Psalm 119

Oh, come on somebody, good morning, let's stand up all across the room, so glad you're at church. Why don't you turn to one of your neighbors, tell them good morning and you're glad to see them. Yeah, it's so good to be in God's house. We fix our eyes on who our God is, so come on, why don't we sing together the truth of who our Lord is. Come on, we worship the God. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. There is joy in the house of the Lord, our God is surely in this place, and we won't be quiet, we shout out your praise. Oh, holy God, most worthy of praise, we sing to you today. We sing to you today. We sing. We sing on you. We sing in your name. We sing to the God who heals, we sing to the God who saves, we sing to the God who always saves the way.

Because he hung you upon that cross, and then he rose up from that grave, my God still grows stronger. There's joy in the house of the Lord, there's joy in the house of the Lord today, and we won't be quiet, and we shout out your praise. There's joy in the house of the Lord, our God is surely in this place, and we won't be quiet, we shout out your praise. Come on, the word says where the Spirit of the Lord is, there's freedom in this place so we're about to sing a testimony, I want you to shout it out with me, come on. We were the beggars and now we're royalty, we were the prisoners and now we're running free. We are forgiven, accepted, redeemed by his grace, let the house of the Lord sing praise. Come on y'all. We were the beggars and now we're royalty, we were the prisoners and now we're running free. We are forgiven, accepted, redeemed by his grace, let the house of the Lord sing praise. We sing your praise God. There's joy in the house of the Lord, there's joy in the house of the Lord today. And we won't be quiet, we shout out your praise. There's joy in the house of the Lord, our God is surely in this place. And we won't be quiet, we shout out your praise. There's joy in the house of the Lord, there's joy in the house of the Lord today. And we won't be quiet, we shout out your praise. There's joy in the house of the Lord, our God is surely in this place. And we won't be quiet, we were the beggars and now we're royalty, we were the prisoners and now we're running free. We are forgiven, accepted, redeemed by his grace, let the house of the Lord sing praise. Come on somebody. Well, good morning, everybody. Hope you had a great Fourth of July yesterday. And we're really excited that you're at church today.

If this is your very first time, welcome, especially to you. We are not a perfect church by any means, but man, there's a lot of good people here who love Jesus. So I hope you'll feel at home today. And more than anything, it's our desire that God would speak directly to your heart. You're here on a good day. Today, we begin a brand new series for about the next six weeks. We're going to be walking through a series in the book of Psalms. We're just calling Summer of Psalms, okay? We're rounding out. We're like right in the middle of summer. and we really just wanted to say, all right, let's spend six weeks together in some of the greatest Psalms that you can find. And so these are not gonna be in order. We're gonna skip around in the Bible right here, but I want you to turn with me right now to Psalm chapter 119, one of the greatest Psalms in the Bible. And I want us to pray together as we begin to open up the word of God. Lord, it's our desire as we open up to what a wonderful book you've given us in the book of Psalms. And Lord, it's our desire that you would speak very clearly right now to our hearts. So Lord, use our pastors as we preach right now. And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Amen, amen. Good morning, everybody. Everybody good and awake?

Anybody kept awake all night long last night with explosions in the sky, right? Happy birthday, America. Happy 250, America. May God's grace continue to shine on us, amen. Hey, listen, I'm glad to be with you today. My name is Jeff. I'm one of your teaching pastors. I was here a couple of weeks ago here at Springdale campus. And I want to welcome, by the miracle of technology, our Pinnacle Hills campus. They're with us right here, right now, live. So everybody in the room here in Springdale, put your hands together. Welcome our Pinnacle Hills family. We are one church in four campuses. And we also wanna welcome in our webcast. So we've got folks from all over America, all over the world, literally joining us today, right now, live. And so glad to have you folks with us as well. Always glad to be here at Springdale. Always glad to be preaching the word of God here. And, you know, one of my roles, in addition to being a teaching pastor, is I'm also the leader of our seminary, Cross Theological Seminary. We talk about it here and there. And we talk a lot about your generosity.

You know, Bryant talked about your generosity, sending students to campus. Get your head around that for a minute. Over 700 teenagers just went to camp. How about that? Isn't that pretty cool? And you, every one of you who give, you helped send them to that, like, anchor experience that will carry on in their lives through the rest of the summer, into the fall, and really some life-changing moments. Y'all, if you ever grew up going to camp with your church, you know how pivotal those camp moments can be. And so thank you. It's not cheap. These things are expensive. But as Bryant said, you guys are generous, and it helps us to send every student. It helps cut that cost down. So thank you. Thank you for your generosity with C3. And, you know, what's really cool is Hannah, who you saw on the screen. Hannah is going to be a seminary student in the fall. How about that, right? And your generosity is paying for her tuition. How about that? So listen, we have an amazing church. You guys help us make church fun, like ministry is fun because you guys are so generous.

And I've just never been a part of a church that can do the things that we do. It's amazing. And so thank you, thank you, thank you. And may you continue to be generous as we move forward in God's vision for our church. So today we start something new. Today is sticker day, all right? So hopefully you got your sticker on the way in. You've got these journals. We handed these journals out last August, okay? And so today, today we begin our last series in that journal. This is gonna steer us to the end of that journal. Today is the last sticker day, all right? So hopefully you got your sticker on the way in. Nothing's more exciting than sticker day. For those of you who are watching online and you're members of this church, and you're like away and you're on a beach somewhere, you missed it. It's sticker day, all right? Bad choice of calendaring. So sticker day. I think if you open up your journals to the beginning of the Psalm, I think it's a picture of me that you're putting the sticker on top of. So you go ahead and do that. Hope you feel good doing that. And as Nick said, we're gonna just kind of spend

the rest of the summer looking at the book of Psalms. Isn't that cool? Not in any particular order, but the Psalms are a special book and we're gonna look at six different Psalms. We're gonna study them together for the next six weeks to finish out our summertime. Then we'll launch into the fall. I really do love the book of Psalms. The book of Psalms is a very unique book in the entire Bible. The Bible is full of different kinds of literature. If you're new to the Bible, if you're new to church, you're new to Christianity, you got this book we call the Bible, God's Word. But there's different kinds of literature in there. You've got law, which is in the Old Testament. You got historical books in the Old Testament. You jump over to the New Testament and you've got four gospels. That's a different kind of unique kind of literature. That's the gospel is a is a story of Jesus, you got four of them, then you got a bunch of letters written to the early church, you got the book of Acts, which is kind of like an appendix to the gospels in terms of like the story continues after Jesus ascended to heaven. So you got all these different kinds of literature. And Psalms is a unique kind of literature. It stands apart in a unique way in our Bibles. And I hinted at this two weeks ago when I was preaching here at Springdale and also Pentecostals.

I hinted at this two weeks ago, and I want to put this on the screen. Let me tell you what the Psalms really are. The Psalms are the prayer book of the church. I adopted this language from Eugene Peterson, who is in heaven now, an old Presbyterian pastor and scholar, and I really like what Eugene says when he says that the Psalms are the prayer book of the church and have been for thousands of years. We may not like necessarily think about it that way in our Protestant tradition, but the Psalms really are a prayer book gifted to the church. Have you ever been stuck in your prayer life just not knowing the words to say? Have you ever, like, sat down to pray and the words that come into your mind, it's kind of like, it's the same words, you're praying the same thing over and over again, and sometimes you get frustrated because you just don't have additional words or different language, and so you just, it's like I just say the same things over and over again. That's like normal, that's common to all of us, but so we have the Psalms. The Psalms are a prayer book for the church. It's sort of like a collection of the prayers of those who've gone before us. They give us words, the Psalms give us words to pray when we have no words to pray, or when we're stuck in our words of prayer. Anybody ever been in a season of grief? You'll find a prayer in Psalms. Anybody in a season of pain or suffering? You'll find a prayer for that in Psalms. Anybody been in a season of, like, longing, like, and you don't even know how to, like, define that, but you're just longing for something different or something more? You'll find a prayer for that in Psalms. Anybody ever been confused? Like confused, and maybe even on the edge of, no, no. You've crossed over, you're angry. You're angry at the world, you're angry maybe even at God, and yes, you will find a prayer in the book of Psalms for that.

Anybody in a season of victory? A season of joy in your life? We got teenagers coming back from camp, and I know that there's a season of victory in the lives of many, many of them. You will find prayers for that in the book of Psalms. Anybody ever been in a season of questioning? You've just got questions. You'll find prayers and words for that in the book of Psalms. You name it, you name it, it's in the book of Psalms, 150 of them. So, we're going to be studying six of them, and I'm going to ask us just to go back to the Lord in prayer to prepare us to dive into the task ahead of us today. Y'all ready? Let's pray. Let's pray one more time. Father, I thank You for this opportunity. I come before You as the preacher today asking that You would guide me, guide me into all that needs to be said, and just prevent me, stop me from going in any direction or saying anything You don't want me to say today. I confess that I am a man, I am human, I am fallible, and I need, I need You today. Father, I pray for all of us in this room. I pray for those who today who are grieving and suffering, those who are confused and questioning and yes, even for those in here who are coming in here on the heels of some victory or joy or answered prayer in their life. Would You meet, would You meet us today, right now, where we are? Would Your Holy Spirit touch us right now where we are and open our ears to hear? Open our eyes to see what You want us to see? Open our minds. to understand what you want us to understand, and then God, after you've done all of that, would you open our hearts to receive what you want us to receive. I pray that you would cover this message in the blood of Christ, and I

pray this now in the name of Jesus Christ. And everyone said, amen, amen. All right, let's get into our study. If you've got your journals, you can jot some notes down. Before I get to Psalm 119, let me just talk by way of introduction about the Psalms in general. You know, there's 150 of them, you can see that laid out, but did you know that the book of Psalms is actually divided into five books? Did you know that? Let me put them on the screen, let me put the division, and if you ever were to like thumb or scroll through a copy of the book of Psalms, you would actually see these notations. Now here's what's interesting is, you know, the verses, the verses that are in in the book of Psalms, there's 176 verses. I'm sorry, there's a...get to that in a minute. There's 150 Psalms, but they're divided into verses. The verses are actually man-made. That's not like inspired. The verses, the numbering of verses is man-made. That's to help us navigate. But you'll see some additional notations as you go through the book of Psalms, and you'll see book one, book two, and they're just divided up exactly like what you see on the screen. Those divisions are part of the inspired organization of the book of Psalms. So there's five books. Here's where it gets interesting, I think. Your Bible begins with a collection of books that sort of stand...remember I talked to you about how there's different kinds of literature in the Bible? Your Bible begins with a collection of books, and guess how many are in that first collection of books in your Bible? How many books would there be? Five. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, you know the last one? Deuteronomy? Five books. We call that the Pentateuch. Penta meaning five. Sometimes they're referred to as the books of Moses. They're a collection of five books. We call this, in terms of the kind of literature, we call this the law. Jews call it the Torah, which means law. And literally, this is God's first word to us. It is God's word, His direction, His guidance for His people. All of that is laid out in story form in the Pentateuch, those first five books of the Bible. You could say it sort of like this way. I'll put this on the screen. The law is where God speaks, and the Psalms are where the people respond. A neat way, if you want to like just read through Psalms, understanding now that

there's five books, a neat way to approach Psalms, there's all kinds of ways you can do it, but a neat way that you can do it is, let's say that it's the first day of the month, and you want to read through the book of Psalms, and you want to experience all five of those books in one month, you could start on the first day of the month in Psalm 1. All right, makes sense. And then on the second day of the month, just add five. Just add five. One plus five is what? Six. I know it's summertime, I know school's out. All right, I get that. And I know some of us are math challenged, all right? One plus five is six. So on the second day of the month, read Psalm chapter six. Then on the third day of the month, add five. Six plus five? Eleven. Now I'm not going to go all the way through, all right? Thank you, right? And you don't have to go all the way through. All you got to do is just bookmark it, and then when you get up in the morning, add five and go to that, go to that. And by day 30, you will have sampled all five books of the Psalms, Psalm 1 through 150. If you want to kind of keep going, then the first day of the next month, read Psalm 2. And then on the second day, add five. It's called the add-five plan, if you're into that, right? And if you were to just continue that, does it make sense? Are y'all following me? I'm not moving too fast for it, right? I'm not moving. If you did that in five months, you'd read every Psalm. But what you're doing is you're sampling all five books in the course of 30 days. You see how that works? The law, God speaks to us in His Word. The Psalms, the prayer book of the church, is where the people respond to God. So the Psalms really, really should take an active, continual, kind of primary role in your life. Not something that you read once a year or every so often, but like, it's there for you as a tool in your spiritual life as you talk to God along the way. That makes sense what I'm saying? And as the Psalms speak to you and you highlight and you write, then you're able to speak back to God

with different and new language. Today, specifically, as Nick said, we're going to be looking at Psalm 119, all right? Psalm 119. It's a great one to pick for us because in addition to all the introduction material, we're looking at—we just happen to be looking at the longest Psalm in the book of Psalms. And as I got a little ahead of myself a moment ago, there are 176 verses in Psalm 119, and we're gonna read all 176 today. No, we're not, all right? It's a long chapter. It's long. 176 verses. Incidentally, not coincidentally, it is the longest chapter in the entire Bible, Psalm 119. What's kind of cool, I think, is that Psalm 119 literally sits right in the middle of your Bible. Kind of like an anchor. You know, today so many of us have Bibles on our phones and we scroll, and I am not in any way anti- Bible on your phone. I'm not. It serves a great purpose. I remember years and years ago, Julie and I were leading a group from our church where I was pastoring in Fort Smith to Israel, and we went up on top of the Temple Mount. The Temple Mount is controlled by the Muslim community, and so they don't allow Bibles on top of the Temple Mount, but they allow phones. And so, you know, subversively, we know we're able to walk around, you know, reading the Bible while we're on top. So, yeah, there's a great purpose there. However, I really do think that everybody should own a print, like, copy of God's Word, because there's certain things about the way the Bible comes to us that you don't get, that you miss. It just doesn't land when you're scrolling. And this idea that Psalm 119, like, if you take a print copy of the Bible and you just open it up right in the middle, you're gonna land, like, right on Psalm 119. Longest chapter in Psalms. Longest chapter in the Bible, right in the middle of your Bible, like, like an anchor, like an anchor. What continues, as we continue to look at this Psalm 119, let me say that it's a poem.

We don't pick up on all of that because it's been translated from, from Hebrew into English. And speaking of the fact that Psalm 119 has been translated from Hebrew into English, if you start looking, if you, if you're scrolling, and you can do that right now, if you got your, your Bible on your phone, or if you got it opened up, if you kind of look and scroll, you're going to notice in the book of Psalms 119, you're going to notice some interesting notations along the way. And, and what you're going to notice is that there are divisions of Psalm 119. The Psalm has 22 sections in and of itself. And those 22 sections, each of them has a label for the section. And it just so happens that, that each section is labeled by one of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. So, so in English, once again, I know it's summertime, but this is really kindergarten we're talking, okay? So in English, how many letters are there in our alphabet? 26. A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, thank you, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z. Thank you very much. So Hebrew, the Hebrew alphabet does not have 26 letters. The Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters, right? Aleph, Beth, Gimel, Daleth, Heiwaz, Elyon, Heth, Teth, Yod, Keth, Lameth, Mem, Num, Samach, Elyon, Peh, Sade, Kof, Reh, Sheen, Sheen, Ta. Y'all know that, right? Kindergarten. Twenty-two letters. You will see, in order, from Aleph to Ta, that's A to Z, quote-unquote, you'll see the twenty-two divisions labeled by a letter of the Hebrew alphabet. There's twenty... There's eight verses for each of the twenty-two letters, each of the twenty-two sections. Once again, the verses are added by man, but the point is they're identical in length, each of the sections. And here's where it gets really cool. The first word of the first verse of each section, that first word starts with that letter of the Hebrew alphabet for which that section is named.

Does that make sense, what I just said? Let me give you an example, because some of you are looking at your heads, they're spinning. Now, lest you think I'm just being a seminary president for a minute, okay? This is the inspired Word of God I'm presenting to you. Inspired in its writing and content, and inspired in its organization and presentation to us as well, for a reason. Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about. Section one of Psalm 119, I'm going to put the first three verses, I'm going to go through those on the screen. Verses one... Verse one starts this way, and if you're looking at this on your phone or in your Bible, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet is the letter Aleph. Everybody say Aleph. Aleph. The first word of Psalm 119 is blessed. Well, that's the English word. That's the English word. The Hebrew word for blessed is, listen, aser. Everybody say aser. And guess what the Hebrew word aser... What does it start with? Aleph. Does everybody...that makes sense now. And all 22 sections are just like that. Let's read, let me read for us the first three verses of Psalm 119. Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the way in the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep His testimonies, who seek Him with their whole heart, who also do no wrong but walk in His ways. Just in those first three verses, let me tell you what we get. You want to be blessed in your life, verse one, then live your life with the Bible as

your guide. You want to be blessed in your life, verse two, seek God with every fiber of your being. You want to be blessed in your life, verse three, find the way of God and walk in that. This is what you're getting in the first three verses of the first section of Psalm 119. Let's move on to the second section. I'm going to speed this thing up, but hang with me because I'm trying to show you how this works. The second section of Psalm 119 begins in verse nine. And if you're looking in your Bible, you're going to see the Hebrew letter Beth, or Beth is pronounced. And the first word in English of verse nine is the word how or how can, that's English. In the Hebrew, the first word of this section is the Hebrew word be, be. Letter B with E and a little curly Q on top of that, but it's pronounced be, and it means in English how or how can. You see how this is working? It's not an accident. It's on purpose, it's really a, the whole Psalm is a marvel of construction inspired by the Holy Spirit. And let me just read the first three verses of the second section here. How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word. With my whole heart I seek you. Let me not wander from your commandments. I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. And with that, you come to really one of the most famous verses in the entire Bible. And you may have heard it or learned it growing up this way. Thy word I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee. One of the most famous verses in God's Word. word, anchored right here in the middle of God's Word. Now, at this point, if you're paying attention, you might start noticing a theme. We've only covered the

beginning of each of the first two sections, 22 sections, but already we're starting to see a theme. I debated doing what I'm about to do, so if it doesn't work, please forgive me. But what I'm going to do, and you're gonna have to hang with me, but it's gonna be okay, all right? What I want to do, because I really think this, I think this lands, I really do, I'm going to very quickly, I want to move through just the first verse, just the first verse of each of the next 20 sections of this psalm, because I want you to see the theme. And I've done some highlighting, I've done some underlining to kind of help us, but when you see it this way, and usually we don't read our Bibles this way, do we? Like what I'm talking about today, very kind of a teachy preachy thing today, we normally don't look at our Bibles and read our Bibles this way, but maybe we should a little bit more often. So I'm gonna go quick, but I want to read to you 20 verses, one at a time, the first verse of each of the sections, all the way to the last section. So if you're ready, you can follow with me on the screen. If you've got your Bibles open, you can scroll, you can turn with me. Here we go, quickly. Verse 17 is the beginning of the next section. It begins with the Hebrew letter, the Hebrew word, letter is Gimel, and it says this, "'Deal bountifully with your servant that I may live and keep your word.'" Verse 25 is the beginning of the next section, beginning with the Hebrew word, our letter Daleth, "'My soul clings to the dust. Give me life according to your word.'" Verse 33 is the beginning of the next section, beginning with the Hebrew letter, He. "'Teach me, O Lord, the way of your statutes, and I will keep it to the end.'" Verse 41, the Hebrew letter Wa is how this begins, "'Let your steadfast love come to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your promise.'" Verse 49 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Zayin, "'Remember your word to your servant in which you have made me hope.'" Verse 57, the next section, is the Hebrew letter Heth, "'The Lord is my portion. I promise to keep your words.'" Verse 65, the Hebrew letter is Teth, "'You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to' — everybody say it — "'your word.'" The next section is in verse 73, the Hebrew letter is Yod, "'Your hands have made and fashioned me. Give me understanding that

I may learn your commandments.'" Verse 81 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Kath, "'My soul longs for salvation, and I hope in' — what? — "'your word.'" Right? Verse 89 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Lamed, "'Forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens.'" Verse 97 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Mame, "'Oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day.'" Verse 105 is the next section, the Hebrew word is Nun, "'Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.'" Anybody heard that one before? Verse 113 is the next section, Psalmic is the Hebrew letter, "'I hate the double-minded, but I love your law.'" Verse 21 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Ayin, "'I have done what is just and right.'" How do you know what's just and right? From "'your word.'" "'Do not leave me to my oppressors.'" Verse 129 is the next section, it's the Hebrew letter Peh, "'Your testimonies are wonderful, therefore my soul keeps them.'" Verse 137 is the next section, the Hebrew letter is Sade, "'Righteous are you, O Lord, and right are your rules.'" Verse 145 is the next section, we're almost there, folks. Kof. Kof is the Hebrew letter. With my whole heart, I cry. Answer me, O Lord. I will keep Your statutes. Verse 153. Resh is the Hebrew letter. Look on my affliction and deliver me, for I do not forget Your law. Verse 161. The Hebrew letter is tzinshin, an interchangeable letter. Princes persecute me without cause, but my heart stands in awe of what? Your words. And then finally, the last section of Psalm 119 begins in verse 169.

The Hebrew letter is ta, and it says this. Let my cry come before You, O Lord. Give me understanding according to, everybody say it, Your what? Word. Do you see a theme? Do you see a theme? It's a theme that sort of screams when you do what we just did right here on a Sunday morning. Listen, right here in the middle of God's word, the longest psalm, the longest chapter, is the Bible shouting to us of the centrality of God's word in our lives. Listen, you wanna know why we at Cross Church run so hard to God's word all the time? It's because of this, right? You wanna know why here at Cross Church that we preach every single week from the pulpit, God's word, while we anchor everything about this church in God's word? It's because the word of God itself is anchored in God's word. I wanna kind of begin to steer this to an end. I wanna take us back. I wanna take us back to the second section, the second section of Psalm 119. And I wanna revisit very, very briefly verses nine through 11 in light of this idea of the centrality of God's word.

In our life, you know, we just sent 709 teenagers to camp. 709 young men and young women. We've got 30-plus college students, next-gen leaders that you guys have sent around the country and even the world this summer. A big investment in that next generation. Listen, we live in a heavily polluted world. And that next generation that we're talking about right now that we're investing so much in, that next generation, they're gonna have more mud to muck through than we did when we were growing up. But there's hope. Verse nine of 119. How can a young man, and I would even say, or a young woman, how can a young man or young woman keep his or her way pure? How do you do that in this world that we live in? Well, look at what verse nine tells us. By guarding it according to, everybody say it, your, say it, word. Your word. I wanna do a jump, a real quick jump to the New Testament, real quick, to a young Jewish man named John. You ever heard of John before, New Testament? Young, a good Jewish education. John wrote one of those gospels for us, the gospel of John.

And you know how John's gospel begins? In the beginning was the word. And the word was with God, and the word was God. Jump down to verse 14, and John says, the word became flesh and dwelt among us. John had a real strong connection with the word. I mean, literally the word, the Son of God. John also wrote three little letters over in the New Testament. In chapter two, of that first little letter, 1st John chapter 2. You gotta see this, I'll put this on the screen. Verse 14. John says this, I write to you young men, young men, young women, I write to you young men because you are strong and the Word of God abides in you and you have overcome the evil one. How do you overcome the evil one? By having a steady digest of the Word of God in your life daily. This was, this, John was a man that not only understood the word Jesus, but he understood, this is Psalm 119 he's basically quoting, in the New Testament. Listen to me, teenagers, any college students that might be in this room, any of us, how do you remain strong? How do you remain strong in this world that we live in? You remain strong because the Word of God abides in you, and when the Word of God abides in you, guess what happens? You overcome the evil one. We just finished a series on satanic attacks that all Christians like, like endure. How do you, how do you combat the satanic attacks? By the Word of God abiding in you, and you overcome the evil one. Listen to me, listen to me. I'm not saying I'm the greatest preacher in the world, but I think I'm okay. But I'll say this about my preaching. If, if I had to rely upon my own preaching for, for my spiritual health, I would be in pitiful shape. I would really be starving. You, you've got to have more in your life than what you get on a Sunday morning, which is important. You've got to have the Word of God, a steady digest of the

Word of God daily in your life. Thy word I've hidden in my heart, and what happens when you do that? That I may not sin. Listen, it is, it's really hard, it's really hard to be reading your Bible and looking at porn at the same time. Thy word I've hidden in my heart that I might not sin against me. Verse 10, Psalm 119, with my whole heart I seek you. And I guess I would just close out by saying this, asking this question, do you? Do you? Do you seek God with your whole heart? I'm gonna see you bow your head, close your eyes, no one looking around. We're done. A good day. Thank you for following along with me and letting me teach as well as preach today, something I love to do, but it's not about me, it's really about the Word of God, and my prayer is that the Word of God has come alive in your life in a different kind of way today, and maybe there's a hunger for the Word of God in your life that's being born right now that you've not sensed or felt in a long, long time, or maybe ever, but it really comes down to this question, with my whole heart do I seek you, but do you? Do you seek God with your whole heart? Jeremiah tells us, he says, if you seek me you will find me when you seek me with your whole heart. It's the Lord in Jeremiah. Father God, I want to come before you today praying for my brothers and my sisters, and I pray for lost people in this room and who are watching online across the country and the world for those at Pinnacle Hills who are with us right now, and God I pray that we would be a people of God that would love your Word and would seek you with all of our hearts. If you're here today and you are not in fellowship with God like you once were or like you need to be, then today I invite you to come home. The altar will be open for prayer. Our teams will be here at Pinnacle Hills and Springdale to pray with you. If you've never given your life to Jesus, it begins with a step. I'll close us in prayer. We'll stand to sing, and when we do that you come to receive Jesus, the Word made flesh, into your life. Thy Word I've hidden in my heart. that I might not sin against you. Father, would you move in our rooms here at Pinnacle, Springdale, would you move online

with anybody who's watching, anywhere? Would you draw us to you? May we seek you with our whole hearts right now. It's in Jesus' name I pray, amen.