Sunday, April 3, AM

And find your seat. We're glad that you're here this morning to worship with us. Already been a good day so far. Pray that the Lord will continue to bless it. A few announcements as we get started this morning.

We'll have our regular evening service tonight at 530 here at the church. Looking ahead to Wednesday looks like regular schedule there. Meal at 545 so come and share together in that. And then at 630 prayer for the adults and tag for the kids.

Looking ahead a few weeks. We've got Easter coming up so that means good Friday service here at the church on Friday April 15th. Be here for that and then on Sunday April 17th we'll have a morning service that morning.

No evening service because it is Easter. A few more announcements. If you do have any announcements look in your bulletin. There's an email address that you can send any announcements that you might want to put in there.

And then also Operation Christmas Child is still continuing. Continue to give towards that. There's a box out in the foyer where you can donate there. Any other announcements before we get started with worship?

Okay I'm gonna end with our fighter verse for this week. Comes from Ephesians chapter 4 verses 31 and 32. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice.

Be kind to one another tender-hearted forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. We're gonna have a time just of quiet prayer preparing our hearts for worship and we're finished with that. Michael.

Will come up and open us in prayer. Heavenly Father we come before you today.

And we confess that you are great. You are powerful. You are almighty. You are a creator. You have spoken everything into existence and you declared it very good and in your grace and in your long-suffering for the glory of your own name you sustain everything and hold it all together in your Son Jesus Christ for whom and through whom and to whom are all things that in all things he has the preeminence.

We thank you that we may wonder at your marvelous creation that we are instantly by the revelation of your Word instantly delivered from idolatry and worshiping the beauty we see but delivered into worshiping you our great God our maker.

I pray that you would help us today as we have gathered together to proclaim the worthiness the excellence of Jesus Christ. I pray that you would help us as we read your Word together sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs as we encourage one another to love and to good deeds and as we hold fast the confession of our faith help us to fear you to love one another and to worship you in spirit and in truth.

We pray these things in the name.

Of Christ. Amen. Before we start I'd like to share just a few verses that God put on my heart this morning. This is out of 2 Samuel 22. As for God his way is blameless the Word of the Lord is tested he is a shield to all who take refuge in him for who is God besides the Lord and who is a rock besides our God.

God is my strong fortress and he sets the blameless in his way. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer my God my rock in whom I take refuge my shield and the horn of my salvation my stronghold and my refuge my Savior.

I call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised and I am saved for my enemies for the waves of death encompass me the torrents of destruction overwhelm me the cords of shield surround me the snares of death confront me.

In my distress I call upon the Lord. Yes I cried to my God and from his temple he heard my voice. Let's know the confidence that we have the rock in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is our refuge our strength our high tower.

Anyway would you stand with me now at this time for our call to worship. Our passage this morning is found in Psalms chapter 7 and 7. We're going to be reading verses 7 through 10. Read with me together.

Will the Lord spurn forever and never again be favorable? Has his steadfast love forever ceased? Are his promises at the end of all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he in anger shut up his compassion?

Then I said I will appeal to this to the ears of the right hand of the Most High. And we're going to sing this very psalm in our Psalms for Worship hymnal page 77a. You'll recognize the tune. Out of Isaiah 21 this morning the first 10.

Verses against the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the south pass through so it comes from the desert from a terrible land. A distressing vision is declared to me. The treacherous deal the treacherous dealer deals treacherously and the plunderer plunders.

Go up O Elam. Besiege O Media. All its sign I have made to cease. Therefore my loins are filled with pain. Pangs have taken hold of me like the pangs of a woman in labor. I was distressed when I heard it.

I was dismayed when I saw it. My heart wavered. Fearfulness frightened me. The night for which I longed he turned into fear for me. Prepare the table. Set a watchman in the tower. Eat and drink. Arise you princes.

Anoint the shield. For thus has the Lord said to me. Go set a watchman. Let him declare what he sees. And he saw a chariot with a pair of horsemen. A chariot of donkeys and a chariot of camels. And he listened earnestly with great care.

Then he cried a lion my Lord. I stand continually on the watchtower in the daytime. I have sat at my post every night. And look here comes a chariot of men with a pair of horsemen. Then he answered and said Babylon has fallen is fallen.

And all the carved images of her gods he has broken to the ground. Oh my threshing and the grain of my floor. That which I have heard from the Lord of hosts the God of Israel I have declared to you. Let us pray.

Father we have from your Word great proclamations and great promises. And in your majesty and your sovereignty you bring them to pass. There is not a rogue molecule in your universe. You have sovereignly sovereignly brought about all things.

And we hang our trust upon your declarations and your promises and your fulfillment of them all in Christ. We praise you Father for your worthiness. We praise you and all of your majesty and holiness.

We see all of these things in creation and we have your Word to rest upon. We thank you for this Word this morning and we pray it bring great fruit in all of us. It's in Christ's name we thank you and praise you.

Amen.

Our last two songs we have in our hymnal page 410 my faith looks up to thee. And then also there was a handout for our last song which is Christ our hope in life and death. Thank you for gathering us here today.

Thank you for the prospect of.

The truth of your Word, its hope, its promises, its revelation of your Son Jesus Christ. We trust that by the gift of the Holy Spirit who indwells your people by whom we are made alive that you would give us understanding of your Word that we would glorify your Son that we would know from our very hearts that we are your children by the person and work of Christ by the ministry of the Spirit.

So we praise you our Heavenly Father that you know our needs before we even ask that you are a great provider and we ask you that you would provide us with the bread of life today nourishment for our faith.

We pray these things looking to Christ the one with whom you are well pleased. Amen. I invite you to open your Bibles and turn with me to Daniel chapter 10. Daniel chapter 10 as we continue looking at the message of Daniel passage by passage chapter by chapter.

As we have worked our way through this book of riddles in which the tests of statecraft wherein death and life are on the line and the riddles of prophecies of what was yet to come. So we see these resolved in Christ time and again.

We should consider the story of Daniel as a whole now that we're coming to the end of the book it parallels the story of the Jews themselves. Here is Daniel he's set aside as God's chosen servant for the time at hand.

He is ministering among the nations and he is pointing them to the truth of God's Word declaring unto them the promises of Messiah and having to deal with and engage with the pagan statism that permeates his world.

This is very much the story of the Jews as a whole set apart by God as a chosen servant with a particular task in mind to declare the light of the Lord to the nations to turn them to fear the one true God to turn away from idols and how they were specially set apart for this task as a as the shadow mediator of the Old Covenant and yet they're always engaging with the Gentiles with the nations and on their best day on their best day the children of Israel pointed the nations to the glory of Christ enshrined in the shadows of the Old Covenant the sacrifices and the tabernacle the the feasts the rituals the topography geography and architecture of their culture.

They were pointing the nations to the hope that God had provided on their best day on their worst day on their worst day they drank deep of the intoxicating drink of the pagan society around them until they were indistinguishable from the other nations they were so thoroughly canonized so thoroughly paganized.

As we think about what goes on in Daniel's life we have seen Daniel be a faithful servant refusing to be compromised refusing to just blend in with the Babylonians or with the Persians. He has stood his ground more than once to remain the servant of God set apart making a clear distinct claim for the glory of God for his name.

And he is looking ahead he is declaring what is yet to come by the ministry of of God through his son by his spirit. Daniel is been in helped and empowered and inspired to declare all that which was to come a calendar of hope for the people of Israel as they look forward to going back home to their promised land to rebuild the temple and to rebuild the city to once again establish the worship of God in the place where he had chosen to place his name.

And so Daniel is looking ahead and he is. He is wanting his fellow believers to look ahead to the coming of Messiah the promises of the new covenant. And he is also declaring these things yet in the center of culture of his day whether it be the Babylonians or the Medes and Persians he is pointing the nations to what is to come.

In fact the prophecies that he gives forth in Daniel's chapters 11 and 12 involve the Medes and Persians and the Greeks all the way through their civil war between the Ptolemies and the Seleucids and involving the rise of Rome after the period of the Maccabees.

And all of this world history is told from the perspective of how it impacts Jerusalem how it impacts the promise of God's coming Messiah and the new covenant. And the nations discover that their ups and downs and back and forth all have to do with the glory of Christ.

And in fact this is the observation that I make about the last three chapters of Daniel which comprises single vision. Is this that Jewish history is Jesus's glory. Jewish history is Jesus's glory. It's all about him.

It's all about him. Well let's read the text together. We're going to. We've read the first 11 verses together. Let's stand for the honor of the reading of God's Word the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by his Holy Spirit through his servant Daniel beginning in verse 12.

Let's read Daniel chapter 10 verse 12 through verse 19. This is the word of the Lord. Then he said to me do not fear Daniel. For from the first day that you set your heart to understand and to humble yourself before your God your words were heard.

And I have come because of your words. But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me 21 days. Behold Michael one of the chief princes came to help me for I had been left alone there with the kings of Persia.

Now I have come to make you understand what will happen to your people in the latter days. For the vision refers to many days yet to come. When he had spoken such words to me I turn my face toward the ground and became speechless.

And suddenly one having the likeness of the sons of men touched my lips. Then I opened my mouth and spoke saying to him who stood before me my lord. Because of the vision my sorrows have overwhelmed me and I have retained no strength.

For how can this servant of my Lord talk with you my lord. As for me no strength remains in me now nor is any breath left in me. Then again the one having the likeness of a man touched me and strengthened me.

And he said to me old man greatly beloved fear not peace. Be to you. Be strong. Yes be strong. So when he spoke to me I was strengthened and said let my Lord speak for you have strengthened me. This is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God. You may be seated. Heard any bad news lately. I know you've heard some bad news lately. Bad news always catches our attention. Bad news is the kind of news that gets led with by any particular news service.

Bad news is what gets discussed. The most bad news is very likely to be shared and retweeted. This should be somewhat strange to us. This should seem foreign to us because we're the people of good news.

We're the people of good news and we have a lot of good news. We have been christened literally to declare the good news of the kingdom with the nation's. We are the good news people. Not just any good news but the particular good news of the person and work of Jesus Christ Savior and sovereign.

We're the people of good news. But bad news tends to catch the attention. Daniel's dealing with some bad news. No doubt it is the third year of Cyrus king of Persia. We see in verse 1. Year one was great.

Cyrus was clearly God's chosen man from the east. He whistled up like a like a fly and told him to do what he was supposed to do. And Cyrus did God's bidding. And he funded the return of the exiles to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple to beautify Jerusalem.

He was the Lord's anointed servant for that time. Year one was great. Year two was great because under the leadership of Ezra and Zerubbabel there the people of God had gathered back in Jerusalem and they had laid the foundation of the temple.

They had gotten to work and things were progressing well. And the worship of God was reinstated there in the holy city on the holy mountain the holy worship of God so here too was great. Year three was not so great.

By year three the local authorities had noticed all the commotion going on in Jerusalem and they sought to make an alliance with Zerubbabel the governor the Jewish governor. And he refused the help of the pagans and said no you're not going to bring your paganism in to the worship of the one true God.

That's not how we are going to do this project. And so they got lawyered up. They grabbed a bunch of attorneys and they began filing lawsuits sending it all the way back to the king who was very busy now with some wars and couldn't be bothered by the issues.

And so now all of the work had stalled in Jerusalem. The third year of Cyrus was a sad year. The work of the Lord had stalled and there the foundation of the temple lay baking in the Sun with nothing going on.

No wonder Daniel was mourning 21 days praying to the Lord for some sort of answer some sort of resolution. We looked at this timing last time 21 days of of mourning and the Lord tells him that he was busy fighting the enemies of the Jews coming to the aid of his people.

Daniel you've been praying for 21 days but if you want to know why there's the delay. I've been busy answering your prayer before you. While you were praying we also hear about timing. We get the phrase that we're using for this last section of Daniel the latter days in verse 14.

Let's read that again. Now I have come to make you understand what will happen to your people in the latter days. For the vision refers to many days yet to come. We've already already been given the timing in the 70 weeks in Daniel 9.

But it's gonna be a long time until these things come to pass which means there's going to be several generations 12. In fact before the prophecies start manifesting coming to pass in Christ. And so Daniel has heard some bad news.

Things are going poorly in Jerusalem. Things are not going according to plan. And then the Lord shows up with a message for Daniel telling him by the way in the coming generations of your people more bad stuff's gonna happen.

The security of the Jews is going to be thrown against the precipice time and time and time again. The destabilization of the Persian Empire by the invasion of Alexander the Great. The destabilization of the Greek Empire by Alexander's death and the division of his kingdom up into four.

And then later two and a civil war will be fought between the Ptolemies and the Seleucids and kings from the north and the south will rage back and forth across your land. And you're gonna be at the epicenter of all this warfare and chaos.

And then we're gonna have this guy named Antiochus Epiphanes who's going to do horrible things to the temple. And there's gonna be the time of the Maccabees. And then there's gonna be the time of Rome and Pompeii and Cleopatra and so on.

And all of this is spelled out in precise detail through the entirety of Daniel. Chapter 11 generations before it ever came to pass. And what was this. A calendar of hope. A schedule to the people of God in tumultuous times would turn to the scroll of Daniel.

The Levite would gather everybody around and they would read it out loud and say yep here we are. Right on schedule here it is exactly what God said was going to happen. We're right about here. Ok. This is going to happen next right on schedule.

Guess what. God is in charge of the entirety of history. And the entirety of history was being funneled and directed towards the arrival of the Son of Man the Christ. A calendar of hope. So this is the answer to Daniel's three weeks of mourning and eating nothing pleasant.

And and he's in his 90s. His heart is breaking. I thought the promises were coming true. What's going on. And then the answer comes. But before the details are given of this calendar of hope before that ever happens the first thing that happens is that that Daniel gets shook.

Christ shows up. Daniel falls down can't even talk. All he can do is tremble and shake. All of his strength fails him. He's terrified. Let's let's look at the terror that we see here. Look with me at verses.

Verse 4. Let's begin reading in verse 4 on the 24th day of the first month as I was by the side of the great river that is the Tigris. I lifted my eyes and look to behold a certain man clothed in linen whose waist was girded with the gold of the fuzz.

His body was like barrel. His face like the appearance of lightning. His eyes like torches of fire. His arms and feet like burnished bronze in color. And the sound of his words like the voice of a multitude.

What a sight. What a sight. Daniel sees. Barrel is kin to an emerald though in far more colors. Bright and shining. Radiant in color. A face like the appearance of lightning. How bright is that. His eyes like torches of fire.

How can you even see his eyes as torches of fire when the face itself is like lightning. How does that even work. His arms and feet like burnished bronze in color. Imagine the light of the face and the fire of the eyes and the radiance of the of the barrel glinting and flashing off the burnished bronze.

If we could use one word to sum up the impact of this appearance what would that one word be. Would the word bright be strong enough full enough to describe the sight that Daniel saw. What about the word fierce.

Are we getting closer. What about the word weighty. We're talking about gold. What about the word powerful. We think of lightning and fire. What about fiery. Is that a good word. The only word we're left with is the most weighty word available to us.

Glory. Glorious. We're told in the scriptures that Abraham was a glorious man. What is meant by that. It's the Hebrew word kibbutz which means weighty. There was a lot of weight to Abraham's life measured in terms of his servants and his livestock his wealth his impact on the region in which he lived.

He was a weighty man. Therefore he was a glorious man. But what of Christ. How weighty is he. Does he not have a name which is above every name as an all-authority in heaven and on earth been given to him.

Is he not described as the heir of all things. And that all things are his. How weighty is that. And so in this appearance we're given these images that flash one after another. And what we are meant to think when we see this is glory.

Glory glory. And then how does Daniel respond. How does Daniel respond to this glory. He is like a piece of driftwood on a tsunami wave. He is utterly moved and he has no control over what happens to him.

This weightiness this glory is so powerful and so significant that Daniel finds himself in helpless orbit around that weight centered on this glorious vision unable to change it alter it even to interact with the one who has made his appearance.

But notice the response. The response is one in which he trembles. He's on the ground he can't talk. He's lost his strength. When the Lord touches him it just makes him tremble uncontrollably. But notice also the response the response that when the Lord speaks it happens as much as when the Lord says let there be light.

And there is light. So here he says do not fear. And Daniel stops fearing. And he says be strengthened. And Daniel is strengthened. And he says be at peace. And Daniel's at peace. Do you see the response of the creature to the Creator when the Word of God is spoken to those made in the image of God.

This is the response to glory. This is the response to the power and the authority of the Word of God. We see the sight. But what about the sound. The sound of his words was like the voice of a multitude a roar of significance.

Verse 9 it says that Daniel heard the sound of his words while he was in the deep sleep on his face with his face on the ground. So Daniel is terrified. He is in dread. He is trembling. He is unable to speak stand.

He has no strength. He's on his face trembling. Isn't this the way that so often we find men respond when God shows up in the Bible. Remember that Moses requested of the Lord show me your glory. Show me your glory.

And God had to stuff Moses into the cleft of the rock and say you're only going to see the glowing trail of the hinder parts of my train. Because no man can see my face and live. And how often do we see people encountering the Lord.

And then what happens. Do you remember Isaiah who was caught up in a vision to the throne room of God and the glory of the Lord filled the temple. And how did Isaiah respond. We just saying from that text holy holy holy.

How did Isaiah respond to the display of the holiness of God and all of his glory. Isaiah says woe is me. I am ruined. I'm a man of unclean lips among a people of unclean lips. And my eyes have beheld the Lord of glory.

Woe is me. He did not expect to survive in the moment it's even deeper than that. He knew he didn't deserve to survive when encountering the holiness of God in all of his glory. Do you remember what happened when the disciples were with Jesus on the Sea of Galilee in the storm.

And Jesus was sleeping in the ship. And they woke him and say master do you not care that we perish. And then Jesus spoke. He rebuked his creation. He spoke to the winds and the waves to the storm. He says peace be still.

And the whole Sea of Galilee went like glass. Did this alleviate the fear of the disciples. Their fear only increased. Who is this that commands the winds and the waves. That they obey him encountering the glory of Christ.

They feared. What did Peter say when Jesus was in his boat. Peter failed all night long to catch the fish. And then Jesus of Nazareth says put that again. Let me show you how to fish. Put your net over here now.

And I got so much fish that they had to call for help. And the nets are breaking in. The ships are sinking. And what does Peter say to Christ apart from me. He's afraid. He's fearful at the sight of glory.

I want you to think about this appearance of Christ. You realize that in the Gospels we are not given very much information about what Jesus looked like. We know he was born of Mary and Mary was a Jew.

And Jesus was a Jew that might help us understand what he looked like a little bit. We know he had a beard. We know from Isaiah 53 that he was not attractive to the normal eye. He didn't have a face for TV.

That's about it. But here in Daniel 10 Revelation chapter 1 when we turn to Matthew 17 what do we see. We see Christ in all of his glory. And suddenly we're given visuals that we are to lay behold of in our worship of Christ.

Behold how glorious Christ is now. And I say read from Revelation chapter 1. It's going to sound very familiar to Daniel chapter 10. You can put in your notes or underline where you see the very same features repeated Revelation 1 beginning in verse 13 John says.

And in the midst of the seven lampstands one like the Son of Man clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. Again we're hearing the Son of Man hear about the gold.

His head and hair were white like wool as white as snow. And his eyes like a flame of fire. Sound familiar. His feet were like fine brass as if refined in a furnace. And his voice is the sound of many waters right on track.

He had in his right hand seven stars out of his mouth when a sharp two-edged sword. And his countenance was like the Sun shining in its strength which I imagine would look a lot like lightning. And when I saw him I fell at his feet as dead.

Do you see what happens encountering the Lord in his glory. And then what happens. Everybody who ever encountered the Lord in that way was surprised to find themselves alive when it was all over. Well the truth of the matter is no man can see God and still live in the first time by the grace of God through the work of the Holy Spirit.

When the veil of Satan is removed from the eyes and you as a sinner see by faith Christ. You don't survive. You don't come away from that. The same you die. You die to the flesh and you die to sin. And you die to slavery.

And you die to that whole life of transgressions and rebellion against God. You die to the world. You don't come away from that still living except that you. You do as you are made alive in Christ. 2nd Corinthians 4 verse 3.

But even if our gospel is veiled it is veiled to those who are perishing whose minds the God of this age has blinded. Who do not believe. That's the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God should shine on them.

But we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves. Your bond servants for Jesus sake for it is the God. Now listen. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

How in the world did light show up in the world. From Genesis 1 1 God said let there be light and turned the impossible darkness into light. How in the world do people covered over in the veil of the enemy dead in their trespasses and sins ever see the light of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

How do they ever see that light. The God who commanded light in the very beginning commands light here. That's why the hymn says it takes a miracle. It took a miracle to save my soul. And when we see and when we see the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

We don't survive that. We don't survive that by faith we die with Christ upon the cross. All of our trespasses our guilt our iniquities are buried in the tomb. They are removed from us as far as the East is from the West and we come forth by faith in Christ alive.

New creatures. The old things have passed away the new have come to pass. Every time you read in the Old Testament about someone encountering God and then falling down as dead men remember how it is that we are saved and we are to glorify our King.

Daniel glorifies his King even in his fear even in his weakness. We are to fear our King and hear our King. Now not only do we have the terror but I want us to focus on the touch. This happens more than once in the text where we're told that the Lord touches Daniel.

Verses 10 and 11. This is remember Daniel at this point he is on his face to the ground in deep sleep. He can still hear but he can't do anything. Verse 10. Suddenly a hand touched me which made me tremble on my knees and on the palm of my hands.

He said to me Oh Daniel man greatly beloved understand the words that I speak to you and stand upright. For I have now been sent to you. While he was speaking this word to me I stood trembling. And again verses 15 through 19 when he had spoken such words to me I turned my face toward the ground and became speechless.

And suddenly one having the likeness of the sons of men touched my lips. Then I opened my mouth and spoke saying to him who stood before me my Lord because of the vision my sorrows have overwhelmed me and I have retained no strength.

For how can this servant of my Lord talk with you my Lord. As for me no strength remains in me now nor is any breath left in me. Then again the one having the likeness of a man touched me and strengthened me.

And he said oh man greatly beloved fear not peace be to you. Be strong. Yes be strong. So when he spoke to me I was strengthened and said Lord let my let my Lord speak for you have strengthened me. When the Lord shows up Daniel is stricken.

He is on his face on the ground. He cannot speak. He has lost his strength. His weakness is utterly exposed his his unworthiness is utterly exposed by the showing up of the brightness of the glory of God.

In some sense we could say it's Christ's fault Daniel is on the ground like this. But it's also notice because of Christ that Daniel can stand up again. That he can start talking again. That he has any strength at all.

What do we see. Daniel was fearing greatly. He's on his face. He was fearing greatly even as he stood there. He was fearing greatly even as he was speaking. But then God strengthens him. How through the touch Christ touches him.

And all of a sudden. Now he's got strength. Now he's got peace. Now he can stand. Now he can speak. What is going on here. Daniel was one of the greatest prophets of all time remarkably unique. One time God was making a point with the people of Israel post-exile.

And he said even if these three men were to petition to me even if these three men were to petition to me to do something I've made up my mind I'm not going to do it. One of those three men was Daniel.

There's one of the greatest prophets of all of Israel standing at an important crossroads in the history of Israel. And he cannot stand on his own without God. He cannot speak of his own accord without God.

He doesn't have any strength of his own without God. Wasn't that what God told Israel from the very beginning. I chose you I formed you I loved you. I've given you all of this. And Israel could not without God.

They could not stand on their own when God would judge them and remove his protective hand. How long did they keep standing. They couldn't stand on their own. They were not to speak of their own accord.

What happened when Israel would speak of their own accord. Those were called false prophets. They were only to speak as God wanted them to speak. They had no strength of their own. They couldn't stand on their own.

They couldn't speak on their own. And the same was the truth was true of Daniel. And what about the generations coming a coming past Daniel who would be reading this encounter and holding to this calendar of hope.

What are they to walk away with. They need to understand that in the days to come when their security would ever be upon the precipice of disaster and the back and forth and ups and downs of world history as the socio-political condition was always swirling and changing and great danger was in their lives generation after generation after generation.

What should they think to themselves. We cannot stand unless God makes us stand. We cannot speak unless we speak according to God's word. We have no strength unless we have it from him. And are we not in the very same situation today as the people of Christ.

Are we not in the very same situation. What strength do you think we have without the Son of Man King of Kings and Lord of Lords. What kind of things are we going to say if we don't speak according to the Word of God incarnate.