"Remember the Lord Your God" - Deuteronomy 8:1-20

Will you remember the Lord your God at every stage and in every moment of your spiritual journey?

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Well again, Cedar Street, I love you so very much. It's my joy to be with you here this morning and um say hi to everybody that's watching on live stream. I know we still have a lot that are coming and going in the summertime, and that's just part of the season that we're in. But speaking of seasons, uh, you know, we are right now we're in the month of July, and I we came out of a sermon series in the book of 2 Samuel. And what I like to do in the summer when we're in transition is just kind of preach from the overflow of my own devotional life, my own thoughts and things I'm wrestling with with God. Uh, we're probably gonna start a new sermon series in the first week of September. But here in these next few weeks, we're just gonna be uh wherever God leads me in the scriptures. And today he led me to the book of Deuteronomy. It's not one that we have looked at in a little while. It's probably one of my top three favorite books of the Old Testament. But we're gonna be looking in Deuteronomy chapter 8, verses 1 through 20. And the title of our message here this morning is Sweet and Simple But Not Easy. It's Remember the Lord Your God. Remember the Lord Your God. Let me say this. In the 16 years I've lived in Candler County, probably more so in the last two or three months, I have felt a shift. Maybe I'm just more sensitive to it than I used to be, but I have felt a shift where things are changing at rapid breakneck speed. Perhaps you have felt that in your life. And I'm gonna be honest with you uh transitions, some people handle them better than others. At this church, they're uh this year we've had more death than we've ever had. In fact, today I'll do my 11th funeral this year. Uh we've had a lot of people transitioning out, and we've had a lot of people transitioning in. We've had a lot of graduations, and a lot of these are, you know, a lot of these are bittersweets. Some of these are times to celebrate, some of these are times to mourn, and then some of these are times to do both at the same time. I know for me, my entire the first 30 plus years of my life was nothing but transition. And perhaps that's why I struggle with it. My parents divorced when I was 11, and I lived with my mom, and I lived with my best friend, then I lived with my dad, then I went back to my mom, and then I didn't see my dad, and then when I finally saw my dad again, you know, I was trying to find something that I, a foundation that I could put my feet on, and I didn't know Jesus back then. And so I used to look out my window and say, I'm getting out of here when I'm 18. And two months after high school graduation, I got in my 89 Chevy Blazer and I drove to Bullock County, Georgia. And uh it was an adventure. But after graduation at Georgia Southern, God sent me on another journey in a sports casting career that led me to from Georgia to North Carolina to Florida to California, back to Georgia, back to Pennsylvania, back to Georgia again. And then seminary and all that. And I finally came back here in 2016, and God has given me a great grace where I've been here 10 years and I've been able to experience stability. But now, because I'm finally rooted, everybody else is changing. Everybody else is moving and shaking, and everybody else seems to be in transition. And I'll be honest with you, I don't do well with that. It's not easy. But I know this whether you're here struggling with other things that are transitioning, or you're the one that's in transition, the answer is still the same. The answer is this: remember the Lord your God. Because there's something about transition in our life that grabs our attention, either for the good or the bad. In times of grief, it's like a storm that we feel like we're never going to get out of. In times of anticipation and excitement, when you're moving to a new place and you're starting something new, the excitement and the prosperity and the joy of that new feeling sometimes can blind us to where God is and what he's doing. So the answer is still the same for everybody in this room. Whatever you're going through right now, whether you're in a time of prosperity, if you're in a time of desolation and trial, or maybe you're in a time where it's just boring and it seems like everybody else is experiencing joy when you're not. Whatever season that you're in, where's God in it? That's the question. And today we're going to be looking at this beautiful passage in Deuteronomy chapter 8, where Moses is speaking to a group of people he's been with for four decades, and they're all going to start heading in separate directions. And he's going to remind them of an awful lot of what God has done, of what God is doing, and of what God promises that he will do. And also warnings of what will happen if we don't keep our eyes on God and remember where he is in all of our seasons. So this is a word for everybody in this room. Doesn't matter what season you're in. You and I are called to remember the Lord our God. And so here's our big idea. Pretty simple, not easy, in one sentence. Remember the Lord your God at every stage and in every moment of your spiritual journey. Remember the Lord your God at every stage and at every moment of your spiritual journey. So if you want to know more about how we can remember the Lord our God, would you join me by turning to the book of Deuteronomy? If you're new to the Bible, it's the fifth book of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and then Deuteronomy. So it comes after Numbers, it comes before Joshua. If you don't have a Bible, grab the Pew Bible in front of you or beside you. We're on page 180 in your Pew Bible. And if you would stand at this time, out of the reverence of the reading of God's holy, infallible, inerrant, and fully sufficient word, we're in Deuteronomy chapter 8, starting in verse 1. And I'll be happy to explain the context after we get done reading here. This is Moses, inspired of the Holy Spirit, speaking to the nation of Israel after their forty-year journey in the wilderness, getting ready to enter into the promised land. Here it is, starting in verse 1 of chapter 8, it says, The whole commandment that I command you today, you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers, and you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you hunger, and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Your clothing did not wear out on you, and your foot did not swell these forty years. Know then in your heart that as man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you. So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and fearing him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs flowing out in the valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees, of pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. Verse eleven. Take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes which I command you today, lest when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions, and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you your water out of the flinty rock, who fed you in the wilderness with manna, that your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and test you to do good, to do you good in the end. Beware lest you say in your heart, My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth. You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day. And if you forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish. Like the nations that the Lord makes to perish before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let's pray. Lord, it is amazing how this was inspired by your spirit through the tongue of your servant Moses thousands of years ago, and it is true to your people here today. You are bringing us out of one season and into another. And it is a season filled with your presence. Therefore, it is a season that is promised of great prosperity, but also great challenges, a season of testing, a season of being disciplined, a season of preparation for what is to come. And yet we forget. We forget where you are, we forget what you've already done, we forget what you're doing, we forget what you're going to do and what you've promised. Lord, I don't know why we are such a forgetful people. Help us today. Plant these words deep in the recesses of our hearts, even the ones in this room right now that fall asleep during this sermon. Plant the word so deep in their heart, Lord, that it will come to harvest at a time they need to know it the most. Help us to remember you in every season, including this one. Be with us right now, I pray, in Jesus' name, and God's people said. Amen. One of the reasons I love Deuteronomy so much is if you read the book of Deuteronomy, you kind of get Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers thrown in for free, because it's a wonderful summary of everything that happens from the beginning of Adam and Eve to the nation of Israel wandering 40 years in the wilderness. And maybe you've wondered if you've ever done a study of where they were when they were coming out of Egypt and where they were headed in the land of Canaan. Many of you may know this, but if you don't, uh, as far as geography is concerned, they had a journey that should have lasted a few weeks, but it lasted 40 years. God was not concerned about their destination as much as he was their transformation. And the same is true for each of you. You and I are reaching for new destinations. There's new goals that we have, places that we want to go, things that we want to do. And they're not unimportant, but they're not God's focus. This is why our mission statement is heads, hearts, and hands being transformed through the gospel. God is molding you and shaping you into the image of his son if you will be submissive to this process. And part of that is no matter what season that you're in, you recognize what God is doing. I think one of the things when I look at my life that I'm most frustrated about, but also that I get sometimes frustrated, you know, in counseling as well, counseling other people, is we just don't realize what he's doing. When we're hurting, we just want it to stop. And God says, if you don't know what I'm doing and I make this pain stop, I'm gonna have to lead something else into your life that's even more painful until you enter into this process. And then when it comes to prosperity, if we don't recognize that all of it comes from God, and then we get kind of caught up in it as if we're the ones that produce this prosperity or that prosperity is the ultimate goal, and we don't recognize that intimacy with God is the ultimate goal, then we're gonna miss out on why God gives us great prosperity. So it doesn't matter where you're at right now, it doesn't matter if this is one of the best seasons that you've ever been and you've come in with great hope and anticipation, or if you're in a season of grief and struggle and you don't know why the storm clouds will not part, the answer is still the same. God says, remember. Remember who I am. Remember everything that I've done to bring you here. Remember what my motive is for doing what I'm doing right now, and remember what I've promised for your future. Moses was saying this to the nation of Israel as they were getting ready at the end of 40 years to enter into this promised land filled with blessing. And you and I are standing here right now on the edge of one season coming to an end, and a new season about ready to begin, and he's telling us the same thing. Remember. So, what is it that we're supposed to remember? Well, out of these 20 verses, I want to shorten it to make it super simple for all of us to understand. And so we're gonna jump right in. Number one, we need to remember the Lord's motive. Why is God doing the things that he's doing? Well, listen to verses one through two. He says, The whole commandment that I command you today, you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply and go in and possess the land the Lord swore to give to your fathers. Now listen to verse two. And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what is in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. What is the Lord's motive? Plain and clear, the Lord tests the hearts of his children. And I will say this he will continue testing your heart until you go to be with him in heaven, or until you recognize that you never gave your life to him and you'll be separated from him forever. The Lord tests hearts. Testing your heart is the only way that you can find out if your love for God is real. And what a great example that Jim Savage gave here this morning. When we're in great trial, there are some that say, Praise God, I don't know how this is gonna end, but something good's gonna happen. And there's others that say, God, why is this happening to me? Why will this not end? Why, why, why? And we shake our fist up at God as if somehow God is being unfair and the pain that we're going through is worse than everybody else's. There's nothing you're going through in this season, no matter how hard it may be, that is not common to mankind. There's no pain that's unique. Now it's unique to us, but we all are suffering in some way. And why does God allow it? Well, praise God, there's a place called heaven where you will not experience any more tears, any more suffering. But until we get there, God reveals the truth of our hearts. Some of us want God, but some of us just want the blessings that God can give. We don't really want God. And God tests the hearts to know what is truly there. It says in Proverbs 17, verse 3, the crucible is for silver and the furnaces for gold, and the Lord tests hearts. Israel needed to be uh remember the wilderness because they were about to go into a season of prosperity. We need to be mindful as well. You know, I've heard it been said that obedience is the dipstick that measures true love. If you love God, even when you're at your absolute worst, you will obey Him. It's the ones that desert Him. And trust me when I say this, after 16 years of being a member of this church in different capacities, I can tell you this. If everyone who came to the altar at the end of a service and made a commitment, they wanted to be part of the church and they wanted to serve, if everyone who said yes to God is still saying yes to God today, we've had we'd have 500 people in this room. But there are a lot of people that get caught up in certain seasons. But when it comes to obeying God, they drift. Obedience is not something that we do to earn God's love. Let me be clear. Obedience is something that we do to reveal our love for Him. And if you're in this room and you're a parent and a grandparent, you you know this. You know, my daughter all over my house has these sticky notes that say, Daddy, I love you, Daddy, I love you, I love Ren loves daddy, I love them, I have them, I have them posted everywhere. But when I look at her and I say, turn that off, it's time to go to bed, the response is typically not, oh yes, daddy, I love you so much. You have my best interest at heart, and you know that ten hours of fruitful sleep is best for me. No. She may write on sticky notes that she loves me, and I believe that she does to the degree a nine-year-old can. But when she says yes, Daddy, that's when my heart moves. Now, if she said no to me the rest of her life, my love for her will never change. But I'll want to know about her love for me. God's love for you never changes. You are as loved by God as you will ever be in this very moment. His love does not go up and it does not go down. It's infinite because he's infinite. He loves you because it's who he is. And it would blow your mind how much he loves you despite all your sin. He loves you. But he wants to know your love for him. And some of you, when things are not going well, you will leave him. And others, you may, you may confess in sin how tough your seasons are, and God respects your honest prayers. But when you stick and you say, God, even if I don't understand, I will walk with you and I will obey you. That's when your love is proven to be true. And that's the Lord's motive. I wish I could say that we've all passed our last test, but until you get to heaven, these tests are going to continue to come. God wants to know what is here. That's number one. Remember the Lord's motive. He tests the hearts of those whom he loves. Number two, remember the Lord's method. He tests us through one word, and it's called discipline. And he does it so that we will depend on his grace. It's how we're called to live, and our flesh rebels against it. Now listen to verses three through six. It says, And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Your clothing did not wear out on you, and your foot did not swell these forty years. Know then in your heart that as man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you, so you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him. Why did he lead them through the wilderness for forty years when he could have taken them around the wilderness and gotten there in a few weeks? The answer is that transformational process, and it happened through daily discipline. If you're new to the Bible and you've not read the first five books of the Bible, in Exodus, as they're coming out of Egypt and they're beginning to learn this life with God, God hands down the laws from Moses to the people. He went up on Mount Sinai and got the law and brought it down to the people. And then as they began this journey, he fed them with bread from heaven called manna. And they were called to fully depend on that bread. He even told them, Do not take more for yourself than what is needed for the day, except when you have the Sabbath day coming up, and then you take a two days portion. All right? And so the idea was trusting God for what is needed for the day. And when you wake up again tomorrow, trust him. Can I say God wants to do the same thing in 2026? The problem is we are too prosperous. You do not want to rely on God. In your flesh, you want to rely on your financial wisdom. You want to rely on a diversified portfolio and a good retirement and lots of equity. You want to rely on your strength. And those of you in this room that are prosperous, I'm telling you, it's hard to trust in God because you are easily going to trust in yourself. Now, all of us are gifted by God in different ways. And it's easy to rely on your gifts. You can get by really far in life on your gifts. God wants you to trust him like a child every day. And so what he does is he disciplines his children and he leads you into a situation that you cannot fix in your strength. And if you somehow make it through 50 or 60 years trusting in yourself, he will begin to take away physical strength from you. And so that's a new season where you cannot make it without trusting him. I will never forget reading a book called Radical Disciple from John Stott, one of the great preachers of the 20th century. He was from Britain. He had a church, I think, outside of London called All Souls. Great preacher, great writer, great theologian, and he was very gifted. But at the end of his life, when he had to have 247 care and he couldn't even feed himself. He wrote this book and he said, I thought I understood grace until I couldn't get from the bed to the bath. And when I needed that help and I prayed for God to help me to have the grace to eat a meal, then I understood dependence on God. You see, the very thing that is stripping you down to your knees that you're so frustrated about and you want God to take away, it's the very thing that is keeping you in dependence on Him. And one of two things happens. I had this on good authority after years of watching hundreds of people go through this. You either soften and become fully dependent on God and experience an intimacy with him that you never had, or your heart gets harder and you get more frustrated and you try twice as hard to fix your problems and you drift from God. Just know this. He's disciplining you for whatever you're in because he loves you. He does this to his children because he loves them. He created us to depend on him. He doesn't want to give you gifts that you'll begin to depend on the gifts and not depend on him. That's why it's so hard for gifted people to be surrendered. And that's why the thorns he gives us to keep us low. That's why those thorns are so painful. But when it's happening, know this. Don't question it. Don't wonder what's wrong. Why is my life not completely free of conflict or pain? No, there's nothing strange happening in your life. Your pain is just different than the one sitting next to you. But know that his method is to discipline his children, that you will depend on his grace. Remember the manna. He'll give you enough for today. Will you trust him for tomorrow? That's number two. That's the Lord's method. Number three, what's his ultimate mission? Remember the Lord's mission. As you look at verses 7 through 10, I'll just skip down to verse 10. It says, And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. What does God want ultimately for you eternally? God wants intimacy with you. God wants to have an intimate relationship with you where he can bless you freely. And you'll never be in danger of making a God out of the blessing. It'll just magnify your love for him. You're not going to try to trust the blessing. You're going to continue to trust him. He wants to be able to trust you with great things, that those things will never be God, that he himself will be God. That promised land of milk and honey that he gave to the nation of Israel, he wants to bring us into seasons like that. And ultimately, the ultimate promised land that he wants to bring us into is the heavenly kingdom, which is promised to all who've put their faith in Jesus. But we're not ready for those things. Because the moment we enter into those things, we begin to trust in prosperity and not trust in the Lord. But he wants us to experience his greatest blessings. He wants to be able to trust us with these things. So when you're reading the Old Testament and you see the nation of Israel getting ready to go into the land of milk and honey, it is a perfect symbol of seasons that God is bringing us into and ultimately the promised land of heaven that God has promised for us. And the question is, do we recognize that He does want to bless us? Whatever pain you're in, whatever discipline that God is giving you, it's not going to last forever. It may feel like it. But you need to know his ultimate mission is not that you would be under a storm cloud for the rest of eternity. It's not God's will. All right? Those of you that are great parents, when you spank your children, it's not 24-7 spanking. If it does, you have some serious issues. It's for a season and for a reason to discipline your children, that there will be a safe place to invest your love. So know whatever you're going through, God's ultimate purpose is for you to experience intimacy with Him in a season of prosperity. But the fulfillment of that is going to be heaven. Here on this earth, we're going to have highs, lows, and buffaloes. But God is in all of them. That's his ultimate mission. He wants us to eat and be full and bless the Lord. Experience the blessing, but not bless the blessing. Bless God, not praise prosperity, but praise the Creator. Enjoy life with him. Whatever he gives us, that's his mission. He wants intimacy with us. Now, what's his ultimate message as we draw to a close here? We have looked at his motive, his method, his mission. Fourth and finally, remember the Lord's message. Now, as you look at verses 11 through 20, let me zero in on verses 17 through 19. This is a warning. Okay? When you're getting ready for a season of blessing, this is a warning for everybody. It says, Beware lest you say in your heart, My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth. You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers as it is to this day. And if you forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish. Let me say this, I'm not trying to be offensive, I'm just saying the truth. The more money you have, the more you think that you have it because of your wisdom and your prudence and your wise investments. This says if you're in this room and you are wealthy, which by the way, according to the world standards, everybody in this room is wealthy. But if you're in this room and you're wealthy, you're wealthy because before you were ever born, God chose this wealth for you. If someone next to you doesn't have it, it's not because you worked hard, or even if you did work hard, God gave you the work ethic. If God gave you the ability to be good with numbers, all my friends that I went to college with that are good with numbers, guess what? There's a common denominator. They're all wealthy. And then those that are good at writing, like me, they're not wealthy. I don't know why that is. But there's a path God chose for me, and there's a path that God chose for others. The key is whatever path you're in, recognize God's hand in it. Thank him for it because there's a blessing in every pathway, but recognize you're not the one that made it happen. Be grateful. Be generous. Be humble. If God gave it to you, be willing to let it go. There are some of you, I know this is blasphemous for some of you. There are some of you that you would not know the blessing that God would have for your life if you cashed out the bulk of your retirement and gave it to the kingdom of God, and you actually had to depend on him like manna for that next week. That is a blessing that you may never taste. Now I can't say that's God's will for your life. I don't know. God's will is different for everybody in this room. I do know this: the more that you have, the more that you're going to be tempted to trust yourself and trust your own resources and your own wisdom and your own strength and not trust God. People who have nothing, they wake up and say, God, I can't do today without you. But praise God for the ones that have wealth and use it for God's glory. There was a man named R. G. Laterno, he's one of my heroes. I don't know a lot about him, but R. G. Laterno was a Christian who made his money with construction equipment. He was a multi, multi, multi-millionaire, and he came up with the idea called reverse tithing. Reverse tithing is living off of 10% and giving away 90%. Sign-up sheets are in the vestibule. If anybody wants to try this theory, I know all of you are shaking your head. I know none of us in this room probably would be able to financially do that, but I'm going to tell you, he recognized that all that wealth, all that wisdom that God gave him, it wasn't for him. It wasn't for lavish vacation homes, and it wasn't for comfort and luxury. It was that it was coming in, it was supposed to go right back out. And because of that, he had an intimacy with God, and his biography still inspires people all over the world. But let me just say this: as God was telling Israel, you're going to go into a land you've been waiting 40 years to inherit, and it's going to be great. But as you are blessed, you're going to forget what we learned here in the wilderness. Don't forget the Lord. The same is true for you. Maybe some of you right now are just this close to the greatest blessing you've ever had here on this earth. You may be getting ready for a season of prosperity where God is going to pour into you in a way that He's never poured into you before. And I will say when He does, by the nature of your flesh, you're going to think that you're the one that made it happen because of your spiritual maturity and your experience and your gifts. And I say to you, on the authority of the Word of God, remember God, you are where you are and you have what you have because He chose it for you. Be faithful with it. Be humble with it. Be true to who God made you to be. Whatever it is. So let me sum it up here. To remember the Lord your God, remind yourself daily of how much you still need the gospel of Jesus Christ. To remember the Lord your God, remind yourself daily of how much you still need the gospel of Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15, verses 1 through 2 says this. Paul says, Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preach to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved if you hold fast to the word I preach to you unless you believed in vain. There's something about the good news of Jesus Christ that you need to be reminded of every single day. Because there's something in our flesh that wants to take credit for what God has done. You cannot get to heaven by being good. Nobody in this room is good enough. Nobody in this world is good enough save one person, and his name is Jesus. You go to heaven by trusting that he was good on your behalf. We say this just about every Sunday. He lived perfectly the way that you were called to live, but couldn't, to earn your righteous status before God. He died sacrificially to take the punishment that you deserved. So you don't go to purgatory or hell when you're a Christian. You go straight to the throne room of God when you die. He rose from the dead, making a way from death to life. He has sent it to the Father to send down his Holy Spirit, because you can't do anything without the help of the Holy Spirit. And he's coming back to make all things new and to judge the living and the dead. That's not a message just to get you saved. That's a message you need Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, because it's a reminder. It's him, not us. It's his grace, not ours. It's his gifts, not ours. It's his blessings, not ours. Even in his testing and in his discipline, he's doing something. It's not a waste of time when you're in pain and suffering. God is producing something. Be faithful. Be patient. Be humble. Again, for those of you in this room, some of you may be getting ready for a blessing that you've never experienced. Will you praise God? Or will you praise the blessing when it happens? That's the question. So as we enter into this invitation, wherever you're at right now, whether you're way up here or way down there, can you remember what God has done in your life to get you here? Can you remember what he's doing right now, even if it's painful? And can you remember his promises and his warnings as you get ready for a new season? All of us, right now, in this time of invitation, let's take time and remember the Lord our God. Lord, I pray right now, in this time of great transition, as we get ready for more funerals, as we have more doctor visits, as we have members transitioning out and others transitioning in, as we have trials that we weren't expecting. Maybe as some of us in this room have more blessings than we realize, more prosperity than we've ever taken time to notice. Whatever season we're in, Lord, we need to remember you. We forget you all the time. Lord, I beg you to help us. Not lose sight of what you're doing, not lose sight of your motive to test our hearts, not lose sight of your method, the discipline you bring into our life, not lose sight of your mission to have intimacy with us and your message. That we need to trust in you above all things. Be with us right now, I pray. In Jesus' name. Amen.