Uzzah (2 Samuel 6)

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Good morning wanna go ahead grab your bibles you can open up the second Samuel chapter six will be in Second Samuel six this morning. As you’re turning there just want to acknowledge upfront my indebtedness to RC Sproul and CJ MAHANEY for some what I’m gonna be saying today and some writing and sermons from those guys. So here we are week two of our series people got killed. And the subtitle is really important, since the title itself is a little bit bracing. The subtitle is a study in a holiness and grace. And last week, we looked closely at holiness. In fact, my argument last week is that we can’t actually understand the grace until we understand holiness. And so we looked at the holiness of God, specifically, this week, we’re going to try and get ourselves much closer to the grace piece. As we go through this. We’re going to dig deeper into it now last week. And this was a disappointment to some of you. I know God did not actually kill anyone in our passage. Although Isaiah was pretty scared, I’ll admit, he will today, we’re going to see His Holiness, a man in the passage today, you guys are awfully nervous, His Holiness is going to manifest in wrath. And when that happens, we get really uncomfortable. We start to ask all sorts of questions. Some of the questions I mentioned last week, you know, Jesus will say things like, turn the other cheek, and then you got God, you know, wiping out Canaan, and we go, did you not feel like turning the cheek today? Or James says everyone should be slow to become angry. And we want to ask God for a definition of slowness, because he seems to be flying off the handle in a passage like where we’ll be today. Nevermind, the big question. Of course, all of that’s just dancing around the issues still have things like hell and judgment. God is condemning people to an eternal suffering, because what they gossiped, this just doesn’t seem fair. Those are some of the questions we raised last week. And those are questions I left hanging over us. I didn’t answer any one of those questions last week. I’m not going to answer most of them today, either. Why? Because we are proceeding by steps. So again, we had to hit his holiness. First. To understand that God can’t abide sin can’t tolerate sin can’t look on sin, because he has transcendently other he is morally perfect. And he has made a holiness, the moral condition of his creation, to a lot of what we did last week. So we start with step one holiness. But step two, is our sin, we have to understand the depth of our sinfulness. Here’s my main idea. My contention for this morning is this because you are more sinful than you admit, God’s grace is more amazing than you acknowledge, and hopefully not, but that’s probably true of most of us myself, in cluded, we’re not amazed by grace, which then also means that we get really confused by Holy justice. And in fact, we’re not so sure that justice is always holy. We’re going to see that so clearly, in today’s story. So let’s dive in. We’re going to take this three scene Scene one, as as death kind of gives it away. All right, but here you go. Second, Samuel six verses one to seven. David again, brought together all the able young men of Israel 30,000, he and all his men went to by law in Judah to bring up from there the ark of God, which is called by the name The name of the Lord Almighty, who was in throne between the chair of him on the ark, they set the ark of God on a new cart and brought it from the house of Abinadab, which was on the Hill, Luiza and Ohio sons of Obinna dab, were guiding the new cart with the ark of God on it, and Ohio was walking in front of it. David and all Israel were celebrating with all their might before the Lord with cast nets, harps, liars, timbrels, systems and symbols. And they came to the threshing floor of makan, Rosa reached out and took hold of the Ark because the oxen stumbled, the Lord’s anger burned against us because of his Reverend act. Therefore, God struck him down, and he died there beside the ark of God.
Let’s get some historical art, historical context. Since we’re picking up in the middle of the story here. The Ark shows up in First Samuel quite a bit. And at that point, this is a period of moral decline for Israel’s being treated as a good luck charm. And, like dummies, they bring the ark into battle with them thinking if the Ark is there, they’re guaranteed to win they lose and the Ark is captured now. Philistia has it and so they put it in the Temple of their god daggone not a good choice dag on keeps bowing to the Lord Almighty until eventually his head and arms break off the statue of him. So the Philistines get a little bit concerned about this they decide to live in and just, you know, ship the Ark back. They’ve all got tumors and things at this point. So they put it on a cart and give some you know, cows to leave the thing and it takes it to Obinna dad’s house, you know, that’s where it got there. And it’s been there for a long time at this point. Because again, that’s back in Samuels day. Now we got that whole saw thing. And then we got the whole Saul and David thing. And now David. So what’s happened David has defeated the Philistines and united the kingdom of Israel under his reign. And so now it is time to bring the ark to David’s new capital, Jerusalem. politically astute move, of course, because means people’s allegiances won’t be divided. But But there you go, this is a good thing. This is a time of national celebration. In fact, he’s got 30,000 men, including his mighty men who are like famous guys with him as he does this. Why? Because the Ark is not a good luck charm. It is the symbol of God’s presence with his people. It is God’s throne on Earth. So what it says in verse two, he sits in this little mercy seat that the angels are making when they’re holed out their wings like this, these these gold angels that they made. So it’s this is the place where atonement is made. On Yom Kippur, the the Day of Atonement, this is where the high priest goes, just that one day out of here to sprinkle blood there to make atonement for his people. In Romans three, when it says that God offered Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, the word that’s used is the mercy seat, God is that Jesus is that place where atonement didn’t. So that’s how significant the Ark is. So this is not just bringing a cool artifact to Jerusalem. This is bringing God back to the center of his people. And Israelites are absolutely caught up in the wonder and excitement of that moment, like they are having a party here. But emotion is not enough. It is not enough to be really excited, because they are bringing God back on their terms, as we’ll see. And that’s dangerous. So this ark, this symbol of God’s presence, His throne, they just plopped on the back of an ox cart. And what happens, the oxen stumble at a certain point, and the ark starts to tip. So it was a reaches out his hand to study it. He’s not trying to sin. He’s not trying to defy God in this moment. This is a simple reflex. Because that’s how we work a dish falls. You reach your hand out, somebody told me a story, just on Friday, in fact, as they were reading through and reflecting on this passage that they were at a worksite and there was a lady there who’s one of they’re picking up a storm drain. And so one of the big guys picked up the storm drain. The lady was just there watching the process and whatnot and the storm drain slipped. What did the lady do? She stuck her hands into to try and catch it just about lost her hands didn’t thankfully, okay. It’s a reflex, right? We don’t need to over spiritualize what just happened here, you can say to me until you’re blue in the face. I will not move unless the spirit leaves me if I throw a baseball at your head. You’re gonna duck. That’s all that’s happening here. Okay? His motives are pure. He’s keeping a sacred object from falling into the muck and mire. What do we expect to happen next? We expect the heavens depart and that cool little sunbeam thing to come down. And the heavens to shout thanks as a really appreciate it, man. But God doesn’t thank him. God kills him immediately says the Lord’s anger burned against him and he struck him down. People don’t like this. They try to explain it away. You’ll read people who say things like other had such respect for the presence of the Lord. He’s so overcome with all that as he touched it. He had a heart attack. I appreciate what they’re trying to do. But they’re sugarcoating scripture. That’s
not what the Bible says. The Bible says that God killed him. No apologies. No euphemisms, nothing like that. There’s no trial. There’s no appeal. There’s no sympathy for the fact that this was just instinct taking over. So that even if he IRD we’re probably sitting here wondering, how about a warning? Wouldn’t that have been okay here like, Look, buddy, I know you’re trying to do right but next time. We don’t even get that same Bible that tells us this story says the Lord is slow to Anger and rich in mercy. We need to reconcile these ideas in our mind, if we’re gonna understand scripture, this is not a contradiction. It just means God is bigger than we thought he is. We need to reconcile what his holiness and His grace. If we’re honest, we might feel that God is a little harsh here. The punishment is well beyond the crime. This is like being executed for speeding, a lot of us would be in trouble. And so you start to question God’s love. And you read a story like this. And again, we haven’t even gotten to hell at this point. He seems capricious, vindictive, even, unloving. That’s how David feels. At this point, we’re probably in the same spot. Let’s keep going. See, if we can’t work out this tension a bit. Let me keep reading verses eight to 11. As we look at scene to David’s anger, then David was angry because the Lord’s wrath had broken out against us. And to this day, that place is called Pervez Azhar. David is afraid of the Lord that day and said, how can the ark of the Lord ever come to me, he was not willing to take the ark of the Lord to be with him in the city of David. Instead, he took the house of Obed Edom the good night, the ark of the Lord remained in the house of Obed Edom to get out for three months, and the Lord blessed him and his entire household. David is asking the same questions we are, he’s angry with God, understandably, never been angry with God, when He doesn’t act, how we expect him to act. And so we get frustrated, which kind of let them have it. There’s part of me that says, this is okay, if you’ve read Psalms, you’ve seen some angry prayers offered to God, God can take it. God is okay with us being open and honest with him. But we need to be careful at the same time. There’s a difference between anger as an emotion over which we have no control. So before emotions are just the warning lights on your dashboard going, something’s happened and I should pay attention. So you know, somebody cuts you off in traffic and your vision narrows and you start to sweat and your hands shake. That’s, that’s just emotion. But then there’s also anger as a mindset, maybe even as a behavioral choice as an attitude. The Bible’s quite clear that one’s really dangerous, that’s sin, unless it’s righteous, which so rarely is in our case. So if your emotions flare, okay, bring them to God and prayer to work through them. Absolutely. But I wouldn’t live there. Because if you’re angry with God, let’s be so clear about this, it means that you are judging God. You are sitting in judgment upon God, you are saying, God, I’m angry because you did not do what you should have done. When you say that out loud. It sounds stupid, doesn’t it? But that’s how we feel sometimes. That is, when we read stories, especially of sinners in the hands of an angry God, the rolls quickly reverse and so that then we get God in the hands of angry sinners. As we put him through the wringer for a bit, as CS Lewis said, we put God in the dark. God is now on trial. He’s got to prove himself just and worthy of worship. You’re gonna have to answer my questions. But again, let’s talk about how foolish This is. If we were to unpackage it a little bit, we get angry, at least we ought to when we see injustice, or evil. When somebody does something wrong, it is not possible for God to be evil or unjust or to do anything wrong, which means we can never be righteously angry with God. He doesn’t ever sin. That’s great news. By the way, Jackie Hill Perry works out what exactly this means for us in a neat little syllogism. She says this, If God is holy, that he can’t sin. And if he can’t send, then he can’t sin against me. And if he can’t sinned against me, shouldn’t that make him the most trustworthy being there is? Yes, and a man which just doesn’t always feel that way. It doesn’t feel that way to David, right now.
This is all a little too much a little too quickly, a little too harsh,
as David has failed to understand God’s holiness, and that’s the issue. Our problem here is that we don’t get the nature of the offense. We underestimate God’s holiness, and we underestimate our sin. If you understand your sin can understand your grace. That’s the main point right? Don’t understand your sin. You’ll never see his grace. Amazing as it is. What Ozo does here is not an innocent mistake. It is not a matter of reflexes. It is an intentional flouting of God’s clear standards as a new not to touch the ark. Here’s numbers four verses 1517 and 20. Clear as it can be, after Aaron and his sons have finished covering the holy furnishings and all the holy articles when the camp is ready to move as he’s talking about the tabernacles, he’s talking about everything that goes in the Holy of Holies. Only then are the CO Hussites, the Levites certain branch of them to come and do the carrying. But they must not touch the holy things or what was this unclear? No, it’s really clear or they will die. The COLA fights that are carry those things that are in the tentative meeting seat at the codified tribal clans are not destroyed from among the Levites. So that they may live and not die when they come near the most holy things do this for them. Aaron and his sons that are going to the sanctuary and assigned each man is working what needs to carry the CO Hussites must not go into look at the holy things, even for a moment, or they will die. Now Uzza is a co Hussite he’s a Levite. He’s in charge of moving the holy things. He knew the regulations. And he knew the punishment for breaking those regulations. Yeah, this was a look at the ark. This thing should have been covered. You read elsewhere numbers four and Exodus as well. It should be carried on poles of your little gold rings that go on the ark because nobody ever gets to touch it. You just slide the pole through the rings, you pick up the poll, it had absolutely no business being on an ox cart, and no one should have touched it ever. see others problem? David’s problem, the nation’s problem is that they had grown familiar with the things of God comfortable. God’s presence, they’d grown careless with God and the things of God because they had grown careless with their own sin should not have minded the Ark falling to the ground. Because God does not have a problem with the ground. He created the ground. He’s a big fan, he looked at it and he saw that it was good. In contrast to Uzza, the ground is not in open rebellion against God, committing treason against its creator. The ground is just doing what he made the ground to do even if that means it gets muddy when the rain falls, there is no way that the throne of God should have been touched by a sinful human hand, as his mistake was in thinking that his hand was any cleaner than the dirt, not even close. He should have let it fall. He should have left it there. He should have gone home, read his Bible, come back and done things the right way. Then these 30,000 people could have approached Jerusalem with celebration, and not an angry fearful funeral procession. But David’s question is key here. How can the ark of the Lord ever come to me? David starting to understand the tension of Scripture. Well, then we can’t be in his presence, because this is sinful. And so his anger very quickly turns to fear you think? Yeah, that makes sense. Because he’s looking at other line of ground they’re going if it happened, that could happen to me, could happen to all of us should happen to all of us. And the holiness of God RC Sproul quotes Roman Catholic theologian Hans Cohn, who points out that the most mysterious aspect of the mystery of sin is not that the sinner deserves to die, but rather that the sinner and the average situation continues to exist. That’s the shocking thing, where our question when we read this story should not be Why is God punishing this sin? But why does He allow us to keep rebelling against Him? That’s the shocking part. Again, we are committing treason against the high king, the king of kings, what human king has ever allowed treason to go unpunished this long. See, God is so slow to anger that when his anger does flare up, we’re shocked
now that patience is meant to lead us to repentance, but it doesn’t always work that way does it sometimes is patience leads us to a lacks view of our sin. RC sprawl again, he shares an illustration when he was a seminary professor. He taught kind of an introductory college class and he was very clear on day one of the class like this was number style. Here’s the law. Three papers they’re due on these dates does not matter what happens. Those are the dates the papers are due. If you’re sick in a hospital bed, send it FedEx, okay, they come in these days. Well, that first pay bear comes around, you know how the story goes right? About 10% of the students go? Oh, Dr. Sproul. I am so sorry. And the excuses come flying, you know, the dog ate the homework and then died. So we had the dogs funeral with homework inside. It was awful and, and he says, okay, okay. I’ll give you grace. I’ll give you grace you have until tomorrow. Second paper comes around, what happens? Those 10% figure their stuff out, get their act together. No, 20% of the class didn’t have their paper done. Same story, same excuses. All right. All right, you got one more day, third paper comes around, you really know where this story goes. Now, half the class doesn’t have their paper. And he says, All right, if you didn’t turn your paper and you get an F on this assignment, how they respond. How would you respond? That’s not fair. That’s a dumb thing to say to a smart professor. He said, All right. You want justice? You want me to be fair, you were laid on the last paper also. That one’s enough to I’m sorry. What I meant was thanks for your grace last time around. But that’s how we work if we don’t get the punishment we grow lacks, in our view of sin. And I keep saying we because we need to make this personal at this point. Right? The question is not why does God allow them to keep sending? Why does God allow me to keep rebelling against Him? And we need to reckon with our own sin. What happened to us is what I deserve. Now, most of us are very comfortable with God punishing sin, really? And some of you are like, No, that’s not what my friends and neighbors say. They are they long for justice, we have all cried out at different times how long Lord. We want God to deal with injustice. In fact, we often think he’s too slow to deal with the evil in the world. So you read about the horrors of sex trafficking in Southeast Asia, where these poor families are tricked into selling their daughters, they think they’re going off to get a good job, they’ll pay the loan back in the big city, all that kind of stuff. And before they know what’s happening, they’re locked in a small room where they will see 15 to 20 clients daily. And we ask where’s God? Why doesn’t God strike them dead? You see, we’ve got no problem with God’s punishment, do we? We just think it should be directed. Elsewhere. We want God to if I could put it this way, get the hell out of earth. All the helplessness that we brought into this world, we want him to cleanse the world of it. We just we don’t want them to do in us. We want him to eradicate sex trafficking yet. Then we read Matthew five. And Jesus says You’ve heard it said you shall not commit adultery. But I tell you, if you even look at a woman with lust in your eyes, you’ve committed adultery with her. That’s a problem. Jesus wants to get rid of sex trafficking and sexual exploitation. He just takes it a whole lot more seriously than I do. So as Joshua Ryan Butler points out in his book, skeletons in God’s closet, excellent book. We want God to prune one dead limb. But God wants to dig out the hole wicked root. And the problem of that is that now I got a target on my back, too. I’m in the same boat or what about genocide, you read about the Holocaust or the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, where a quarter of the population is wiped out, or Rwanda, where 800,000 are hacked to death in 100 days, or we could just go to Ukraine today or anywhere else where this is happening. Where’s God? How can we didn’t strike Hitler that how can we instruct Pol Pot dead? And then we come back to Matthew five. And Jesus says, You’ve heard it said you shall not murder but I tell you, if that hanger flares up and you just start throwing out reckless words, you are guilty of murder. Butler again, he says, you know, we want to put boundaries on the wildfire. And God wants to snuff out the wicked spark and that spark is in me, and that spark is in you.
The problem is not out there. The problem is in here, as Alexander Solzhenitsyn said, for 40 was shipped off to Siberia, the line separating good from evil does not pass between borders of countries, but it passes straight through the human heart. If you’re feeling angry with God, when He judges or when he’s not judging the people you think he should judge, look at your own heart and ask the question, why am I still here? Why am I alive? that will make you think of grace and the blessing of God which is our third scene and we read the rest of the chapter, although we’re not really going to talk through every verse here. Now King David was told the Lord has blessed the household of Obed, Edom and everything he has, because the ark of God. So David want to bring up the ark of God from the house of Obed Edom to the city of David with rejoicing. When those who are carrying the ark of the Lord had taken six steps he sacrificed a bowl and a fattened calf, wearing a linen ephod. David was dancing before the Lord with all his might, while he and all Israel were bringing up the ark, the Lord of the shouts and the sound of trumpets, the ark of the Lord was entering the city of David Mikael, daughter of Saul watched from a window. When she saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, she despised him in her heart. They brought the ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent that David had pitched for it and David sacrifice burnt offerings and fellowship offerings before the Lord. After he had finished sacrificing the burnt offerings and fellowship offerings he bless the people in the name of the Lord Almighty. And he gave a loaf of bread a cake of dates and a cake of raisins to each person in the whole crowd of Israelites, both men and women, and all the people went back to their homes. When David returned home to bless his household may call daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today going around half naked in full view of the slave girls of its servants, as any vulgar fellow would do. David said to me call it was before the Lord who chose me rather than your father, anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the Lord’s people Israel. I will celebrate before the Lord I will become even more undignified than this. And I will be humiliated in my own eyes. By the slave girls who spoke up I will be held in honor and be called daughter of Saul had no children to the day of her death. I’m going to retreat this briefly. We’re not gonna go verse by verse through this, but there are some things we got to draw out from here. So what happens next in the story is that David leaves the ark with Obed Edom. And if you’re reading your bibles imaginatively as I certainly hope you do, this is interesting. How do you convince him? Like there’s just a knock at the guy’s door? There’s 30,000 people on his front lawn. Hi, I’m David may have heard me say a few my friends. He’s going to need the mighty man at this point. Certainly he’s going to point them out. Almost certainly. You see that guy over there? He killed a lion by ripping it into the actually chased the lion. He’s going to ask a favor of you. You want to be careful how you answer him. Because you see we got this cool relic. We’d love for you to store it in your garage. You might want to put some stuff around it though. I’d highly recommend you not touch it. You see that guy laying on the ground over there. He’s not asleep. You’re thinking the only way Obed Edom was convinced is that he probably had a neighbor he didn’t like you should check this thing out. It’s pretty cool. Go ahead, put your hand on it. But what’s most interesting for us because the Bible does not tell us how he convinced Obed Edom then what’s most interesting for us is that Obed Edom is richly
blessed. Why?
He’s not part of the revival. We’re not told he was part of the precession here. Whereas Uzza is part of this restoration. He’s got a zeal for God’s glory, and he’s now dead. But here’s this other person who’s just got it in his garage, and he’s being richly blessed. It’s this reminder of God’s grace. Never forget that God’s desire is to bless us. That’s his heart towards us. This is also what God uses to bring David back. Because David hears about the blessing and goes, we need that ark. We need God’s presence in Jerusalem. And he comes back only this time he does it right. He went back he read his Bible, you see verse 13, they’re carrying the Ark doesn’t specify the poles, but we know that it’s on poles. How do we know that? Because they’re still walking. That’s how we know that. So he does it right. And it is accompanied by the sacrifice of praise. There is this interesting side note, of course, that we call despises him because of his dancing before the Lord basically in his underwear. That is what God uses to end the souls dynasty finally, because certainly David may call could have had a child together, it could have been the next king of Israel. And so in God’s providence, and God’s ways, this is what God uses. But I think it’s important we just pause for a moment and look at David and how he worships. And when he gets called out on it, he says, I will become even more undignified then this. Here’s another one of those tensions. I said, our worship can’t just be emotional, right? Because that led them to treat God and their own terms. But neither should our worship be dignified. You see, most of the church falls into one or the other right? Right, we got to figure out how to have some sort of Scripture based on dignified worship. But what that means, of course, is we should probably look at ourselves as we’re worshiping before the Lord. Like when we come to the Lord’s table in a few minutes here, like what is happening in us? Do people see it? If no one ever looks at you, like you’re weird when you’re worshiping the Lord? Spend some time in Second Samuel six. That’s all I’ll say. This is why when glorious day rolls around. That’s the way it should be. But what’s happened? Why is David dancing before the Lord anyway, because he finally gets sin. He gets God’s holiness. So he gets God’s grace. If you Lord kept a record of sins, who could stand, we would all look like other but with you there is forgiveness. Therefore you are feared, so that we may with reverence, serve you worship you like this, that change of heart that David has, we all need to experience. Remember, when we are offended by God’s wrath, that is because we don’t understand His Holiness. Right? You don’t get holiness, you’re not going to get wrath, you’re not going to get judgment, you’re not going to get our the effect of our sin on God. Which means you won’t get God’s grace. How deep the Father’s love for us is, look, if you want to be offended, by God’s judgment, if you want to be outraged with God, there’s only one place, you should feel that and that’s at the foot of the cross. We sometimes talk about and write best selling books with ridiculous titles, like when bad things happen to good people. There’s only one time ever that a bad thing happened to a good person, because there’s only ever been one good person. And yes, God punished him. Not for his sin. But for ours. God has never judged an innocent man, woman or child except once. And that was only because Jesus volunteered to be the holy, spotless, sinless Lamb offered in our place. And you can imagine the pain that God felt when he poured out the fullness of His righteous wrath on the only innocent person he ever judged. Do you want to be outraged with God? Ask him about his son. He never did anything wrong.
Why did you judge him? You can read the answer on every page of this book. Because I love you.
Because he knows we need an answer to the question that David asked How then can the ark of God ever come to me? How can I live in God’s presence? Only if he makes it right, he see I can explain as it was not hard to explain to you that other deserve to die, but I cannot explain why God loves me. God should have struck me dead years ago, and God should have struck you did years ago as well. Are you not stunned by the patience of Almighty God? The question is not why was as a killed question is why are we still alive? Why is God so merciful? Why are we not all been judged already? Not only are we not judged? I mean, you look at it like the ark of the Lord, the presence of the Lord God doesn’t just say okay, now now that you’re covered by the blood of Christ, you can timidly approach him, you’re permitted to do that? No, He commands us to come before him boldly to plead for grace and mercy in our time of need. Why? Because all of that fierce anger fell on Jesus. Instead of us. What do you do with love like that? You must see yourself as sinful, like us, like the traffickers and genocides. Because you are not that different. Since the caterpillar and the ark Angel from last week, right? You must see yourself as sinful or else you will not see God as gracious because you are more sinful than you admit, God’s grace is more amazing than you acknowledge. So, takeaway is very simple. Acknowledge it. Let that lead you into undignified worship. But that leads you to treat God as He deserves the fearful love and treat yourself as you deserve just with a whole lot more humility, and treat your sin that it deserves. Like stop coddling your sin. It’s an No big deal. Yes it is. You put a gun to its head. What does Jesus say if your hand causes you to sin, give it a little slap. Don’t cut it off guy cuz he sinned gouge it out. Don’t try to touch the arc with that sinful hand, like let God kill the hell in you because that’s a whole lot better than the alternative, isn’t it? As we go through this series, the question we have to keep asking is why? But not Why did God kill all those people? Why did you accept the punishment that justice demands? should have been mine? You accepted in Christ and said, Why would you do that for people who every day, rebelled against you and hate and dishonor and oppose you? See, that is the lesson and holiness. That is a lesson in grace. Let’s pray. Lord, we are humbled before you because we know that we are no different than us. That we deserve absolutely without question without even pretending to mount an excuse. To suffer as fate. That’s what we deserve. We deserve judgment. We should not be alive even now. Because of our sin. But Lord, we are because of your mercy, and grace, and love. And may that truth, humble us and lead us to worship you with an undignified abandon not just when we sing, but in the way we live our lives and the way we put sin to death and the boldness with which we share the gospel and the boldness with which we come before your throne of grace to receive mercy. Lord, we worship you, and we thank you for the grace that we know through Christ our Lord, Amen.