Outsiders Always Welcome

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Nancy Guthrie
Hey friends, I am so happy to be here in this room with you. And I’m so grateful to those who are not in the room with us, but are joining us via livestream. We love having you here with us too. So a number of years ago, I was speaking at a women’s retreat that was taking place at a camp in Texas. That was usually a youth camp. And I had had flight problems. And so I got there a little late. And when I got there, they said, Well, all of the women have gone out to get in line to ride the zipline. And so I went out. And you know, I wanted to make friends. And I wanted him to think I was really cool. And so I went out there just stand in line with them. And we’re chatting. And it was a really long line. And so stood there for about an hour watching these all these other people who were ahead of us ride the zipline because it was on this field, where there were two kinds of five storey towers, maybe on the end of, of maybe two football fields in between them. And then there were three long cables that ran in between these two five storey towers. And so we’re just standing there, and we’re watching all these women fly by, and they say so. So you’re gonna ride the zipline with us? And like, yeah, yeah, and but to be honest, I was kind of thinking, as we were inching closer, I thought, you know, I’ve been really nice to just like hanging around in line with everybody all this time, but I’m kind of afraid of heights. So I thought, you know, I’ll just stick with them till we get up there. And then I’ll say, see you guys at the other side. Okay. But I got there was in a conversation, we start going up the, you know, the five flights of stairs, I get about midway up, and I’m starting to think to myself, you know, I’ve been so nice to stay in line. I think maybe I’ll make my way down to the bottom now. But then I just kind of imagined a conversation I might overhear on the way down, where somebody says, who’s that girl going down the stairs. And they go, Well, that’s our speaker. She’s so lame. And so I thought, I think I’m gonna have to do this. And so I continued to climb. I got up there to the top. And like they had a one of those pieces of paper that seems to be from some health and safety regulatory agency that said that this thing had been checked over, that seems good. And I talked to the girl who was there kind of overseeing things and said, you know how long you’ve been doing this. And she’d been there all summer, no fatalities, that seemed good. And so then I had a decision to make. I had to decide if I was going to take the risks, putting my faith in those inspectors, and this right operator, and those belts, and harnesses and cables, and all that I had been witnessing of all these women who had glided through the air happily to the other side without incident before me. Well, in these days, we’ve been working through our ways through the old what the Old Testament has to reveal about salvation. And tonight, we are going to zoom in on the one story of someone who might have been the world’s most unlikely person to experience the salvation of God in her day. Tonight, we’re going to talk about a woman who took a far greater risk than riding a zipline, let me tell you, and she’s going to show us two important things about those who experience salvation. Number one, she is going to show us that salvation comes to those who risk everything on the Word of God being true. And secondly, salvation comes to those who rest completely in the mercy of God being shown. This woman we’re going to talk about she risked everything on the Word of God that she had heard being true. And she rested completely incompetent faith, that the mercy of God would be extended to her. And we’re going to see that the same things are true for us today. If we want to experience the salvation that God has made available to us. We We’re going to have to risk everything on the Word of God being true. And we’re going to have to rest completely on the mercy of God being extended to us believing that even though we don’t deserve it. In fact, we actually deserve to perish along with all who have set themselves against God. And yet we’re, we can rest completely in God’s promise of mercy. But before we get to this woman and her risky face, we need a little backstory that’s going to help us make more sense of what she says and what she does. So I’m gonna go way back to in the beginning, when God planted a garden, he placed the man and woman there who bore his glorious image in this atmosphere of blessing, we just get to Genesis chapter three. And we discovered that a curse has now infected all of creation. And we might conclude that this curse is going to define reality of life in this world forever. Until we get to Genesis chapter 12, where the promise of blessing breaks in, we read it in Genesis 12, where it says, Now the Lord said to Abram, go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house, to, to the land, to the land that I will show you and I will make you a great nation. And I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. And I’m going to bless those who bless you and Him who dishonors you, I will curse and in you. All the families of the earth shall be blessed. You know, I think sometimes because so much of the Old Testament that we read focuses on Abraham’s family and his descendants, we might be tempted to think that this blessing is just for are primarily for them. But actually from right here in the beginning, we are told that that is not the case. You see, Abraham’s family is actually intended to be the conduit of blessing to did you hear it, all the families of the earth. In other words, God’s salvation purposes, have never been limited to this one, the people group, God has always had a purpose at the very center of this people’s existence. And that is to make the salvation promises of God known to all people, in fact, to make the salvation of God, beautiful to all people urgence to all people. We read, so Abram went, as the Lord told him, and it says, At that time, the Canaanites were in the land. Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said to your offspring, I will give this lamb and then later, the promise was reiterated. But with an ominous prophecy included, we read in Genesis 15, then the Lord said to Abram, know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and there’ll be servants there. And they will be afflicted for 400 years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. And they’re going to come back here, this land in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete. So Abraham has told he’s going to have offspring who are going to leave this land that God has given to him, they’re going to go to a land where they’ll become servants. And we know this is exactly what happened when Jacob’s sons all went to Egypt, in the midst of the famine, and where they eventually became slaves of Pharaoh. But did you hear that this prophecy also tells us something else very significant. And that is that when Abraham’s descendants come back 400 years later to live in this land that God has given to them, they are going to be God’s instruments to execute his judgment upon the people living there, who have despoiled his land through their unbridled wickedness, which God can be patient with for only so long.

Now, you see when God spoke this prophecy to Abraham, the Eve All of the Amorites living in Canaan had not yet reached the point of deserving of liberating a little obliterating judgment. But one day it would. The day was going to come when Israel would drive out not innocent people who were being unjustly attacked and invaded no guilty people, fully deserving of the judgment of God delivered by the people of God. 400 years later, God’s promise of this land was reaffirmed to Moses when God called Moses to go to Egypt, and demand that Pharaoh released his people. Here’s what God told Moses. He says, I have come down, to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the parasites, the invite to the Jebusites. You see, these various tribes were squatters, interlopers on God’s land and God was about to evict them is either evil had become more and more egregious with every new generation, as they worship their false gods through shameful sexual practices, even by throwing some of their infant children into the fire in the worship of false gods. Now want you to imagine with me, if there was a country today, in which parents were routinely throwing their children into a fire pit, as a sacrifice to some imagine God. I mean, there would be constant coverage when they’re on every cable news channel. And celebrities will be lining up to demand that the United Nations put an end to this evil. But you see in the world at this time, no one was calling out for this evil to stop in this ancient setting, except for God, himself. In an age, when there was no worldwide cry for justice, God was about to use his people to put an end to this wickedness and this cruelty. Don’t think for a minute that what was about to happen to the Canaanites? was some kind of divinely sponsored genocide. No, it’s not. You see, this is divine justice. This is the just judgment of God, God had been giving them a 400 year long opportunity to turn away from their wickedness. And toward him, while his people were kept in slavery in Egypt. Moses led the people out of Egypt, across the Red Sea, and to the edge of the land that God had promised to give to them. Now, keep in mind, that God had told them repeatedly, you’ve heard several other times already, that he was going to give them the land. But they simply didn’t believe they just didn’t have the faith to believe what God had said, you see, they were unwilling to risk everything on what God had said, unwilling to risk that the word of God was true. And so rather than entering the land, that generation died off in the wilderness. So then we come to 40 years later, the next generation. They’re just outside the borders of Canaan, and they’re preparing to finally take possession of this land before they went over. God told them through his servant noses, he said, This day, I will begin to put the dread and fear of you on the peoples who are under the whole heaven, who shall hear that report of you. They’re going to tremble and be in anguish because of you. Well, we are about to meet some of the people who heard this report and they are trembling, in dread and fear and perhaps one reason they’re so afraid, is that the report that they have heard, includes the marching orders that have been given to the Israelites by God. Moses had told them when the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears the way many nations before you, then you must devote them to complete destruction. You shall make no covenant with them. And show no mercy to them. Complete destruction. Show no mercy. I’m just thinking of it. There’s the people, 2 million people strong, and they are headed in your direction with those marching orders. Well, that would be pretty terrifying, wouldn’t it? Well, we finally gotten up to the book of Joshua, will you open your Bibles if you haven’t already the book of Joshua. You open to Joshua one. When we read open it to Joshua one. We read that the Lord says to Joshua Moses successor, this is in Joshua Chapter One beginning of verse two. It’s right in the middle of verse two, it says, Arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people into the land that I am giving to them, to the people of Israel, every place that the soul of your foot will tread upon I have given to you, just as I promised Moses. So Joshua, he gives instructions to prepare for taking possession of the land in three days. And meanwhile, he picks out two trusted men that he’s going to send into Jericho to get a sense of what they should expect when they cross over. Turn to Joshua to look at the second part of verse one, it says about these two men and they went and came into the house of a prostitute, whose name was Rahab and lodged there. Well, this is interesting. These two emissaries they make their way to the place in town, it’s the kind of place where an outsider might go unnoticed. While gleaning some information about the city, they end up at the home or end of a prostitute named Rahab. But evidently, maybe they’re not the most skilled spies ever, because evidently, they’re immediately identified as men of Israel, who have come in to spy out the land. I mean, clearly, the people living in Jericho, they are aware of this huge camp of 2 million people across the Jordan River, and they’re aware of their intentions to begin taking possession of the land of Canaan, city by city, beginning with the first city they come to you when they cross over the river River, which is Jericho. I don’t know what it was, that gave them away. Maybe it’s those 40 year old slave wardrobe that they’re wearing. Maybe, maybe it’s they’ve got a funny accent. Maybe they got bad haircuts, I don’t know. Whatever it was, that gave them away. Apparently their presidents did not go unnoticed. In fact, news of their arrival has made all the way to the king of Jericho. And so he sends some men to Rahab verse three in chapter two, she said, bring it said to her bring out the men who have come to you who’ve entered your house, for they have come to search out all the land. Now think about this a minute. If she turned these two men over to the king, she’ll likely be rewarded. But if she hides them, she’s going to be committing treason against her country of Jericho and its king. And if she’s discovered she can be put to death. It’s at this point Rahab has a difficult decision to make.

And what she’s decided becomes clear by what she tells the king’s men now as I read it, if you’re inclined to count up re Habs falsehoods in her response, I’ll just tell you in advance I I count for all right so let’s listen. She says she Who the men came to me? True. But I didn’t know where they were from that’s alive. And when the gate was about to be closed at dark, the men went out. No, they didn’t. I do not know where the men went, Yes, she does. Pursue them quickly, for you will overtake them, no chance. She didn’t know where they’re from. She didn’t know where they went. But actually, the text doesn’t seem to want us to get all caught up in the issue of her lies. Suffice it to say that we can’t expect Rahab to have the full blown ethics that Israel has been called to in the 10 commandments. Instead, it seems that rather than focusing on the lie, the writer of the book of Joshua law wants us to focus on her action, and the truth that she proclaims. So first, we see her action in verse six. But she had brought them up to the roof and hit them with the stalks of flax that she had laid in order on the roof. What has she done, what she has done, is that she has risked everything. To hide these two Israelite scouts, she has committed treason, she is aiding and abetting the enemy that has come to destroy her people and society. Now, we don’t know yet why she has done this until we hear what she says to these two Israelites sweating it out underneath these heavy flat stalks on the roof. And it’s here we come to the center of the story. And it’s as if they’re here, this is here in the center. So it will shine a spotlight so we can see what is most important in this story, which is that we’re going to learn why Rahab has risked everything for these two Israelites why she was willing to deceive the king why she has essentially abandoned all allegiance to her people and thrown her lot in with the people of God. It’s because of what she knows. Based on what she’s heard, in verse nine, Rahab said to the men, I know I know that the Lord has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. So this word that God gave to His people, His promise that he was going to bless them by giving them the land of Canaan. Well, it’s clearly not a secret. The Canaanites know all about it. And evidently, they don’t think it’s some ridiculous rumor and worthy of an ounce of worry, they’re scared to death. The passage repeatedly tells us that they are melting away and all I can think of is the Wicked Witch of the North, right? In the Wizard of Oz. Remember this? She’s slowly disrupting into a heap of closing. I’m melting. I just have to say that I’m not sure it’s all that helpful to understand this passage, but Navion helps a little bit. Because fear has such a grip on these Canaanites that they have shut the gates. And they’re diligently watching out for spies. You see, evidently, they believe something that all those Israelites who are on the other side of the river are having a really hard time believing at this point. And that is that God is going to give them the land of the Canaanites and that the Canaanites aren’t simply going to be displaced rather they are going to be devoted to destruction. No person in the city from the king on down is going to survive when the Israelites show up and everyone is terrified. There’s something else they know. Look at verses 1011 Rahab tells us she says to the two spies for we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea. before, before you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites, who were beyond the Jordan to Sai Han and Og, whom you devoted to destruction. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted. And there was no spirit left in any man because of you, for the Lord, your God. He is God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath. They know exactly how those who have dared to set themselves against God and His people have fared in encounters in the past. They’ve heard how the entire Egyptian army was crushed under a wall of water. When God released the waters of the Red Sea on them. Maybe they saw the pictures in the Jericho chronicle of all of the dead Egyptians on the seashore. Maybe they’ve even heard that song that Israel sang. Once they were on the other side of the Red Sea. Maybe they heard it playing on the radio, and they realized that’s about us. Because here’s what the songs said, recorded back in Exodus 15. The song it saying the peoples have heard they tremble. All the inhabitants of Canaan have melted away, and the backup singers sing, or Milty were mill terror and dread fall upon him because of the greatness of your arm. The inhabitants of Jericho heard not only about what happened 40 years ago, they’ve heard about more recent battles, how the Israelites took the Ammonites city of Heshbon, when their king sai Han wouldn’t allow them to pass through. And they how they did the same when all the king of Buchon came against them. You know, Jericho is exactly right, to take stock of these reports and determine that they are up next. And that the outcome is likely going to be the same. So Rahab She not only heard though, what God had said, she heard and knows who God is, did you hear it? She says for the Lord, your God. That’s his personal name. Your wife. She knows he’s not just one of many gods that he’s the one true God who’s not just some local deity, but rather He’s the God over the realms of heaven, and the whole of the earth. You see, she understands that the most foolish thing that a person can do is to set themselves against this God, ignoring what he has said, and actually risking that what he has said is not true. Indeed, the inhabitants of Jericho they are melting away in fear and dread. And yet, they’re still thinking they’re if their intelligence is good enough, and if their walls are strong enough, and if their weapons are powerful enough, and their strategy is smart enough, that maybe they’ll be able to overcome the power of the God of heaven and earth. There’s your showing no interest in forsaking their false gods for the one true God. They intend to fight to the end even as they stand there trembling in their boots. Except for Rahab. Is the evidently the Word of God that reached Rahab ears? Yes, it did cause her heart to melt. But you see it did a much deeper work in rehab than merely making her afraid.

Because while the hearts of all of the rest of the people in Jericho melted into fear, Rahab’s heart melted into faith. She came to believe that Yahweh was going to give the land to his people something that people of Israel are having a hard time believing thing, and she wanted in on it, Rahab was willing to risk everything on the Word of God, what word God’s promise that he was going to give his people the land and he was going to defeat their enemies. She’s risking everything on that being true. And her belief translated into action, it provided the impetus for her to risk everything. Now, up to this point in the story of the Bible, the Canaanites have been presented to us as kind of one wicked monolith. And yet here, Joshua enables us to zoom in on one very real person. And we discover that perhaps not all of the Canaanites fit the profile. Perhaps not all of the Canaanites are destined for wrath. You see, Joshua is forcing us as readers to think very carefully about who can and who cannot belong to the people of God who can and cannot experience the salvation of God. You see, salvation comes not simply to all of those who know all of the right things about God, not simply to those who are born into a family of faith. It comes to those who have allowed the reality of God’s promised judgment and their recognition that they deserve nothing less than his judgment, to make them desperate to be a recipient of His mercy.

And I just got to ask you, have you ever become desperate to be a recipient of His mercy? Are you too intellectual for that? To sophisticate, maybe, to self assured before that it would seem that Rahab had not only heard what God had said about his intention to judge the Canaanites and give the land to his people. But I think she’s also heard what God has said about himself. The very first time he introduced anything about his personal nature to anyone. He said that he was abundance in mercy. And so she reached out to take a hold of that mercy, saying in verse 12, now then please swear to me by the Lord, that as I have dealt kindly with you, you also will deal kindly with my father’s house, and give me a sure sign that you will save alive. My father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them, and deliver our lives from death. So we have put all of her hope. She places all of her confidence in the mercy of God being available to anyone who is desperate enough to ask for it. Rahab has heard about God’s covenant promises to the descendants of Abraham. Maybe she also heard about Tamar. A Canaanite getting in on those promises. Maybe she’s heard about that mixed multitude that came out of Egypt with the Israelites, and they’re getting in on the promise of a home in Canaan. And she believes that God is abundant in mercy, and she wants in on it. And so she asks for a short sign, but it’s actually these two Israelites that asked her to display a sign. Look at verse 18, chapter two, behold, when we come into the land, you shall tie the scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down. And you shall gather into your house, your father and mother, your brothers and all your father’s household is given to verse 21. And she said, according to your words, so be it. Then she sent them away, and they departed. And she tied the scarlet cord in the window. I have to wonder, when these two spies, when they’re thinking of the way for her to mark herself, I have to wonder when they came up with this idea of the scarlet cord in the window, were they thinking about a time 40 years earlier, when God’s judgment was about to come down a time, when all who would be saved through the judgment would be saved, not through a scarlet cord hung in the window, but by blood painted around a doorway, blood that marked out a household for protection. In the judgment, is the this scarlet cord hanging out the window, it would mark out the home of Rahab as a zone of safety and protection. When judgment falls, in the midst of peril, there was a place of refuge. So we read that these spies they depart and they make their way back to the camp. And here’s what they report to Joshua, verse 23, truly, the Lord has given all the land into our hands. And also, all the inhabitants of the land melt away because of us. Now, I’m not sure if this was the intelligence that they expected to get on their adventure, into Jericho. But what they discovered there was indeed helpful to the Israelites. Because if these pagan Canaanites believed God was giving them the land, and if this Canaanite prostitute was willing to risk everything, because she believed God was giving them the land, that maybe they should believe it too. So they crossed over the Jordan, and they camped right outside of Jericho at Gilgal, where they set up 12 stones of remembrance to mark and remember God drying up the Jordan River for them to pass through the land. But we read in Joshua for turn there with me, we read that this marker was set up, it was meant to remind them of the purpose. I’ll say it again, the purpose for which God brought them out of Egypt, and is bringing them into the look with me and Joshua for 24. Here’s what this tower of stones is meant to remind them of, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever. So Joshua knows. And he wants the Israelites to remember that God is at work in them, and through them, and not just for them. But for all the peoples of the earth. We’ve seen now the face of one of these peoples of the earth re hab who clearly knows that the hand of the Lord is Mighty, and she has come to fear him. It’s a few days later that the Israelites begin to march around the city in silence for six days, I mean, if the hearts of the people inside the walls were melting away before, imagine how freaky this would be. As these armies marched around the city inside, it must have just only increased their sense of dread. And then came the seventh day when they heard the sound of a trumpet and people shouting. And as they stood on that wall, watching the wall of the city which was their pride and joy and their source of security, it simply crumbled down all around them. When we skip to chapter six, in verse 20, we read what happens it says, Then they devoted in all all in the city to destruction. Both men and women, young and old oxen, sheep, donkeys, with the edge of the sword. Verse 25, but Rahab the prostitute and her father’s household and all who belonged to her, Joshua, saved, alive, saved, alive. The judgment on the Canaanite city of Jericho was horrific, but someone was spared. And it wasn’t the most upstanding, the most impressive, the most religious, the most important person. It was the person who believed what God had said, and came under his promise of grace and mercy for undeserving sinners. You see, for anyone, in fact, everyone who seeks God’s mercy while it may be found, experiencing that mercy is not simply a possibility, it’s a certainty.

Unknown Speaker
There’s our wideness in God’s mercy, like the whiteness of see, there’s a kindness in his justice, which is more than liberty. For the love of God is broader than the measures of the mind. And the heart of the E turno. is most wonderfully calm.

Nancy Guthrie
No one in Jericho deserve to live. Yet your way, was pleased to show kindness to show mercy to one whose unworthiness underscored the riches of his grace Rahab, the ultimate outsider became an enduring part of the people of God. We see it there in chapter six, the second part of verse 25, it says, and she has lived in Israel to this day because she hid the messengers whom Joshua was sent to spy out Jericho. You see, it seems that Rahab was not just tolerated, not ostracized, rather, she was welcomed into the family of the people of God, even the royal family. Because you see, when we get to the New Testament, and read the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew one, we discover that Rahab married Salomon, and that Salomon was the son of nation, who numbers seven tells us was one of the 12 princes from the tribe of Judah, who brought gifts when the tabernacle was raised. So this prostitute, married a prince, and found a place in this royal family that Jesus was born into, in fact, in two places in the New Testament, she may have is the one who is presented to us as an example of what it looks like to live by faith, because she shows us that salvation comes to those who risk everything on the Word of God being true. And that salvation comes to those who rests completely on the mercy of God being shown. And if this is true, what does the word of God have to say to you and need today that we need to risk everything on? Well, the Old Testament it presents us with a series of judgment scenes judgment coming down like on in the form of rain on Noah, while Noah and his family are safe inside the ark. judgment coming down on Egypt with the Israelite families safe behind those blood brushed doorways. And now judgment coming down on Jericho with Rahab. safe inside the house marked with the scarlet cord. It intends for us to recognize these are precursors or previews of a great and final judgment that is yet to come. This great and final judgment is described for us in the Book of Revelation. And interestingly, when we get to Revelation chapter seven, we discover that trumpets will be blown just as they were in Jericho on that great and terrible day, when Christ comes again, all who have rejected Christ, shed blood and perfect righteousness, as their only hope, will suffer the same fate as those who lived in Jericho. rich and poor, great and small, young and old. We’ll face God’s fury. When the commander of the Lord’s armies the same one who led the armies of Israel to kill every inhabitant of Jericho will bring final and complete destruction on the city of man. But revelation also shows us a picture of those who hear what God has said and risked everything on it being true. We read several times that they are marked for protection. How are they marked? Revelation tells us the name of God has been written on their forehead. We read, therefore they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple. And he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence. Judgment is falling all around them and they’re protected. They’re safe. Just like right now, they’re going to be saved, alive. How is it that someone like Rahab saw someone like me, and dare I say someone like you can dare to believe that when judgment falls, we’ll find mercy instead of being devoted to destruction? Well, it’s only because Jesus was devoted to destruction in our place. You see, the full force of God’s judgment came down on him, and he was not delivered from death, he was not saved, alive. But instead, he bore the judgment that you and I deserve. You see, the only place to find safety in the certainty of God’s judgment is to flee to the place, or in reality to the person on whom judgment has already fallen. My friends, do not presume upon the mercy of God, take hold of it. risk everything on the promises of God being true, and that they are for you. No matter who you are, or what you’ve done, or who you slept with, or what family you were born into. May it be said of you. That light ray, have you at one time were separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and stranger to the covenants of this promise, having no hope, without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, You who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

So are you wondering whether or not I wrote that zip line? Well, I stood at the top of that five storey tower, looked at that piece of paper on the wall. Listen to the testimony of this girl operating the ride, I considered all of the women that I had seen glide happily from tower to tower. And I stepped into the harness. And I hooked those clips to the cables. And I came out and I sat down on the ledge. And the girl said, Okay, I’m going to count to three. And you’re going to push off. And she counted 123. And I pushed off, screaming bloody murder. But my screams quickly turned to squeals of laughter It was so much fun. I would have done it again. But the line was just way too long. Now, you know, what I could have done was just stayed down there, the bottom of the tower watching all of those women push off, perhaps even saying, Yeah, I believe those cables would hold me and yet never pushing off myself. And you know, I think that’s what many many people do in regard to faith. They hang around in places where lots of other people are living by faith, but they never push off in the life of faith for themselves. They never go I’m to the place that they risked everything on the Word of God being true. They’re never willing to put the full weight of their past and present and future on the mercy of God being extended to them. My friend, won’t you hear what God has said about his certain judgment as well as his abundant mercy? And won’t you risk everything on it being true? Won’t you take hold of the Mercy that’s been made available to you in the person and work of Jesus Christ, and rest in the confidence that you will be saved? Alive. You know, when I pushed off the ledge of that tower, I had a death grip on the cords that attached me the cable, I was holding on to it. Like it was up to me to stay tethered to that line. But I actually quickly discovered that actually, it wasn’t up to me to hold on that harness. And those belts and cables, they had me in their grip. And similarly, we push off in the life of faith, taking hold of the Mercy of Jesus Christ, like it is up to us to hold on, only to discover that he has taken hold of us, and that he is holding us and he is projecting us. Indeed, he will get us safely to the other side, where we will be saved. Let’s pray.

Lord, we are so grateful that you have spoken. We have your word set before us. We’ve got it on our phones, and we’ve got it on our shelves. We’ve got it in our bag, we’ve got it everywhere. And we realized the question of our lives is are we willing to risk everything on what you said in your word being true. Lord, would you give us the gift of faith to believe? Would you give us the courage to push off and then to live out our days, continually continuing to relish your word and continuing to live, resting completely in the mercy of God that has been extended to us. Lord, we don’t want to simply look back at that one time in our lives when we took hold of your mercy. No, no, no. We need your mercy. Your mercy is what has saved us. It’s what is saving is us. It’s what will save us in the final and complete way so we are not letting go of your mercy. No. We’ve grabbed hold of it gratefully knowing that because we have you have taken hold of us and you will get us safely to the other side, where we will be saved alive in your presence forevermore. Amen.