Latest / Bible stories / Standing in the Gap_ A Call to Action Against Corruption and Injustice ✊_biblestudy(M4A_128K)

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Standing in the Gap_ A Call to Action Against Corruption and Injustice ✊_biblestudy(M4A_128K) · Bible stories

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  Speaker 1: Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to our lesson summary, The Draws
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: of Unrighteousness, Ezekiel 22, verses 17 through 31. Yeah, this one,
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  Speaker 1: I'm sure I don't even have to say it. It
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  Speaker 1: goes without saying. This was a very difficult text. I'm
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  Speaker 1: sure it's been a very challenging text for you as well.
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  Speaker 1: But I finally saw some things, finally. It took a
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  Speaker 1: minute to really dig through and comb through this, to
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  Speaker 1: try to break it down and make it hopefully into
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  Speaker 1: smaller chunks that are much easier to digest, if you will. So,
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  Speaker 1: I mean, if I was teaching this or for that matter,
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  Speaker 1: even preaching this, I probably are, if I would have
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  Speaker 1: written this lesson, let me say it that way, because
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  Speaker 1: I have a degree in curriculum and instruction. I probably
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  Speaker 1: would have called it standing in the gap, especially when
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  Speaker 1: you look down at verse 30. And then I started
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  Speaker 1: to see a lot of pieces in here, and we'll
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  Speaker 1: see that in just a second, where that theme is,
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  Speaker 1: it's there. You just have to keep reading it in
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  Speaker 1: different translations and looking through multiple sources until you can
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  Speaker 1: finally fully understand the text before you can begin to
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  Speaker 1: try to design or craft an outline for this. So Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I would call this standing in the gap. So and
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  Speaker 1: you'll see why in just a second. So the big
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  Speaker 1: idea when sin spreads and leaders fail, God looks for
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  Speaker 1: one person to stand in the gap, to stand in
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  Speaker 1: the gap. Ezekiel was preaching to a people in exile.
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  Speaker 1: He was also, by the way, in exile himself away
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  Speaker 1: from the people. They were displaced. They were discouraged and
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  Speaker 1: wondering if God had forgotten them. But God hadn't forgotten them.
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  Speaker 1: He was grieving over them as well as it relates
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  Speaker 1: to their sin or the sins of Israel. The same
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  Speaker 1: sins that brought down Jerusalem are showing up in our
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  Speaker 1: communities today. Broken families, corrupt leadership, injustice in the streets,
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  Speaker 1: and a church that sometimes looks more like the world,
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  Speaker 1: not our church, but there are many churches out there
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  Speaker 1: without a doubt look more like the world. God's most
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  Speaker 1: repeated line in this entire book is, you will know
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  Speaker 1: that I am the Lord. And normally that line is
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  Speaker 1: in the context of judgment. In other words, he will
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  Speaker 1: make himself known either through blessing because Israel was supposed
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  Speaker 1: to keep the covenant. As long as they kept the covenant,
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  Speaker 1: that God made with them, they would experience blessings. But
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  Speaker 1: if they did not keep the covenant, they would experience curses.
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  Speaker 1: In other words, judgment. The question is, where will you
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  Speaker 1: be standing when he does, when he makes himself known,
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  Speaker 1: either through blessing or judgment? So the first thing that
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  Speaker 1: I saw here in the text is the corruption of,
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  Speaker 1: God saw that covers verses 17 through 29, 17 through 29.
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  Speaker 1: My outline again is always going to be a little
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  Speaker 1: different from what's here in the text. And I think
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  Speaker 1: I think this is really going to help you as
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  Speaker 1: you teach the text without a doubt. The corruption God
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  Speaker 1: saw verses 17 through 29. In other words, another way
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  Speaker 1: of saying that is somebody needs to stand up in
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  Speaker 1: a nutshell. That's what this whole section is saying. When
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  Speaker 1: corruption runs from the pulpit to the people, somebody has
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  Speaker 1: to be willing to stand up and refuse to go
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  Speaker 1: along with it. Not everybody was corrupt in Israel, but
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  Speaker 1: the righteous stayed silent. Silence in the face of systemic
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  Speaker 1: sin is its own kind of sin. It is sin.
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  Speaker 1: And so God looked at Israel and saw silver. But
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  Speaker 1: when he put them in the fire, all he found
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  Speaker 1: was dross. Well, what is dross? Dross is the waste,
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  Speaker 1: the scum, the worthless residue left over after refining. Israel
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  Speaker 1: looked like silver on the outside, that is. But the
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  Speaker 1: fire revealed they were worthless waste. They had the look
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  Speaker 1: of God's people on. without the life of God's people.
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  Speaker 1: They look saved, but they did not live like they
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  Speaker 1: were saved. This was a problem from top down. And
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  Speaker 1: it wasn't, again, it wasn't just the people. Leadership had
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  Speaker 1: completely collapsed. And so the first part of leadership that
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  Speaker 1: he mentions, that Ezekiel mentions, is the prophet's. The prophets
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  Speaker 1: were preaching smoothly. You see that in verse 28. They
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  Speaker 1: were preaching smooth lies instead of hard truth. They were
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  Speaker 1: silent about sin and loud about everything else. They told
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  Speaker 1: people what they wanted to hear because they were more
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  Speaker 1: concerned about their popularity than their responsibility. Sound familiar? There
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  Speaker 1: are voices today in pulpits saying, on platforms and social
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  Speaker 1: media who call themselves prophets, right, and teachers, but never
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  Speaker 1: once challenge anyone to turn from sin. They preach prosperity
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  Speaker 1: without holiness, blessing without obedience, and grace without repentance. The
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  Speaker 1: church is full of people who have been told they're
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  Speaker 1: fine when God is saying something different. When the watchman
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  Speaker 1: refuses to sound the alarm, the people don't prepare and
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  Speaker 1: the enemy walks right in. You've heard this illustration before.
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  Speaker 1: We really have too many duck Baptist churches today. This
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  Speaker 1: comes from Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard says basically every Sunday the ducks
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  Speaker 1: gather together. Pastor Duck preaches a three-point sermon. You are ducks,
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  Speaker 1: you have wings, and you can fly. That's a solid sermon.
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  Speaker 1: That's a solid three-point sermon. He's talking to ducks. He
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  Speaker 1: knows his audience. He tells them, you are ducks. And
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  Speaker 1: he describes ducks, the anatomy of ducks. And then he says,
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  Speaker 1: you have wings. And he talks about how their wings
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  Speaker 1: are so powerful. And then he says, you can fly.
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  Speaker 1: The ducks quacked out a shout. The duck mass choir sings.
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  Speaker 1: The offering is taken. And when Duck Church is over,
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  Speaker 1: all the ducks walked home. Nothing changed, in other words.
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  Speaker 1: Nobody flew. They all went home the same way they
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  Speaker 1: came to church. The problem was not that the message
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  Speaker 1: was wrong. The problem was that the message never moved anybody.
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  Speaker 1: The prophets in Ezekiel's day were the same way, preaching
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  Speaker 1: without conviction. teaching without transformation, and speaking without ever disturbing
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  Speaker 1: the sin comfort level of the people sitting in front
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  Speaker 1: of them. A sermon that doesn't challenge you to change
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  Speaker 1: is just a bunch of religious noise, sounding brass and
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  Speaker 1: tinkling simple. God is not looking for a church that
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  Speaker 1: knows the right words. He's looking for a church that
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  Speaker 1: is actually living them out. it is time to stop
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  Speaker 1: walking and start flying. You can quote every scripture from
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  Speaker 1: Genesis to Revelation, but if your life doesn't reflect it,
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  Speaker 1: you are still just a duck walking home. So the problem,
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  Speaker 1: it started with the prophets, but then there's also a
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  Speaker 1: problem with the priests. The priests couldn't tell the difference
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  Speaker 1: between holy and unholiness, verse 26. They mixed everything together
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  Speaker 1: until nothing was sacred. When you can't tell the difference
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  Speaker 1: between the church and the world, something has gone terribly wrong.
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  Speaker 1: Some churches today look more like entertainment venues than houses
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  Speaker 1: of worship. The music sounds the same. The language sounds
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  Speaker 1: the same. The lifestyle looks the same. And nobody seems
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  Speaker 1: to be bothered by it. When holiness disappears from the church,
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  Speaker 1: the church loses its power. We were never called to
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  Speaker 1: blend in with the world. We were called to stand out.
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  Speaker 1: We were called to be set apart. We were called
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  Speaker 1: to be holy. And the moment the sacred becomes ordinary,
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  Speaker 1: we have nothing left to offer a world that is
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  Speaker 1: desperate for something real. A dying world that is really,
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  Speaker 1: in all honesty, lost and on their way to hell.
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  Speaker 1: But then the princes, there's also a problem with them.
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  Speaker 1: In verse 27, Ezekiel says, the princes were using their
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  Speaker 1: power to get rich off the people they were supposed
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  Speaker 1: to protect. This wickedness in high places, this is wickedness
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  Speaker 1: in high places, and we are watching it happen, y'all,
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  Speaker 1: in all honesty, in real time today. Leaders who were
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  Speaker 1: elected to serve are instead serving themselves. Policies are written
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  Speaker 1: to protect the wealthy while the working poor can barely survive.
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  Speaker 1: Corporations get tax breaks while families choose between paying groceries
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  Speaker 1: and rent. Contracts go to the connected while communities crumble.
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  Speaker 1: This is not a new story. It is as old
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  Speaker 1: as Ezekiel. God is never silent about sin, and God
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  Speaker 1: has always had something to say about leaders who devour
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  Speaker 1: the people they were called to shepherd. And he's still watching,
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  Speaker 1: by the way. Power is not ownership. It's stewardship. And
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  Speaker 1: every leader will one day give an account. The sad
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  Speaker 1: reality is the people who follow wicked leaders will also
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  Speaker 1: suffer consequences. When you look at verse 29, Ezekiel says,
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  Speaker 1: the people followed right along, oppressing the poor and taking
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  Speaker 1: advantage of the vulnerable. When leadership is corrupt, corrupt long
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  Speaker 1: enough The people start to follow that pattern. Oppression becomes normal.
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  Speaker 1: Injustice becomes expected. Nobody speaks up because everybody has either
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  Speaker 1: given up or joined in. Again, we see it today
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  Speaker 1: when our communities turn a blind eye to exploitation. When
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  Speaker 1: neighbors take advantage of neighbors. When the elderly are scammed.
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  Speaker 1: When workers are underpaid and overlooked. and farmers lose their livelihood,
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  Speaker 1: and when nobody stands up because standing up feels too costly.
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  Speaker 1: But God has never been silent about how his people
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  Speaker 1: treat the vulnerable. From the law to the prophets to
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  Speaker 1: Jesus himself, caring for the poor and the marginalized has
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  Speaker 1: always been at the heart of what it means to
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  Speaker 1: follow God. Silence in the face of it in the
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  Speaker 1: face of injustice, is not neutrality. It is participation. I mean, Dr.
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  Speaker 1: King said it well. To ignore evil is to become
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  Speaker 1: an accomplice to it. And this wasn't just a personal problem.
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  Speaker 1: This was a systemic problem. So when leadership falls, the
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  Speaker 1: whole community, the whole nation suffers. So questions to ponder.
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  Speaker 1: The fire doesn't ask how many scriptures you know or
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  Speaker 1: how many Sundays you've been to church. It only reveals
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  Speaker 1: what you are made of. So let me ask you plainly,
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  Speaker 1: if God turned up the heat on your life today,
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  Speaker 1: would he find silver worth keeping or dross that needs
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  Speaker 1: to be scraped away? Have you confessed looking saved with
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  Speaker 1: living life? I'm sorry, have you confused looking saved with
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  Speaker 1: living saved? You can look like you got it all together.
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  Speaker 1: Walk the walk, talk the talk, quote scripture, but God
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  Speaker 1: knows your heart. Where has compromise become comfortable in your circle?
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  Speaker 1: Are you at the point that you are more comfortable
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  Speaker 1: defending sin instead of taking a stand against it? So,
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  Speaker 1: Then there's the crisis God identified. Verse 30, the A
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  Speaker 1: section of verse 30. Somebody needed to speak up. God
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  Speaker 1: was looking for somebody to speak truth into a broken situation.
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  Speaker 1: The wall was down and nobody was saying anything about it.
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  Speaker 1: It's like that priest and that scribe who passed by
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  Speaker 1: on the other side instead of rendering help to the
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  Speaker 1: individual who was hurt. The prophets had already proven They
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  Speaker 1: would not tell the truth, but God needed a voice.
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  Speaker 1: The text says, I sought for a man among them
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  Speaker 1: who would build up the wall and stand, here's the
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  Speaker 1: key phrase right here in the whole text, stand in
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  Speaker 1: the gap before me for the land. In other words,
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  Speaker 1: for the people. Ezekiel's wall was never primarily about a
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  Speaker 1: physical structure. That's not what we're talking about. It was
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  Speaker 1: about spiritual and moral protection. The wall represented the boundaries,
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  Speaker 1: the values, and covenant commitments that kept a community safe
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  Speaker 1: and ordered under God. Like I already mentioned, it's all
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  Speaker 1: about the covenant, them living according to the covenant that
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  Speaker 1: God made with them. When those collapsed, the people became vulnerable,
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  Speaker 1: not just to enemies, but to themselves. In the ancient world,
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  Speaker 1: a broken wall meant the city was defenseless. An enemy
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  Speaker 1: could walk right in. God looked at Israel and saw
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  Speaker 1: broken down walls everywhere. Moral walls. Spiritual walls. Family walls.
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  Speaker 1: Government walls. Community walls. And nobody was doing anything about it.
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  Speaker 1: We know what broken walls look like today, right? The
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  Speaker 1: missing wall between Mexico and the U.S. is not the problem.
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  Speaker 1: The moral wall is neighborhoods where violence has become normal,
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  Speaker 1: families where nobody is praying, churches where nobody is being
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  Speaker 1: challenged to grow, schools where children are falling through the cracks,
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  Speaker 1: and a government where leaders are more concerned with power
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  Speaker 1: and greed than with the people they were elected to serve,
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  Speaker 1: where justice is slow for some and swift for others,
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  Speaker 1: where the vulnerable are overlooked and the powerful are protected.
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  Speaker 1: And just like the princes in Ezekiel's day who used
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  Speaker 1: their positions for dishonest gain, we are watching leadership collapse
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  Speaker 1: again in real time. the more wall in this country
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  Speaker 1: is down. And yet God is looking for somebody willing
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  Speaker 1: to pick up a stone and not throw it, but
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  Speaker 1: pick up a stone and start rebuilding. So the questions
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  Speaker 1: to ponder are, what walls are broken in your home,
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  Speaker 1: in your church, in your community? Are you building something
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  Speaker 1: or somebody or just talking about what's broken? Where is
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  Speaker 1: God calling you to show up? And then finally, there
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  Speaker 1: is the call God is still making. I was trying
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  Speaker 1: my best to figure out. I'm like, Lord, this whole thing,
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  Speaker 1: I know, I get it. It's a warning from God
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  Speaker 1: for Israel. In other words, this is what God is
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  Speaker 1: about to do. Ezekiel was reporting based on what God
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  Speaker 1: was telling him. This is what God is getting ready
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  Speaker 1: to do. And he concludes this whole thing With the
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  Speaker 1: most important piece right here, that it was not only
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  Speaker 1: important to them, but it's important to us to this day.
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  Speaker 1: The call God is still making. Verses 30b as well
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  Speaker 1: as verse 31. In other words, somebody needs to show up.
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  Speaker 1: God searched the whole land and found nobody. The text says,
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  Speaker 1: but I found none. The greatest tragedy is not the sin.
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  Speaker 1: It was the absence of anybody willing, actually, really, this
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  Speaker 1: is a sin, willing to show up and do something
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  Speaker 1: about it. And God is still searching today. The question
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  Speaker 1: is whether he will find you. God says, but I
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  Speaker 1: found none. Those have, I mean, these words right here
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  Speaker 1: has to be the saddest words in scripture, right? God
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  Speaker 1: searched the whole land and came up empty. Nobody stepped forward.
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  Speaker 1: And because no one stood between the people and their sin,
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  Speaker 1: judgment eventually failed. But here, y'all, to be honest, you
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  Speaker 1: can't put a period because it doesn't end right here.
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  Speaker 1: Because you've got to look forward to what God did
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  Speaker 1: in the New Testament. But here is the gospel hiding
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  Speaker 1: in this hard text, really in plain sight. What Israel,
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  Speaker 1: where Israel came up short, God made up the difference.
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  Speaker 1: What Israel could not produce, God provided in Jesus Christ.
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  Speaker 1: Where no man could be found, God sent his son. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: thank you. It's the same pattern throughout. Where Adam fell, basically,
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  Speaker 1: the second Adam, Jesus Christ, God sent the second Adam
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  Speaker 1: to make up the difference. So the call God is
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  Speaker 1: still making, here it is, God sent his son. Jesus
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  Speaker 1: is the perfect boundary keeper. When all others did not,
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  Speaker 1: the priests, the prophets, they didn't want to keep the boundary.
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  Speaker 1: In Hebrews 7, 26, it tells us he is the
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  Speaker 1: perfect boundary keeper. In a world where everything is relative
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  Speaker 1: and people are constantly told that the truth is whatever
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  Speaker 1: feels right to you, which is, that's the worst. oh
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  Speaker 1: my god that's not biblical jesus never moved the line
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  Speaker 1: we're talking about the line of holiness he never bent
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  Speaker 1: the standard to make people feel comfortable we live in
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  Speaker 1: a culture that wants a god who approves of everything
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  Speaker 1: and confronts nothing But that is not the Jesus of
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  Speaker 1: scripture that we know. He is holy and he calls
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  Speaker 1: his people to be holy in our homes, in our relationships,
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  Speaker 1: in our entertainment choices and in how we carry ourselves.
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  Speaker 1: The standard hasn't changed at all because the culture has changed.
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  Speaker 1: We serve a perfect boundary keeper who is the same today,
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  Speaker 1: yesterday and forevermore. So Jesus is the perfect boundary keeper.
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  Speaker 1: But number two, Jesus is the perfect bearer of truth.
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  Speaker 1: John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and
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  Speaker 1: the life. No man comes to the Father but by me.
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  Speaker 1: The prophets in Ezekiel's day told people what they wanted
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  Speaker 1: to hear. They preached peace when there was no peace.
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  Speaker 1: That sounds a lot like some pulpits today where sin
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  Speaker 1: is never named, repentance is never preached, and everybody leaves
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  Speaker 1: feeling good like the Duck Baptist Church, but nothing ever changes.
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  Speaker 1: Jesus did not do that. He looked for people. He
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  Speaker 1: looked people in the eye and told them the truth,
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  Speaker 1: even when it was hard. He told the rich young
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  Speaker 1: ruler the truth. He told the woman at the well
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  Speaker 1: the truth. He didn't whitewash anybody's sin. As a matter
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  Speaker 1: of fact, he went to the cross and washed our
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  Speaker 1: sins away, past, present, and future. Real love tells the
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  Speaker 1: truth because real love wants people to be set free
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  Speaker 1: from sin. But lastly, Jesus is the perfect intercessor. Hebrews 7.25,
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  Speaker 1: Romans 8.34. Right now, at this very moment, Jesus is
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  Speaker 1: interceding for you and I before the Father. where he
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  Speaker 1: talks about he needs somebody to stand in the gap,
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  Speaker 1: he's talking about intercession. He's not doing this for us occasionally,
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  Speaker 1: not when he feels like it. The Bible says he
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  Speaker 1: always lives to make intercession. When the enemy brings up
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  Speaker 1: our past, Jesus is speaking on our behalf. When life
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  Speaker 1: feels like it's caving in and you don't even have
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  Speaker 1: the words to pray, Jesus is already standing in the
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  Speaker 1: gap For you and I. And because he intercedes for us.
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  Speaker 1: We are called to intercede for others. For our children.
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  Speaker 1: For our communities. For our nation. Somebody has to be willing.
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  Speaker 1: To pray. When everybody else has given up. That is
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  Speaker 1: the gap. God is looking for you to fill. Ezekiel
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  Speaker 1: 22 30 says. God found none. But the gospel says.
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  Speaker 1: He found one. And because Jesus stood. In the ultimate
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  Speaker 1: gap for us, we are now free and called to
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  Speaker 1: stand in the gap for others. So God is still searching.
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  Speaker 1: He's still asking, is there anybody willing to pray for
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  Speaker 1: this community? Is there anybody willing to tell the truth
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  Speaker 1: even when it costs something? Is there anybody willing to
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  Speaker 1: rebuild what sin has broken? Will he find you standing
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  Speaker 1: in the gap? And if God searched your generation, would
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  Speaker 1: he find you standing? Who are you interceding for right now?
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  Speaker 1: What gap is God calling you, specifically you, to fill?
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  Speaker 1: In conclusion, we serve a God who doesn't give up
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  Speaker 1: on his people, even when they've given up on themselves.
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  Speaker 1: He's still looking. He's still calling. And because of Jesus,
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  Speaker 1: the one who stood in the ultimate gap, We don't
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  Speaker 1: stand alone. We stand in his power by his spirit
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  Speaker 1: for his people because somebody needs to stand up. Somebody
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  Speaker 1: needs to speak up and somebody needs to show up.
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  Speaker 1: Will you be that somebody today? Amen. Praise God. Yeah,
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: I pray that that is a blessing to you. That's
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: a yeah, that's a tall, tall text. And so I
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: tried my best to break it down as much as
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: possible to make it simple for you in your understanding
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: of the biblical text as you pray and you teach
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: this text. So if you have any questions, any concerns,
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: please reach out to me. I'm definitely here for you.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: To God be the glory. I will see you on Sunday.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: Lord willing.