Genesis Chapter 26 - Pastor Bruce Mejia

Okay, we're in Genesis chapter 26 this evening.

Genesis 26 · chapter mention

We're continuing with our Bible study in the book of Genesis.

And in this particular chapter, we have somewhat of a repetition of what took place in the days

of Abraham, specifically in the matter of a famine.

We see in verse number one, it says, there was a famine in the land beside the first

famine that was in the days of Abraham.

And Isaac went unto Abimelech, king of the Philistines, unto Giroir.

And the first point I want to make here is that famines exist in the will of

God.

We have Isaac, he's in the will of God, he's serving the Lord.

He's geographically in the will of God because he's in the promised land that he had given

to his father.

And of course, he's fulfilling the will of God.

He's doing that which God has called him to do.

But yet we see a famine taking place, a time of need, a time of difficulty where food

is scarce.

And so we have an issue here.

And what Isaac decides to do is he decides to go to Egypt.

Now he doesn't make it all the way to Egypt because God stops him and he ends up dwelling

in Giroir for quite some time.

But the point that I want to make here is that just because a famine comes along, it doesn't

necessarily mean that you're not in the will of God, right?

Just because needs arise, just because difficulties arise, just because hard situations come

up, it doesn't mean you're not right with God, it doesn't mean that God's

not blessing you.

It doesn't mean that God's hand is not on you.

It just means there's a famine, okay?

Sometimes famines exist for a variety of reasons.

You have situations come up where maybe you're low on funds.

Maybe you are low on certain needs that you have.

The bills aren't getting paid.

And maybe it's just an opportunity for you to step out in faith, to pray, to work.

And God wants to show himself strong on your behalf, okay?

And so it's important for us that when we experience a famine, which of course at

this particular time, no one knows what a famine is, right?

We have more than three square meals, okay?

And obviously the Bible tells us, I've not seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed

begging bread.

And with that in mind, we need to make sure that when we experience a time of need,

it's an indication to us that we need to have faith in God, look for

opportunities to serve God and to be provided for while not disobeying the

Lord, right?

Not going out of the promised land, leaving the boundaries of God's will.

And keep in mind that Girard, though it's a little further from where Isaac and

Abraham were, it's still geographically in that same region that's considered

the promised land.

You know, Isaac would have done wrong to go to Egypt, okay?

Egypt in the Bible is a picture of the world, it's a picture of the world

system.

And often it's a picture of, you know, when a believer goes there,

it kind of indicates that this person is backslidden or they're having a relapse

of faith.

And we had this in times past with Abraham, right?

There was a famine, he goes to Egypt and of course he ends up picking up

Hagar there, he took his nephew there, he ended up developing an Egyptian

appetite, so to speak, which worked against them later on.

And so obviously you can go to Egypt, you can get out of the church,

get out of the will of God in order to provide for your needs because

life is just so hard, but just know this, it's going to come at the cost,

right?

There's a price to be paid.

And so God does not want Isaac to repeat that same mistake that his father

made by going down into Egypt.

So he commands him to not go to Egypt and to stay, or at least

geographically, still stay in that same promised land region known as

Girard.

It says in verse number two, the Lord appeared unto him and said,

Go not down into Egypt, dwell on the land which I shall tell thee of.

So God already knows, I know where you're going, you know, you're going down,

right?

Because Egypt is directionally south and spiritually south as well.

He knows that's where he's going, he knows that's where he's headed,

and so he speaks to him and he tells him, don't go there,

dwell in Girard, keep the commandment of the Lord.

Because he says there, dwell on the land which I shall tell thee of.

Okay?

And it's important for us as Christians that when we're going through

a tribulation, a trial, a time of famine, we allow God to continue to speak

to us through his word, right?

We allow God, and we listen to God by reading the Bible and not get off

kilter and off track, you know, we still need to adhere to the statutes

and the commandments of the Lord in order to gain proper direction

for the decisions that we have to make, right?

And so, you know, the Lord tells Isaac not to go

to Egypt and so, you know, famines exist in the will of God and just

know that even when there's famines, God can still provide, right?

He has them dwell in Girard and as we're going to see later, he ends

up blessing them.

I mean, he, you know, ends up having exceeding many flocks

and possessions and he sows and he reaps.

I mean, God blesses them in a tremendous way in Girard showing

us that even if there is a famine, God can still bless us.

He can still provide for us.

The principle there is that if we seek first the kingdom of God and his

righteousness, these things, and of course, Matthew 6, when it says

these things is referring to the food and raiment, these things

shall be added unto you, okay?

But it takes faith and here's how you step out in faith.

You stay in the promise land, okay?

Do as God tells you to do and you stay in the promise land.

And so, you know, don't allow the famines, the trials

and the difficulties, the necessities of life to demonstrate

to you that somehow, oh man, you just need to make a drastic

decision.

You need to just get out of church.

You just need to get a third job that it will take you out

of church.

You just need to make sure you do this.

You know, when you start thinking that way and you don't

allow the word of God to kind of, you know, determine

your direction, you're going to go down.

You're going to go down into Egypt.

You're going to pick up baggage.

You're going to get a Hagar.

You're going to develop, you know, worldly appetites

in your children, in your nephews or whoever's with

you and you're going to pay for it in the long run, okay?

And so God provides in Girar, he shows himself strong.

And then what we see here, so that's verses two,

all the way to six, of course, we have God reiterating

the promises to Isaac that he gave to his father.

Skip down to verse six, verse seven, excuse me.

Now he goes to Girar, but unfortunately he continues

to attempt to repeat the same sins of his father.

So the first attempt was when he tried to go to Egypt, right?

God stopped him, but then he repeats another mistake

that his father made, which is lying, okay?

There's actually two sins.

One of them is that he lies.

And the second one is that he's a coward, okay?

Look at verse seven.

It says, in the men of the place asked him of his wife

and he said, she is my sister, for he feared to say

she is my wife, lest said he, the men of the place

should kill me for Rebecca because she was fair to look upon.

You're like, oh man, this is bad, you know?

Yeah, it is pretty bad, especially considering that,

you know, at least Abraham was telling a half truth, right?

You know, when Abraham said this of his wife, Sarah,

he, you know, he was being deceptive,

but there was still a little bit of truth to it

because it was his half sister.

That was kind of weird, but you know,

that was just what they did, you know?

The son of, excuse me, the daughter of his father.

And so, but in this particular case,

this is not true at all, okay?

You know, Rebecca, I think she's like a cousin removed

or something like that, second cousin removed,

I don't remember exactly how that stated,

but it's definitely not his sister.

So he just blatantly lies.

Now, what's the principle that we can learn here?

You know, what we do in moderation,

our children can often do in excess.

Our followers, our children can often do in excess.

If we provide a bad example, you know,

it is likely the percentage is higher

for our children to repeat those same mistakes as well.

And you know, where did Isaac get this idea anyways?

Where did he get this idea to say,

Rebecca's my sister, if not from his father

who said this about Sarah, okay?

So, you know, they're asking him of his wife

and instead of saying like, yeah, this is my wife.

And you know what, let me just be honest with you,

it's better for you to just to tell the truth, be honest

and not allow your imagination to just run wild with you,

right?

Because, you know, we don't really know

if anything was really gonna happen to Isaac, okay?

They could have been like, oh, am I bad?

You know, good looking wife, you know?

You got to, you pick a winner, like,

hey, you hit the lottery, good for you or something.

But the first reaction he had is just like,

she's my sister.

And then he tells Rebecca like,

hey, I don't want these guys to kill me,

so I need you to kind of play along with this, okay?

You know, apparently she's fair to look upon.

When it says fair to look upon means that she is attractive,

she's beautiful and Isaac recognizes that

along with the men of Girard

and this is why they're in the situation that they're in.

Verse eight says, and it came to pass

when he had been there a long time

that a bimilek, king of the Philistines looked out

at a window and saw him, behold,

Isaac was sporting with Rebecca, his wife.

Now, this bimilek is not the same bimilek

that his father Abraham had encountered years before.

It's a different a bimilek.

Bimilek simply means father of a king.

It's kind of used as a term to identify

somewhat of an office.

So this is a different a bimilek.

And what we have here is that, you know,

he's there for a long time.

They're keeping up this charade,

this lie that this is his sister.

It's not his wife.

But then a bimilek, he's looking outside of a window

and the Bible says here that Isaac

is sporting with Rebecca's wife.

This doesn't mean they're playing soccer.

Okay, they're not practicing the World Cup.

They're not playing football or something like that.

Sporting means like he's playing with her, okay?

And the implication here is that, you know,

he's basically, you know,

he's basically just making out with his wife possibly.

We don't know exactly what.

But obviously whatever he was doing

with his wife out in public that was appropriate,

you know, it let a bimilek know like,

hey, wait a minute, you know,

you guys are not siblings, okay?

Because siblings don't do that

except for in the South, no offense, Ben, you know?

You know, this is not a regular occurrence here.

So obviously sporting means that he is being

physically affectionate with his wife,

not just a hug, not just a kiss on the cheek.

Obviously there's other things going on there

that a bimilek is like, okay, bro, the jig is up.

Okay, I know that this is not your sister,

it must be your wife.

And you know, it's good.

I'm glad Isaac is, you know,

being affectionate towards his wife as he should,

as all husbands should.

Verse nine says an abimilek called Isaac

and said, behold, of a surety, she is thy wife.

And I'll say this to you,

she is my sister and Isaac said unto him,

because I said, lest I die for her.

And abimilek said, oh, you know,

she's like, lest I die for her, oh man.

What does this say?

It's like cowardice.

He was like, well, you know,

you are the savior of the body.

You should probably should have just died for her

if that was the case.

Verse 10 says an abimilek said,

what is this that thou has done unto us?

One of the people might lightly have lying with thy wife

and now should have brought guiltiness upon us.

So this kind of shows us that, you know,

when we decide to deceive and to lie,

to save our rear ends, okay,

just know that it could end up

affecting other people as well, right?

Because abimilek, he's not necessarily

a righteous person as in he's a believer.

He's not a believer in the God of the Bible,

but he's obviously somewhat of a moral man to the degree

that he understands that adultery is wrong, right?

That it's wicked, it's wrong.

And he's specifically saying here,

like your deception could have cost us guiltiness.

We could have gotten a lot of trouble for this.

You know, guiltiness could have come upon us.

And obviously, I don't know if this is the case.

It seems to imply this that maybe there was a law

within Girar that adulterers were put to death, okay?

How do we know that?

Because it says in verse 11, abimilek charged all his people

saying he that touched this man's wife,

this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.

And I do think that that is in the context of adultery.

We don't know for sure that that's what the case is

as far as the laws in Girar are concerned,

but this man obviously understood this is a grievous sin.

It's a criminal act and your lie could have got us

in a lot of trouble because someone could have slept

with your wife, committed adultery with your wife,

not knowing she was your wife,

and they could have suffered the consequences because of that.

It says in verse 12, then Isaac sowed in that land

and received in the same year a hundredfold

and the Lord blessed him.

So this kind of shows us again,

kind of what we saw with Abraham in times past

that there's people that can be blessed

despite the fact that they have some serious flaws,

and I would say that that's the reason I've been blessed.

That's the reason our church has been blessed.

That's the reason you've been blessed

is because of the fact it's not because we're perfect.

It's not because we're great.

It's not because we have no flaws.

It's because God is great.

He's gracious to us.

He's merciful and we are all he has to work with.

And so don't think, oh man,

I'm being blessed because I'm such a great guy.

No, often it's God just blessing

despite those attributes, despite those characteristics,

despite those flaws.

Because Isaac is clearly just, he's a coward.

He has the propensity to lie just like his father.

But yet because he sowed there, God was with him.

He allowed him to reap a great harvest.

He sowed in that land, it says in verse 12,

and received in the same year a hundredfold

the Lord blessed him.

Verse 13, the man waxed great,

meaning he grew to be great,

and went forward and grew until he became very great.

So this is a verse indicating

that Isaac is becoming very successful.

He has a lot of possessions in the midst of the famine,

by the way, right?

There's a famine going on.

He's succeeding.

He has a great harvest.

He's growing great.

It says he's going forward.

You know, he's progressing.

The Lord is with him.

Everything's going great.

Verse 14 says for he had great possessions of flocks

and possession of herds and great store of servants

and the Philistines envied him.

So aside from the fact that he has,

he's multiplying his possessions, his harvest,

things of that nature, you know,

he even has people working for him.

So he's a man of great stature.

He's a man of great influence.

Obviously he's building somewhat of an enterprise there

in Girard, and you know, the Lord is with him.

Now, what is the result?

What happens when you begin to succeed financially,

spiritually, or in any manner of life?

What's gonna happen?

Well, we see here in verse 14

that the Philistines envied Isaac, okay?

You can't have some success

without a little bit of friction with others, right?

Someone is gonna view your success.

They're gonna look at what you're doing.

They're gonna look at the raise that you got.

They're gonna look at the amount of souls that you've won.

They're gonna look at the success that you're experiencing,

the spiritual success, monetary success, whatever it may be.

And they are going to envy you

because success in others, in some,

produces envy in others, okay?

And you know what, you can't expect to succeed

in any area of life without having some haters.

That's just the common denominator there

that's always gonna take place.

You're always gonna have someone envying you

for the things that you do.

And what is envy?

Envy is when someone feels a sense of discontentment

and maybe even some anger over the success of others.

They want someone else's success.

They want their success.

They want their position.

They want what they have.

They want their status.

That's what they want.

And so they have this envy in their heart

towards that individual.

Not because that individual got it unrighteously.

Not because, oh, this person just got there by wicked means.

It's just because they're lazy.

An envious person is a lazy individual, my friends.

And obviously, you know, there's a spectrum.

There's people who are just lazy.

There's people who are extremely lazy

and extremely wicked.

Point being is that they're envious.

And you know what?

This is gonna happen in a successful marriage.

It's gonna happen in a successful church.

It's gonna happen with successful Christians.

It's gonna happen at your job.

You're always going to have haters, okay?

Who don't like the success that you are experiencing

and you can't do anything about it, okay?

There's nothing you can do about it

because you can't change someone else's heart.

Now, what we have to guard ourselves against

is having envy over other people's success, right?

We see someone being successful at our job,

in their finances, in their marriage, or spiritually,

whatever it may be, at their church.

We can't have this heart of envy, say, man.

Well, I deserve that.

Why does that person get to have that?

Why does this person get to have this level of success,

this level of attention, this much money,

that kind of car, this, that, and the other,

that kind of wife, that kind of husband?

That's called envy.

And we need to make sure

that we protect ourselves against that.

Because at the end of the day,

envy is a sin that, yes, even Christians can fall into, right?

You can have the propensity, because of our flesh,

to envy other people over things that you don't have.

And obviously, it's closely related to covetousness.

Covetousness is more closely related to

wanting the things that other people have.

Envy has more to do with wanting to have

their position, their status, okay?

And so, we need to be aware of envy.

It is the rottenness of the bones.

And envy can drive people to cruelty.

It can drive people to wrath, and anger, and slander,

and all manner of wickedness,

because of the fact that we have things,

we accomplish things that they can't.

Or they won't, okay?

And to those who are envious,

just get off your rear end and do something then.

You know, if you don't like the success of others,

okay, that's lame for not liking it,

but if it's making you so angry, and upset,

and discontent with yourself,

because you just suck, then don't suck,

and go do something extraordinary, right?

Go put in the work, go, you know,

and you know, I have people message me

all the time on Instagram,

and it's just amazing the kind of things

that people are willing to message you,

just embarrassing stuff.

You know, oh, you don't deserve this kind of following.

You know, you need to post this

because this is what you have this following for.

It's just like, well, why don't you grow your account

to 180,000 followers,

and then you can do what you want on that.

Don't try to piggyback on me.

Don't try to hate on me.

Don't try to make me, you know,

try to do what you want me to do with my account.

And if you don't like the success that I'm experiencing,

well, tough luck, stop sucking.

Don't produce sucky material, you know, crappy content.

You know, if you want that attention,

if you want that amount of followers,

you want the likes, you want the influence,

then go do it.

What's stopping you from doing it?

Nothing other than your suckiness, okay?

And it's true.

It's absolutely true.

You know, everyone is a Monday morning quarterback,

you know, in, on social media.

This is the way you should be doing it.

You go on their account, two followers.

This is how you should be stating that.

You go on their account, five followers, 20 followers.

Oh, I'm really gonna, you know,

and then you have people that message you,

and obviously some of these are bots.

But you know, people message you,

it's like, hey, you really wanna grow your account.

Let me just show you how you can get it.

You go on their account, 100 followers.

Oh, great.

I'm really gonna take advice

from someone who has 100 followers or something, you know?

It's called envy, okay?

We need to guard ourselves from envy.

And how do we do that?

Well, obviously, you know, number one,

we gotta learn contentment with what we have.

And contentment in its simplest form

is just being satisfied with the current state

that you're in, right?

Current finances that you have,

this life situation that you're experiencing,

the possessions you have.

But you know what, just because you're satisfied

doesn't mean you can't have more,

or it doesn't mean you shouldn't aspire to have more,

but you should be happy in whatsoever state you're in.

That's what contentment is, right?

So, you know, contentment is being satisfied

with where you're at,

but having the ambition to endeavor, to work hard,

put in the effort to get more if you have to,

if you want to.

You know, if you have the aspirations

to become greater, to make more money at your job,

to have greater influence,

just don't let it drive you to become an envious person,

to compare yourself with others,

to try to tear down others in order to elevate yourself.

And look, I compare myself with my peers all the time.

Yeah, you heard right, I do.

But not to hate on them,

but to glean wisdom from them, right?

I compare myself to like,

what am I doing that this person is doing

that they're doing better, right?

What am I doing in this particular area

that maybe I'm not succeeding in,

I need to look at what my past friends are doing,

I need to look at what other people are doing online

and kind of see what they're doing

and kind of emulate that

and not hate on them for it.

That's safe.

But you know, a lot of people are just like,

well, let me just go ahead and tear them down

to bring them down to my level

since I can't climb the ladder of success.

That's not right to do.

That is a hater mentality.

That's what envious people do.

Envious people make, you know,

Facebook groups hating on a particular successful movement.

It's getting a lot of people saved,

it's growing their churches,

it has great preaching,

it's getting a lot of influence out there.

That's what envious people do

because they can't do it, okay?

You know, I'll give you this example.

You know, a couple of months ago,

I don't remember how long ago.

You know, I did the podcast with the Hotch Twins, right?

And it was an awesome podcast.

I love the podcast.

It was fun, a little random at times of course.

You know, I went to a conference earlier this week

and someone was like, I know you,

you're from the Hotch Twins, you know?

And I'm like, well, I'm from a church,

but yes, I was on the Hotch Twins podcast.

It was great.

We got a lot of views.

There's clips on there that hit over 100,000 views.

It's great, it's awesome.

And we even got people in church

who were reached through the Hotch Twins.

Okay, so it was great.

But then you have, you know, a group of haters

who because they can't influence anybody

because they're just a bunch of weirdos,

just a bunch of haters,

they have to promote their garbage

on the comments section of that podcast.

Why?

Because they have to use my audience and my influence

in order to get, you know, in order to get an audience

because they can't get it themselves

because they're too weird, you know?

They can't make a video that hits 100,000, 200,000,

300,000, 500, a million views

to get the word out because they just suck.

So it's just like, well, out of envy,

then we need to go on the comment section

of this person's video,

of this person's successful video

and put it in the comment section,

hey, go watch this stupid movie or whatever, all right?

This gay movie that no one even cares about.

And you go on the comment section,

no one's giving them a thumbs up,

no one's really acknowledging, they don't really care.

They're just like, if anything, they're just like,

well, what does this have to do with Jews, you know?

Like, and in fact, I had someone contact me

and said like, hey, I saw this movie, you're in it.

And it seems to be like, you know,

exposing some pastor,

but honestly, I saw five minutes of it

and I was just like, this looks stupid.

Who didn't get spanked when they were younger?

And they said, and they said this,

I think it's a Jewish PSYOP too,

because the director sounds Jewish.

So like, I want nothing to do with it, you know?

And these aren't new, I've even,

these are people who have reached

through these podcasts and stuff, you know?

The point that I'm making here

is that it comes with the territory.

Envy comes with the territory.

You just gotta make sure it's not on your end.

You gotta make sure that you don't feel envy

towards another team leader,

towards another team, another family in our church,

another marriage in our church,

another, you know, Christian

who's experiencing success in our church.

You need to make sure you temper yourself

and allow the success of others,

listen to me, to provoke you to greater heights, okay?

Allow other people to be an example unto you

of what you should be trying out and doing, okay?

And so success can often breed envy.

The Philistines are envying this guy,

you know, because of his wife,

because of his possessions,

his success that God is blessing him with.

Look what it goes on to say here,

verse 15, for all the wells which his father's servants

had digged in the days of Abraham his father,

the Philistines had stopped them

and filled them with earth.

So what does envy do?

It causes people to not like you

and then it also moves them to try to hinder your success.

Try to fill up the common section with nonsense,

with earth, with nonsense, right?

With just bad content, with slander in lies and nonsense.

This is what the Philistines are doing.

So instead of, you know, the Philistines saying,

you know what, maybe we should sew as much as he did.

Maybe we should put in the work to be blessed of God.

They're like, well, actually,

why don't we just fill up these wells that belong to him

with earth to hinder his success?

It's godless.

It says in verse 16,

and by the way, I love verse 15

because it says, for all the wells

which his father's servants had digged

in the days of Abraham his father.

You know, obviously what Isaac is doing

is he is utilizing the wells

that were once dug by his forefathers,

specifically by his dad, right?

And I'll get more into that in just a bit.

I love the concept of the wells being dug here.

Verse 16 says,

and Abimelech said unto Isaac, go from us,

for thou art much mightier than we.

And Isaac, the part of the fence,

and pitched his tent in the valley of Gerar

and dwelt there.

So, you know, we don't exactly know

what Abimelech's intentions were here.

We don't know if he also feels envy

or if he agrees with the Philistines in this area.

You know, he is removing Isaac from the land

and he's using the pretext, oh, you're mightier than us, okay?

And the reason I say we don't know

is because towards the end of the story,

he comes back and he wants to make peace with Isaac.

And so it could be that he thought like,

hey, you've just outgrown us, okay?

You've outgrown us and so it's time for you to move on

and get your own thing going on or whatever.

And that would be good.

But obviously, you know, we could infer into the text here

that Abimelech was provoked or highly motivated

by the Philistines who envied Isaac,

probably like, and get this guy out of here,

you know what I mean?

We don't like this guy and he's sewing in our land,

he's being successful, we don't like it.

And so we see that.

Look at verse 18.

And Isaac digged again the wells of water

which they had digged in the days of Abraham his father

for the Philistines that stopped them

after the death of Abraham.

And he called their names after the names

by which his father had called them.

Now I love this concept because, you know,

Abraham and his time put in a lot of work.

I mean, it requires a great amount of work.

It's very arduous to create wells and dig them,

make them function in order to utilize them.

And so, you know, water is life.

You know, you need this for your livestock,

your cattle, for yourself.

And Abraham put in a lot of work.

But the Philistines, because they're lame, you know,

they obviously have ought against Abraham.

They filled up the wells with earth.

Instead of actually utilizing them, okay,

they could have just used them.

Instead, you know, they're being spiteful

and they are filling up the wells with earth.

So what does Isaac do after Abraham is long gone?

He goes back to those wells again

and begins to dig them up, right?

And, you know, in a spiritual sense,

the spiritual principle that we can learn here

is that, you know, our spiritual forefathers,

so to speak, you know, they fought a lot of battles.

They dug many wells, right?

And then you have these godless Philistines,

these haters of God, false prophets,

who are filling up the wells with earth.

They're kind of packing it out.

They're trying to hinder that living water

from coming out of the well, right?

Throughout the generations,

there's doctrines that are fought for.

You think of the fight for the King James Bible.

That's something that our forefathers fought for.

Soul winning, you know, being a fundamental Baptist,

the fundamentals of the faith.

And then over time, because we experience success

in those areas, we become a little lenient.

And I think it happens with every generation.

And what happens, Philistines come

and they fill up those wells with earth, okay?

Then it requires for a new generation to arise

and dig those wells again, right?

It requires a new generation of fundamental Baptists

to come and say, all right,

let's dig up the wells again of soul winning, right?

Let's dig up the wells again of the King James Bible.

Let's dig up the wells again of, you know, hymns.

Let's dig up the wells again

of just local New Testament churches

that preach hellfire and damnation.

And instead of being so practical,

we're teaching a lot of doctrine.

We're digging up the wells of end times prophecy.

We're digging up the wells of just living

a holy and sanctified life.

We're just digging up these wells

that our forefathers dug,

but they were filled up by the Philistines.

And you know what?

We're gonna put in a lot of work in our lifetime.

But let me tell you, once we're gone,

they're gonna get filled up again.

They're gonna get filled up again.

Some lame Philistine out of envy

is gonna come and try to bury the heritage,

bury the work that was put years prior to that, right?

But it's okay, because Isaac's gonna come

and he's gonna dig again the wells.

And you know what?

We as Isaac are to do the same.

We need to make sure that we are reviving

the doctrines of the faith.

We are reviving the practices

of the local New Testament church.

We are reviving missions and soul winning

and hard preaching and systematic doctrine

and preaching against sin,

preaching against the abominations of the land,

making sure that we're looking at the wells

that were dug in times past and revive them once again.

One well that we need to dig up again

is just church attendance.

After 2020, you have the whole COVID thing

and people just get really comfortable

with just live streams and just staying at home

because it's just a lot easier.

You could eat chips off your belly and have soda

and just hang out at home and watch church like that.

But you know what?

That's not God's will.

God says not forsaken the assembling of ourselves together

as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another

and so much the more as you see the day approaching.

No brother, we are the church.

No you're not.

If you're out there in your own house,

that's not church.

Church is you assembling together

with a group of baptized, saved believers

to hear the word of God being preached.

And let me just remind you, a church is not the building.

We need to meet in a building for sure.

But a church is not the building.

This is what Catholics have to say, oh man,

yeah, go ahead and meet your strip mall.

Oh yeah, while you meet in your cathedral

and just split a whole wide open anyways.

You're just a whiteed sepulcher,

beautiful on the outside,

but just full of dead men's bones on the inside.

You know, we need to make sure we revive

and make sure we keep alive.

We dig the wells of church attendance.

We dig the wells of the Romans road, amen?

Preaching the gospel, the Romans road.

We don't need to be cute about it.

We don't need to give some sort of cartoon illustration

and you can watch this video

and you can get saved that way.

And I'm not saying people haven't got saved that way,

but you know what?

We just need to dig up the wells

of just preaching, opening our mouths boldly

to make known the mysteries of the gospel.

Okay, and so it's a great principle here.

So we need to train the next generation

to understand like I'm not gonna always be here,

you need to fight these battles after I'm gone.

Okay, you need to dig up these wells.

And you know, it almost seems like a losing battle is like,

man, I'm digging up all these wells

just to know that they're gonna be filled up with earth

again after I'm gone.

But you know what?

It's necessary.

It's necessary.

Why?

Because the next generation has to fight for something.

They gotta fight for something.

And so it's important.

And thank God, you know, you have Isaac coming here.

And I'm sure as he's digging, he's appreciating dad.

He's like, man, my dad put in a lot of work

for this, a lot of work.

Look what it says in verse 19.

And Isaac's servants digged in the valley

and found their well of spring and water.

And the herdman of Girard did strive

with Isaac's herdman saying, the water is ours.

And he called the name of the well east sec

because they strove with him.

So throughout this project of digging again the wells,

you see that each of them are named a particular name

that means something.

So east sec means like contention.

Meaning that, you know, when a generation

decides to dig up a well,

they're gonna experience some contention from others, right?

We cannot revive a particular well

that has living water without having some opposition.

It's always gonna be opposition.

There's always gonna be contention.

There's always gonna be people who say,

well, this water is ours.

So it takes fighting.

It takes, you know, facing the opposition,

making sure that we dig as we're fighting and so forth.

It says in verse 21, and they digged another well

and strove for that one also.

And he called the name of it sitna.

And sitna simply means opposition.

So the first two is just referring to like striving.

It's referring to opposition.

It's basically addressing the fact

that you can't revive these things

without having some friction with other people.

You're always gonna have people

who don't like what you do, okay?

You can't expect to live the Christian life

and have all your teeth crossed and your eyes dotted

and everything's good and your doctrine's great

without having someone fight you on it.

It's gonna happen, okay?

You're gonna have a sitna and you're gonna have

an east sec, you're gonna have contention

and you're gonna have opposition.

A great ineffectual door is open unto me

and there are many adversaries.

It's just the way it works, okay?

This is what the Bible says, fight the good fight of faith.

The Christian life is a life of fighting, right?

We know, we understand we wrestle not against flesh

and blood, but against principalities,

powers against the rules of the darkness of this world.

But there is fighting involved

and these principalities have human agents.

So sometimes it requires for us to fight against them as well.

Verse 22 says, and he removed from fence

and digged another well, and for that they strove not.

And he called the name of it, Rehoboth,

and he said, for now the Lord hath made room for us

and we shall be fruitful in the land.

So I love this because the first two is just like,

kind of like a headache, it's just stressful.

You're striving, you're fighting, that's our water.

People are just like giving you a hard time.

You're just like, dude, shut up.

I'm just gonna get some water here

and people are opposing you,

but then when you stick with it,

what happens?

You become fruitful.

And you get to a point where you experience a season

where there's no striving at all.

Now obviously this doesn't mean that Isaac will not

experience any type of strife thereafter

because we obviously know the story,

but in this particular era he's like,

oh, there's no more striving.

God has made room for us.

So we can picture this as like the Christian life as well.

In the Christian life, when you initially get saved,

you have a lot of digging to do.

You have a lot of digging in your conduct.

You got a lot of digging in your knowledge

of the word of God.

You gotta dig into the Bible to get that living water.

You gotta study to show thyself approved unto God.

You gotta dig deep in order to correct your conduct

and your conversation, but there comes a point

where you mature in the Christian faith

not that you've arrived, but where you can look back

and say, man, I've come a long way.

God has made room for us.

And how do we know when that's the case,

when you become fruitful, right?

When you begin to produce fruit.

Why?

Because fruit grows where the stream flows, amen?

He's digging the well and then fruit begins

to spring out and it begins to produce fruit.

And it's just like, oh man, it was worth it.

It's great.

He's made room for us.

Verse 23, and he went up from Thence to Bersheba.

And the Lord appeared unto him the same night

and said, I am the God of Abraham, thy father, fear not.

For I am with thee, and I will bless thee

and multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham's sake.

So notice that throughout the striving,

throughout the difficulty, God's always been there.

He's just always been there, folks.

You know, God didn't disappear.

He was still in the midst.

Even in the middle of fighting and opposition

and strife and contentions and people envying him,

you know, God is always there.

And you know, I've said this before, you know,

he doesn't have, he's not obligated

to prove that he's there.

We just gotta kind of, we just gotta believe it.

That's what it says, right?

And after all of it's done, when he's fruitful,

God shows up, he's just like, I'm with you.

I am with thee.

I am the God of Abraham, thy father, fear not.

For I am with thee, I will bless thee

and multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham's sake.

So he reiterates the promise.

And I will say that this takes a level of maturity

to just understand when you're going through a trial,

doesn't mean that God's not there.

If you're experiencing opposition,

doesn't mean that God's not there.

He is present and he is with you.

All things taken that you're right with God

and you don't have sin in your life and so forth.

Verse 25 says that he built in an altar there

and called upon the name of the Lord

and pitched his tent there

and there Isaac's servants digged a well.

Then Abimelech went to him from Girar

and Ahusath, one of his friends in Fikol,

the chief captain of his army.

And Isaac said unto them,

wherefore come ye to me, seeing ye hate me

and have sent me away from you?

They said, we saw certainly that the Lord was with thee.

We said, let there be now and oath betwixt us,

even betwixt us in thee

and let us make a covenant with thee.

So obviously, Isaac feels a little bit of resentment here,

maybe towards Abimelech,

maybe towards the guys that are with him,

just in general with the men of Girar,

because when he was experiencing success,

they just kind of removed him.

Just like get out of our country.

And Abimelech said that,

oh, you're mightier than us,

but obviously Isaac didn't take it that way.

He took it as you hate me.

That's why you removed me.

Envious of me, you hated me, that's why you removed me.

And Abimelech seems to be very humble here.

And what does he say?

We saw that the Lord was with thee.

And you know what?

Let me just say this,

is that you're gonna have people in your life

that in the beginning stages of your Christian life,

they're gonna envy you,

they're gonna remove you from their company,

they're gonna hate on you,

they might criticize you,

your family, friends or whatever,

they don't like what you believe and whatnot.

And it's gonna take some time.

And then you know what it's gonna take?

It's gonna take you digging some wells,

being fruitful,

and then somewhere along down the line,

Abimelech comes back and he's like,

we see that the Lord is with you, right?

We saw certainly that the Lord was with thee, right?

They say like, oh man, it wasn't just like a phase.

It's not just like, oh, he's just going through

like a small period of just,

he just got into this church thing,

she just got into this church thing,

she'll get over it, he'll get over it.

No, he's saying like, okay,

now we know that God's with you,

like God's blessed you, right?

It's the fruitfulness that testified

that the Lord was with him.

And you know what?

Let me just tell you this,

like this sounds awesome,

but sometimes it does take years though.

It takes years.

You know, he's like, how do you know?

Well, I'm going on 20 years saved next year.

And you know, people are just starting to come around.

People are just starting to come around.

You know, people are finally starting to realize like,

all right, God's with you.

It's like, what's all that stuff you were saying before, huh?

What's all that nonsense you're talking?

That's what I want to say.

But they realize like, oh man,

God's obviously like blessing you,

his hands on you, like God's using you.

And you know, he,

Abominan humbles himself and he says like,

okay, you know, let there be now an oath betwixt us

and betwixt us and the,

let us make a covenant with the,

what does he say?

And let's read verse 29,

that thou will do us no hurt

as we have not touched thee

and as we have done unto thee nothing but good

and as sent thee away in peace.

Thou are now blessed of the Lord.

Now, that point is debatable, right?

But what is Abominan like asking for?

He's like, I want peace, okay?

I want there to be peace between us.

And you know, Isaac did the right thing.

He made peace.

You know, he could have been like,

no, I'm mightier than you remember.

I'm gonna go ahead and just take over your entire land.

I'm just gonna destroy you.

You're done.

Look what you guys did on my dad's wells.

I've been spending all this time digging back up.

You know what he did?

He made peace with them.

And you know what?

The temptation years from now

is for you to kind of rub their mistakes

and their bad assessment of you in their face.

It's the temptation.

It's my temptation.

But you know what?

God has called us to be peacemakers though.

You know?

And at the end of the day,

if someone humbles themselves before us

and asks for an apology,

they ask for forgiveness,

they recognize the error of their ways,

we should just like,

leap to the opportunity to forgive that person

and restore relationships, amen.

I just can't.

I just have so much hurt.

I have so much, you know, these people,

they separated me from their company

and you know, my brother said this

and my aunt said this

and you know, the people from my previous church did this

or you know, I get it, you know, it's hard.

Now look folks, obviously I'm not referring to reprobates.

Reprobates, they have no forgiveness.

Not in this world, not in the world to come.

Like I'm not obligated to forgive reprobates.

Well, if God doesn't forgive them,

then you're not obligated to forgive them either.

So let's just, you know, shave that off

and we know we're not talking about reprobates, okay.

And so I'm talking about just people, Christians,

brethren who, you know, they envy you.

They thought you're just being a bad testimony, you know,

they may have done things to hurt you, okay.

But then later on, if they come back

and they humble themselves and they make it right,

we should accept the apology.

We should.

We should accept the apology and reconcile.

And I'll be honest with you, one of my favorite things

to do in the Christian life is reconcile.

I love reconciliation.

It's great.

Maybe it's because it reminds me of how merciful

and gracious God is towards me.

When I fall short, I sin against the Lord

and he's just ready to forgive, right.

If we confess our sins, he's faithful

and just to forgive us our sins

and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

You know, God is always like waiting

for us to get right with him.

If we're, you know, if we've deviated from the path,

if we got involved in sin,

he's like ready to forgive.

He's ready to pardon.

He will not always chide, right?

He's ready.

Well, you know what?

We should do the same, okay?

We should be ready to forgive people

when they come around.

And I'm speaking to you, you know,

but you just, I just need you to remember this

20 years from now.

So make sure you like put it on a piece of paper or something.

You just gotta remember this because it will happen.

If you are faithfully serving the Lord,

you're loyal to the cause of Christ,

you're winning souls, you're living a godly life,

you're being sanctified.

I mean, the house of God, the service of God,

the Bible's like the centerpiece of your life

as much as you can, as much as it can be in your life.

You know, you're gonna be fruitful.

And you know what?

God's gonna give opportunities in the future

for those people to come around again.

And you know, may not be said

that when they do come around,

they just find a just bitter person

who just is still angry about the past, right?

May not be said.

And I experienced something like this this week, actually.

You know, I had a pastor friend.

It's not new IFB, old IFB,

someone who I greatly admired, greatly respected.

I looked up to a lot.

And you know, we had a major falling out years ago,

major falling out.

And I'll be honest with you, I was hurt.

Like, it hurt my feelings, you know?

My feelings were hurt.

I was embarrassed in front of all the internet

because of it.

And I couldn't believe what took place.

And I'm not gonna go through all of it,

but it was bad.

And you know what?

There was strife between us for a long time.

And it just sucked, you know what I mean?

It was just like, man,

because this person was such a pivotal influence in my life.

Just like such a man of God that like,

he's like the man that I,

that inspired me to like be a hard preacher,

to be a,

he made me like proud to be a fundamental Baptist.

Right?

And so it was very difficult to experience that.

And I even preached against him, you know?

Like, I let him have it.

But, you know, this week we reconcile, you know?

And quite frankly, like, I went to go see him

not with the expectation that he was gonna

ask for forgiveness or anything.

I just went there just as a way to honor him.

Because you know, I do believe

that we should still honor those

and love those who reached us.

Right?

Like if a pastor got you saved,

or if a pastor played a major role

in your salvation in some way or shape or form,

no matter what happened between you and that pastor,

you should appreciate that man.

Like God used that man in a great way to get you saved.

Or to help you to grow spiritually.

And I believe in giving honor where honors do.

And you know what?

Like, I've matured and so like,

I just thought to myself like,

I wanna go see him and just thank him.

Cause I know that this would be pleasing

unto the Lord for me to do this.

I know that God would be pleased with me

to just set my differences aside

and not even expect an apology or anything.

But just tell that man that I love him,

give him a gift

and just let him know how much I appreciate

for everything that he's done in my life

and not even bring up the past.

And you know, I went there

and he saw me in the hallway right before this.

And he just came up and he hugged me

and he just held me for a really long time.

And he just gripped me

and he's like, this is what he's like,

I missed you, I missed you.

He's like, I love you, brother Bruce.

And you know, we didn't conversate exactly at that moment

like what, you know, I just told him the same thing.

And I said, I came here to see you.

I just wanna see you.

I said, we can talk afterwards.

Afterwards, after he was done preaching,

I came up to him

and before we could even start the conversation,

he said, I wanna let you know

that I want you to forgive me

for what I did to you years ago.

He said, I have regretted it for years

and I need you to forgive me for that.

And I'm sorry.

And it was very, it humbled me

because you know,

you don't really expect spiritual giants

to do something like that.

I mean, I guess you kind of do, but you kind of don't.

And I was just kind of taking it like,

I didn't expect it.

And he's just like, I'm sorry.

He's like, forgive me for that.

He's like, it's plagued me for years.

You know, and it's just bothering me and I'm so sorry.

And this man is an established man.

Like he doesn't, he gains nothing,

especially from being friends with me, you know what I mean?

Like, you don't get anything

from being friends with me, you know what I mean?

Like, it's not like, you know,

maybe we could get some of the students

on our Bible college or something like that

or, ain't no way that's happening, you know?

Like, it's not like, you know,

if anything, I kind of would be like a liability

to him to a certain degree.

If people found out that, you know,

we're friends, which they are now.

But, you know, he gained nothing.

But not, according to him, according to him,

he, this is extremely important to him.

And, you know, and he said, like,

he's like, I want to be your friend again.

And I want to know what's going on in your life.

I want to know what's going on in your church.

I want to know about the salvation.

Like, I want to stay in conflict with you.

And I told him, I was like, I forgive you.

I was like, you don't ever have to bring it up again.

I was like, apology accepted.

It's all done.

And let me just tell you, it feels good

to forgive someone.

If you've never done it, you should try it sometime.

You should just, I'll offend you.

Just so you could try it.

I'll offend the fire out of you

and then, you know, you can,

you can wait for me to apologize to you.

It feels great to forgive someone.

It's like a, it's like a load that I didn't know I had.

And it felt, just in my heart,

I felt such a swelling sense of joy

over just relieving someone of the offense that they felt.

It feels great.

And I said, I love you and you changed my life.

It was under your preaching that I got saved

and you were such an example unto me.

And I'm just so thankful that like,

that you're here when I was 21 years old

and I came as an unsafe person

and I'm so thankful that you're the one that was preaching

and just everything you've done,

I said, it's all forgiven, you know?

And he said, I appreciate it.

He said, thank you for forgiving me.

And it's just like, you didn't have to say all that,

you know?

And I told him, I said, forgive me.

And we're having this conversation in front of like,

all these people, you know,

people are just like waiting to get his autograph.

And we're just kind of like,

we're like this far away from each other

just because the conversation was just intense.

And he said, you know, I'm gonna come back

and I wanna go visit your church.

I just wanna know what's going on with your life,

keep in contact with me, you know?

And I told him, I said, well, let me just tell you,

we got 6,100 salvation so far this year at our church.

I said, a lot of that goes to your account.

Just remember that.

We got like 40 baptisms serving God,

we went to, and I just started telling him

about all these exploits

and he's just smiling ear to ear.

He's like, man, I'm so happy about that, you know?

And, you know, I could have been like,

no, you hated me, you know?

And it's not like he thinks,

he knows who I'm affiliated with.

He knows who I'm associated with.

He knows it all, okay?

You know?

And, you know, but he doesn't care, you know?

And so, and I'm not saying we're gonna be best friends

or anything like that.

It's not like, you know, hey, what are you doing?

You know, like, well, let's go in and out, you know?

But, you know, just the most important thing

that I got from that is just the peace between us.

Peace.

Because in my mind, five years, six years ago

when all that took place,

I thought to myself, I'm heartbroken

that I will never have a good relationship

with this person, this side of eternity.

And I look forward to the day

that I can see him in the millennial reign

and we can put our differences aside.

That's literally what I thought.

And I'm just thankful that came a lot sooner.

Don't hold grudges.

Don't be bitter towards people.

Don't hold grudges.

You know, I don't consider being angry

towards reprobates as bitterness, by the way, you know?

That's pretty justified.

I'm talking about just people and Christians

who you felt like did you wrong or something like that.

Okay?

And, you know, obviously Isaac is a humble guy.

He's just like, yeah, let's do it.

And then they got it right.

And, you know, and look, folks,

it's just better to live life

not constantly having to think about the past.

Carry that load with you everywhere you go.

It's just not worth it.

It's just not worth it at all.

And I've learned in the Christian life

that one of the greatest exploits that you can do

is forgive people.

Forgive them.

Forgive your parents.

Forgive your siblings.

Forgive, you know, your spouse.

Just forgive them.

Just like relieve them of that.

Because I'm going to tell you right now,

it's very pleasing unto the Lord when you do that.

It makes God happy.

And just, you know, from a selfish perspective,

you know, if you want to be forgiven of God,

you need to make sure that you forgive others.

And if you want God to forgive you speedily,

you make sure you forgive others speedily as well.

And so it was an awesome week for me.

I've been thinking about it every single day.

I'm thankful for it.

It goes on to say here in verse 30, he says,

he made them a feast and they did eat and drink

and they rose up B times in the morning

and swear one to another and Isaac sent them away

and they departed from him in peace.

Let me say one last thing.

You know, this could apply to just your old IFV pastor.

Maybe you didn't have a good experience there.

Maybe you were kicked out or something.

They criticized you and they did this, that and the other.

You know, just put all that to the side.

Who cares?

We got a great church now.

Got a great church.

Got awesome preaching, amen.

Got a lot of soulening going on.

You can speak freely.

You know, we're having a great time.

The Lord is with us.

Everything is just beautiful.

So why even worry about that?

You know what I mean?

Just be thankful.

Now, if your old IFV pastor was a reprobate,

screw that guy, you know what I mean?

It's just a different story.

But you know what?

If he's just an old IFV guy, okay?

Just let him be an old IFV guy.

You could still love him.

Still appreciate what he did.

And look, let me just tell you.

Like, I, you know, and I preached my share of sermons

against the old IFV and I probably will continue

to do so over the years.

But let me just tell you, I do appreciate

and love the old IFV.

We will never be just like them

because we just, certain things we just don't agree with.

You know what I mean?

But you know, just because we don't agree with them

just doesn't mean that they're not great still

in a lot of ways.

And it doesn't mean we can't appreciate them

for the greatness that they have done and will do.

Because we don't want to have this mentality

is just like, oh, we're the only ones

committing great things and doing great things.

And you know, that might be true in certain areas

where there's like no churches, you know,

in that particular geographic location.

But in general, you know, there's old IFV churches

that are doing great works for God.

Still got great preaching, still seeing souls saved.

And you know what?

If I was not a pastor, you know, obviously like

I would want to be in a new IFV church.

I probably would not ever go back to an old IFV church.

It's not gonna happen, you know?

Because you just, once you get,

once you're in the new IFV, you just,

you know, you just kind of hooked.

It's like, it's like spiritual crap, you know what I mean?

It's just like, this is good, you know?

You know, someone's gonna clip that, clip that.

Except the MSG, you know what I mean?

It's like the MSG over the preaching.

It's just like, you know, you can listen to other stuff,

but you always come back to new IFV preaching.

That's a fact, that's just how it is.

And you know, it's all good, you know?

But obviously a spiritual person

can listen to any kind of preaching

at any given time regardless of who it is

and still learn.

So, you know, he leaves, they depart in peace,

they're happy, verse 32,

and it came to pass the same day that Isaac's servants came

and told them concerning the well,

which they had digged and said unto him,

we have found water and he called it Sheba,

therefore the name of the city

is for Sheba unto this day.

So it's interesting, after they make peace,

God allows them to find this great well called Sheba.

You know?

And you just never know what kind of blessings

things are on the other side of your forgiveness.

On the other side of your reconciliation,

you just never know what God might do.

And he allows them to find a great well.

Now, you know, I love the Bible because it's just real

and it's such a beautiful story.

It's just like, man, it's so good.

Peace and everything, you know?

It's just like, and then end credits, right?

Fade scene, end credits.

Verse 34, and he's always 40 years old

when he took a wife, Judith, the daughter of B.R.I.,

the Hittite, and Beth Shemath, the daughter of Elon,

the Hittite, which were a grief of mine

and to Isaac and to Rebecca.

It's like, you know, it fades out.

It's just like, by the way,

like Esau's wives are just a grief.

You know, they're a grief to Isaac and Rebecca.

It just finishes off with that.

I love that, okay?

And so, you know, Esau is over here committing polygamy

and it finishes off with that.

It just says like, his wives are just like, you know,

the parents are just like,

ugh, can't believe this guy married these women, you know?

And so, hey, that shows us parents

that we need to make sure that we pray for our children

to find the right spouse, one, find the right spouse

so that they don't become a grief later on

because it can happen, okay?

We see this with the situation.

What's the sermon tonight?

The sermon's simply this, you know,

we need to make sure that we are doing our part

in this generation to dig up the wells

that our forefathers have dug, okay?

And, you know, when we do so,

we have to expect opposition, contention,

but there's also blessings and room that God makes for us.

He allows us to be fruitful.

And along with that, we need to make sure

that along this journey that we're taking,

that, you know, when God provides opportunities

for us to reconcile with others,

we do put our differences aside and forgive

and allow them to move on and so forth, you know?

And so, it's important for us to reconcile

with the Bimalak and reconcile with those of Girard.

Because, you know, Isaac could have said,

you know, you guys did let me live there.

That's true, you know?

You guys did let me live there.

You gave me a spot.

You allowed me to be successful.

I grew there.

I, you know, I became successful there.

And then you guys kicked me out.

But I'll never forget the fact

that you guys let me live among you.

And so, you know, I feel that way

about my old IFB church.

You know, obviously, we can highlight all the bad stuff.

But what's the point?

What's the point?

I got there.

I was there for 10 years.

And you know what?

I was blessed.

How blessed?

I got saved there.

I learned about the King James Bible there.

I came into the new IFB and people were coming to like,

I just heard about the KJV.

I never heard about soul winning.

I never heard about any of this stuff

because they went to another.

I'm like, I got saved in a Baptist church

where this stuff was just normal.

Where it was just like KJV only, soul winning,

heart preaching, you know?

I'm thankful for that.

Very grateful for that.

I'm thankful for Girard and everything

that I got in Girard.

And I'm thankful that I grew in Girard

and became prosperous and succeeded there.

And you know what?

Sometimes it's just time to move on.

Go dig some wells, amen.

Let's pray.

Father, we thank you so much for your word.

Thank you for the examples that we have here.

Help us as your people to be ready to forgive.

And I pray that, Lord, you'd give us a tender heart

to forgive one another when people have offended us.

And even if they don't come to ask for forgiveness,

sometimes we just need to do it in our hearts.

As unto you, Lord.

But especially when they come to us asking for forgiveness,

may we extend that hand of mercy towards them

and be ready to forgive, to reconcile,

and to restore that friendship once again.

I love it, Lord.

I'm thankful for it.

And I pray that others would extend that same grace to me

that when I offended and I ask for forgiveness,

the people would readily forgive me as well.

And I pray you, bless us as we go on our way, Lord.

We love you, we thank you,

and pray this thing is in Jesus' name.