you say that God is not a sovereign God, you have no assurance that there's glory on the other side of suffering. And I'm telling you, what gets the people of God through difficulty, what gets them through suffering, is knowing that on the other side of suffering, there is glory. And God promises that. And if He promises that, you can take it to the bank that He will do it.

Second thing: The people of God will have their names remembered. I grew up in Kentucky, and I'm not very tall. In fact, I was out last night at First Friday, and somebody walked up, and they were like, “Wow, you're a lot shorter in person.”

And I'm like, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow.”

But I remember that, growing up, I wanted to play basketball. It seemed like every time we would play basketball, I was one of the last two that would be picked. And honestly, my prayer, all I prayed, was, “Don't let be the last one. Just don’t let me be last,” because the last one is the one that was the last one. Just don't. And many times, I was the last one. I felt insignificant. I didn't feel like I had any value. It really bothered me in my life. I suspect many of you have probably felt unseen and unheard, at times. Not remembered, not thought about, or neglected. You didn't get invited. We've all had those issues. Sometimes we even have it from people in church.

But see, people of God, they're going to have their names remembered because, see, these are the names. Pharaoh's not named. Why? Because he's not the one that's going to be remembered. Whose names are mentioned? Shiphrah and Puah. Two women. I love what this writer says here. Who are the other ones? Miriam. It's all women at the first part of Exodus. It’s all women. Look at what this writer says.

“We should remember that these women did something for us. Because they rescued the babies, we'll be raised from the dead. How so? If you don't have these women, you don't have Moses, you don't have the Exodus, you don't have David, you don't have Mary, you don't have Jesus. The women are so important that Moses mentioned them by name, yet you don't see the name of Pharaoh anywhere in this text. Pharaohs wanted their names remembered. They built pyramids to be remembered, yet the only names remembered are those who feared God and protected life.”

Listen to me, God knows your name if you are one of His children, and He’s going to say one day, over you, your name.

“Well done, good and faithful servant.”

And do you know why I know He can tell you that? Because our “well done” and our “good” and our “faithfulness” is not based on how well we perform. It's based on the fact that God, in Christ, when we accepted Him as Lord and Savior, gave us His righteousness, He gave us His cleansing. And because of that, one day your name will be called out, and you won't be like Chip Bennett, sitting on the fence hoping maybe, just maybe, you might not be the last one. You will realize, in that day, that you are a child of the Most High God, and you matter massively.

Third. The people of God realize that obedience leads to blessing. I wish we could understand that it is just better to do it God's way. I've never been, in my lifetime — I can't say that it's not been in any historical time, but in my lifetime, I've never seen so many people just trying to just chuck the Word of God, and make it seem like whatever they want to make it seem like. Obedience leads to blessing. Because the midwives feared God, He gave them families.

I don't know how God will bless you, I don't know what He will do when you respond in obedience to Him, but I can tell you this: The writer of Hebrews says that we should believe that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. He does. He responds.

Last. This is so important. The people of God know that God will bring justice. We're unable, in our own humanity, to fully bring justice. We don't know the data points. We don't know all the background. We don't know all the stuff. We make judgments so fast, and then, three days later, we get new information. We go, “Oh, now the story's changed.”

We don't know, but God will. God will bring justice. I can assure you of that. Because we're told, “Every son that's born into the Hebrews, cast into the Nile, but let every daughter live.”

Listen to me, God remembers. God is a God of justice. The 10th plague wiped every first-born son from Egypt. And not only that, but all those kids that Pharaoh had cast into the Nile and drowned in the Nile, God drowned Pharaoh in the Red Sea. God doesn't forget. He is a God of justice. We're not the justice bringers. We are the people that reflect Him that. We do our best to shine the mercy, the love, the compassion, and all of those things. God is the one who will bring justice.

So, I asked you this question. When it's all said and done, when you're there by yourself, and all the calamities are going on, who's going to be the one that really provides for you? Who's going to be the one that really meets your needs? Well, we know. His name is Jireh. When Abraham took his son up and God provided him a ram, he named that place Jehovah Jireh, a place that God provided. These stories tell us. This is why God, when He took the children of Israel out of Egypt, the first place He took them was to the wilderness. Why did He do that? Because He needed to show them that He could provide for them. You can't be provided for in the wilderness. You die in the wilderness. God took them to the wilderness first because He knew they would never obey what He asked them to do if they didn't believe that He would provide for them.

And He will provide for you. You don't have to ask the question, “What's going to happen? Who's going to take care? Who's going to do this?”

I'm here to tell you, as the people of God, no matter what the world brings, no matter what goes on, nothing is going to separate you from the love of God, nothing is going to keep you from what God has for you, and I promise you, when it's all said and done, you will see that God provided every single step of the way because He is a God who promises that He will take care of His children.

And not only that, but I want to leave you with this. I want to encourage you with this. Many of you have heard this, but I want you to hear it again. I want you to feel this in your spirit. I want you to know this. In the world that we live in, with all the calamities, I want you to know this, as a child of God. We know that after David killed Goliath, there’s this obscure passage that says that he took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem. He severed the head and took it 18 miles to Jerusalem. Why'd he do that? Jerusalem wasn't his city, at the time. The Jebusites had it, so he couldn't go in. He took the head outside of the gates of Jerusalem.

. I think he took it because he knew that, “Hey, God just helped me slay this giant. God's going to help me take that city one day.”

He knew that. So, he took that head out there.

“This is the giant I just slayed. I'm going to slay another giant.”

He put that head on a stick, the birds ate it, and it just became a skull. He buried it in the ground, and it became his skull. I think he knew, “God’s going to give me Jerusalem one day.”

But when we get to the New Testament, when Jesus is crucified, He’s taken outside of the same walls. He's taken to a place called the Skull. It's probably not just circumstance. It's a place called Golgotha. You probably can hear “Goliath of Gath” in that. What if, just maybe, just maybe, where that skull was placed by David, that's the same exact place that Jesus was crucified? Which would mean that every single giant, every single problem, every single issue that you and I will ever face, He has already defeated.

And He has. So, we’re going to sing a song, and I want you to sing it. It's a new song. We've never done it here. Let's sing the song. I want you to sing it. I want you to allow it, in faith, to speak to you. I want it to encourage you. I want it to lift you up. I want you to walk out of here, and I want those watching on the internet — don’t tune out. I want you to go, “Man, God will provide. He's enough. He is good.”

I want to watch you skip as you go to your car, going, “Man, God is a good God.”

So, would you stand with me?