Jude 1:17-25 The Call to Persevere

Welcome to the podcast of Recast Church in Mattawan, Michigan. This is a sermon by Elder Zach Lloyd taken from the book of Jude. If you'd like more information about recast feel free to visit our website at www .recastchurch .com.

Here's Zach.

Have any of those at any time during the service help yourself. If you haven't been here before and you'd like to know more about recast. We have a website that you're welcome to find out about us, but we also send out a weekly email.

With the current events that are going on if you'd like to Receive those emails we send out one a week. There is a connection card in your worship folder. If you didn't get one of those you can get one at the door or on that black table or that table back there.

If you fill that out take a coffee cup and put your card in that black box. We'll be sure to email you each week that black box over there. Also we used to. If you desire to worship God through your ties and offerings you can put them there.

So You probably recognize I'm not Don feels like he's the normal preaching pastor each week him and Kyler were away this past. Kind of selfish. This is for me to be up here and I appreciate you guys. Just not really collectively sighing when you didn't see Don up here.

So I'm gonna do my best to preach God's words at least to his standard, but it's not to gloss over it. They were at a church planning assessment a sort of conference in Seattle, Washington and Recast the re we are recast is an acronym and the re is about Replicating and we want to be a replicating church.

We were planted five five and a half years ago Recast was and we want to we desire to continue to to do that to plant other churches to reach other Locally or could be distant to reach somebody that's not coming to recast.

So we would ask that you would be praying with us for that. Even this year we carved out part of our budget to bring someone on to do that to do just that and we're just desiring For God to provide that person.

So we don't know the who or the where or the wind but we know the how and it's through God and we're gonna be Praying for that that he would do that and we just ask you to join us in this. It's something that's in our on our front burner and we we want to make sure you guys are on board with us as well.

Jude as a Letter to the Church and a Call to Replication

I'm gonna be preaching from the book of Jude this morning. So if you have a Bible go ahead and turn to Jude. Jude is the well, I guess I'll just take opportunity. If you don't have a Bible go ahead and raise your hand and we can make sure you get a Bible.

I don't know if anybody's handing them out but they're over there on the table as well if somebody wants to maybe even Matt could help us out so we have a this Bible if you don't own a Bible you can go ahead and Thanks, Mark.

You can take this if you don't own a Bible, but we're gonna be in the book of Jude. Jude is on page 882. It's the last book right before Revelation. So if you get to the end turn back a little bit. So first, I guess it's been five summers in a row.

We've taken my family. Has taken a summer vacation and it's been the highlight of my summer is to go on these family vacations. We've been going to Gold Lake family camp. It's in Richland on Gold Lake and it's it's a unique opportunity for us to Be together as a family because they bring someone in to speak to the adults and I don't know five or six times during The week so we're encouraged spiritually while we're there as adults and they have counselors for the kids and the kids are being encouraged.

There's we're on jet or on tubing and we're ziplining or playing basketball and just doing all kinds of fun stuff that you know I I'm really not that excited about the winter. I reflect back on summer is already gone and I wish I was still back.

There's just a really sweet time for us. But this past year we were. They brought in they also bring in a missionary to present two or three times during the week and the missions. Organization they brought in this year was called kids alive and kids alive was sort of like compassion international if you're familiar with that group where they're really just trying to minister to presentations and one in particular struck me they were Taking our playground equipment and Sort of refurbishing it seems like I don't know since I've had kids it seems like there's so much these playgrounds have just flourished and They're enormous.

But they're taking in refurbishing them and setting them up in these third world countries where they don't have anything besides What appears to be dirt and they set this up for the kids and one of the videos it showed all these African kids all in their uniforms and and sort of the unveiling of the the playground can Equipment and as the ceremony progressed they kind of let the turn the kids loose and it was just sort of this Energetic frenetic just kids just engulfing the playground equipment.

You couldn't see it within like 10 seconds. Just hundreds of these kids. They all had their uniforms on they all looked identical and I was touched by I Couldn't tell one of them apart from the other they looked identical to me and to see that God Created each one of them uniquely.

Differently certainly then in contrast to one of my kids. It was stark but each one of them in comparison to one another they were unique. And I was just blown away that God is that big that he's able to touch.

He knows their hearts and he knows them like he knows me. He created them and he knows that they're sinful and he's he's calling them to him so not only is his glory displayed in how he creates everybody so enormously and so Just manifold so many different ways, but that he's redeeming us.

So this morning our my talk is going to be our sermon Worshiping him. So we're gonna be in the the last eight verses. I believe of Jude. Jude is a single chapter book 25 verses. So I'm gonna read verses 17 through 25, please 17 But you must remember beloved the predictions of the Apostle.

Following their own ungodly passions it is these who cause divisions worldly people devoid of the spirit. But you beloved building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit.

Keep yourselves in the love of God. Waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life and have mercy on those who doubt save others by snatching them out of the fire to those to Keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy.

To the only God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord be glory Majesty dominion and authority before all time and now and forever. Amen, I've asked now that you would quiet our hearts. Help us to see you help us to worship you in spirit and truth.

That we would forget the cares of our kids or the troubles that we've had during the week. We would focus on you now and your glory. Which is revealed in your? Difficulties, all right, I can think that's on.

I'll try not to move. So the book of Jude, yeah, that's on. So it's important to understand the context of. Who wrote this and who they wrote this book to so this book is written by Jude? But it's also important that we understand that it's written by the Holy Spirit.

If it's written by man alone. Then this is of no value to us, but it is written by God. But as we apply it. We need to understand that it's not every part that we read to us doesn't need doesn't isn't directly applicable.

We don't read the command to go in and take the promised land and take that forward to today. We don't go in and kill the Amalekites now because of what we read in scripture today. So we need to be first mindful of who wrote this.

So this book is written by Jude and he starts off just look with me in verse 1. He says Jude he describes himself. This is a letter to the church. He describes himself as a servant of Jesus Christ and a brother of James.

So this is a letter to the church and he describes himself as a brother of James. So James is his full brother James the author of the book of James. James and Jude are both half brothers to Jesus Christ the king of the Universe, so if I was gonna write a letter to his people and want to obtain some credibility I think I might mention that in different light like when I read.

You know, you read anything any kind of scientific journal for sure. You'll see people want to gain some credibility. They list their credentials. I'm a PhD. I got it from Cal Berkeley and I'm a part of this under this Dean.

They ascribe themselves to give themselves some credibility so it's interesting to see that Jude doesn't list that himself as the brother of Jesus and If it was me, I think you know, whatever you were bringing to the table to describe your opinion I think I might slide that one across the table.

Oh, yeah, I'm I'm kind of his brother, you know so maybe you want to defer a little bit, but he doesn't he describes himself as a Servant and I want to emphasize that just briefly this morning that that really is the best thing that we can put on our resume.

This morning is that we are servants to King Jesus and why do I say that's the number one thing? We can put on a resume because if it's not Jesus then who is it or what is it? Is it myself that I'm serving?

Is it man? Is it money it defines who you are and I can't think of anything better to be serving any person better than the one that? Runs this place runs the universe is Jesus and that's how Jude describes himself.

So he's gonna write a letter to people on that authority. I am a servant to King Jesus. And to complete that thought of who this is to we see at the end of verse 1. It says this is to those who are called beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ.

Now there's a lot of theological implication there. But just for the moment to identify and highlight the fact that this is to the church. It's to those that are beloved to believers so we can we can read this as a letter to us.

There's not much contextualization. We don't need to jump through a lot of hurdles to well. Well, maybe he meant this for that time and place. It really is applicable to us here today. So we're just gonna walk through the text.

It's kind of gonna be my outline. I'm not super sophisticated and coming up with outlines. So we're just gonna Follow the text. So look with me in verse 17. It says Jude talking to the church, but you must remember beloved the predictions of the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So he's saying remember first. He's saying first remember so the idea here remembering. It's not just this mental exercise where there's a oh, yeah. Yeah, I forgot all about that. It's this is the idea that you are not only just remembering but it's precipitating.

It's creating a Action a change of behavior. So he's saying remember you need to be doing something about this and he doesn't just leave it at Remember some prediction and they're like which one he gives them the exact prediction that the Apostles gave.

He said they said to you in the last time there will be scoffers Following their own ungodly passions. It is these who cause divisions worldly people devoid of the Spirit so he gives them the specific warning in the.

These folks are described as scoffers and mockers. And we look around our current culture and I think it's easy to sort of identify certainly I don't know I feel like in the last ten years Christianity gets continually pushed and marginalized that if you are Discussing with somebody that's not a believer and you mentioned that the basis for my opinion.

Is this the Word of God? Automatically you are dismissed that that's not relevant. That's a that's a myth. That's man wrote that that carries no weight so I can put myself in the shoes of picturing mockers and scoffers in that light.

But I mean on the other hand, you know, there are people in our society that are sort of Defending the name of Christ. There's these, you know, like the Westboro Baptist clowns that are, you know picketing Funerals of soldiers saying it's it's this is how I'm showing the love of God by picketing funerals but but then we do still need to make a stand for stuff like the sanctity of human life and Honoring marriage between a man and a woman or even the the idea of an ex nihilo out-of-nothing creation account that we see in the book of Genesis so there are some legitimate things that we need to be standing on that we do get mocked and scoffed and We read this to the church though.

These are some generic examples and I and I have to wrestle like why would there be scoffers in the church? I mean, why would any of you be scoffering? And I think so far. I don't think anyone probably here.

I don't want to assume too much as Identified themselves as yeah, that's that's hitting home Zach. I am the scoffer. I don't that's something something we really resonate with but if you look at the definition it gives or the description it says following their own ungodly passions and Now I know I have ungodly passions.

I Have Christ his Holy Spirit living inside me, but yet I still have ungodly passions. So all of a sudden now It's starting to hit a little bit closer to home and if and I would argue we all have ungodly passions and if we have ungodly passions, it's not such a Leap to say that we are acting on them from time to time.

So it's possible that this is Addressing us on occasion and the particular I Say this because that he's addressing the church because it doesn't make any sense that he's addressing those outside the walls of the church.

And maybe to clarify I know we always talk about the church being the body of Christ the people not the building but this. That's in view here. But he's talking to those that are gathering the ecclesia the gathering of the church.

And not just sort of the universal those that are called in Christ. This is those that are coming together and they look like Christians. So the the second piece of information he gives here is that they these folks are Worldly people devoid of the Spirit now, can you be a Christian and be devoid of the Spirit?

The answer is no that is the litmus test if the Holy Spirit isn't in you you are not a Christian. There's no getting around that. So these are not Christians, but they're in our midst and they are scoffing and they are causing divisions.

That's what this letter is about. So it's a call to watch out for these divisive unbelievers that are in our midst. His concern really is for the health of the church. So so now we're gonna see what the game plan is.

So as an elder here at recast if we see division in the church on my instinct would be to They have a false doctrine. We need to shore up our doctrinal statement. We need to shore up our membership application.

We need to you know, take that kind of strategy, but let's see what Jude does here he gives four verbs to sort of remedy to his game plan that he's subscribing to the church to Remedy this situation or how to address this and he gives four verbs four commands that we're really going to spend the bulk of our time on.

He says but you Beloved again. He keeps calling him beloved. These are believers. He's talking to them. He said build yourselves up in your most holy faith. So build yourselves up is the first verb praying in the Holy Spirit.

Keep yourselves in the love of God and waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ so we have four verbs here that I think are are going to be driving how we should be reacting and I'm also gonna argue by Praying in the Holy Spirit.

We're gonna that's the key verb here. All the other three build off of praying in the Holy Spirit. That's the key this morning in because we're praying we're gonna be building ourselves up in faith. We're gonna be able to wait and we're gonna be able to be keeping ourselves in the in the love of God.

And I think this is the key this is how we be this is the prescription to how to live out the Christian life in 2014 so I don't I think it's Imminently important for us to get this and what we're I'm talking about this morning.

So he's talking about first. He says build yourselves up in your most holy faith and in my instinct there is to go back. This is an idea of me. I need to do something. I need to get back in the spiritual weight room.

I got to start memorizing creeds getting my doctrine, right? Starting you're looking at the Heidelberg Catechism and just getting that stuff locked down. But what we see here is It's building yourselves up.

It's it's about building each other up. It's not about you doing something to yourself. You need others to be building yourself up. That's what we see here. And it might it might seem like a pretty trivial thing or and conceptually you yes.

We should building ourselves up in our most holy faith. Onto ready break. Let's go do that. That's that sounds great. Zack or Jude. But my opinion here is is that there's something more we need to be doing that in a way that we are praying in the Holy Spirit, so there's there's more to that.

We got to figure out how to actually build each other up in our most holy faith. So I'm gonna emphasize a little bit here on praying in the Holy Spirit. Now I want to spend a moment here to address. There's sort of two types of prayer.

I don't want to be too dogmatic about that, but there's intercessory prayer where we are requesting things of God. We're asking him to intercede. We need you to bring your glory. We need you to do something like that.

My wife and I are taking this course right now in called perspectives on Tuesday nights. And it's a perspective on God's movement of Christianity throughout the course of humanity. Starting with Genesis till now and we get a lot of different examples and in one I thought I would share that.

Maybe you all know but I'm not that smart and I just had to share it and it's example of intercessory prayer. It comes from the Moravians. Moravians are. This group in like the 1700s that got together and like Czechoslovakia or Czech people whatever they're called at that time Moravians.

Apparently what they were called and they got a group together and they decided they were gonna start praying. They're gonna have a 24-hour vigil that they were gonna be praying for God to do something.

They were gonna be interceding and they kept that vigil going for a little bit. They kept it going for a hundred years they started praying 24 hours for a hundred years and within 20 years of doing that one out of every 14 of them went off to the most despised remote areas of the Planet to share the Christ to share the gospel.

The power of their prayer was that they changed and they went and did something. 2100 of these folks went out as a result of those prayers. That's an example of legit intercessory prayer. So what I'm talking about is praying in the Holy Spirit now I think there's there's a little bit difference that I want to highlight here.

And I think it's important to make this distinction of what it means to be praying. For God to do something and then be praying in the Holy Spirit. So it says praying in the Holy Spirit, which means there's some kind of praying that's not praying in the Holy Spirit to me.

If you think like me. It seems like well, there must be a way that I'm doing this that's wrong and it's not in the Holy Spirit. So go with me to page 870. This is James Jude's full brother in James 4 3 gives an example page 870 in your.

If you've got this Bible here that I'm preaching out of that. We've handed out. Is an example of what I think is not James 4 3 he says you ask and do not receive because you ask. Wrongly to spend it on your passions.

I know it's a little bit of a theological leap to say that you're asking according to your your passions that that's not praying in The Holy Spirit so that's at least one example of where your prayer.

I mean, it's just like these unbelievers. We see following their own ungodly passions. Asking in that way is certainly not praying in the Holy Spirit. But a couple more texts we're gonna be Jumping through a lot of texts here in the next couple minutes and I just invite you to see it with your own eyes.

We're gonna go to Galatians 5 16 through 17. It's page 835 and this is I'm trying to Dig into this idea of praying in the Spirit. I think it's gonna be fruitful for us to really get a handle on this. He says in Galatians 5 16 through 17 says but I say Walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.

For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh. For these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things that you want to do. So the idea here is being I'm arguing in that text is that we have two warring ideas in our head.

We have our flesh the things that we want to do and we have our spirit God's spirit that we we want to do what it does and they are at war with one another but we need to be walking with the Spirit so It's easy for me to sit up here.

I'll give the example sitting where you're sitting each week and I hear Don and he he's giving a defense or giving his study Of the scripture presenting it to us and and I just get to receive it and you're in those shoes.

But I want to encourage you to do some study because when I study The Word of God, it's so much different than any other study that I do. My job requires me frequently to do scientific literature searches.

So if I want to know What a lipid lowering drug does on a rat liver at a hundred milligrams per kilogram in this strain of rat and I search PubMed. Or science direct or something I get thousands of results and the problem is none of them are Super relevant they all well This is at 80 milligrams or this is in that strain of rat and this was with this drug and there's just all this well.

You don't get the answer to the question. You want you will end up having to do your own experiment. But what we see in scriptures when you study is just incredible consistency. So when I search There's so many online tools now, but you search for in the spirit.

There's so much and they all just agree so much. It's so encouraging. I just encourage you all to Take the time to study God's Word is great to read through it and do your mind or your morning devotions.

But there's so much more to be had when you study scripture. So go to Romans 8 with me we're that's a whole chapter devoted to Walking in the spirit Romans 8 so that's on page 809 I believe in the in the church provided Bible and just look with me in verse 5.

It says That's a way for people to get there. You guys have apps so I can't hear the pages turning so I don't know exactly where everybody's at. So for those who live according to the flesh they set their minds on the things of the flesh.

But those who live according to the spirit Set their minds on the things of the spirit. So this is a continual process we see here and then just jump over with me. On the opposites page to verses 26 and 27 of that same chapter Romans 8.

Likewise the spirit helps us in our weakness for we do not know what to pray for as we ought. But the spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words and He who searches hearts knows what is in the mind of the spirit because the spirit intercedes for the Saints according to the will of God.

So.

Another facet to this idea of praying in the spirit is that it's not about theological content. The spirit knows what we should be praying for so it's not that you got to get the exact right words. It's the idea that we should have the spirit in our minds and we should be Interacting with it and lastly we're gonna go to Hebrews 4 verse 16 page 862 in the the church provided Bible.

Actually, this isn't the last one. I think I got one more beyond this Hebrews 4 16 and I just think it's fun to see this and not you don't have to worry about Zach's words. But know that God said these things.

Hebrews 4 16 says let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace. That we may receive mercy and find grace to help in the time of need. So there The author of Hebrews is saying that we get to come before the throne of grace with confidence boldly.

But more importantly we get to come when in the time of need. When is the time of need when do we need grace and mercy? Not I don't know when I don't need it, but it's it's constant and Just to build on the last passage Ephesians chapter 6.

So I got the page number here page 839 Ephesians chapter 6. Paul kind of goes all the way with this argument. Ephesians 6 verse 18 He says Praying at all times in the spirit with all prayer in supplication.

So my point this morning is that praying in the spirit is a non-stop. It's a continual process. There's not well, I'm praying in the spirit now. I'm gonna go this way. I'm gonna go about my life. No praying in the spirit is a constant process that we are doing and it's it's just encouraging to see certainly the consistency consistency throughout scripture.

Praying in the spirit. I just want to dispel the idea that it's some kind of Zen like yoga induced state of mind that we aspire to. It's a constant process of dying to self dying to our fleshly desires praying in the spirit is humility and action.

We're completely dependent on the spirit our flesh wants to do this, but our spirit we want to follow the spirit. We're continually making that choice. And to put a little bit more feet on it. I like the analogy of Computers so There is random access memory and then there is hard drive and hard drive the computer puts back on the back burner and what needs It it goes and gets it.

The RAM memory is what's uploaded. We need to be Holy Spirit. We need to be having God's Word his Holy Spirit in our RAM. It needs to be constantly before our eyes so that when I'm driving home from work I'm thinking about what does God want me to be doing now as I'm Interacting with co-workers as I'm interacting with my children my wife.

Constantly thinking about what does God want me to be doing? Every human interaction is an opportunity for God to act and if we're in the Holy Spirit We're gonna be having we're gonna have God's eyes.

We're gonna see what he wants us to do and if we're acting in the Holy Spirit We're gonna be in power to actually accomplish what he wants us to do. He's working in us and through us and this really is the.

This is the worst part about preaching that I get to stand up here and tell you guys. This is how you pray in the spirit. I Contend with Paul when he says that he among sinners is chief. He didn't know me.

He didn't know my depravity. I'm in no position. But this is the mystery of the faith the God in his sovereignty in his omniscience. More more his holiness. He decided that the best way to display his glory is to work through sinners like me and you.

So don't let sin prevent you don't think that you can't do something because of your sin. God is working in us and throws he uses sinners and it's for his glory. I can't explain that. That's just what he's decided.

So don't let that be a discouragement. So while we're on this topic of sort of mysteries of the faith, let's go to the next verse. I got to get to Jude.

Jude.

He then says But beloved building yourselves up in your most. Make sure I get my notes right here. He's yes, he says. We're gonna be building ourselves up in our most holy faith by praying in the Spirit.

But he says but you beloved Know yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourselves in the love of God. Keep yourselves in the love of God.

So I.

Don't know if you paid attention but the first verse says of this chapter says to those who are called beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ and. Then if you paid attention when I read earlier verse 24 says now to him who was able to keep you from stumbling.

So we see at the chapter sort of book ended with this idea that God is keeping us. But yet we see here the solution to not being to not being discouraged by the division in the church to the by the scoffers in The church is to keep yourselves.

So, how do you resolve those? It's not like well Jesus said it this way and Paul said it this way or well Moses really didn't mean it that way. This is Jude in 25 verses saying. The same two ideas that seem to be contradictory, but they're not.

It's it's a paradox. This is the mystery of the faith on the one hand. We are kept by God for eternity. We are eternally secure. We do not lose our salvation and on the other hand He's saying you need to be keeping yourselves and to the extent that we diminish either of those.

We're going to be missing something essential to the faith. We we can either just rest alone in our eternal security. I don't need to worry about doing anything else. God's got me or I can be just totally fretting and and I got it I got to keep now these there's a lot of demonic forces and spiritual influences out there I got to be and you you miss something.

So it's both and if you you want to talk to me afterwards about you think that I'm preaching you can lose your salvation. I'm not saying that but I'm saying that if you are truly saved as a child of God.

You will be keeping yourselves keeping yourselves in Keeping yourselves in the love of God. So what does that look like? It's praying in the Holy Spirit and Building each other up in our most holy faith now.

Don talked about it last week our most holy faith. What is our most holy faith? The fountain the corn the cornerstone the foundation of our most holy faith is Jesus Christ. That's what we should be building each other up.

So when we come become discouraged, we should be praying in the Holy Spirit. We have God's eyes and we see someone discouraged. We build them up. Look you are you are purchased by God. He died for you.

That's building each other up in our most holy faith. So that's how we that's how we encourage one another and lastly the fourth verse that we earth fourth verb that we see is that we're going to be Waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Waiting for the Mercy of Our Lord Jesus Christ

So waiting is sort of a it's idea that I'm not super encouraged by I'm not an activity that I Really strive for if I could just find an opportunity where I could just wait on something. That's sort of maybe You guys are like me and you don't want to wait, but there's been Thought I would use this illustration that from this past summer that really sort of encouraged me In my own personal life and it even caused me to journal now.

I I don't journal very often. I wish I did more. I know there's some men in here that journal every day and and I I am humbled by that. I think that's a great Discipline to be in but this this act this Event in my life should cause me to even journal.

So I'm just mentioning that to highlight its significance on me. But I've been blessed by a job that has a pretty regular schedule. I go to work between 7 30 and 8 in the morning. I oftentimes I'm able to come home at lunch and then I come home between say 4 40 and 5 20 In the evening and try to keep my wife informed of my precise schedule, but probably don't do the best job with that.

But as I'm often coming home at in the evening for dinner I'll be transitioning sort of mentally on the driver. Sometimes I live like four miles from where I work and I'll ride my bike and I'll be just transitioning mentally from the you know Everything I was thinking about at work now I'm gonna be coming home into my home and being a husband and being a father and I'm just sort of lost in my thoughts.

And as I get closer to my home, I come over the hill on 3rd Street and I can see my driveway. It's about a quarter mile away and I see my kids waiting at the end of the driveway weird that I'd get emotional about that, but Anyway, so I see them and then I see one of them see me and then they tell their siblings I have four young kids and they start cheering their dad's coming home.

Me I'm a flawed human. It's not that I'm bringing bags of candy and all this great stuff is just me. I saw them four hours ago at lunchtime. And something's been missing in their lives and they're seeing me come home and they're just.

It's like things are right again. Something's been missing and Sort of as a prodigal son twist on the whole analogy is the idea that my most defiant hard Hearted son is the one that's been most Disciplined the one that does it the most and recently he was out there for 40 minutes in the rain.

Without complaining just sitting out there and he's just so excited when I get home. And it humbles me to think about that, but it's a picture for us. I mean he's sitting out there and it's on 3rd Street and the traffic is.

I don't enjoy them out there. It's dangerous for them to be out there. The safety is up by the house. They're waiting in a dangerous location all the fun all the toys. The safety is up in the house, but they're choosing to wait down there for me.

I think that's a picture of how we should be waiting for Jesus. Jesus is gonna come back. We're in this life. We're struggling in the church with division. We're scoffers and when we're humbled by that we build ourselves up in our most holy faith.

Waiting what are we waiting for? Jesus is gonna come back. It has this end view in mind what we're waiting for. He's gonna set all things make all things new again. He's gonna set things, right? So things are not right right now when I'm gone at home.