Eden to Eternity | Ep. 3

Hi everybody, welcome to episode 3 of Eden to Eternity where we're walking through the story of the Bible. So far we have been on a journey through the Old Testament. We have walked through the creation and the fall and seeing how God has made a promise to save us from our sin and save us from ourselves and the choices that we have made. Last week we got to talk through some of the history of Israel where God has identified this nation as these descendants of Abraham are the people through which he's going to bring a deliverer onto the scene. And we saw how God took them from Egypt into being their own nation, becoming the kingdom of Israel. And, you know, things start off okay enough. We get King David, King Solomon, the nation seems to be growing and thriving. But things, Derek and Sarah, start to take a little bit of a turn in the history of Israel. And it really kind of triggers after the death of Solomon, which I'll talk about here in just a little bit. But, you know, one of the tensions we've been noticing as we go through the history of Israel, as we go through the history of the human race, is that God wants to lead us and we don't want to follow. So I guess, kind of backing up a little bit, why is that? Like, how do we get ourselves in that place and what happens ultimately when we just insist on going our own way? Yeah, I mean, I think it goes back to that question that we talked about in week one with Genesis. Like, do we ultimately trust that God's word is good and that he has wisdom for our lives or are we trusting our own version of good and evil? And, you know, that's the crux of so many of these decisions that we see people make throughout the Bible and even in our own lives. Like, do we trust God with our lives or are we going to be the ones in control? And I think just so often we see, even through like what we're going to be talking about today is, yeah, they are like, oh God, you're fine, but just stay up far from us.

Like, we've got it under control down here and they clearly do not. Yeah, it's amazing how much of the problems throughout the biblical story and the problems throughout our own stories come back to the same things, right? Like we're always falling into the same traps. We're always like, well, this time, this time it's going to work out for me. It's going to be all right. And, you know, the nation of Israel does that again and again and again. I do that again and again and again, that we just kind of think like, oh, my way's going to be fine this time. So Derek, how does God like respond sometimes when we get to those places where he just kind of lets us be like, all right, you guys go do what you want to do then? Yeah, I think there definitely are times when one of the ways that we see, especially through this portion of scripture, is that I think one of the ways that God disciplines is through letting us kind of make our mistakes and go our own way. And he's not going to force you to be obedient, right? He wants us to have this deep sense of love for him and a sense of obedience. As we're going to see, so many of these kings, their hearts were not set on following the way of the Lord. Right? And there was, I mean, gosh, there is even a point here, I can't remember if it's in first or second Kings, where they actually find, what was it, Moses' writings? Oh, the Book of the Law. Yeah. The Book of the Law. They have to find something, like, golly, you lost it? You know? It's very deep in the temple. How far gone could we... But I do get it at the same time, of like, man, you kind of go one day without reading scripture and praying, right?

You only skip church one week because you're tired, and then you miss group, but then you get sick, right? And then you get busy with work, and something goes on in your family or whatever it is, and you end up falling away and looking up, and you're like, whoa. You know, I use those examples just because that's been kind of the rhythm in my life at different points of like, golly, all these things happen, and I think the good thing is God is always faithful and gives us opportunity to return, but as we'll learn, it's like, man, when we start worshiping, in which the nation of Israel did, they start worshiping other gods and being accustomed to other cultures in a place where they were supposed to be worshiping the one God who had brought them there. He disciplines them by taking them and forcing them to be exiled. Yeah, yeah. And it's, you know, I love how you phrased that towards the beginning, because I think there is an element of sometimes the things that we view as punishments from God. are really just the consequences of our own decisions. Like it's not, oh, why is God doing this to me? It's like, oh, I've done this to myself. I put myself in this situation. And some of that is what Israel does to themselves. So we're entering a period of Israelite history that's a little bit difficult sometimes for us to understand, for us to kind of piece everything together. So let me just kind of talk a little bit about where we're at. After the death of Solomon, the kingdom of Israel splits into two kingdoms. There's the Northern kingdom that's called Israel, the Southern kingdom that's called Judah. And one of the defining differences

between those two nations is that the Northern kingdom of Israel, they never have a good king. In fact, every single one of their kings leads them into idolatry. One of the reasons for that is because the temple in Jerusalem is in the Southern kingdom. And so in order to distance themselves from the Southern kingdom, they're like, well, we can't go down there to worship. So they start falling into their own patterns of idolatry and sinfulness, and they wander away from God. Now, the Southern kingdom occasionally has a decent king, not very often, but they have men like King Hezekiah, who's a good king. They have King Josiah, you're talking about, who finds the law. Hey guys, did you leave your Bible over here? They find the law, they rededicate everything to God. And so the Southern kingdom fares a little bit better than the other ones. Some of what happens, talking about consequences of things, is that Israel falls into playing political games with the nations around them.

They start playing with some of the ascendant powers of the day, like Egypt is still in the background there. You also have Assyria that's growing pretty powerful. And then after that, you have Babylon that's growing pretty powerful. And so Israel and Judah both try to play different sorts of games with these nations. They try to prop themselves up, they make alliances. And God is very clear. Like, no, I want you guys to be different. I want you guys to be set apart. Don't get caught up in all of these other nations games. But eventually Israel comes to pay for those things. Assyria will come through and conquer the Northern kingdom. And one of the things Assyria does is that they wipe out people by relocating them. Like they just kind of move different cultural groups and stuff into areas. And so Assyria does that to the Northern kingdom. They end up intermarrying. And you may hear today about like the 10 lost tribes of Israel. That's the Northern kingdom. They kind of intermarry and disappear into that. The Southern kingdom eventually gets conquered by Babylon, which we'll talk a little bit about that and what that means. But in the midst of all of this,

in the midst of all this turmoil, we get some of the most interesting characters in the Old Testament. One is the prophets, that God sends these men to talk to Israel about what he wants from them. And we think of prophecy and prophets as largely truth, or I'm sorry, as largely as future tellers, but they're truth tellers. They come to talk on behalf of God. So as you guys kind of think about the prophets, their message to Israel, what are they calling Israel to? Like what are they trying to get God's people back into? Well, they're calling them to repentance. I think that's the biggest thing is that... I love that you said that, that even when I think of prophets or prophecy, we're thinking this like futuristic thing, and like speaking something into existence almost that a normal person wouldn't know. But even as I was reading through Jeremiah, just in my own personal study, just my goodness, they are giving word for word of what God is telling them to say. And Jeremiah even gets beat up for it, because the people didn't like it. And I think that's such a perfect example of the hostility that people had towards anyone or anything that was trying to push them in a direction

other than where they wanted to go or to do whatever they wanted to do. And it wasn't, I don't even think, I could be wrong. I don't even think it was like this natural opposition to God necessarily. I think it was just that they wanted to do what they wanted to do. And you see all of these prophets saying, hey, this is what God's saying. If you continue to do this, this is what I'm going to do. And I'm not gonna relent from doing it. Now, if you return to me, tear down your altars and stop worshiping to those gods, then I will redeem, heal, so on and so forth. But I almost feel bad for those guys, because it's such a hard job, because they're just speaking what God's telling them to do. And then there are other parts where they're trying to convince the prophets to say something different. And they'll end up finding people that become just kind of yes people. It's not helpful. Yeah, what it reminds me of is like, you're driving down the road and you see a road closed sign ahead. And, but you can't see like, maybe the, that the road is washed away quite yet. Yeah. It is your responsibility to be like,

okay, I'm gonna heed that warning. Right. Even though I can't see the road closed ahead. And it's pretty bad consequence if you choose to ignore that sign and then you run off the road, you know? And that's what I think of the prophets of, they're telling something that is true, even though they can't quite see that, oh, we're not gonna go into exile. Like we're fine. Right. You know, but they're like, hey, this is going to happen. Like you are going to be conquered. Like this is going to happen if you don't turn around. And so it's like, how many warning signs do we have in our lives? And then we end up in a place where we didn't expect and we're like, oh, how'd I get here? It's like, no, there are consequences. There are warning signs. Like, you know, here's your sign kind of thing. Yeah. You know, it's funny as you guys were sitting here, as I was sitting here listening to you guys talk about this, I was thinking about like, we rebel against truth-telling in almost every area of life. I'm sitting here thinking like last week, I had to go to the doctor and you know,

the doctor, they always say the same thing. Well, at least to me, like, well, you know, you need to lose weight or watch what you eat or whatever. And immediately in that moment, you're like, yeah. No, I don't. I can do what I want, sir. You guys make fun of me for this, but it's like when I'm sick and I'm like, oh, it's just allergies. You know, like it's like, oh, there's some truth telling there. You're like, I'm not going to do that. I'm fine. I'm going to go have an oatmeal cream pie and you can deal with it. Right. But you know, we have, I guess that's kind of that residual nature of sin in us. That's just kind of like, no, you can't tell me what to do. Like, this is going to be fine. It's just going to turn out differently for me than anybody else in human history. Right. And Israel gets themselves into that place. And I don't know if it's their disobedience, if it's their pride of thinking like, we're God's chosen people, it's going to be fine. But like eventually they pay the price for it. So let's talk a little bit about what ultimately becomes one of the defining tragedies

of the Old Testament. And that is the exile of the Southern Kingdom. The Northern Kingdom has fallen. They, again, they were conquered by Assyria. Years later, Babylon comes through and destroys the Southern Kingdom. And they completely wipe out the city of Jerusalem. They really leave no stone unturned from the walls. The temple is destroyed. And it's King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon who comes through. And Assyria would kind of move people around. Babylon believed in turning you into a Babylonian. So what they do is after they conquer Jerusalem, they want to take the best and the brightest out of Jerusalem and take them back to Babylon so that they can train them in the ways of this nation and teach them how to become good servants of the kingdom. And so Nebuchadnezzar does that. And we read about that in a couple different books of the Old Testament. There's the book of Daniel that really recounts it. And we read the story of Daniel caught up in the kingdom of Babylon and the court of King Nebuchadnezzar but an entire generation because, well, an entire generation of these exiles grows up in Babylon away from Jerusalem. They're out of the Promised Land again, by and large. So when you guys look at that part, like how dark does that get for Israel and how does God still continue to speak hope for them?

Yeah, I feel like it's a reflection back to Eden, right? Like the first rebellion, they were banished from the garden and then the second bigger rebellion of the whole nation, they're banished again, like through the scattering in the Northern kingdom and then being exiled into Babylon. And it's so fascinating because after that first rebellion, when they leave the garden, when Adam and Eve leave the garden, it led to the building of what city? Babylon. Oh yeah. And now the second rebellion, they're exiled to that same place. And I think there's something really significant there of, man, like it's just, they're ending right back where we started. You know, it's almost like all of these stories have just led them right back to being banished from the garden, banished from Jerusalem, the holy city, where their people have, you know, gathered and lived for so long. And it is kind of sad to me because it's like, how did we end up here kind of thing? And you know, that happens to us in our lives as well, but how many times, like you said, Brandon, do we do the same things over and over? And it's like, man, I thought I wouldn't be here again, but here I am again, like struggling with this same thing. But that doesn't mean that there's that hope is lost. I just think that we have to recognize those patterns.

And, you know, I think if the people of Israel had kind of recognized, hey, we've done this before a lot of times, you know, they might not have quite fallen as far as they did. So I think there's a lot of lessons for us. learn from, hey, like, don't end up in that place again. Like, what can you do, or not what can you do, but like, trust in the Lord to not lead you down that wrong path again, you know? Yeah. Yeah, no, I think, yeah, that's a great point. And the only thing that I would add to it is, I think for us as humans, like, when left to our own accord and our own wants, like, we are all very self-obsessed people. And I'm leading the pack of that, right? Like, we're all very self-obsessed, and, you know, and I think the way of God gets us out of that to where, you know, for me, so it's like a self-obsessed person, like, I want what I want, even if it means that somebody else doesn't have something, or if that, hey, I get this, I get that, I feel this way, don't care how that person feels. I wanna win, even if they lose. And, you know, I just think that even something as simple as those examples can get even darker, depending on the different areas of life. And, you know, like, we can look back at the nation of Israel throughout all the weeks

that we've done so far and talking through scripture and be like, man, well, like, how, like, why would they make these decisions? Well, like, I guarantee you, like, you know, given the right context, most of us would probably be in the same place, but it's, I think life's just this continual journey of learning that apart from God, we can do nothing. Yeah. And it's as simple as that. Yeah, and I think, you know, one of the most comforting things that comes out of it, it's essentially a 70-year exile, and we'll talk about why that is here in just a minute, but like, one of the most comforting things that comes out of that is, like, there is a remnant that is faithful to God throughout the middle of it. Like, you see, like, Isaiah and Ezekiel kind of prophesy, like, hey, no, like, there's gonna be people who are faithful to God, and this Daniel is a perfect example of it, because he and his friends, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they are very faithful to God. Like, Nebuchadnezzar wants them to bow down to a gold statue, and they refuse. You know, the three men get tossed in the fire and are met by a fourth man who saves them. Like, Daniel prays and ends up in the lion's den. Like, we see- There's another in the fire.

Yeah, yeah, like, even in this great darkness, there is faithfulness that shines through all the more. Like, we see, like, oh, this is incredible, what is going on there. And even, you know, I think the exile for us, when we think about it, it really helps us see our own lives, in a sense, because these people are, you know, strangers in a strange land. They're in a place where they don't belong. And, you know, the New Testament will say, well, that's what Christ followers are like today, is, like, this world is not our home. But Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 29, has a very famous passage in the Old Testament. It's got that great promise, you know, I know the plans I have for you, in Jeremiah 29. But it begins with this letter to the exiles, where he says, build homes, plan to stay, plant gardens, eat the food they produce, marry and have children, find spouses for them so that you can have many grandchildren, multiply, do not dwindle away, and work for the peace and prosperity of the city where I have sent you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, for its welfare will determine your welfare. That there's a way that as you live in exile, to be faithful to the Lord, and to care about the people around you. And I think that's a good example of faithfulness for us,

in those times where we feel like, yeah, this world isn't where we belong. We can still contribute, we can still make a difference. We can still be faithful to God in the New Testament. So they spend 70 years in exile. Like I said, an entire generation grows up. And some of that is because Second Chronicles says it, and I think Jeremiah as well, they had been in the Promised Land about 490 years, about 500 years at this point in time. And every seven years, they were supposed to give a Sabbath year to the land. They were supposed to not plant any crops, they were supposed to give the land a year off. And God tells them, you're gonna go away for 70 years, because you never did that. You spent 490 years here, you skipped 70 Sabbath years, so you're gonna be gone for 70 years. 70 years later, the Book of Daniel records the end of this, is the Persian Empire is growing up at this point in time. Like, ancient history is crazy. You'll be like, oh, these nations are all over the place. But Persia is becoming the main power. King Cyrus of Persia conquers Babylon. He comes through, destroys it, and he is a much more benevolent king than any of the other kings Israel has dealt with before. And he decides the Israelite people can go home. He sends them back to Jerusalem. And some of them stay.

The Book of Esther tells us the story of those who stay. It's an interesting story that we don't have time for, because I love it. I love that story. But then the rest of the Old Testament, this point in time, tells the story. story of those who went home. And when they get home, they do not find the Jerusalem that they've heard people talk about for 70 years. Because in the 70 years that they've been gone, no one has rebuilt it. No one has rebuilt the temple. No one has rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem. And so they are trying at that point in time to rebuild the splendor of the city. And so some of the books of the Old Testament we kind of overlook are books like Nehemiah. It's Nehemiah who goes back to rebuild the wall. It's Ezra who goes back to kind of reestablish religion and to be like, no, this is how we're going to worship God. It's the way. Yeah, this is the way to do that. There's a man named Zerubbabel. I love that name. What was it? Zerubbabel. It's fun to say. Like he goes back. Zerubbabel from the rubble. Oh, that's good. Thank you. Zerubbabel rebuilds the rubble. Which is true.

Like he helps rebuild the temple. But even after they rebuild the temple, it's said that they look at it and the older people who can remember Solomon's temple are like, eh. They're sad about it. It's not quite what it was. So what happened in the midst of this, God is still speaking hope to them through the prophets. He's still saying like, hey, no, this has not completely derailed my plan. This is not going to be a terminal failure. Like the Messiah is still coming. The deliverer is still coming. And as you see that in the prophets, some of their future talk, most of their future talk is about Jesus and what he's going to do. So as you think through the Old Testament prophecies, what do you see as far as God still holding out that hope for a plan with his people? Yeah. I mean, we have Isaiah talking about this promise of a coming suffering servant. One of the places in the Old Testament, whenever we look at like, okay, where can we look at some specific foreshadowings of Jesus or future promises of Jesus? That's what we would believe as Christians, that that would be one. Number two, Ezekiel promising a new heart within us, talking about even this New Testament idea of how God will, through his Spirit, write the law in our hearts, that his presence will be with us. And then I think it was, is it Micah that was talking about the King being born in Bethlehem? And so I think with all three of those, I think we see even in the midst of all of these things that I'm sure that as the Southern kingdoms trying to get back on their feet and rebuild the temple and the walls and all these things, and it may not be what it used to be, but there's a future coming, and not even just a future, there's a person coming in God himself that is going to come and be the King, the King of Kings, that will lead a kingdom that will never end, that in Jesus' kingdom there is not going to be some sort

of just destroyed temple that we're coming back to. And in the midst of that, I think that should give us all hope, even today, reading this as a Christian, and today being 2026, of knowing that like, hey, even if I'm not in a place right now where I think I should be, or my life is more of a mess than I want it to be, that we have a hope in Jesus that pulls us through all of that. I wonder, too, kind of what they were thinking as they would hear all of those prophecies, we've already talked about, all of this started way back in Genesis 3, the promise of that new human, that perfect person that's going to defeat evil once and for all, and then it adds on with Abraham's covenant, and they have to be thinking, we're getting close, because the prophecies get more specific. So for a long time, it was just the promise of, hey, this is all going to be redeemed, one day you're going to be saved, and then it starts getting really intentional, and so you see that more and more as you hear these prophecies, and we'll talk about this next time, but it's not as quickly as they hope, and I think for us today, we know that Jesus is returning one day, but sometimes it's not as quickly as we would hope. I think it's a tension of, we're comfortable here on earth, so I think eternity scares us a little bit, it scares me a little bit, because it's like the unknown, but it's also like, man, we long for that day when he does come back to redeem and make everything new, and I just think we can relate to them in a lot of ways, because like you said, exile is a human condition, because we feel that tension too of knowing, okay, this is not our home, and we're always longing for something more, because you have to think about how they felt being in Babylon for 70 years, the people who did remember Jerusalem and thinking, this is not our home, and that's kind of who we are on earth, this is not our home. that God continues to reaffirm His promises to His people in the midst of this, because He's not just, as you said, He's not just talking about what He wants to do for them, He's talking about what He wants to do in them, right? He's saying like, hey, I'm still bringing this deliverer, I'm still bringing Messiah, but listen,

Ezekiel 36, like, I wanna give you a new heart. I wanna cut out that heart of stone, that heart that is so hardened by the circumstances of life, and I wanna give you a new one that's receptive to me, that's sensitive to me, that moves according to my spirit. Joel 2, the prophet Joel is writing about the day of the Lord coming, and he sees this day as a day when God pours out His spirit on everybody, like men and women and children can, in his words, he says, you know, see visions and dream dreams and all of this, that there's a day when God's spirit is coming to be poured out on mankind in a way that we've never known before. So he just continues to be like, no, I'm still gonna do what I'm gonna do. Like, you've gone and done what you wanted to do, and look what it did, look what it did. Now let me do what I'm gonna do, and I'm gonna take care of it, and I'm gonna work it out for your good. You know, there's an interesting prophecy, I think it's in Haggai chapter two, which is one of the minor prophets, which in the Old Testament, the Old Testament ends with like five major prophets, 12 minor prophets. They're kind of scattered out in time frame, but the five major ones are, they have longer books. They're not major because they're more important, I don't think, it's because they're just longer books.

And then the other prophets, the 12 are- You guys are the minor ones. Yeah, you guys are- The JV team, yes we will. Hosea, go over there. But in Haggai, in chapter two, he's talking about the rebuilt temple, and this temple that everyone has looked at and said, it's not great, it's not as good as it was. And yet God promises in that moment, he tells Haggai, no, my glory is going to be in this temple in a way that it never has been before. He promises that that's gonna happen. And you think, well, that's not true at all, really, because this temple is not glorious at all. And then you think about it and you realize, well, it's in that rebuilt temple that Jesus steps into. Like, this is what God is promising. Like, oh, my presence is going to be in this temple in a way you have never known before, because I'm gonna send the Messiah to this temple, and this is where he is going to be. So just kind of in closing, what to you all is the most important lesson we take away from this period of exile? Like, how do we see that? I know, Sarah, you talked about it a little bit. How do we see that in our own stories? How do we live forward in hope based on what we read in these books?

Yeah, I think, you know, talking about the rebellion and just relating it to our own stories, like, they had those warning signs, but God still saves them. He still brings them back. And I just think, like, nothing is ever too far gone. And we see this over and over in scripture of when we see that things are beyond saving, the Lord still comes in somehow and has a plan. And because he's outside of time and he can see everything all at once, and that also makes my brain hurt, but it also means that he is never surprised by our choices. And he knows that we're not perfect, right? Like, and we know we're not perfect, but he has a way of working through things that we cannot fathom for our good and his glory. And I think it just shows you through the exile and then coming back to Jerusalem and then, you know, Jesus showing up hundreds of years later that, like, there is still purpose in things and we are never too far gone to continue to be used for him. And, you know, all the people coming back from exile, they had to think like, well, what do we do now? You know, like, how do we still live in a way that honors God? And I think that's challenging too of, you know, when you find yourself in a place where you think, oh, like everything is lost,

like just continue to return to him. Like that's all that God called them to do in that moment. Like not returning to a physical place, but also continuing to return to him through it all. And so, yeah, nobody's ever too far gone and it's never too late for the Lord to continue to use you in whatever way he sees fit. Yeah, I would agree. I think that, you know, there are gonna be times in our life where we find ourselves at a crossroads of are we going to do things our way or are we going to do things God's way? And, you know, I can think of so many examples of my life where I've tried to do things my way and it just doesn't work. And I think almost the scariest part of life is when we do things our way and it does work, you know? And it's like, oof. Because it works for Israel for a minute. Right. Right. And so. you can get far down a path, and then you look up, and you're like, well, I haven't really included God in this, I haven't prayed about it, but, so I keep doing it, you know, even though I know it's not His way, and then you can, I mean, gosh, you blink, and it's five, 10, 15 years down the road, and you're like, man, well, what happened? How did all this stuff, like, how did I end up in exile,

right, kind of metaphorically, in my life? Well, it's like, you look back, and it's like, okay, well, I've made it, I haven't been following the Lord, but I think one of the things that we continue to see about God is that even though He does discipline us, we always have a Father at the end of that road with His arms open in posture, rather than closed, rather than arms crossed, and it's the same with Israel, He loves Israel, but at the same time, like, there's also discipline for the things that we do, and consequences for our actions, and, you know, that's just the way that this world tends to work. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. You know, it makes me think, I heard years ago, like, a sermon where somebody was talking about, we feel like we've gotten off track, like, we have messed up God's plan because of how we've lived, or the decisions we've made, and the conclusion the person came to was just saying, like, do you think God, this God who has worked through all of human history to do these things has not factored in your stupidity? And I'm like, you know, that's a little harsh, but it also seems fairly accurate, like, hey, He knows. This feels targeted. Yeah. Have you, what? Maybe for some more than others. Are you talking to me? I'm just teasing.

Hey, don't point me out here in the middle of the message. So, to kind of set up where we'll be going in the New Testament, kind of the end of the story of the Old Testament is they're back from exile, this is about 400 BC, 400 years before the birth of Christ, they're back from exile, things are not as great as they were, but they're restored, they're on the path to kind of getting everything back together, and God makes a final promise through the, it's the end of our Old Testament, the prophet Malachi, the very last paragraph in the Old Testament. In Malachi 4, starting in verse 5, God says, "'Look, I'm sending you the prophet Elijah "'before the great and dreadful day of the Lord arrives. "'His preaching will turn the hearts of the fathers "'to their children, and the hearts of the children "'to their fathers.'" And so there's this promise, like, hey, this day is coming when the Lord is gonna be here, and before that day comes, I'm gonna send the prophet Elijah, who is gonna prepare the way and get everything together. And it's kind of a weird, I wish our New Testaments were arranged a little bit differently, because if Luke came first, instead of Matthew, we would read in Luke 1, an angel appears to Zachariah and says, hey, your wife, who has not been able to have children, is gonna be able to have children, and here's what I want you to know about that child. In Luke 1, 17, he will be a man with the spirit and power of Elijah, he will prepare the people

for the coming of the Lord, he will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children. And so we see, like, God is not slow in keeping his promises, the way that we think of slowness, that he is working, he is moving, he is doing something. And when we see the birth and the coming of John the Baptist, we know that this one who ends the Old Testament is here, and that the story of God's deliverance is about to be fully and ultimately revealed to us in Christ. Amen. Thanks for joining us again for episode three of From Eden to Eternity. We'll be, next week, hopping into the New Testament, looking at the story of what happens when the Messiah finally does come, who he is, what he's about, what he teaches us. So hope you'll join us as we continue on in this journey and head into the New Testament next week. We'll see you then.