Genesis 6:1-8, How Deep Does It Go?, Dr. John Carpenter

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Genesis 6:1-8 How Deep Does It Go?

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Genesis chapter 6 verses 1 to 8 hear the word of the Lord When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive and they
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Took as their wives any they chose then the Lord said my spirit shall not abide in man
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Forever for he is flesh his days shall be 120 years The Nephilim were on the earth in those days and also afterward
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When the sons of God came into the daughters of man and they bore children to them These were the mighty men who were of old the men of her noun
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The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil
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Continually and the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth and it grieved him to his heart
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So the Lord said I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens
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For I am sorry that I have made them a but Noah found favor in the eyes of the
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Lord May the Lord had his blessings to the reading of his Holy Word Well, have you ever been given a wrong diagnosis when
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I broke my leg last year one doctor the Danville Hospital First said that he couldn't see a clear break in the x -ray
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It may be I just had a sprain and that's what I wanted to hear The earlier doctor first went to in the
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Anseville clinics said I had a break and it would require emergency surgery And I didn't like that.
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So I was glad to hear that. Maybe it wasn't so bad They'd give me a CAT scan to make sure well the worst diagnosis
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Turned out to be the right one If I had latched on to the diagnosis that I wanted to hear and kind of limped out of the hospital thinking
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I'll get better in a few days All the consequences could have been dire When the
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SARS epidemic first hit Asia many doctors thought their patients just had the flu And so they prescribe antibiotics sent them home probably tell them to rest or something like that drink plenty of fluids
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What are this kind of thing and many died and others were infected because of the wrong diagnosis now
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What if a doctor did that on purpose? What if he knew you had a potentially deadly but treatable disease, but decided the cure was too costly
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Or he just didn't want to upset you He was more concerned with with losing your approval
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Wanted to keep your approval Then he wasn't saving your life or he wanted to tell you what you wanted to hear
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You want to be popular with you? He wanted you to like him the consequences Could be dire
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Why is it so different with spiritual health? Why do we prefer to be told that we are basically good that we even if sometimes we do bad things
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Deep down we mean well, we have good intentions. We have a good heart 77 % of professed evangelicals in America think that people are basically good
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Even though God the great physician gives a very different diagnosis as we see here Many people refuse to take the bitter pill that we are dead in our trespasses and sins as Paul puts it preferring
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Whatever is positive and encouraging the problem with a message that says we're basically good and simply need more encouragement we just need to treat our symptoms is that it's like telling me that I only have a sprained hip or Telling a person with SARS that he just has the flu, you know, drink orange juice get some sleep
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You'll be better in a few days. It might make you feel better in the short run but the consequences
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You know the rest Well, these eight verses in Genesis 6 give us the diagnosis the human heart after the fall and these eight verses cut right to the depth
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Of where sin is rooted and it shows us that sin is not just something on the surface not just symptoms
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It's not just behavior But it's rooted in the heart and the consequences are dire and here we see how deep the problem goes
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How deep is it? Here sin is first cosmic Second it is complete and finally it is catastrophic
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Well first sin is cosmic Means universal something that tears the entire universe.
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We see that in this bizarre story Everyone's curious about the daughters of men and the sons of God and their various interpretation to this
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But it appears that this refers to angels or demons I'm out reproducing with human beings with women, even though that sounds incredible and a lot raises a lot of strange questions
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But verses 1 & 2 simply say that man Not just the descendants of Seth notice there man began to reproduce the sons of God saw the daughters of men some people say well the daughters of men are the daughters of Seth and the sons of God are the sons of Cain Well, no that doesn't work because it says man generally is reproducing and they look at the daughters of men
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So that man began to multiply and were attractive to the sons of God Who are these people are things?
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their people to some other beings who are apparently not man because they're different the sons of God are these they're different than the
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Man, they're likely fallen angels and the book of Job the term sons of God is used for angels and say and for Satan And this partly explains why their offspring were giants described in verse 4.
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Why would Seth's? Descendants reproducing with Cain's descendants make Giants. It doesn't that doesn't make any sense, but let's put away speculation
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People get fascinated with this kind of weird things. He'd speculated about it and really get to the bottom line
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What's the real purpose of this passage? The point is that human beings have Grotesquely sinned our sin has disrupted all of creation orders of creation, you know
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Angels and demons and men here and women have been trespassed
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Sin has infected even the supernatural beings it is cosmic in scope
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And we often want to trivialize sin. Well since everyone does it Some people do things that we think are much worse than our sins
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Our sins are the okay since other people's sins are the really bad ones And so it must not be that big a deal.
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But here we see how enormous a problem it is It's cosmic CS Lewis in a science fiction trilogy wrote that earth was quarantined from the rest of creation this is this is
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Fiction is fact, but it illustrates the point that earth is quarantined in the universe
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All the other beings that God has created are not allowed to go to the earth because it's infected with sin Our rebellion against the creator of the universe makes the earth set aside
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From the rest of creation as the planet that is in revolt against God. Our sin is so enormous
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It's acidic effects cuts through the entire universe Paul wrote in Romans chapter 8 verse 22 that the whole creation is now groaning
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Awaiting to be set free from the death and decay that our sin is broad So how high how far reaching is sin?
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It is cosmic it reaches even to the stars. The consequences are
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Judgment in verse 3 his days. That's man's days will be a hundred and twenty years
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Either that means well those long lives That we were amazed by in chapter 5
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Remember that people living past 900 years old that they're all about to be limited to no more than 120 years
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And that does happen right after the flood live starting Lifespans go down rapidly or it could be those 120 years until the flood
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Or can mean both Second our sin is also complete How deep is it?
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How deep does it go in? Its depth it is complete. It's spoiling the deepest parts of the human heart
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Like some kind of infection. It's not just on the skin It goes down into your bones and first five shows that completeness first wickedness was great
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And the word great there is used in chapter 7 as we'll see of the flood where the springs of the great deep
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Others are the water that's that below the surface of the earth the great deep has opened up So amazing wickedness how bitter the sound that spoiled the creation so perfect Well second every intention to the thoughts of his heart was only evil
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Continually notice that in verse 5 very important statement Every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually
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Now some object that this is only describing the sinfulness of that time In other words the people of Noah's time just before the flood.
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It's just about them It's not a general principle of all people over all time But while wickedness that's the actual visible sins that people do that might be greater or lesser at different times
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Like at the first half of chapter of verse 5 the human heart hasn't changed Also in several other verses in the
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Old Testament accorded by the Apostle Paul in Romans 3 Remember several months back the conclusion is the same as here in verse 5 and finally here in Genesis the story of the flood not only begins with this sweeping statement about our sinfulness
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It ends with a similar statement kind of summarized a shortened form of this same statement in Genesis chapter 8 verse 21
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Says all our inclinations are evil and then it adds from youth in other words the flood stories preceded and Concluded by a statement that the human heart is inclined toward evil
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Well notice that sentence how airtight it is every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually
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It's like I was written by a lawyer to close any loopholes You're looking for exceptions.
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There's got to be some good in there somewhere. No, he closes every single one But first the heart of the problem
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The heart of the problem is the problem of the heart. It's not just our actions are bad Only we can change our actions reform our behavior.
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Well, then we'll be okay No, it's deeper It's in the thoughts and it's not even just just that our thoughts are bad
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And maybe if we could change our thinking or new our minds we can think good thoughts and then we'll be okay with God no, it's the inclination of Our thoughts the direction our thoughts are oriented the way they go the way they're shaped
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The NIV has inclination the ESV has intention the word there in Hebrew inclination or intention means either
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Intend or purpose your frame the reason why you do this or that Not just that you do this or that it's the reason why you do what you do
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Why you eat or drink or whatever you do you do it without God's grace for the glory of self and that's evil
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We don't understand this because we often don't understand what evil is a Lot of people just define evil is what hurts them hurts me.
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It's evil hurts other people, but not me. It's fine You know, you're a German and they live in Hitler's Germany.
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You think how this Hitler guy? Okay, he's killing the Jews, but I'm not Jewish. So he's not evil to me That's the way a lot of them thought right why a lot of people think today
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I've heard I've told people About so -and -so this person has done this and this and that all kinds of evil things and the person goes
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But he hadn't done me any harm So he's not evil does not hurt me that's the way people often think we often think it's just a breaking of a list of rules, but it's not just actions is inclinations in the heart and those
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Inclinations and lead to actions and they're always the inclinations are always against God They may not be against us.
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He might be convenient to them They might like us but it's always against God and so that's evil because what's against God is what eat what is evil now?
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What's against us? It's the motive of why you do what you do the way of hearts the way our hearts lean the direction
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They lean toward if they have not been transformed by God by God They're evil. They're skewed against God.
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It's like a table that leans There's things roll off of it. It's like a compass points toward the south
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When it should be pointing toward the north, it's totally unreliable So the very guidance system from which our action to thoughts come it's corrupted like a
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GPS that always gives the wrong directions Totally against the worldly advice, you know follow your heart. No, don't you'll go the wrong way
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This verse shows us that sin is not primarily a matter of actions as sure it works its way out in our actions
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But evil first is our disposition the way our hearts lean
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Against God and C .s. Lewis is science fiction. He described us as being bent
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We're like a car with a bent frame and bent wheels Perhaps with enough corrective steering
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We can keep it going straight the alignments off, but you can still make it go drive straight.
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Keep it in the lanes You gotta kind of hold it firmly Sideways, but the car is still going straight down the road
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But even after we've driven it straight It's still bent And so too even if with a with enough morality or enough religion we can make ourselves live straight but still
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We're bent Every inclination of the thoughts of our heart is evil. In other words, it's not just the fruit
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But it's the root That's bad. And this is the opposite of the way. We usually think of ourselves or of others
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We imagine that no matter what we do no matter how badly we mess up Some untruth we tell we call it a white lie
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Some selfish act we indulge in deep down. We meant well We were inclined towards something good good intentions.
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We think it doesn't come out the way we hoped and There may be sometimes in God's grace when that is the case, but here
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God says that left to ourselves Our intentions are not good
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We are inclined toward evil. We do bad things because That was our intention
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Even when we do apparently good things people around us call good without God's grace
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We intend evil We give to charity Intending to be seen as a good person
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With to glorify me We do it for the feeling of the rightness we get from it.
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Not really Because we care about Whatever the poor orphans the refugees the injured veterans sick children
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We're a faithful spouse because we figure that's the best way to keep a peaceful family in the long run makes the most sense
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Even if we're tempted case. Otherwise we pay our taxes. We don't cheat customers. We don't steal because we see well
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That's best for business or it's a good way to stay out of jail It's best for us and because it's all about ourselves our advantage our
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Glory, it's evil and God looks on the heart and sees that we're inclined always
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Away from him that were bent the diagnosis. It's bad Notice how bad notice the adjectives of the adverbs particularly in that second half of verse 5
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Three of them is every there's only and continually every inclination without exception
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It's not that some are most intentions majority of intentions and I'll be out a few good intentions
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No, it's not even merely some thoughts are off -target a mix of good and bad motives No, every inclination is evil without God's grace even our motive to go to church
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It's about glorifying self Some advantage we can get from it You know in some bigger churches people will go to make business contacts sell amway
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Politicians go because it makes him look good. They maybe a few more votes They can see coming out of that big church with the
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Bible in their hand Some pastors go because they're paid Some preachers go because they just want to have other people listen to them
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Every one of these motive is not about loving and honoring God or evil Now not only are they evil without exception.
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They are evil without delusion Without any mixture of anything good Our intentions are only evil and the word there literally means all together as in all our inclinations in their entirety without anything else
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They're evil It's not just that every inclination is infected with evil just tainted a little bit with evil
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But there's otherwise there's there They're otherwise good if you could just take out that little bit of evil like your body when you're infected, right?
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You take out the infection and your body's still good. No With our evil our inclinations are only evil.
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That's all that they are continually Not just some of the time not even just a majority of the time
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But maybe if you if you catch me in a good mood After my coffee, I'll have better intentions
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No, all our intentions are evil all the time and not just after a so -called age of accountability
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Oh the poor sweet innocent children their intentions are good. They're they're free of sin, right?
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They haven't reached that age of a so -called age of accountability All the time here means all our lifetime from the moment of conception.
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There's no no exceptions Psalm 51 verse 5 says behold I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me and we are without God's grace continually off -target
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Continually going the wrong way Away from God From the from the point we exist.
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We instinctively feel that this is not so we feel deeply that we're not that bad off And we often we feel that way because we mistake what's
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God's grace for us We think we do have some genuinely good intentions some right inclinations coming out of our heart.
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We feel that way because we are We feel that way because this passage is true the irony of it because We're self -righteous
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We're arrogant Which is another form of this evil? Because we're inclined to make our feelings the standard by which we judge right and wrong.
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He said I don't feel evil Of course, you know because you're evil Well, we make ourselves our feelings the standard of what is evil or not
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What is right or wrong and that is only evil? We look at our years of church attendance or the very fact that we're here and commend ourselves there
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We're better than those other people But it's especially when we feel good about our religion when we feel like patting ourselves on the back
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When we take what is God's grace to us and we mistake it for what we've produced for what comes from us
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Especially then Did we show how numb we become to our own sinfulness that we completely lost sight of the grace that makes any truly good fruit?
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possible that we try to Take to ourselves The glory for what
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God's grace is produced in our lives if we do have some good intentions, it's a good fruit We tried it and we think that that's us
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And so we try to take to ourselves the glory that belongs only to God. So just as we are celebrating our own righteousness
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It's then that we've stepped into Blasphemy That is why the
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Prophet Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 64 or 6 that all our our
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Righteousness is as filthy rags Even the very thing
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That we feel even think that we are so confident are good if they come ultimately from us and Are ultimately for us
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They're soiled by us Every inclination of our hearts are only evil all the time
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That's a bad diagnosis We don't want to hear that naturally that's offensive in our day It's offensive to have to sing about a wretch like me
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There's even a version of amazing grace that takes that humbling word wretch out replaces it with a bland
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Someone it's amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved a someone like me
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Horrible rewriting, isn't it? No, that's not amazing Saving a wretch is amazing.
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How deep does sin go to the depths of our heart sin is complete and because it is complete our salvation must be completely something that God does and Sin is catastrophic
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God is here. Not a not a hand -wringing God Who wishes we would do better?
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Notice he sees the wickedness the great wickedness that every inclination of their hearts is only evil all the time and he does always these people
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Were better, but what can I do about it? I gave them free will No, so don't say that today He's not a worried hand -wringing
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God just wishes we would do better but then casually didn't casually excuses our sin You'll we get it or not doing better, but I can't
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I can't condemn them It's not like that wishes we hadn't done it, but it'll let us get by with it Here he is a grieved and angry
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God who will not forever tolerate sin the consequences are dire sin brings us the catastrophe of God's judgment
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Now somebody curious that God is described in verse 6 as being sorry
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That he created us That we grieved him Something that suggested somehow a human depravity our sin just caught
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God by surprise Things must have got a lot worse than he expected them to but this passage doesn't say that God was caught off guard
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By human sin. It only says that God showed grief because of his sin and Literally the word sorry there means this heave a sigh of regret good grief
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These people are so bad This is a human expression about God, so we'll understand
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You ever gotten something? This is so bad. I got to start all over This car is in such bad condition.
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I got to get rid of it and get a new one This creation is so bad. Got to start over. So we'll understand how deeply
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God is offended by sin. It's a way of saying that God Looking at us merely in our sin at our sin now left to ourselves
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Our natural condition without his grace. He sighs and declares that there's nothing good here that we only deserve judgment blotting out a catastrophe
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It does not imply that God did not know so to people say he regretted that he made them
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It's like some people think well that means that God if he couldn't see the future He would have seen that he was gonna regret he made him and not made us
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Well, no, it doesn't say that said at that moment looking at human sin without his grace this is not worth creating for even before creation
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He knew that sin would get this bad. It says that God looking at humanity as an eternally just God looking at us in our sins declared that this
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Without his grace was not worth creating for I understand that we bring grief to a holy
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God left to ourself without his grace. There's nothing here that he wants and That it gives him grief and that grief will have to be born by someone
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It's not a passing emotion this grief. I was like we might be Exasperated as someone angry as someone because they did something to us and then we get over it after a while It's not a passing emotion of grief, but it's a rock -solid
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Verdict on our catastrophic sinfulness. This is God's eternal
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Judgment on our sins we bring grief and someone will have to bear it either we will
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Will be consumed by an eternity of infinite grief. There will be unloaded on us or Someone else
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Abiding with us bearing our grief Enduring a catastrophe for us those are the dire consequences
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So this passage doesn't say or suggest that God changed It only says that God turned to a different side of himself
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Toward us and toward creation and Genesis chapter 1 and 2 God is very good and he shows us his extravagant generous
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Loving side God is love Yes Like a mountain
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They have a lush beautiful green gentle slope you can easily walk up but he is also has a just side that is hard like a granite cliff and That side and in him he must judge and condemn sin.
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He is grieved by it There is catastrophe for sin because of it remember in Romans the kindness and the severity of God here where there is great wickedness
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Where there is only evil he turns and Shows us another aspect of his unchanging character hatred of sin grief toward sin as an eternal fixture of God's character
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So God decrees in verse 7 I will blot out man
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Catastrophe is coming and this is the true God. It's not the cuddly one the many imagined today
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Teddy bears divine teddy bear in the sky the one preachers talk about who tell us there are sins aren't so bad
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All we really need to do is change some actions. We need some be happy attitudes Like a bad doctor who tells us the diagnosis we want to hear not the real truth the true
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God here shows us that our sins are our cosmic that they are complete and Catastrophic and the catastrophe here, of course is the coming flood.
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And so God is not fickle here He's not changing with his moods. He's not gonna just kind of get over it with time he is consistently expressing his revulsion toward sin always loving and Always just God is love and our
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God is a consuming fire Our sinfulness and God's wrath toward our sinfulness may be news to a human centered culture the world today but it shouldn't be if we've if we
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Personally kind of slogged our way through the swamp of conviction sort of described for us today in Psalm 32
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Keep silent about your sin. It's like you're withering away You're drying up, but then you can know
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God's forgiveness But if you've been through that experience what it says in Psalm 32 his hand is heavy on you as he's taking you through conviction
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No, then it's not so surprising. Is it? That he has judgment towards him.
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We felt God's Spirit contending for us contending with us
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Convicting us of our sins and judging us and showing us our sin Bringing us to repentance.
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We confess our sin. We see his righteousness we see the judgment that we deserve and we'll feel to our bones how cosmic and Complete our sinfulness is and then we'll see
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God's grief at our sin is justifiable and then we'll confess your judgments are true and right all together
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To What should be news? And should be be should be genuinely shocking to us is the revelation here that he contends with and for us in verse 3
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In which he's fighting for us for his people the word they're translated abide If you'll stay you'll live also could be contend means that he's not gonna put up with our sin forever but for now
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He is contending for us he's fighting for his people God is grieved by sin yet His spirit still remains on earth who remains with us bringing conviction to sinners showing us our sinfulness his righteousness and judgment
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He endures the grief and the pain that our sin brings As he abides with us he stays with us not striking out immediately wiping us all out
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Just to relieve himself of that grief Instead he's bearing it even coming as God in human flesh a man acquainted with grief
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He does not take pleasure in punishment. He's not a sadist instead. He struggles for us he abides with and contends for us even today
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God is Contending says here will not contend forever, but still he is contending
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He's struggling for the hearts and the minds of people and now of course He always wins the battles
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He chooses to win When he contends and he chooses to win this content, he will win it
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But these eight verses here show that he often wins through struggles
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Through many dangers toils and snares I have already come
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Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far and grace will lead me home
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As a church, we are called to let God contend through us
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We are to contend for God by the power of the Holy Spirit according to the Word of God We're contending for you right now for your sanctification
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We contend for your children for your husband or wife We're struggling with the world for people so that God might save some through us
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Sometimes the world will consider us to be to be intolerant because we're struggling with it We're contending with it and calling them to repent
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Martin Luther wrote It's a good sign when men condemn us the church talking about and call us agitators
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Maybe put in there intolerant today would be the word It's a good sign when men condemn us and call his agitators
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The Spirit of God is the one who strives with men reproves them and condemns them That's this brings them conviction
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This is what we as a church are called to do Contend with those for whom God is contending and then before the catastrophe we're shown here something that's not just shocking
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This is the surprising thing Not really the depravity the the completeness of the sin that all were only evil all the time
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The really shocking thing of this passage so shocking. It's amazing is the verse 8 Noah found
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Favor Grace the word there could just as easily be translated grace
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Noah found it Because God put it there right in front of him and that's amazing
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Now if God were a worried on a weak hand ring and God is rooting for us and have it We will do better but not really able to do much else.
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And if we were these basically decent people With good intentions. We just need a little education a little remedial training and then we'll be better if that were the case then grace
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Really isn't amazing at all. But this passage shows us the grace. Is it just possible? Shows us the grace is absolutely necessary if we are to be spared the dire catastrophe
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We are guilty Every inclination of our fallen hearts is only evil all the time
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And since we are completely sinful the only way that we could believe only way we can be saved
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The only way we could believe you know Some people think was God make salvation possible out there and if we just believe we can we can opt in we can get it
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But since every inclination of the hot thoughts of our heart is only evil all the time. We will never believe
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Unless God gives us a new heart The only way we could believe have saving faith is if God does something good
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In us our hearts with every inclination only evil continually will never believe left to ourselves
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Your salvation would something just kind of left up to us like milk has left up to you in the grocery store You can go get it if you want.
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It's up to you. It's all your free will if that were the case for salvation We would be surely lost
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We could never make the right choices We would never make the right choices because our hearts being evil
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We would always make the wrong choices. The only way we can make the right choice for God is if God has favor on us and We find that favor a favor enables us to choose what is right.
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God gives us favor and Because of his favor we find it
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Some could say They're looking for loopholes here. I know a found favor Now does it doesn't that imply that well?
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He was the active when he was doing something that that earned God's favor that made the favor come about made it active in his life some people
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Favorite analogy with salvation like God gives you a check, but you still up to you to endorse it and deposit it
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You know you know You find things that are already there
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Did you ever lose something in your house? And finally after looking hard through the whole house you finally find it now did the act of your looking
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Make the thing you were looking about looking for come about of course not it's already there
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You simply uncovered it Columbus days coming up Columbus create
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America or simply find it. He just found it. He didn't add one thing to its existence
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Our looking does it make God's grace come about does it make it exist? Sometimes God is so active in his graciousness that he finds those
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Who aren't even looking? Saul of Tarsus was not looking for Christ, but for Christians to persecute and God graciously found him and Turned him into the
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Apostle Paul C .s. Lewis wrote that he was dragged kicking and screaming into the kingdom of God thought that he found grace grace found him
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Notice that the grace is found in the eyes of the Lord It's not found in our actions or our morality or our religion
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You do the right things then you get grace and that's not really grace Is it something you earned but that's the way some people think
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Noah's righteous is not in his actions But in the eyes of the Lord other words what was
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Gracious what was righteous about Noah was the way God chose to see him This is what we saw in Romans remember from us after five and six
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God's imputation got imputes or credits accounts Righteousness to us.
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In other words God decided To look at him graciously why because of his grace
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God made the choice even while all the evil infect in the world to see one man as righteous nothing compelled him to do that God could have rightly condemned
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Noah along with everyone else There was nothing about Noah that made God spare him
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It's God's grace that made the difference not know his behavior But God decided to look at Noah through the lenses of his grace
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That's the only way that we can be saved today without that grace
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We are stuck in our sins and the consequences are dire God is under no obligation to save anyone
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Because sin is cosmic it's complete there only has to be punishment judgment catastrophe
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There does not have to be salvation But as Noah discovered
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There is grace there is something that does not have to be and It's in the eyes of the
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Lord Grace is really amazing because we haven't we have no right to it We don't earn it we don't make it come about every inclination of our hearts is only evil all the time
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We may not be that bad in our actions We may be able to control our sinfulness pretty well or the way we express it.
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We may keep our temper down We may not look at we may not be greedy. We may not be sexually immoral. We may tell the truth
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We make ourselves drive straight but we're still bent and God sees that God sees that even underneath all our morality our decency our religion our law keeping still
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All that stuff we cover ourselves with still We're bent
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And our sin grieves God That grief will have to be born
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Someone will have to carry it either we Will we follow the evil inclinations of our hearts and then we have to suffer eternal grief or We let a man of sorrows acquainted with grief
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Take it for us Our cosmic sins had him cry out my god.
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My god. Why have you forsaken me? Even the sky grew dark to hide him
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He took the completeness of our sins and he finally sighed
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It is finished He suffered the greatest catastrophe and was laid in the tomb
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The same God who was grieved that he made us Through the grief born by a son can now joyfully remake us because of him