Remember your Creator

We're in chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes, and I thought, you

know, since it is Mother's Day, once you pass your Bible and

your notebook and your pen mums to your husband, he can take

notes for you today. No, really.

Compete. Yeah.

Wax eloquently upfront. Serve your wife here.

He says he's already given me his notes.

We're going to be an Ecclesiastes 12 and I want to

read the first 8 verses, but I I want to read it to you out of

the message Bible just because I know there's some Pretoria boys

high guys here and, and, and it just helps us sort of

disseminate Scripture. It says the following.

This is verse one of Ecclesiastes 12.

Remember your creator while you're still young, before the

years take their toll and your vigor wanes.

Before your vision dims and the world blurs.

You know? And getting those plus threes

from cliques and the winter years keep you close to the

fire. In old age, your body no longer

serves you so well. Muscle slack and grip weakens.

Joints stiffen. The shades are pulled down on

the world. You can't come and go at will.

Things grind to a halt and the hum of the household fades away.

You're awakened now by birdsong. True story.

It's a thing, they told me. Like every decade.

It's an hour earlier and this rains.

I'm going to wake up before I go to sleep.

You're awakened now by birdsong. Hikes to the mountains are a

thing of the past. Even a stroll down the road has

its terrors. Or at least Pitt tells me.

Your hair turns apple blossom white, adorning A fragile and

impotent matchstick body. Yes, you're well on your way to

eternal race while your friends make plans for your funeral.

Come to church, they said. It will be fun, they said.

Life, lovely while it lasts, is soon over.

Life as we know it's precious and beautiful ends.

And look at this. The body is put back in the same

ground it came from. The Spirit returns to God.

It first breathed it. It's all smoke, says Solomon.

Nothing but smoke. Now, if I were to start where we

normally start in life group and ask you like what stands out

there for you? I'm sure you're probably going

to quote maybe verse 6. You know, life lovely while it

lasts us soon over. It's all smoke, nothing but

smoke. But that's not the point.

That's not the point that Solomon is trying to make.

His point is found right at the very beginning and we kind of

lose it. You know, you might be familiar

with this portion of Scripture because you, you, you can relate

with waking up with the birds and you know, the house is

growing quiet and everything stiffens and gets sore.

But you've missed the point because he starts right at the

very beginning by saying remember your creator.

Remember your creator before, before it's too terrifying to

walk down the streets before you're getting old and on in

years before everything turns to smoke.

Now, what's interesting, and I'm sure you know this, but the

Bible wasn't written in English. I'm sure you know that, right.

So the Old Testament was actually written in Hebrew.

Most of it is in Hebrew, a little bit of of Syriac.

But then the New Testament was written in Greek, not modern day

Greek. It was Koine Greek.

So ancient Greek for lack of a better term.

But what's interesting about Hebrew, which is what

Ecclesiastes was written in, is that someone went and they

counted every single Hebrew word that is used in the Old

Testament and they found that there are 8000 unique Hebrew

words that make up the Old Testament.

Now that sounds like a lot, but while there are 8000 Hebrew

words, unique Hebrew words, there are 178,000 English words.

And the reason for this is because each Hebrew word is like

a, like a suitcase stuffed full of meaning.

You know, like guys, when, when she called you in December, just

before the holidays to come and sit on the suitcase so you could

zip it close because of all the things that were stuffed in

there. That's what each Hebrew word

looks like an overstuffed suitcase full of meaning.

There's, it's such a rich word that it took us 178,000 English

words to try and bring meaning and, and understanding to each

one of these Hebrew words. OK, so say all of that because

none more than that phrase remember your creator.

So we're going to do a little bit of a Bible study and unpack

some of the the clothing inside of the suitcase first before we

go any further. Remember your creator.

Remember is the word Zahar. It's kind of like a baddie in a

Disney movie, Zahar. And it means like we, we, we

write. And this is where it becomes

difficult because, you know, it's like you remember when you

lost your tooth. It does have remember, but it's

so much more because it also means to mock or to brand, you

know, like you would brand an ox.

It means to draw a line in the sand.

You know, when you see on your Instagram feed the before and

after, there's a line between. It's like that to to mock, to

draw a line, to make a memorial, to build something that you

never forget to tattoo, write or bind it to your heart.

Remember and crazy. I was busy prepping on this

during the week and I get an e-mail from the Bible project on

this word Zakhar and they add to focus your attention so that it

drives you to action. It seems like we miss when it's

just like you remember. There's so much going in here to

remember to to bind it to your heart and focus your attention

so that it drives you to action. Remember what it then says,

remember your creator. And there for me, the surprise

twist here is not so much in in what creator means, but what is

left unsaid here because he doesn't say remember Yahweh,

remember the God of your salvation because it's not.

He's not talking about salvation issues.

He's not talking about the work of the cross here.

He also doesn't say remember Shafat the judge.

Everything you say and do will be held against you in the court

of laws. Yes Sir, No Sir, 2 bags full,

Sir. He doesn't say remember your

judge or remember your God of salvation.

He says remember your creator. Why?

Well, because when you talk about Creator in a biblical

context, you're talking about the one who made you, obviously.

And He didn't just burp you up as some, you know, figment of

His imagination. Off you go one the clock, let it

run. No, He created you with purpose.

He has plans for you. He has a calling on your life

and that is worked out in His Kingdom that He is bringing to

earth. And so when you take those two

together He is saying remember your Creator.

Bind His ways, His plans, His purposes.

Bind His calling for you the way He made you, who He made you to

be binded to your heart. Focus your attention on His ways

and His will so that it affects and directs your actions before

you get old and grumpy and it's just too much and church again

and oh, you know, the people behind me Can't Sing on note and

the lights are too bright and the guitars, I'm sure it's

distorting and does the drummer have to play?

And no one else plays? What is it before?

Remember your creator, Zahar. Bind it to your heart.

Focus your attention now. I'm a pictures person and I

found a great picture that describes Zaha.

And it comes from a story to a guy who got injured at work and

he submitted a workers compensation claim.

You know, that's where you say, well, you know, it was because

of you that I got hurt. And so you need to pay those

bills. And so he did it and he

explained, you know, these are the medical bills.

This is what what I broke and the injuries are sustained.

And then there's this little block that said, you know, how

did the accident happen? And he wrote, well, I lost my

presence of mind. And so they looked at this and

they thought, give us some, you know, put some flesh on the

bones. What do you mean you lost your

presence of mind? So he put together an e-mail

which I'm going to read to you. He said I'm a bricklayer by

trade. On the day of the accidents, I

was working alone in a new six story building.

When I'd completed my work, I discovered that I had about 200

to 300 KGS of bricks leftover. And rather than carry them load

by load down, floor by floor, I decided to lower them in a

barrel by using a pulley that was attached to the side of the

building at the 6th floor, securing the rope at ground

level. I went up and I swung the barrel

out and I loaded bricks into it. Then I went all the way back

down and I tied the rope, holding it to a sure slow

descent of the two to 300 kilograms of bricks.

You'll note in block 11 of the accidents reporting form that I

weigh 80 kilograms. Due to my surprise of being

jerked off the ground so suddenly, I lost my presence of

mind and clung to the rope. Needless to say, I proceeded at

a rapid rate up the side of the building.

In the vicinity of the third floor, I met the barrel coming

down. This explains the fractured

skull and the broken collarbone. Slowed only slightly, I

continued the rapid ascent, not stopping until the fingers on my

right hand were two knuckles deep in the pulley, which

explains the broken finger. Fortunately, by this time I had

regained my presence of mind and held tightly to the rope in

spite of the pain. At approximately the same time,

however, the barrel of bricks hit the ground so hard that the

bottom of the barrel fell out. Devoid of the weight of the

bricks, the barrel now only weighed about 30 kilograms.

I refer you again to my weight of 80 kilograms that are

allocated in Block 11. As you can imagine, I began a

rapid descent down the side of the building.

Once again in the vicinity of the third floor, I met the

barrel coming up. This accounts for the two

fractured ankles and the lacerations to my legs.

The encounter with a barrel slowed me just enough to lessen

my injuries when I fell into the pile of bricks, and fortunately

I only fractured my pelvis. I'm sorry to report, however,

that as I lay there in the bricks in pain, unable to move

and watching the barrel 6 stories above me, I again lost

my presence of mind and let go of the rope.

No offence to my professors at Bible college, but this is the

best description of Zahar to lose.

Your prayers do not bind this to your heart.

And you're up and down the side of the of the building hitting

bricks and barrels and breaking bones because you have not bound

his words and his ways and his call and your life to your heart

is no longer driving your actions.

And so Solomon looks back on his life having done just that, gone

up and down so many countless buildings and it's every barrel

and brick inside. He said three CR please, for

heaven's sake, remember your creator.

And there's so much in this that I'm only going to have one point

this morning. So guys, not that much writing.

Remember your creator, Zaha, bind it to your heart.

Focus your attention on his word and His ways so that it drives

your actions. So where do we start?

Well, let's start at the beginning.

Let's go all the way back to Ecclesiastes chapter 1.

Ecclesiastes 1 · chapter mention

I don't know if you remember if you were here when we started on

this series called Finding Sofia.

I can remember the first time we were at Life Group and we were

all like deer in the headlights. It was like meaningless,

meaningless. Everything is meaningless.

And I remember it was weighty. We were confronted with our

corner offices and our bank accounts and our Botox, our gym

routines. I mean, even our shell

collections were not left unscathed.

You know, it was like scripture set up a machine gun nest in the

corner of our estates and just mowed everything down you can.

You remember that? It was almost like we were

shaken when actually scripture looked at all these things that

we prioritize and pursue. And he said meaningless,

meaningless, everything's meaningless.

And he challenged us to let go of Hevel, that which is

meaningless and pursue what is tov.

But it's funny, don't quite have that same experience and same

emotion at Life Group at the moment.

Could it be that as much as it impacted and challenged, that

scripture is no longer coming like that double edged sword

dividing between bone and marrow?

Because I never really did any Sahara with what I heard.

Jews have a saying. I love this Jewish proverb.

We learn more through our feet and through our ears.

We learn more through our feet than through our ears.

Essentially, they're saying hearing is useless if it doesn't

lead to doing. You learn more through our feet

than through our ears. Now we can look at the Hebrew,

and you might not believe the Hebrew, but maybe you'll believe

the Harvard. The Harvard did a study on this

very thing. They looked at their students

and Harvard Business College realized that there's a

dissonance between the students. Some, some seem to thrive.

Others get halfway through their first year and they're wanting

to change subjects. What's going on there?

What what are they missing? So they did an extensive study

with their students and they came to find a little bit about

the value of Sahar. And they said the following.

They said if their students do what you and I do, come to

church, listen. No Bible, no notes, no pen or

paper, because I listen good, you and I, and they only retain

a maximum of 5% of what you hear. 5%.

And that's only until the next sermon or the next lecture.

Which explains why I came back from time away.

I wasn't here this past weekend. Bump into people.

And of course I'm saying, yo, how was Sunday?

Next level? Were you here last week?

Sunday, yo, everyone's saying Rory hit it out the park.

It's like the Rory of old. I'm like I said, what did he

preach on Ecclesiastes? Yeah, yeah, no, but yo-yo, I

mean, out the park. This is the one that once said

to me, he had Nico get up and and he was cheering about his

chicken. So that's your 5%.

What's your 5%? Can you tell me the points?

He had a guy coming up and saying, you know what?

I don't need to take notes. I've got a good memory.

And he said, oh, what did I say in my sermon about marriage,

Nico? It's chicken's good 5%.

We remember 5%. That's why we're not being

facetious when we say, hey, listen, take notes, nothing

more. At least bring a Bible.

But even taking notes is not that much. 35% retention if you

take notes. And so they say, actually what

you're after, in my words, not theirs is Zahar to come to

listen, to take notes, but then to revisit, to apply and even

better to teach. And you know, when, when they

found students doing that, where you get to a point where you've

grasped it enough to be able to teach the the retention of it is

disproportionate not just to the next lecture, but for years to

come, because now you are actually retaining 95% of what

you're hearing now. One of the things that I often

do when when we do a marriage course, so near the end of the

year, it's it's wedding season. We have a lot of younger couples

who coming in there, you know, wanting to get married and they

often have to sit like 3 or 4 evenings together.

And when you've got 12 weddings to do, that just takes up, you

know, the next 15 years of your life.

So we group them all together and we do a little marriage

course. And the way I always start is I

start with one question. Brace yourself if you ever want

know you're coming to marriage course with me.

This is the question number one. I want to know from you what is

your favorite verse in the Bible?

And I said to them, they're not allowed to tell me Genesis one

verse one in either Benini or John 316 for God so loved the

world and you watch them squirm. Mainly the guys.

It's like you know, I'm and then when they think made it through

that awesome. OK, so what's your favorite

chapter in the Bible? And then there's always, there's

always dirt under the nails. And so I think it was last year,

maybe the year before I had the group like this.

And so I thought, well, let me sort of set an example.

So and Arvie and his wife are coming.

There's one of our band members and I said to him, hey, listen,

this is what I'm going to do. Just a heads up, you know, make

sure you come with a favorite verse and favorite scripture so

someone in the crowd can actually sort of set an example.

So we did that and I asked the 1st and obviously asked Arvie.

And he smashed it. And everyone was like, you all

spiritual giant. But then when I asked the

chapter, you know, all the nail, dirty nail thing happened.

And I, I didn't want to condemn. Yeah, it was really awkward.

So we've moved on. So at the end of it, Arvi and

his wife come to me and said, like, why didn't you ask me?

And I explained to him. I said, no, I don't want it to

be a condemning thing. You know, I just wanted to start

a conversation. But it turns out Arvi had gone

home and memorized the chapter. I'm like, that's not what it

means. I'm like, you know, maybe like

as I 54, you know, lengthen this the cause of your tent and how

God, you know, spoke to you through that, how he's going to

enlarge your capacity. And you know something, I'm

like, I didn't mean for you to memorize an entire chapter of

the Bible. But then he said this and this

was what I'm after. I'll never forget it.

He said, you know, the crazy thing is because I memorize it

now we're talking more than 95% retention.

He said everything I went through in the last week somehow

was filtered through this chapter in the Bible.

The questions are the business meetings I had, the decisions we

had to make in terms of rolling out certain elements within our

department. It was like God was just

speaking through that chapter to me.

It's like all the answers were there.

It's as if He had bound that chapter to his heart.

It was as if he was focusing his attention on the Word and the

ways of God to the degree that it was driving his actions.

You see, here's the thing. This is why I spent 20 minutes

laboring this one point. Because if we do not, if you do

not, if you have not, if I have not committed the Word of God to

my heart, if I, if you have set through just the series on

Ecclesiastes. And we can barely remember what

Rory preached last week Sunday. And we've seen the highs and

lows of scriptures and we've been moved by the ministry and

we've gone home and like, whoa. And there's Nico's chicken and

then some. But there is no Zaha.

What we are actually saying is thank you.

But Ecclesiastes is meaningless. Meaningless.

Actually. There's this quote by Kolbath.

Because this is how we behave, he says.

Religion is the pinnacle of man's rebellion against God.

Religion is the pinnacle of man's rebellion against God.

And I have to believe that if I am not moved, if I'm not binding

to my heart the things that that God is whispering and

challenging me on, surely all I can ascribe my actions and my

behaviour through the, the, the series of Ecclesiastes, surely

all I can ascribe it to is religious behaviour.

And so Solomon is saying, remember your creator, Zahar,

your creator. You see, the reason why I'll

labor this point is because we dare not look at what God is

doing here. 3 CR has never been so full and has never been so

big. We dare not look at this and

think that this is some kind of an indication of my relationship

with my heavenly Father, that this is a measure of the the

depth of my intimacy with Christ.

You see, we dare not hear the reports of kids, men, there's

like it's a small village down there, 500 little kiddies and

say things. We who say things like, you

know, some churches aren't even that big and think that that is

a reflection of our intimacy with our heavenly Father, a

reflection of my walk with Jesus.

You see, we dare not be buoyed up with everything that's

happening in three CR and think that that's a reflection of my

quiet time and my obedience to this word.

You know, there's a tree in the city.

It's a thorn tree. It grows really, really big, but

it's roots only get down to where it reaches the water

table. So if this tree is growing

during the season like we've had with the amount of rain that

we've had, and these trees grow 3-4 stories high once their

roots reach the water table, which is rather shallow right

now, as soon as the winds come, you know, September, October,

these trees fall over. And so I had a neighbor who came

to me the one day and explained this to me because he owned a

couple properties and he'd just come back from one of the

properties where he had one of these thorn trees fall over.

It went straight through the garage and both of the cars and

into the lounge. Fortunately happened in the

middle of the night when the family was sleeping on the other

side, destroyed the property and the cars.

And then he gets home. It was there like 2:00 AM.

He gets home just after sunrise and as he's driving past, he

sees, you know what? It's exactly the same tree

growing in our front yard, right on the boundary line of our

driveways. And he said, I've seen your

little kids on the, you know, those black plastic box up and

down your driveway. He said, I'll die 1000 deaths of

this thing falls over and one of your kids is injured.

And so I find the municipality. I don't know if you've ever

found the municipality to report a pothole.

Hey, there's a really big pothole.

I think I've lost my family. They're down there somewhere.

And for months nothing happens. I was told the telephone number

to phone for streetlights. What's the chance?

But I phoned and I said, listen, I don't know if you know, but

I've got this kind of a tree. They were there within the hour

because it is such a notorious tree in our city.

And then for me is a picture of you and I, if we do not, Zaha,

if we are buoyed by what is happening in this community.

And if you think that your wife's relationship with God is

what's carrying you through, you face those storms and there's

things falling over and the collateral damage is immense.

And you know what, I think Solomon knew this because he had

seen that exact same thing happened in his life over and

over again that he leans and it says, remember your creator,

Zahar, your creator. It's Mother's Day.

So I need to speak to mothers. Thank you, Sander.

He think he's not. No, just kidding.

I want to talk to moms on this because I think this can often

condemn. Tell your story, friend of ours.

They won eldership with us, Andy and Irene.

Irene was an architect by trade. And the last house that they

owned in in South Africa before they moved over, they're now

relocated there. They're in the US The last house

she built from scratch as an architect, designed every last

element. And so a whole bunch of friends

and family went over sort of to celebrate the first major events

in their home. And we arrived early and Irene

was in the kitchen. And so Andy said, hey, let me

just show you around. We were walking around and

walked into Irene, into, sorry, into the bedroom, which had the

study on it and this floor to ceiling cupboards.

And it was lovely. And then into the Andy's office

and right as we walked in, someone else arrived and because

they're intercom wasn't working between the gates in the house

and he had to disappear and let someone in.

So I was left in Andy study. Now, if you know Andy, the is a

professor in veterinary science, you know, kind of what I

encountered when I looked at his Bible study.

He had a whole bunch of Bibles open and handwritten notes

everywhere, things and sort of almost like these mind maps on

the wall. I was like, I was very

intimidated. Commentaries piled up.

This thing you're like, yo, if you've ever heard him preach,

you'd understand. It's just, it's like drinking

from a fire hose when you hear him preaches.

There's such depth and knowledge and insight into the word.

So he gets back and I'm sort of like going your respect.

He's like, oh, I see you're looking at my wife's notes.

Don't tell me that wretched man that I am, he's like, Oh my

gosh, He said, bro, you doing in?

AI said it's probably not, but I'm going to tell you anyway.

So what she does, she opens the Bible and she'll study a book of

the Bible till the cows come home.

She'll write her own commentary on it and then she'd take other

commentaries and compare notes to see where she missed

anything. Is there something else

different angle that she didn't see?

But he said this. He said by the time she's done

with that, she knows the book of her heart took about 95%

retention offer. And he said it just so happened

that we went for a walk this morning and she quoted from

Ephesians chapter one verse 1 all the way to the very end,

which is Ephesians chapter. I know I also have to look it

up. Chapter 6 verse 24.

I didn't even know how many verses and chapters there were.

She knew it off by heart because she rolled around and scripted

some. She had the heart, the word,

right? But it's Mother's Day.

Why am I telling you this story? Because she wasn't a mother yet.

When she became a mom, everything changed.

And I watched from afar how that gift of studying the word and

memorizing it became like a noose of condemnation around her

neck because she just couldn't get back to where she was for

years. And I often tell newly married

couples about to have children this story.

And I speak to moms in Milky Lane and Smallville.

I say to the moms to be or the moms, I say, give yourself five

years before you're anywhere near acquired.

Time again. Really.

Yeah. Thank you for that, Amy.

Five years now in the light of Zahar and there's charge from

Solomon. You're probably going but OK,

well, hang on a second that cannot compute what's going to

happen to to my relationship with God, my spiritual journey,

my understanding of Scripture, my Zahar that's that's going to

govern my actions or you know, God has thought about this and

then Ephesians 5. He says the following.

He says husbands love your wives just as Christ loved the church

and gave himself up for her to make her holy.

We know this. We do, you know, pre marriage or

sitting with a marriage that's taking strain and and the guys

know this and sure, I need to lay my life down for my wife,

just like Jesus laid his life down for his bride.

And that was like dying on a cross.

I know, I know, I know. But do you know what comes off

to the comma? Cleansing her by the washing

with water through the word? And that's in the Greek is the

word Rhema. A Rhema word is a personalized

revelation. So this is what God is saying to

you through His word. Today, husbands, see God wired

into your role as a husband and a father, the responsibility to

wash your wife with water through the Word, which requires

A Rhema word, which requires you being filled by God and His

revelation through His Word every day.

Because God delights in revealing Himself to you in this

Word so you can pour yourself into your wife and pour His Word

into your wife so she can pour herself into your children.

Do you see the weighty call for us to Zaha yet?

I think a lot of the time it is US men who are backfooted in

this regard. The ladies, maybe it's a more

romantic thing to open up your Bible and and highlight it so it

looks like a paint by numbers and have your coffee cup and

your your daily devotional. And for guys, we're like, you

know, I've got to go to work. But it's Solomon who's saying

Zaha. You know, I think a lot of the

time men abdicate their responsibility this Ephesians 5

responsibility, you know, we we call it serving Now, babes, you

go into Sunday service you I'll I'll go to Smallville.

I'll look after little Johnny you you going and we actually

abdicating that because the responsibility is not for your

wife to wash you with the cleansing of the word.

It's for you and I to wash our wives to have a daily

interruption with the revelation of God through the Word, a

rhythm that allows this to take hold of our hearts so that

weakens our heart and we can be driven by the Word and the ways

of God to lead our homes and allow them to follow suit.

I heard going to love me for this.

I heard a statement. They said come to their Sunday

morning service and you'll see how popular the churches.

Come to their Sunday evening service and you'll see how

popular their preacher is. Come to their Monday morning

quiet time and you'll see how popular their God is.

Remember your Creator. Bind His word, His ways, His

presence, His purpose and plan. Bind it to your heart.

Focus your attention so that it drives your actions close with

this. This is from Psalm 65.

David is writing the Psalm and he makes comments and this, this

struck me. He makes a comment about the

heart of God. He says, you know, he, he

desires to visit the earth and enrich it.

It's an interesting word choice that he he desires, he longs to

visit the earth and enrich it. And the reason why I caught my

attention is because I was consulting in the mining space

with a guy who's a, who was basically given the

responsibility to bring green energy to all their mines.

And of course, the best way to do that is nuclear, right?

And we are talking about enriching uranium, which can't

do in South Africa, apparently. But to enrich uranium, this is

the word enrich you. You take this bland, boring Gray

metal, you enrich it. You know what you get out of

that is you get this eternal nucleus fission, this constant

supply of energy. And in the same way God is

saying, you know, when you use the hard my word, it does the

same. It's like a force field comes

alongside to empower. You know, what you also get is

you get nuclear weapons to bring down strongholds, principalities

and power. But one of the things you were

saying was that they've managed to create this little modular

version of the prototype and they're just patented it because

it was small enough to put on an aeroplane.

And the nuclear waste, you know, that that sort of nuclear

dangerous thing thing was so low, it was less dangerous than

some of the machines that you find in hospitals.

So there's no red type. And the plan is to, once the

prototypes have done all their testing and everything, so you

can take one of these, you can put it on an aeroplane.

The plane can take off and it never has to land, which means

that George Clooney never has to be lost in space because his

jetpack runs out of power. You can strap that thing and he

can travel around the world until he's done and come home

safely. And the crazy thing is for that

they use a mineral called thorium.

Thorium is what it sounds like. Thorium.

It's like the, the armpits of minerals.

You know, when you, when you buy a Willy's chicken, it's got that

funny little tail thing that you, you take off and you

that's, that's thorium in the mineral world, you know, but

thorium enriched and you have sustained nuclear fission,

sustained nuclear power, your walk with Christ enriched.

Why spend your days going up and down the side of a building,

hitting every barrel and every brick and enduring every broken

bone when God says, let me help your brother out Zahar, just

take what you've heard. Bind it to your heart.

Focus your attention on so that it drives your actions.

He begins by saying in verse one, remember your creator while

you're still young before, before, before life lovely while

it lasts. As soon over life as we know

precious and beautiful ends. The body is put back in the same

ground it came from. The Spirit returns to God.

He first breathed it. If we do not the heart, then

what he says in verse 8 is true. It will all be smoke, nothing

but smoke. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father want to bring you every home and every heart,

every journey with you. Although I want to bring those

who feel like they're just thorium lying on a pile of

bricks with nothing to give. Would you allow us to understand

and be gripped by the fact that when you enrich us, when your

word takes a hold of us, when your ways captivate our heart to

the to the point where it drives our actions, that then we

genuinely see your Kingdom come and your will be done.

Lord, I pray for those of us who don't even know where to start

that you would show yourself that you'd make it easy to find

you, to find our futures and and your word and your way.

I pray for Life Group this coming week, Lord, that we would

be able to share something of our journey and impart to one

another journeys that can be taken easy routes, ways to study

scripture or how you reveal yourself.

I pray that we'd learn from one another.

I pray that we would be a community that are known as

those who's a harm, those who don't just tickle for some

religious box, but those who are genuinely influenced, directed,

governed by your word, your ways, your calling and your

Kingdom, Jesus name, Amen.