How did we end up here? part 2 | Pastor Di Beals | Venture Church

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Well, hey, good morning.

If I haven't met you, my name is Di, part

of the team here at our Mill Creek campus, and

I have the privilege and the daunting task of taking

us through part two of a very long introduction to

our series that will be diving into Ezra next week.

We're calling it Ruins to Revival because really what we're

doing is we're tracking a how God's people went from

the ruins of exile, where we're going to look at

where they're at today, the ruins of exile, to returning

to their land, repenting to their God, being restored, rebuilding,

and then again having God's spirit rest on them, which

is the revival part. I just want to give you

a little helpful thing. There's a lot of information today,

and I really don't want this to be a history

TED Talk. But there's a lot of history, biblical history

in here, which is awesome. But you might find a

need for note-taking. And so inside of our app, we

have a button called What's Next. And in the What's

Next button, there's another button that says Take Notes. And

if you would like a note-taking, it's there every week.

and it fills in the blanks for you if you

get it wrong. So if you're thinking, I'm not gonna

be able to keep up, great, that is for you.

All right, so last week we covered some critical biblical history,

and actually world history too, to lay a foundation. But

I'm just gonna summarize. I'll always point you back to

last week's message to get what you missed. But I'm

gonna have a timeline be thrown up behind me. We

looked at this last week, and I'm just gonna summarize

that God made a promise to Abraham, And his promise

to Abraham long ago was, I'm going to make you

a great nation. Your descendants will be a great nation.

In fact, your descendants will be a blessing to all people.

On the earth.

But 1500 years later, we find Israel in captivity. And

Though they carry the promise of being a great nation,

and though they carry the promise of being a blessing

to all the people of the earth, and they carry

the promise of the Messiah, Jesus, who will be to come,

salvation for mankind, their disobedience has taken them on a

much longer route. to the fulfillment of these promises. So

last week, we covered two verses to help us remember,

and I'm going to remind us of these a few

times today. Last week, we remembered that 2 Peter 3.9 says,

God is not slow in keeping his promises, at least

not how you and I understand slowness.

Instead, he's patient. Can you say he's patient?

He's patient. God is patient. He's not slow. He's patient.

Why?

He wants all of us to come to repentance. We

also reminded ourselves last week that nothing, no nothing, not anything,

nothing can separate us from God's love for us. So

though those things are true now and they were true then,

we can definitely still, of our own free will, walk

away from his plan for our lives. And so, following

the fall of the northern kingdom of Israel, they fell,

they were conquered by Assyria. That was about 720 BC.

And then later in 586 BC, that left Judah, the

southern part of Israel, to be conquered by Babylon. So

all of this is just review of where we've been.

Jerusalem has been destroyed. The temple for the God Almighty,

creator of the universe, creator of the heavens, that has

also been destroyed. It's been burned to the ground and

the people have been exiled, which means forcibly moved from

their own homes and their own land to be assimilated

into the cultures that have captured them. They have reaped

the result of their own disobedience that they sowed, of

their own unfaithfulness, of their own idolatry, and they have

been sitting in exile now for 70 years. And we

proposed last week that they would ask a question that

you and I probably have asked in our life as well.

or certainly could if we found ourselves in dire circumstances.

And that question was and is, how did we get here?

How did we get here?

Every story in the Bible, every story throughout history, every

story represented in this room, watching us online, we're given

the opportunity in every story to ask, how did we

get here?

And the hope for us when we ask.

That question is, lies in the fact that God is

not slow in keeping his promises. He's patient with us,

wanting us to come to repentance to him. And also nothing, nothing,

nothing can separate us from his love for us. And

if we'll return to God, he will rescue us.

He will help us rebuild.

He will restore and he will bring revival.

His spirit will rest on us again.

So for Israel, conquered, scattered, And living in exile, their

hope was in those understandings too. And also, they stood

on a prophecy that was found in the book of Isaiah.

And this is a pretty wild connection. And this was

so fun to study this week. So hang with me.

This prophecy in Isaiah... that's gonna go on the screen

in just a second, was written down, recorded 150 years

before the moment that you and I are looking at today,

before this period of history. And through the prophet Isaiah,

this is what God said. You can look at it

in Isaiah chapter 44. God says, I say to Jerusalem,

Isaiah 44 · chapter mention

people will live here again. Remember, it's destroyed, it's in ruins,

and all the people have been taken off into exile.

And the towns of Judah, you will be rebuilt. I

will restore all of your ruins. And then we get

this mysterious name. When I say of Cyrus, this is

God talking, he is my shepherd.

He will certainly do as I say.

He will command, rebuild Jerusalem, and he will say, restore

the temple. We're going to come back to that very

critical prophecy at the end. But though Israel was in ruins,

what we're looking at this morning, they believed that God

would once again restore them to their land.

They believed that he would.

Once again help them rebuild Israel, rebuild Jerusalem, rebuild and

restore his temple, and that he would use a man

named Cyrus to do it. And that's where we find

ourselves today as we come to the text. But before

we even do that, I'm going to invite you to

bow your head with me. Can we just pray and

agree this together? God, some of us here today, I

know this, some today are sitting here in this room,

are listening, watching online, or are going to listen to

this in the weeks, months, or even years to come,

and they are asking the question, how did I get here?

This is not how I thought it was going to go.

This is not what I planned. I did not see

this coming. Some are in desperate need, God, of a

way forward. Some right now are in desperate need of

a miracle, of you to make the way, of you

to help rebuild, of you to restore, and of you

to remind us that you still love us and nothing

can separate us from that love.

So be with us today.

Restore, instill, and fortify in us the hope that you

have a way forward, and we thank you for that. Amen. Amen. Okay,

so we did our review. We threw in something from Isaiah.

And now we're going to go to the other really

well-read book of the Old Testament, Daniel. So if you

have a Bible, you can turn to Daniel. We're going

to look at chapter 5. If you don't have your Bible,

I'm going to summarize some sections and read some. And

the ones I read will be on the screen behind me.

So Daniel chapter 5 tells this kind of a wild story.

Daniel 5 · chapter mention

We actually taught through the first half of Daniel about

two years ago, and I put a link for that

series in the What's Next page. So if you'd like

to go back and listen to that, it'd be helpful.

But Daniel 5 tells this kind of wild, unbelievable story,

and I want you to catch this. This story sets

the scene for God's intervention to end the reign of Babylon.

That's where the southern kingdom of Israel is now captive.

They are in Babylon.

This story sets the scene for how God will end

the reign of Babylon, who's the terror of the world

at this point in history, and begin the rescue of

his people from exile to go back to their land

and rebuild what's been ruined. This is the story. This

is the turning point. So in Daniel chapter 5, a

Daniel 5 · chapter mention

couple key characters. One of them, King Belshazzar. I'm going

to try and keep you involved here. So participation. Say Belshazzar. Belshazzar. Good.

King Belshazzar. This is the grandson of King Nebuchadnezzar. If

you watched VeggieTales growing up, I can never, ever... You're laughing.

If you didn't watch VeggieTales, they tried to not scare kids.

So King Nebuchadnezzar was like a giant... chocolate bunny. Like,

just silly. But that's what I think of. I can

never read Nebuchadnezzar and not picture a giant chocolate bunny. Okay,

so King Belshazzar, grandson of Nebuchadnezzar, And Nebuchadnezzar is the

one who conquered Jerusalem. He's the one that came in.

He's the one that burned the temple. We looked at

this last week. He's the one that stole things from

the temple and carted off people into exile. So that's Nebuchadnezzar.

His grandson, Belshazzar, is throwing a huge party.

Huge.

So huge, he invites 1,000 of his closest friends and

people of influence, the wealthiest people, the most influential people.

And the Bible says he drank wine with them.

You can infer with me, they're all wasted. They're partying.

We know from other historical sources, the two primary ones

I'm going to mention today are Herodotus, who is Greek,

and Josephus, who is Jewish.

These are two historians.

We know from both of these historians that what Belshazzar

and his partying friends don't know is Persia is on

their way to come and conquer them. In fact, at

this point, of Belshazzar's reign, some of the outlying little

countryside villages that he doesn't really care about and aren't

really important, Persia has already conquered. So they're on the way.

But guess what? Belshazzar isn't worried. Say not worried. Not worried.

What a dangerous sentence. That's not even a sentence. That's

a fragment of a sentence.

What a dangerous two words.

Not worried.

Not worried.

Why is this guy not worried? that Persia has already

conquered some of these little villages. I mean, maybe they

weren't important. Why is he not worried that they're on

the way? Well, because he believed Babylon, the city that

he is the king of, is completely impenetrable. Absolutely nobody

can overtake this city. I thought about showing a picture,

but because there's, I mean, just let's go old-fashioned. Let's

use our imaginations. The thing AI wants to take from us.

Just imagine with me some of the historical records of

how great the fortress Babylon was. It was a city

with two sets of massive walls. Most scholars say 100

feet high. Some say as high as 300. Some say shorter.

So we'll just go with 100. 100-foot walls, two sets

of them. In fact, Herodotus, the Greek historian, says that

these walls were so wide that a four-horse chariot was

could run the length of them and turn around with

no problem. That's how wide they were. Okay, so they're wide.

They're made of reinforced brick. It's this special process to

make it so battering rams can't break the bricks. and

interspersed with towers all the way around it so that

archers can stand on the towers, have a good view

of any approaching enemy, and shoot arrows and kill them

before they ever get to the wall.

Okay, so that's a good start.

Add to that, there's a wide and deep moat around

the walls, and it takes its water from the very

large Euphrates River that's nearby. Okay. making it so that

no large battering rams can even be wheeled up to

the city walls because they'd be floating or sinking in

the water.

So this was Babylon's way of saying nobody can get in.

And add to that, they also put at the bottom

of the walls down in the water, iron gates all

the way around so that nobody could swim underneath the walls. Okay,

so this place is supposedly impenetrable. And then add to that,

they have over a year's worth of food and water

stockpiled in the city. So in case anyone tries to

lay siege to them, they can just keep partying right

along inside. All right. Needless to say, King Belshazzar isn't worried.

Not worried. Not worried. No measly Persian king is coming inside. Yes,

he can have those little villages in the countryside, but

he is not getting in here. Look with me at

Daniel 5 verse 2. It says, while Belshazzar was drinking

Daniel 5:2

the wine, he gave orders to bring in the gold

and silver cups that his predecessor, also known as his grandpa, Nebuchadnezzar,

the chocolate bunny, had taken from the temple in Jerusalem.

He wanted to.

Drink from them with his nobles, his wives, and his concubines.

So they brought these gold cups taken from the temple,

the house of God in Jerusalem, and the king and

his nobles, his wives and his concubines drank from those cups.

So 70 years beforehand, Belshazzar's grandpa, the feared Nebuchadnezzar, went

in Jerusalem, laid siege to it, destroyed it, knocked down

the walls, burned down the temple, carted off all the people,

and created a trophy case of the temple items used

in the temple to worship God Almighty, creator of heaven

and earth.

Agree with me, this was not a good move.

Okay, so already Belshazzar is making a poor military decision.

This is a military mistake in that he's not worried,

and now it's a spiritual mistake.

Okay, so verse 3 says he.

Drank from them, and verse 4 says they praised the

gods of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.

In other words, they made a complete mockery of God Almighty,

creator of heaven and earth, This was a very bad move.

Daniel 5.5 tells us what happens next.

This is wild.

If you've never read this, if you're here for the

first time, I'm so glad you're here. There's really cool

stuff in the Bible. This story's wild. Okay, Daniel 5.5. Suddenly,

all the people there saw the fingers of a human hand,

just the hand, but then In the first service, I

was like, just the hand. Then I was like, well,

wouldn't it also be weird if it was the arm

and the hand? Like, there's no good way to tell

this story. The fingers of a human hand writing on

the plaster wall of the king's palace near the lampstand,

which scholars like to point out means it was lit

up so everyone could see it. The king himself saw

the hand as it wrote. So suddenly a hand appears,

use your imagination, floating in the air, and starts inscribing

something on the wall under the light where everyone can

see it. The Bible does not have to tell us

these people were afraid, but it does. It says in

verse 6, And his, Belshazzar's, face turned pale with fright.

His knees knocked together in fear, and his legs gave

way beneath him. That's the New Living Translation. Other translations

say his knees were knocking, his color changed, his loins

gave way, his limbs gave way.

The guy is passing out in utter fear.

Verse 7 then describes that he starts shouting, like, bring

me the enchanters, bring me all the smart guys in

the kingdom, bring me my magicians, bring me my fortune tellers,

bring me someone who can tell me what this says.

And then he told the men when they arrived. the

supposed wisest men in all of Babylon. He tells them,

whoever can read this writing and tell me what it

means is going to be dressed in purple robes of

royal honor and will have a gold chain placed around

his neck and he will become the third highest ruler

in the kingdom.

But then verse 8 tells us nobody could read it.

Nobody could read the writing and nobody could tell him

what the writing meant. So the king became even more alarmed.

which I just think is a funny word. Like what

an understatement. The king is in utter terror. His face

turns even more pale and even his nobles, duh, were shaken.

Everybody is freaked out by this.

Now that story, that description might have sounded familiar to you.

And if it didn't, that's okay. I'll help bring the

pieces together, but it might have sounded familiar to you

If you've read Daniel chapter 2 or you heard us

Daniel 2 · chapter mention

when we taught on Daniel a couple of years ago.

So let me break this down a little bit. So

70 years earlier, roughly, Babylon came in under Nebuchadnezzar and

they conquered and destroyed Jerusalem. We already established that. Well,

Nebuchadnezzar brings the exiles into his kingdom and he has

Jewish people living in his midst that he is basically brainwashing.

And Nebuchadnezzar has a dream and his dream terrifies him.

It scares him so much that he decides, I need

someone to not only interpret it for me, but I'm

not even going to tell him what the dream was.

I'm going to make my magicians and enchanters and diviners

and astrologers. I'm going to make them come in, tell

me what my dream was, and then tell me what

it meant, which prevented them from just making up an

answer because they, I mean, you'd know right away if

they don't know what the dream was. Nobody, of course,

could tell him what his dream was or what it

meant until someone brought in a young man, a young

Jewish man named Daniel. Daniel was brought in before the king, Nebuchadnezzar,

And what God made known to him from the dream

was that Babylon would be conquered by a less powerful enemy.

In other words, let me tell you about the end

of your kingdom. This is what it will look like.

In spite of how bad the message was, the king

rewarded Daniel. He rewarded him with purple robes, a gold

chain around his neck, and he made him the third

highest ruler in his kingdom. Sound familiar? And now that

we have Nebuchadnezzar's grandson, Belshazzar, in our story, who's seen

this mysterious writing that he can't read and doesn't understand,

and he needs someone to interpret it, and his own

wise men can't solve it, and he starts throwing out

the promise of all these things.

He'll give to someone who can.

Just then, the queen mother comes rushing in, and she

is actually the queen grandmother. So she would have been

Nebuchadnezzar's wife. So she is Belshazzar's grandma. Are you hanging

with me on all the names? Okay. Sorry. So this

is how the Jewish historian Josephus records her as Nebuchadnezzar's wife.

He records her.

As Nebuchadnezzar's wife and Belshazzar's grandmother. And this is how

the Bible records what she says. And I'm going to

summarize it for you, but it's, Daniel chapter 5, verses

Daniel 5:11

11 and 12, she comes running in and she says, oh, king,

also my grandson, you're the greatest in all of the kingdom.

And you might remember also that your predecessor, who was

your grandpa, Nebuchadnezzar, also had something similar to this happen

to him. And so he called in the magicians and

the diviners and the astrologers, and nobody could solve his

dream except for Daniel. And then she says, this is

the queen mother, she says, he has exceptional ability and

is filled with divine knowledge and understanding. He can interpret dreams,

explain riddles, and solve difficult problems. So, oh king, call

in Daniel. He'll tell you what this writing means. And

there it is, the final connection to Daniel chapter 2

Daniel 2 · chapter mention

and to Nebuchadnezzar's story. Daniel, the same man who interpreted

Nebuchadnezzar's dream is now brought in to see if he

can reveal what has been written on that wall. So

Daniel's brought in. King Belshazzar brings him up to speed.

He says, hey, I was having this party with all

of these nobles and all these important influential people.

And we were drinking good wine.

And in the midst of it, a hand floating in

the air came and wrote this inscription on the wall.

You can see it right here. And then he offers

Daniel the world, if he can interpret it. He says,

I'll give you a gold chain. I'll give you a

purple robe. I'll make you third in command in the kingdom.

And you know what Daniel's thinking? Already been there. Already

done it. In fact, Daniel is probably now in his 80s.

And it's been 10 years since King Nebuchadnezzar died, who

he had already served under and already interpreted for. And

in that time, the throne has changed hands more than

just once. It's not like Nebuchadnezzar passed it down to Belshazzar.

In fact, in between there, there was a son who

was assassinated. There was a usurper who took the throne

who then died of natural causes. There was a child

king that was installed on the throne who was beaten

to death. I mean, this is a rough place. And

then a guy named Nabonidus. who gets called, he's part

of the family, but he marries into the family. Most

scholars believe, most historians believe, he married one of Nebuchadnezzar's daughters.

He comes into the family, he takes the throne, and

he absolutely hates it. He hates it so much that

he decides, I'd rather go live in the wilderness and

worship the god of the moon, and he's the one

that deems his son, Belshazzar, remember that name? Belshazzar, deems

him king and places him on the throne.

And Daniel has been here for all of this.

He's seen all of it. He was there when Nebuchadnezzar

had the dream. He was there when Nebuchadnezzar didn't listen

to the dream. He was there when Nebuchadnezzar eventually repented

and gave his heart to the Lord, which we'll get

to in a second. But Daniel's like, you can keep

your gifts, king. You can keep your purple robe and

you can keep your gold chain and you can keep

your you know third highest in the kingdom let me

tell you something that you may not know but actually

he did know and Daniel knew it your own grandpa

was a great king why because when he got prideful

and he did and God took all of it from

him including his sanity and you can read that story

in the book of Daniel where Nebuchadnezzar didn't listen, and

he ended up a wild man crawling around on all

fours out in the wilderness for like a year until

he repented. And when he repented, God restored everything to him.

And Daniel's saying he was a great king because he

got prideful, lost it all, and he repented. But you

will not repent. You will not give up your pride.

In fact, Daniel says this in 522. You knew all

of this. You knew this story. And yet you have

not humbled yourself before God Almighty. And here's the thing,

Belshazzar is not innocent. He's not ignorant. He's not like, oh,

you poor guy. You didn't even know the history that

came before you. That's what scripture's pointing at here. He

knew and he deliberately repeated the exact same sin of pride.

He dishonored God and therefore he is living inside the

fulfillment of Nebuchadnezzar's dream that Daniel himself interpreted, which is

Babylon will fall and they will fall together. to a

lesser kingdom. Literally, the writing is on the wall. Do

you know that's where we get that expression from? The

writing is on the wall. You can't see it because

your pride has blinded you, but the writing is on

the wall. So what did the message say? Well, Daniel

read it. It says, scripture says he read it and

he interpreted it.

Many, many, many, parson. Mene, mene, tekel, parson.

Mene, which means numbered, which means, O king, your days

are numbered. Tekel, which means weighted, which means, O king,

you've been weighed and measured and you've been found wanting.

And tekel, or parson, which means divided, meaning, oh king,

your kingdom is about to be divided and conquered. Meaning, numbered, tekel, weighted, parson, divided.

In short, the dream your grandfather had is being fulfilled

in you right now. Daniel chapter 5 verse 30 tells

Daniel 5:30

us that night, Belshazzar, dies and a guy named Darius

who's like a governor slash general took over the kingdom

of Babylon under the rule of a not so much

known at that time king of Persia named Cyrus Cyrus

there's that name While Belshazzar wasn't paying attention, while Belshazzar

was hanging out with his friends and wasn't worried, while

Belshazzar was ignoring the fact that what took out his

grandpa was pride until he repented, while Belshazzar isn't caring,

Cyrus had his general divert the water from the moat,

so divert the Euphrates River to go in a different area,

And once it had almost completely dried up, the moat

around the walls, they just simply slipped underneath the bronze

gates that were supposed to go all the way to

the ground.

And when they slipped under.

And walked in, they didn't even have to use a sword.

They just took over the city just like that. In fact,

a lot of historians say that the people of Babylon

didn't even know they'd been conquered for days or weeks

because there was not even a battle. And Babylon, the

impenetrable city, was conquered just like that.

Two weeks later, are you still with me?

Let me bring it home. Two weeks later, Cyrus, the

great King Cyrus, who will later be known as a

vicious king. The great King Cyrus rode triumphantly into his

new prized city of Babylon. And Josephus, the Jewish historian,

helps connect the dots here. He says when Cyrus rode

into the city, Daniel was waiting for him at the gate.

And in Daniel's hand was a scroll from the prophet

Isaiah who had prophesied about 150 years earlier about him.

And he read the scroll of Isaiah. We call it

chapter 45. They didn't have chapter chapters back then but

he read and I haven't read that yet I'm gonna

let you read that on your own but I'm gonna

summarize it for you he read to him from the

scroll of Isaiah that declares God has anointed and appointed

Cyrus to come in and conquer this city It also

has this prophetic word to Cyrus from God.

While the whole world tells.

Us how vicious he is and all of history is

going to tell us how vicious he is, he is

the guy, according to God's prophetic word through Isaiah, that

will return the kidnapped Jews back to their home city,

that will give the resources that will enable them to

make the journey back to their homeland. and will give

them the resources to rebuild their temple, rebuild their walls,

and he's going to give them back the trophy case,

all the stuff that had been stolen by Nebuchadnezzar from

the temple of God. So it's under Cyrus that 70

years of Jewish exile ends, and the people of God

will return home to the ruins. To the ruins. I

really encourage you to read Isaiah chapter 45. It is

Isaiah 45 · chapter mention

incredible that 150 years beforehand, the guy is named who

God appoints and anoints to go and instigate what will

bring his people back home. But the question for us

today is, what do we do with this? What do

we do with these stories? I mean, that's cool history,

and it's really cool how it's all intertwined, but what

do we do with it, remember Belshazzar wasn't worried, not worried,

not worried. Living a life of pride, probably thinking I

created everything.

Around me and I deserve it all.

Living a life that rejects and flies in the face

of creator God.

But remember in the midst of.

That, because though that's Belshazzar's story, it might be ours too.

Remember in the midst of it, God was not slow

in keeping his promise. While God's people are in exile

for 70 years thinking, when God are you going to

rescue us? God's promise is not slow. He's waiting for repentance.

That's Nebuchadnezzar's story. That's Belshazzar's story. That's the Jewish people's story.

And it's our story too.

He's waiting for repentance. But also remember, nothing can separate

us from God's love. He's waiting while we sit in

the ruins. He's waiting for us to return to him.

And then he'll help us rebuild. And this is the

setting for Ezra chapter 1. This is the setting.

Ezra 1 · chapter mention

This is where now God's people are going to go back.

They didn't put God first. They rebelled against him.

They disobeyed him. Their punishment was reaping what they sowed.

And they ended up in exile. But now that they've

figured it out, now that.

They've repented, and this story repeats over and over throughout

history to us, now they're going to sit in the

ruins and go, what do we even do.

With this mess? And hear me, my friends, that might

be you today, wondering, what do I do in the

mess of my life, of my choices, of reaping what

I sowed in my own life?

Or maybe you're right.

On the edge. Cyrus is just about to send his

army to take over and you are still resistant and

don't realize the precipice you're standing on. The message is

for us if we will repent. That's what God's waiting for.

He's waiting for our repentance. Nothing can separate us from

his love. And he will restore and he will help

us rebuild. And he will once again put his spirit

on us. That's called revival. That's what we're waiting for.

We're waiting for God, not just individually, but starting with individually.

But corporately and as a community and as a world.

We're waiting and we're asking God to pour out his

spirit on us once again. So I'm going to invite

you in this room and online, if you will bow

your heads. Would you just... Turn your evaluation gaze inward

right now. Don't miss this moment. Don't miss. Can you

just turn your gaze inward and say, God, what is

it you want me to see right now? Where is

it that I've been refusing to acknowledge where I'm standing

on the edge of danger? I don't even realize the

ruins in front of me.

Or maybe you're sitting in the ruins and you.

Know full well that Maybe you're in this room or

listening online and you are like, I've been there. Thank you, God,

that you have brought restoration. But there's still the restoration

we're waiting for, for all of God's people and for

all of humanity. We're still asking for him to show

up in our midst. So would you agree with me

as I pray? Would you agree with me wholeheartedly? God,

right now, we start off by repenting. We have certainly

been prideful.

We have certainly.

lived our lives in many occasions where we have not

acknowledged you, where we have disobeyed you, where we've had

hardened hearts, where we've patted ourselves on the back and thought,

I did this all myself and there's no way it's

going to fall apart. And yet, God, you allow us

to go through difficulty, sometimes to realize our great.

Need for you. And in that way, it becomes a

gift to us.

So God, across this room and online, and we know

we represent many around the world who are in desperate

need of hope that you can take what is ruined

and rebuild it. No matter the condition of our lives,

no matter how bad things look, if we still have

breath in our lungs, we still can ask for you

to come in and restore. So we repent, we receive

your forgiveness, and we ask you to once again, Help

us to rebuild, restore what we've lost, and allow your

spirit to rest on us again.

We call that revival.

Revive us again, oh God. Send your spirit to our families,

to our lives, to our relationships, to our marriages, to

our businesses, our careers, our futures, our hopes, our dreams,

and our world.

Send your spirit. It's for your glory we pray it.

In your name, amen.

Come on, how many of you are thankful for that message,

for who God is in our life? And there's so

much in this series that you're going to be learning about,

not just history, not just like biblical history, but just

the character of God, right? Like when you look at history,

sometimes you see the bigger picture of who God is

for our life. And I love the way that we

saw that this morning. I want to direct you to

our What's Next page on the app because on the

What's Next page, is all sorts of really helpful resources

that are going to help you kind of go home

and take this message and take the text and really

dive into it at another level. And so Di and

the team have provided a lot of resources on there

that we want to encourage you to check out. Bible

reading plans, all sorts of maps and resources and timelines,

all sorts of things for you to continue to dig

into it. But with that, I actually want to invite

you to go ahead to stand your feet as you

leave today. Just a quick reminder as your men's pastor, men,

men's retreat is in two weeks. If you're not signed up,

God is patient.

Love you guys.

Have a great week, and we'll see you next Sunday.

God bless.