[0:00] Well, please turn in your Bibles to the book of Joel, the book of Joel. It's Old Testament. Remember that Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel.
[0:16] And while you're turning there, let me just say it's a joy to be here. It's wonderful to be with you all. It's been just a delight for my family to catch up with you and talk with you and just to see your faces again. It's really been just wonderful.
[0:27] I do want to bring you greetings from the church in Camp Hill, Grace Reformed Baptist Church. Now, as far as they know, I'm on vacation this week. They have no idea I'm preaching tonight, so they think I'm getting a break.
[0:41] But Chad heard I was coming and he roped me in. So glad to be here. Well, Joel, you can turn to Joel chapter 1. And I'm going to read two different bits from Joel, a bit from chapter 1 and a bit from chapter 2.
[0:58] What's going on in the book of Joel? Joel consists of three chapters. And often in the first half of each chapter, Joel talks about this coming horrible day, this day of the Lord. And then in the second half of the chapter, there's a call to response of some sort.
[1:14] And so Joel has this kind of sandwichy nature to it, where it alternates between looking at the day of the Lord, demanding a response. Day of the Lord, response. Day of the Lord, response. I'm going to look at two, part of two of the demands for response.
[1:29] And we'll be looking at chapter 1, verses 13 through 20, and then chapter 2, verses 12 through 17. And please follow along as I read.
[1:42] Chapter 1, verse 13. Put on sackcloth and lament, O priests. Wail, O ministers of the altar.
[1:53] Go in past the night in sackcloth, O ministers of my God, because grain offering and drink offering are withheld from the house of your God. Consecrate a fast.
[2:03] Call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of the Lord your God, and cry out to the Lord. Alas for the day, for the day of the Lord is near, and as destruction from the Almighty it comes.
[2:20] Is not the food cut off before our eyes? Joy and gladness from the house of our God? The seed shrivels under the clods. The storehouses are desolate. The granaries are torn down because the grain has dried up.
[2:34] How the beasts groan. The herds of cattle are perplexed because there is no pasture for them. Even the flocks of sheep suffer. To you, O Lord, I call. For fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and flame has burned all the trees of the field.
[2:51] Even the beasts of the field pant for you because the water brooks are dried up, and fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness. And then flip forward to chapter 2, verse 12.
[3:03] Yet even now, declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning, and rend your hearts and not your garments.
[3:17] Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and he relents over disaster. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord your God?
[3:35] Blow the trumpet in Zion. Consecrate a fast. Call a solemn assembly. Gather the people. Consecrate the congregation. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, even nursing infants.
[3:46] Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her chamber. Between the vestibule and the altar, let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep and say, Spare your people, O Lord, and make not your heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations.
[4:02] Why should they say among the peoples, Where is their God? Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word.
[4:16] We thank you that you have given this to us. Lord, we know that all scripture is God-breathed, and that it is useful for teaching, and rebuking, and correcting, and for training in righteousness.
[4:28] And so, Lord, we ask if that's what it would do tonight, would you accompany your truth with your spirit? And would your spirit do his work in our hearts, preparing us, softening us, readying us to hear the things that you would have to say to us?
[4:44] And then use me and my lips to speak your truth to these people. Speak them to all our hearts, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I don't know if when you hear the book of Joel, if you have any mental associations with the book of Joel.
[5:00] If you hear, oh, the book of Joel, and it makes you think immediately of something. So let me just do a little pop quiz. So here we go. It's time for a pop quiz. I'll give it to you as a multiple choice pop quiz.
[5:12] I know students always like that when they hear it's multiple choice. At least there's a one in four chance you'll get it right. So here's my question for you. What creature does Joel mention, and it's not in the section that we read today, okay?
[5:26] What creature does Joel mention that causes people to scream and to cry? So what is the creature that causes people to scream and to cry? Here we go. A, a lion, B, a ladybug, C, a locust, or D, a leviathan.
[5:46] Okay? There they are. Lion, ladybug, locust, leviathan. Okay? I'll actually have you raise your hands. Who says it's A, lion?
[5:57] Sounds like a strong contender, right? Lion. Okay. Who says it's B, ladybug? Scary ladybug. All right. Who says it's C, locust?
[6:09] Oh, you guys are so well-churched. All right. Anybody going to go for D, leviathan? All right. So locust. Locust.
[6:19] A locust causes people to scream and to cry. And you think, what? A locust? I mean, just that small little insect? I mean, kids, if you were after church to go out here into the foyer, and there was hopping along on the carpet a little grasshopper or a cricket of some sort, my guess is you would not scream and cry.
[6:40] You might say, oh, it's so cute, and start to poke it with sticks. But you're not going to scream and cry. Why? So what's going on here? Why would a locust be so scary? And the problem with a locust is not the single locust.
[6:51] It's the multitude of locusts. It's when the locusts come in big numbers. Because when locusts come in big numbers, they can absolutely devastate the land. They like to eat the green vegetation.
[7:03] And they will eat all of it so that there's no vegetation left anywhere. Perhaps you've seen this in some of the news reports. But even right now, in East Africa, they're facing a severe locust plague.
[7:16] It's the worst locust plague that many of them have ever seen. Journalists are calling it a scourge of biblical proportions, probably referencing the Exodus. And they say that it is unprecedented in modern times.
[7:31] There's nothing like it. And of course, a locust plague can just entirely devastate a country and its economy and its food supply. And so that's why when there's a locust invasion, it would cause people to scream and to cry.
[7:46] And what that means is as we look at today's passage, we get to this question of if something like that happens. If something like that happens, if there's this tragedy, it's a locust invasion or a famine, or whether it's the death of a loved one, or a horrible terrorist attack, or some sort of national tragedy, when something like that happens, how should we respond?
[8:10] I was thinking of the news reports we're hearing about the coronavirus, this spreading sickness that just doesn't seem to be stoppable. And when something like that happens, when we have a pandemic, I don't think it's been called a pandemic yet, but if we have a pandemic caused by a virus, what do we do?
[8:30] How do we respond? You know, should we kind of just roll over on our pillows and go back to sleep? Should we shrug our shoulders and ignore the tragedy?
[8:43] Well, if you look at the book of Joel, you'll see that he doesn't expect you to be dismissive. He expects you to do something.
[8:53] He wants you to do something. If you look back in chapter 1, we didn't read this bit, but let me just show you, even in the beginning of chapter 1, and here's where he talks about this invasion of locusts, look at all of the action verbs.
[9:06] Verse 5, he says, Awake. And then he says, Wail. Or you get to verse 8, he says, Lament. Verse 11, he says, Be ashamed. Wail.
[9:17] Verse 13, Put on sackcloth. Lament. Wail. Verse 14, Consecrate a fast. Call an assembly. Gather the elders. Joel expects you to do something.
[9:30] You see, there ought to be a response to a tragedy. Right now, people are responding to the locust invasion in Africa.
[9:41] There's a response to that tragedy. Or when there's a hurricane that destroys an island or a nation, people respond to the tragedy. There ought to be a response to a tragedy.
[9:53] But the response in the book of Joel is not, Oh, let's send them financial aid. Let's get our money, pool our money together and send them help.
[10:04] Or, you know, let's go there and actually help these people to rebuild their lives. The response that Joel hopes to see is the response of repentance. The response of repentance.
[10:18] He's calling people to turn to God. You see, tragedies, and they come at us in all shapes and sizes, tragedies are often meant to be alarms.
[10:31] Kind of like that tornado siren. It's an alarm. And they're meant to alarm us. They're meant to wake us up. They're meant to help us see that there is a greater tragedy to come.
[10:45] This tragedy is not the only tragedy. You see, this book, the book of Joel, is not just about locusts. A lot of it is about these locusts. But it's really actually about an even worse day.
[11:00] There is a worse day. There is a great day coming. And it's the day of the Lord. It's this day of judgment. In fact, that's a predominant theme in the book of Joel.
[11:11] Probably the major theme of the book of Joel is this future day of the Lord. The day of the Lord, we could define as that day on which God will manifest his lordship over men by enforcing his covenant.
[11:27] He's going to enforce his covenant. He's going to manifest his lordship over people. And it's going to be a day of judgment and a day of justice. And that day is ultimately eschatological.
[11:37] That means ultimately it's future. But there are these miniature days of the Lord that happen along the way, that happen throughout history, and that point to that final, ultimate day of the Lord.
[11:51] For example, this locust invasion. It points to that ultimate day of the Lord. But as I've said, Joel doesn't concern himself simply with the day of the Lord.
[12:02] He also is concerned with how we're going to respond in light of the day of the Lord. What's our response? If that day is coming, what should we do?
[12:15] When tragedies happen, the family of Job is entirely destroyed, or that tower in Siloam falls and kills 18 people.
[12:28] When tragedies happen, what do we do? We're supposed to remember the day of the Lord and cry out to God in repentance. Verse 11 of chapter 2 says this, the second half of it, it says, For the day of the Lord is great and very awesome.
[12:50] Who can endure it? Who can endure the day of the Lord? And the answer, verse 12, it says, those who repent. Those who turn to God.
[13:03] Can we, this evening, have an attitude of repentance? An attitude of repentance. What are some areas of sin in your life that need to be repented of?
[13:17] Not just the big ones, although certainly those, but the small ones as well. You see, even the small sins bring separation from God. And therefore, even the small sins need to be confessed.
[13:31] Even they need the blood of Christ if there is to be reconciliation with God. The day of the Lord is coming. The day of the Lord is coming, and you want to be ready for that day.
[13:41] Your lamp's full and burning. You want to be awake and sober and dressed for action. And one way to do that is to keep short accounts of your sin.
[13:54] Repent of your sin before the Lord. And so what I'd like to do this evening is I'd like to give you a three-step process as found in the book of Joel for repenting of your sins before God.
[14:07] We could say it this way. We could say these are three elements. I'm going to give you three elements that ought to be part of your repentance. And here they are. Humble yourself, call to God, and return to God.
[14:21] Humble yourself, call to God, and return to God. Three elements of repentance. All right, so first, you must humble yourself.
[14:38] You know, one of the reasons we don't like to repent of our sins and we don't do it very often is because we're too proud. I like to think of myself as pretty good. I like to think I'm a pretty decent guy.
[14:50] And when I repent, I have to admit that something's wrong, that I'm not as decent as I like to think I am. There's something wrong with me.
[15:00] Now, sure, I'll admit, I'll admit to something. I'll admit to my sin when it actually helps me look good. I'll do that. You know, wow, he's so humble.
[15:11] Wow, he's willing to even be up front and open about his sin. But that's a problem because one, repentance isn't just admitting sin. And two, in that instance, you haven't really humbled yourself.
[15:25] You're repenting of your sin in order to make yourself look better. We ought to be humbled. We ought to be broken over our sin. In Joel chapter 1, we've got people who are definitely humbled and brought low.
[15:43] Now, it's not clear whether they've been brought low because of their sin or because of their circumstances. They might be crying just because life is miserable. Circumstances are bad.
[15:55] And we want to be careful that we don't make the mistake of crying over circumstances instead of crying over sin. You know, it's possible for a man to be devastated not because he's committed adultery, but because he's been found out.
[16:12] Or it's possible for kids that you might cry actually because you're in trouble. You're in trouble, not because you're sorry for what you did.
[16:23] But the people laid out for us in Joel chapter 1 are an example to us of people who are certainly broken. They've been broken. Now, it doesn't mention their sin here.
[16:34] It's interesting. In the book of Joel, nowhere in the entire book are we ever told how they sinned. We're never given what is the way in which they've sinned that they're in trouble for.
[16:48] In some ways, that might be intentional and helpful for us because it allows for a very general application of the book of Joel because it's just generic sin and we can all relate.
[17:04] So it doesn't mention their sin. However, in its Old Testament Israel context, it's very likely that they associated a disaster of this proportion with God's curse upon them for their sin.
[17:17] For example, in Deuteronomy 28, 38, God had said that if you disobey His commandments, there would be curses. And one of them is that you would sow much seed in your field, but you will harvest little because locusts will devour it.
[17:33] If you sin against God, did you catch that? If you sin against God, locusts will devour your fields. And many of them would have made the connection. We've sinned. God has sent locusts.
[17:47] The weeping and the wailing that you see back at the beginning of chapter 1 may not be just because there's no wine for the drunkard like the guy in verse 5, or there's no crops for the farmer like this fellow in verse 11.
[18:01] It may be because they realize God's curse is upon them for disobedience. But the good news is they're not stuck there.
[18:12] They're not stuck in that bad position. Turn in your Bibles back to 2 Chronicles 7. Look at 2 Chronicles 7, verse 13.
[18:34] 2 Chronicles 7, verse 13. This is God. He's speaking to Solomon. And He says, When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people.
[18:54] So if you're in a situation like this one, locusts devouring the land, if My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from Heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
[19:11] Now My eyes will be open and My ear attentive to the prayer that is made in this place. Notice they've got to humble themselves, pray and seek His face, and then turn from their sin.
[19:23] It's actually very similar to the main three points we've got tonight. But notice where it starts. It starts with humility. Humble yourself. Well, back to Joel 1.
[19:38] Look at verse 13. You see these guys? It says they're putting on sackcloth. Put on sackcloth and lament, O priests. Wail, O ministers of the altar.
[19:52] These verses that start in verse 13 and go down through verse 20 really follow the traditional outline for a lament. Scripture is full of lament where the writer expresses his grief or his anger or his sorrow.
[20:05] And often they start with a call to gather together, kind of what you see here in verses 13 and 14. In fact, in verse 14, it says, consecrate a fast, call the assembly, gather the elders.
[20:16] There's this call to be together. So a lament often starts there and then comes the actual lamentation. And here that's in verses 15 through 18 where it says, the day of the Lord is near.
[20:28] Food is cut off. The storehouses are empty. The cattle and the sheep have nothing to eat. And there's the actual lamentation. And then finally, often there comes a petition, an appeal to God.
[20:43] And you see that in verse 19. To you, O Yahweh, I call. And part of the appeal is even, hey, look what's happened, God. Look what's happened.
[20:53] So in verses 19 and 20, it says, to the Lord I call, a fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness. Flame has burned all the trees of the field. Now that might not be a reference to literal flame and fire.
[21:07] It might be metaphorical for the locusts, which are like a fire in destroying everything. But there's this condition where even the beasts of the field are panting for water.
[21:18] They have no water. They have no food. And the picture here is of absolute humility before the Lord. They put on sackcloth and they beg for mercy.
[21:33] They're humbled. Are you torn apart by your sin? When you look inside and you see your sin, does it tear you apart? Are you humbled?
[21:44] By your sin. It's said that Martin Luther, and this is before he came to understand salvation by faith alone, that Martin Luther, when he was a monk, was a man who was absolutely broken over his sin.
[21:59] And so he would go to his priest, because of course, in the Catholic Church, you'd go to a confessor, and he'd go to his priest for confession, and he'd go in, and he'd confess his sin, and he'd come up with this huge list of sin, and then he'd walk out only to turn around and go back in because he'd thought of more things, and he'd confess more sin, and he would come frequently again and again.
[22:20] He was just overwhelmed by the amount of his sin. It was actually to the point where his confessor actually had to say to him, hey, you might want to tone it down a little. You're overdoing it. But he was broken by his sin.
[22:34] At that stage of life, Luther was full of anxiety and fear, and that's not what I'm urging you to do. But are you willing to humble yourself to admit your sin?
[22:47] Are you willing to do that self-analysis that's necessary to see what are the sins that are lurking inside? I hope so. But then what?
[22:59] Well, secondly, secondly, you must call to God. You must call to God. That's what we saw in verse 19.
[23:12] They gathered themselves together. They lamented over their sin and their circumstances, and then they called out to God. Now, in the Bible, when someone calls out to God, they're calling out to God for help.
[23:27] It's a call for help. They're saying, help me. So when Jonah is in the belly of the whale, he said he called out to the Lord. It was a call for help. Or when Elijah had the contest with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, it says that they were calling out to their gods.
[23:45] What were they doing? They were calling to the gods to help them, to send fire, to burn those sacrifices. You call out to God for help. There's this acknowledgement that I can't do this.
[23:56] I can't do this. I need help. You see, with our sin, we need to get to the point where we realize, I can't do this. I can't do this. I can't save myself.
[24:06] I can't reform myself. I can't even forgive myself. I can't atone for my own sin. And so we call on the Lord. We call out to Him.
[24:16] It's really the counterpart to humbling ourselves. So we humble ourselves, and humility says, I can't do this. And calling out to God says, God, you alone can do this.
[24:28] I can't do it. Only you can. I've got some good news for you. If you call on the name of the Lord, you will be saved.
[24:42] If you call on the name of the Lord, you will be saved. Flip forward in the book of Joel to chapter 2, verse 32. It says there, And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
[24:58] So Joel says, there's this day coming. There's this day coming. And the tail end of Joel chapter 2 finds its fulfillment on the day of Pentecost.
[25:10] And we realize this is referring to the church age. And Joel says, There's this day coming when everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Listen, if you've never called on God, you can call on God, and He will save you.
[25:28] He will save you. To call on Him is to cry out to Him and to say, God, You alone can help me. You alone can save me from my sin. I need you.
[25:40] And He will save you. It's guaranteed. You know, it's not a promise that God gave to Judah during their national repentance in Joel chapters 1, 2, and 3.
[25:50] God didn't promise them that He would avert their tragedy. Look at chapter 2, verse 14. There's some question left hanging in the air as to what God will do.
[26:01] It says, Who knows whether He will not turn and relent and leave a blessing behind Him? Who knows? Who knows? He may, but He may not.
[26:13] God gives you greater assurance than He gave to Judah in the midst of their national tragedy. God says, Call on me, and you will be saved.
[26:25] He doesn't say, Call on me, and who knows? Maybe I'll save you. Call on me, and you will be saved. Why would we not call on Him? You know, if floodwaters are raging around my house and I've been told, if you're in this circumstance, here's the phone number, call this number, we will send somebody by helicopter immediately to save you.
[26:47] Why would I not punch that number in my phone and call for help? Why would we not call on God to help us in our sin? Call out to God.
[26:58] And then thirdly, you must return to God. You must return to God. Look at chapter 2, verses 12 and 13.
[27:15] Yet even now, declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning, and rend your hearts and not your garments.
[27:26] Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and He relents over disaster. So twice in there, God says, to return to Him.
[27:40] Return to Him. You know, to return is to go back to the point of departure. So if you go on a hike, you go on a hike with your family, and you drive to the trailhead, and you park there in the parking lot, and your family gets out of the van, and you begin down the path, and you start your hike, and then somebody goes, oh, we forgot the, whatever it is, tissues or the camera, and somebody goes back to the car to get what you forgot, what are they doing?
[28:03] They're returning. That's returning. To return is to go to the point of departure. And God says, return. You've departed from me.
[28:14] Your sin has separated you from me. And now come back. Come back to the point of departure. Return to me. You've probably heard it said that true repentance means you make a 180 degree turn.
[28:30] You're going this way, and you turn, and you go that way. You know, repentance is not saying, well, I'm sorry, I guess I probably shouldn't have done that. Sorry, that was my bad. And then you continue on the path you were on.
[28:42] No, repentance means you turn around, you forsake the path you're on, and you walk the new direction, the opposite of how you were walking before. Now it's clear from this passage that the key to true repentance is inward transformation.
[29:00] Inward transformation. Verse 12 talks about returning with all your heart. Verse 13 says, we are to rend our hearts, not our garments.
[29:14] In Jewish culture, if someone was in anguish over something, they would tear apart their clothing. And it was meant to, as they tore their clothes apart, it was meant to be an outward representation of how he felt inside.
[29:27] As I tear apart my cloak, it's saying, look, I'm torn apart inside. But of course, it's possible for someone to pretend he's in anguish, to tear his garments on the outside, to cover himself in ashes, to put on sackcloth, and to not care at all on the inside.
[29:50] And inside, he's not really broken. And God says, repentance must be a matter of the heart. Remember God's words to Samuel as he looked for the next king of Israel.
[30:03] God said, man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. David says, in Psalm 51, remember that Psalm after he committed sin with Bathsheba, and he's broken over his sin.
[30:19] He says in Psalm 51 that God doesn't delight in sacrifice. What he wants is a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. How do we get there?
[30:31] How do we become broken over our sin? How do we become broken over our sin? The answer is this. You need to expand your view of who God is, and you need to expand your view of what sin is.
[30:47] I'm convinced we're not broken over our sin because we fail to see how great and glorious and grand God truly is, and we fail to see how despicable and degraded and deadly our sin is.
[31:03] And so we ask God to open our eyes, open the eyes of our hearts, so we can see these things. Show me, God, just how great and glorious you are, and show me just how horrible and deadly my sin is.
[31:17] The key to true repentance is inward transformation. I also want you to notice in this passage the sense of urgency. The sense of urgency.
[31:29] Perhaps you're thinking, well, let me sit on this for a while, Craig. Let me just think about this. Yeah, I should eventually get around to dealing with my sin, but let me think about it for a bit. Look at the passage. Verse 12 says, Yet even now, yet even now return to me.
[31:46] There's this sense of urgency. Do it now. Tomorrow might be too late. This call to repentance is urgent enough that no one is exempt.
[31:57] So in verses 15 and 16, it's got everyone from the elders down to the children are called together. They don't say, you know, well, the children probably need to have their afternoon nap, so they're excluded.
[32:09] No, everyone is to be there. Nursing mothers, verse 16, nursing mothers are not exempt. Even the newlyweds, who traditionally, in Jewish culture, were given a year of freedom from national obligations, even the newlyweds are told to leave their chamber, leave their wedding bed, and get there.
[32:28] This is urgent. All hands on deck. Everyone must be there. Get there now. It's urgent. Brothers and sisters, do you understand this sense of urgency?
[32:41] The single most important thing in the world for you is your standing with God. And I know it's easy for us to knock it down to third place or fourth place or twelfth place, but it's your relationship with your maker that should be your all-consuming priority.
[32:57] So humble yourself. Call to God and return to Him. In our last few minutes, I want to give you our hope for repentance and the results of our repentance.
[33:11] The hope for our repentance and the results of our repentance. What is the hope of our repentance? repentance? How do we know that if we humble ourselves and cry out to God that He will forgive us?
[33:27] That He'll actually forgive us? Maybe my sin is too great. Maybe I'm too disgusting. Maybe He's tired of me. Is there really hope that He'll actually forgive me?
[33:38] And the hope of our repentance is found in the character of God. We could go to that 2 Chronicles 7 passage that says God will hear from heaven and forgive our sin.
[33:50] It's part of His promise. That's what He said He'll do. We can also look in our own passage in Joel 2. Verse 13. It says, Return to the Lord your God for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and He relents over disaster.
[34:12] The reason that we know that our repentance will yield forgiveness is because of who God is. He's a God who's gracious and merciful. He's abounding in love and all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved.
[34:26] We have great hope in the face of our repentance. And then what is the result of our repentance? So what happens once I repent?
[34:37] Is there anything on the other side of that? Once I repent, is there anything beyond repentance? Well, that's something that Joel kind of develops in the rest of the book and I don't have time to go into it in full, but let me just give you a taste of what happens to those who repent.
[34:53] In this context, for Judah, God says He'll give them material prosperity. The enemies are gone. He says the ground yields abundantly. There's restoration of what was lost.
[35:04] Now, I can't promise you as an individual that God will grant you material prosperity. However, there are even richer blessings to be found in repentance. At the end of chapter 2, you see there, God is pouring out His Spirit on His people.
[35:21] That's something He gives to you if you repent. He's pouring out His Spirit on His people. We see Him performing signs and wonders on their behalf. We see salvation for all who call on His name. And we see, best of all, God dwelling among His people.
[35:36] God with us and us with Him. Don't you want that? God dwelling with you? I know I want that. Brothers and sisters, now is the time to return to God in true humility and repentance.
[35:52] Let me close with a verse from Isaiah 57. This is Isaiah 57, verse 15.
[36:04] For thus, says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy, here's what He says, I dwell in the high and holy place and also with Him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit.
[36:25] There it is. Humble yourself. God loves to dwell with the One who is of a contrite and lowly spirit. And it says, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.
[36:38] God's there with those who humble themselves before Him. Let's pray. Lord, we thank You for that promise that if we humble ourselves and pray to You and seek Your face and turn from our wicked ways that You, God, will hear from Heaven, that You'll forgive sin, heal the land.
[37:01] And Lord, so we ask that You would be turning our hearts to You. Lord, it's so easy to hear calls for repentance and to just think of it as another churchy thing that we do when we talk about.
[37:13] But Lord, would You give us the humility to examine our sins, to humble ourselves, and to call out to You for help and then to turn from that which is displeasing to You and return to You.
[37:26] Would You strengthen us to do this, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
[37:49] Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
[38:55] Amen.