Dr Greg Bahnsen - Proverbs: Proverbs 8:32-36 (The Love of Death) (Part 23)

Please turn with me in God's word this morning to Proverbs, the eighth chapter, where we take as our reading verses 32 to 36, Proverbs 8, 32, 36, where we read of the theme the love of death. Hear now God's word. Now therefore, my sons hearken unto me, for blessed are they that keep my ways, hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the post of my doors. For whoso findeth me, findeth life, and shall obtain favour of Jehovah. But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul. All they that hate me love death and thus far. The reading of God's word we have seen thus far in Proverbs, the eighth chapter, Wisdom's Invitation to Men. In verses 1 to 5, Wisdom comes before us, crying aloud in the streets and in the high places and everywhere, inviting men to receive the benefits that she has for them. We've seen in this chapter wisdom's broad relevance for men as well. In verses 6 to 21, we've seen that wisdom speaks a word that is wholly true, righteous and just. The Wisdom speaks a word not only that benefits us spiritually and ethically and philosophically, but politically and economically as well. That wisdom speaks to all of life. We've seen in Proverbs, the eighth chapter that wisdom is eternal, that wisdom had a role in creation, as we saw last Lord's day in verses 22 to 31. And it's in light of these things. It's in light of wisdom's invitation. Wisdom's broad relevance, wisdom's place in creation and eternality. The wisdom now says, therefore we finally come to the punchline, as it were. And I've said it many times, I'll say it as often as it seems appropriate. Whenever you see the word therefore in God's Word, you had better ask, what is it there for? You see, all of Proverbs 8 has been building and building and building. And though I've broken this down into separate messages, all of which have their place and their individual value in our lives, you need to see that all of these messages over this last month have been building up to this now, Wisdom personified, anticipating the Logos, who is the Son of God, Wisdom speaks and says, therefore, based on what I have told you, hearken to me. Since personified wisdom cries out to help you. Since personified wisdom speaks without error in all areas of life, since personified wisdom is eternal and is the very key principle of the World and happiness. Therefore, hearken to wisdom. If we pay attention to wisdom's credentials, we should then not hesitate to follow what wisdom says. You imagine a young man learning to play the violin who is struggling. I once learned to play the violin and I struggled. I would still struggle today, I'm afraid. And though I did attain a certain level of expertise playing in our school orchestra and in a junior symphony in the city nearby where we lived, it was difficult. And sometimes I would be given a piece of music that I really had to work hard on. I want you to imagine young Greg Bonson learning to play the violin and some virtuoso happening across my path someday. Imagine how it comes about in your own way and sees that I'm struggling over this piece of music and tells me something which is contrary to what I would have thought you're supposed to do for managing this particular difficult piece. And I listen to the guidance of this violin virtuoso and I think about how I would have done it, and I say, eh, I can avoid listening to this guy. I'll do it my own way. The difficulty there is that I don't recognize the credentials of the one who is counseling me. I don't have a sufficient awe and respect. I don't see the accomplishment of that person. And therefore I think, well, you know, you've got your opinion, I've got my opinion, and I'll just have to choose between them. Wisdom has come before us as struggling players in the game of life. Wisdom created us. Wisdom made this world. Wisdom has guidance and truth for all areas of life. Wisdom is ready, inviting us to take advantage of what God has for us. And yet the Bible tells us there are some people who say maybe, maybe not. They don't recognize the credentials of the one who was speaking to them. You say, well, that's not us. I mean, we see the word of God speaking. We know the wisdom of God's word. We certainly hearken to wisdom. I want to ask you this morning whether that's true, though. Do we really hearken to wisdom? Now, therefore, my sons hearken unto me. I want to suggest that the very fact God put puts this in the book of Proverbs and puts this in the book of Proverbs and then puts it in the book of Proverbs again suggests that we are very inclined to deceive ourselves, to fool ourselves as to whether we are hearkening to wisdom. You know, we jokingly say sometimes that free advice is worth exactly what you paid for it. There's probably people that you know in your neighborhood or relatives, you have people at work who are often giving you just that free advice that you don't respect. And you would jokingly say, it's worth just what I had to pay for. It's worth nothing. The fact that advice or guidance may cost us nothing, however, shouldn't distract from the fact that sometimes it is good, healthy advice, but often it does distract from that. I find it interesting that perhaps the best wisdom available to most people. I can't say universally there are wicked parents in this world, but for most people, the best wisdom available to you is parental counsel. And yet, you know, just because the parental counsel is so ready and so free, we tend to not pay attention to it, to not take it seriously. I know this dynamic. It works in pastoral counseling, too. This may surprise you, but as you know, in this church we have a policy that the needs of our members are met by the pastor and the elders and as much as we possibly can. And no one pays anything for that. That's just part of your tithes and offerings as part of the ministry of our church. But when people from outside our congregation come for that kind of help for teaching or tutoring or counseling, we often have a minimal fee that is charged to help defray the cost of running this ministry here. And I find it fascinating that for the most part, those who end up paying for the counsel that I give them take it a lot more seriously than those who get it week in and week out for free. It shouldn't be that way. I'm not commending that situation. I'm just describing it as a matter of fact. When we don't have to pay, when it doesn't cost us something, we tend to take things lightly. We don't tend to do what we're told to do. We don't follow the guidance that is given. And you know, the freest counsel available, the most ready counsel you can find is here in the word of God. God has openly declared his will. He has set down his wisdom, that wisdom by which he runs the world and made everything that exists. That wisdom is available for human life right here in Proverbs. And yet God is portrayed in this book as crying out in the streets, won't someone listen to me? Won't you take my counsel? Won't you live by my advice? It's a very sad thing. God freely communicates wisdom to us. Do we listen to it? Do we heed the wisdom of God? Do you? I want to suggest that you probably have answered that question. Too quickly this morning and without accurate reflection. Do you hearken to the wisdom of God's Word? I mean, do you really heed the advice of inspired wisdom? My guess would be that we often confuse. Now listen to this. We often confuse a general respect for the Word of God. We confuse that with hearkening to the Word of God in an eager, specific, concrete and unqualifiedly obedient response. I'm setting two things over against one another today. Please note the difference. A general respect for the Word of God, which I think all of us have. Over against an eager, specific, concrete and unqualifiedly obedient response to the Word of God. Those are different things. Notice, first of all, that this passage calls us to an eager response to the Word of God. Look at verse 34. Blessed is the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the doorpost of my house. Isn't that interesting? Wisdom, says the person who is heeding wisdom is going to be eager to find out what wisdom has to say. Eager to hear the Word of God waiting daily at my gates. You can imagine a poor person who knows that his life and his sustenance depends upon the grace and the generosity of some wealthy man waiting at his gates, day by day for his daily portion, for a little handout that will get him by. Those of us who really want the wisdom of God should wait daily at God's gates, waiting for everything that he may give us, expecting that everything that we are or shall be, all the guidance of our lives depends upon Him. And so we're anxious. We're eager, ready to receive whatever he has for us. Does that describe you? Does it really? Do we discipline ourselves to become serious students of God's Word? It calls for discipline. It doesn't come naturally. Do we discipline ourselves to study God's Word? I mean, there are times when I think we are more prone to study how to grow grass, when we have to do that than to study God's Word when it means settling the affairs of life. There are times when we pay more attention to how to put together the TV and the VCR than we do how to put together the strands of theology in God's Word. We are not serious students of Scripture, are we? Do we thirst after its truth every day? Can you imagine getting up and getting through a day without ever drinking water or having a bite to eat or breathing the air? No, we take that for granted every day. How about spiritually? Do we, when we get up, think, I can't get through the day? Without studying God's Word, do you wait daily at the doorpost of his house? God, deliver some truth to me. I need strength, I need guidance. I need your help. And are we glad to have God's Word confront us and correct us and counsel us? Are we glad to have that? Or do we subtly avoid coming into contact with what we don't want to hear? You know, I've gotten to the point where in counseling I often ask people, do you want to hear what the Bible says about that? Because you see, it becomes evident to me in the way they are responding that they probably know what the Bible says, but they're avoiding it. And so instead of casting pearls before swine as the Bible says that are just going to turn against them and rend me, I say, do you want the biblical counsel on this point? Are you ready to hear what God says? Are you ready to be corrected? The problem with most of us is when we go counseling, we want to get counsel or we look for advice from God's Word, we do it in a window shopping manner. We want to find that counsel that agrees with us, that agrees with our preconceived opinions. That's not going to be too painful, that isn't going to cost me too much, that isn't going to require me to change too much. And so I ask you again, do you hearken to the wisdom of God's Word? Are you daily standing at his doorpost saying, I need your truth God? Are you eager to hear the counsel of God's Word? Secondly, I ask you, do you hearken to God's Word specifically? Notice in verse 32 we read, Blessed are they that keep my ways. The plural there is important. And the concrete word in verse 33 that follows is important as well. Here, instruction. You see, everyone is happy to follow the way of God. If you keep it very general, very broad, very unspecific, non particularized and undetailed, then people are glad to say, well of course we believe in following God's Word when it comes to taking the ways of God and the specific instructions of God's Word, though, that's different. You see, generalities and ideals are easy to espouse as long as they're not translated into something that's very detailed. As long as it doesn't have teeth, if you will. So I'm going to give you an example today. What if I were to tell you the rule for life? The most general ethical principle we all could follow is the rule of fair play. What I would advise you all to do is follow the rule of fair play in your life. Everyone would endorse that. That sounds good. Of course. Fair play. That's what we want. We want fairness. We want justice. We want everybody to be treated right. We want fair play. I think everyone would claim to follow that, too. They'd say, well, you know, the rule for my life is fair play. If I disagree with you, it's because you're obviously breaking the rule of fair play. I don't break that rule. I believe in fair play, but you don't. You see, as long as there's nothing in particular that is forbidden, as long as there's nothing in particular that is demanded, fair play. Sounds great, but can you imagine playing a football game where the only rule the referees follow is the rule of fair play? One team would do one thing, the other team would squawk right away. They'd say, that's not fair. The first team would say, it is fair. The problem is when you have general rules that sound good and abstract, everyone can agree, and no one has to do anything. No one has to be corrected. And likewise, I think we evade specific obedience to the wisdom of God's word by thinking only of generalities, only of summary commands. You know, it's great to preach that we ought to love one another, and we should. I think that's important. It's valuable. But you take love and divorce it from the specific guidance of God's law. And you haven't got anything. You've got fair play as your rule because everyone thinks what they're doing is love. So now, when I say, do you hearken to God's word? I don't mean do you hearken to the general idea of justice or the general idea of love or the general idea of fidelity? I want to know, do you hearken specifically to the corrective instruction of God's Word? And thirdly, I wonder, do we hearken concretely? I want you to notice the requirement in verse 33. In philosophical terms, it's called an achievement requirement. Hear instruction and be wise. Why is that called an achievement instruction? Because it says, intention is not good enough. Don't simply aim to be wise. The Bible says, don't simply endorse wisdom in general. It says here, be wise. It's not just a theoretical ideal. Then. A New Testament book of wisdom puts it this way. Be doers of the word and not hearers, only deceiving yourselves. James 1:22. Be doers of the word. Be concrete. Be wise. Don't aim for it. Don't simply intend it. Don't simply commend it as a general ideal. But be it, be wise. Now, I've been preaching wisdom to you for weeks and weeks and weeks after this book. You've heard the Word, and you've heard the Word, and you've heard the Word. Are you doing it? Are you doing the word? James 1:22 says, Be doers of the Word and not hearers only deceiving yourselves. Of course that draws my attention every time I see it in God's Word because I did my doctoral dissertation on that self deception. The Bible is very hard on those who make religious professions and deceive themselves because they aren't doing what they say. And so is our hearkening to God's Word eager today? Is it specific? Is it concrete? And finally I ask, is it unqualifiedly obedient? Verse 33 says that we are to hear wisdom and refuse it not. Verse 32 says we must keep wisdom's ways. I specifically think I ought to do such and such because the Bible tells me I concretely am setting out to be wise in that way. But then you see some obstacle comes up, some inconvenience comes up, some pain or agony obedience is going to bring into my life arises, and then I don't want to do it anymore. I refuse it. I think most of us, as I've said earlier, make the mistake of shopping for advice when we're down and out and when we're having troubles, when we're feeling depressed, when things aren't going right in our relationships, we seek that advice which will confirm our preconceived ideas. And when Scripture speaks contrary to our preconceived ideas, our tendency is to refuse the wisdom found in God's Word. Of course, we'd never say that's what we're doing. I don't mean that there are some who are like that. I've seen that from time to time. People professing to be Christians who are told, well, you're supposed to forgive in this situation, or you're supposed to go to your brother in this situation, or you're supposed to make restitution in this situation. Are you supposed to do this and supposed to do that? There are some people when they hear that, say, well, then, if that's what God wants, forget it. I'm not going to do it at all. Just don't consider me a Christian anymore. There are people like that, but for the most part, I think our tendency is to refuse to do it and then find an excuse. We look for loopholes, for exceptions. Or we pretend the issue is not really clear to us. We duck and we evade. We bob and weave. As long as the hard truth doesn't finally land on us, then we end up not doing it. Or sometimes we see that wisdom requires something of us, but we hesitate to comply. We say, well, maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, it's going to take. I'm going to have to really think about that. I need to pray for strength to do this. Do you know that prayer can sometimes be a very ungodly thing? That may sound amazing to those whose orientation to the Christian life is towards subjective piety only, but prayer can be a very ungodly thing. God says, you tell the truth. Someone says, well, I've got to pray about that. Oh no you don't. You just do it. Now, you may need prayer for sustenance, consistency, perseverance, but when people say I've got to pray about something as though the issue is not settled, that's very disobedient. God has settled most of the issues of our lives in the Bible. I know people don't like to hear that. They like to think we live in a universe where you have to be rather skeptical about knowing anything about God or what we should do. But just about every situation in life has received an answer in the Bible. It's right there. It tells us what to do. But what we like to say is, I'm going to pray about it. I'm going to leave this up in the. I'm going to volley the issue and see where it comes down. And so I ask you again, do you hearken to God's wisdom? Do you hearken eagerly? Do you wait daily at the doorpost of God's house for his word? Do you hearken specifically, not just to generalizations, but to the hard and fast rules and instruction of God's Word? Do you hearken concretely, not just by intention, but because you want to be wise? And do you hearken with unqualified obedience? Do you hearken in a way that says, if God says it, that settles it? If God says it, I'm to do it. Not to pray about it, not to think about it, not to equivocate over it, but to do it? Hearkening unto wisdom is what God wants of us. Not cheap and not washed out alternatives. Now let's come back to this. Now therefore my sons hearken unto me, and if we do, what will happen? Verse 35 says that hearkening to wisdom is the way of life verse 36 says, Hating wisdom is the love of death. First of all, hearkening to wisdom is the way of life. For whoso findeth me, findeth life, and shall obtain favor of jehovah. Both verses 32 and 34 have already indicated that hearkening unto wisdom eventuates in blessing. If you were to be blessed, if you're to know prosperity or peace or happiness in this life, you must hearken to the wisdom of God's Word. And now verse 35 expands upon the nature of this blessing which attends to wisdom, and says that the blessing wisdom will bring you is nothing less than life itself, a life which Jehovah grants unto us when we hearken to His Word. There's also a very beautiful truth in verse 35. Remember in terms of Hebrew poetry that there's a parallel construction here. For whoso findeth me, findeth life, and shall obtain favor of Jehovah. What are the two ideas that are put in parallel to one another here? Life and the favor of Jehovah it's noteworthy that the favor of Jehovah just is the blessing of life itself. The author of Proverbs would stand before you and tell you today there is no happiness. There is no sustenance. There is no life in order apart from the favor of Jehovah. Oh, you give a man riches and cut him off from his Creator and he's got misery. You give a man a large family and cut him off from wisdom, and he has misery. Anything short of the favor of God in our lives cannot satisfy us. As Augustine said, our hearts are restless until they find their rest in thee. We can't be happy with the things of life. We can't be happy with relationships. We can't be happy with with accomplishments or reputation. We can't be happy with power or authority or anything else that's available in this life apart from the favor of God. There is no true life outside the sunshine of his love and his approval. If God doesn't smile upon you, your life's miserable, it's wretched, it's barren. It is, as the next verse will say, the ways of death. Death. Last week I told you that I think personified wisdom in Proverbs 8 is the beginning of a theological development through progressive revelation of what is in the New Testament called the Logos, the person of God himself, God's own Son speaking. And I think confirmation of that view is found right here in verse 35, where what we read in verse 35 is part of the the self proclamation of the Son of God on earth as we read it in the New Testament, when Jesus preached on earth, you notice, especially in John's Gospel, how often his theme was just what you see in verse 35 for whoso findeth me, findeth life, and shall obtain favor of Jehovah. You'll notice this in John the third chapter, verse 36, where Jesus says to Nicodemus, he who believes on the Son has eternal life, but he who obeys not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. Notice what wisdom says. Jesus says, I am life. Believe on me and you will have life. Refuse me, and you shall know death. John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, he who hears my word and believes him that sent me has passed out, out of death into life. Jesus assumes we're all walking in the ways of death. We need to hear him if we are to live. John 8:51 if a man keep my sayings, he shall never see death. In John 10:10 I came that they might have life and have it more abundantly. One of my favorites, all of God's word. John 11:25 I am the resurrection and and the life. He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever lives and believes in me shall never die. I am the life, Jesus says, I am the way, the truth and the life. John 14:6 and as Jesus prays in the garden of Gethsemane, before he will go to the cross, he prays to the Father, saying, even as you gave him authority over all flesh, flesh, that to all whom you have given him, he should give eternal life. And this is life eternal. That they should know you, the only true God, and him whom you did send Jesus Christ. This is life to know God. For God is life, and in him there is no death. God is the very principle and origin and sustainer of life. John the Apostle summary is found in his first Epistle. This whole theme when he says very simply, he who has the Son has life. He who has not, the Son of God has not life. God speaks to us in very personal terms. He says, I'm here to guide you, to instruct you, to show you the way. I made this world. I know how life can be happy in this world. Let me show you how I am eternal. My wisdom is not conditioned by time or circumstance, by person or place. Listen to me and live. We have a world, a society, a culture full of people who don't see the credentials of God, who, like a young violin Player not looking, listening to a virtuoso say, well, you've got your opinion, I've got mine. But you see, it's more than just an intellectual mistake when wisdom is refused. It's more than just an error in thought, more than just a momentary slip when we don't listen to wisdom. For you see, all of life and death hangs in the balance according to God's word. In verse 36 we read, but he that sins against me wrongs his own soul. The word for sins, by the way, is a Hebrew word for miss, the one who misses the mark against me. Or to put it very simply, the one who misses me. The verse just preceding it said, the one who finds me finds life. But the one who misses me me acts suicidally. The one who would turn down the wisdom of God, the one who would turn down God himself acts suicidally, wrongs his own soul. And it should be obvious to us, if wisdom is Life, verse 35, if wisdom is the tree of life, Proverbs 3:18, then it just stands to reason that those who hate wisdom hate life. Which is just to say that they love death instead. One of the most devastating messages of God's Word is that a man can stray into the territory of death and that he himself can live with the inhabitants of death. And he can live according to the self destructive guidance of those who have died even before he leaves this earth, even before he leaves this life. Look at Proverbs 9:18 speaking of those who follow after the folly of this world. He knoweth not that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol. There are people who are living out hell today. They are living hell in their own personal experience, in their own relationships, because they won't listen to God's word. They won't submit to the grace of God that He personally makes available in His Son. You know that it's true. We see this all around us, that those who hate God love death. Those who hate the wisdom of God's word love death. I see this. How often do I talk to people in the midst of marital disruptions and distress? How often do I hear them say, did you know I'm contemplating, contemplating suicide? And of course it breaks my heart to hear that, to see anyone go through that. But it's true. When we don't do what God tells us to do, then we love death instead. We see this in the movies, all around us. Our society is so bloodthirsty. Murder is readily accepted. It's a plaything. It's a matter for entertainment in our day. And it shouldn't surprise us that suicide rates are as high as they are. And by the way, suicide rates are not just high among people that are down and out. You know, those who are on drugs, those who are strung out. Suicide rates are high among doctors and psychologists and lawyers and people that are supposed to have it made. We have a society that has turned from God, and it doesn't surprise us. I hope that in so doing, they've turned to death. And more and more we see this culturally work its way out. You say our society doesn't love death. They say, what is the abortion epidemic all about? If we don't love death, our society doesn't love death. Why then do we think about putting our old and affirmed away because they're inconvenient. We love death, not the ways of life. When I sometimes tell I'm asked this question, when people call for counseling, they'll say, you know, aunt Mary's on these life support systems. They don't have a brain wave. There's nothing really here. We can't talk to her. She doesn't do anything. She's as good as dead. Isn't it all right to turn off the machines? And I say, no, it's not. Why not? There's no value in this for us. I say, because life is important to God. There's a symbol there that must be maintained. You turn off the life support on a horse, yes, you may step on an ant. But God made life, human life, life in his own image. In our society, you see, that kind of thinking is just, phew, right over their heads. No one even catches on to that. And that's because we've lost our love of life. We don't know what it is to live. Of course, we think we do. We think we're really living it up. We're living it up with a drug epidemic that brings people to the doors of death every day of their lives over and over again. Our hospitals receiving people dead on arrival because they've overdosed on drugs. The we think we're living it up. And look at the drunks all about us. We think we're living it up. We're taking care of our problems. We live in the ways of death. How about sexually? We think we're going to live it up. God doesn't know what he's talking about. So homosexuality becomes endorsed in our culture. And now what are we doing? We're at again the doorstep of death because of an AIDS epidemic in our culture. You know, everywhere you look, in every walk of life, it's true over and over again. And we are so foolish, we're blind. God says, if you don't love me, you love death in the end. I think it's true that a culture will not break God's law. In the end, God's law will break that culture. For to defy the wisdom of God's word is to commit spiritual and intellectual and cultural suicide. I think it's very interesting. We come to the end of Proverbs 8 and the ultimate sanction upon God's holy word is that of life and death. We're covenant theologians in this church. We should have expected that a covenant is a life. It's a life and death matter. It's a bond in blood, as we say. A covenant is a bond in blood. It's a commitment unto death. And so God blesses us or he curses us on the basis of our response to His Word. There can be no neutral response to a covenant from God. When God binds us to Himself, we either break the covenant or we submit and keep it. And if we break the covenant, he breaks us. And if we submit to it, he takes care of us. There is blessing and there is cursing set before us us. And God's Word says it's a life and death matter how you respond here. This is not intellectual chess anymore. This is not just a social game we're playing. This is life and death. The end of the book of Deuteronomy. After God has delivered his saving covenantal word through Moses, his prophet, we read in Deuteronomy the 30th chapter. I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day that I have set before you. Life and death. Blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life that you may live, you and your seed to love Jehovah, your God, to obey his voice and cleave unto him. For he is your life and the length of your days. Doesn't that say it all? Personified wisdom now renews the covenant with men. Even as God speaking through Moses in Deuteronomy 30, he now stands personified as wisdom. As I've set before you. Life and death. Choose life. Why would you die? Why would you choose the ways of death? When I am your life and the length of your days? And for all your seed after you, what is it that keeps you from hearkening to God's word? Is there maybe down deep inside you something you need to root out this morning? A self destructive urge? A love of death? Because you love yourself? And your own ways too much. God says, I am life. Choose life. Choose to live. Let's pray. Father, how could we choose but to live? How could anyone who is sane and rational choose the ways of death? And yet we must confess as we look at our lives, we have chosen the ways of death. We have transgressed your Holy law. We have done those things displeasing in your sight. We've leaned upon our own wisdom. We really have been self destructive. And so God save us. Save us from ourselves, from our sin, from our rebellion, from our foolishness. Help us to see youe credentials as yous speak to us in youn Word. That indeed all of heaven and earth can be called upon to witness against us. That when we don't live according to youo Word, we don't live in harmony with reality. When we don't live according to your Word, we don't walk in the ways of life, but we kill ourselves and those about us. And so, Father, we ask you to save us, to forgive us, to heal us, to give us life. Indeed, Father, we would pray for life from the dead because we are in the ways of death. Our hearts are wrong. We are spiritually dead, apart from your regenerating grace by the Holy Spirit. So this morning we pray for new life from the dead. That we might be raised to newness of life in Jesus Christ, our Savior. That we might know him, who is the resurrection and the life, that we might receive from Him. Life and that more abundant, that we might know him and have faith in him. And therefore be those that gain eternal life with you forever, Father. Abide with us now. Stay with us. Keep our feet in the ways of life. Help us not to turn to the right and to the left. Help us to hearken to your word, to do it specifically and concretely, eagerly and without any qualification about it. Be with us through all the trials of this life, all the difficulties we endure, the depressions we go through, the confusions that we have, all the difficult decisions we must make, and even through the threat of persecution and death. Lord, we pray that you would abide with us, that we might daily enjoy the benefits of life and not be those who are brought down to death. We pray in the name of the Lord of Life, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.