Midweek – The Blank Page In Your Bible Part 4

400 years of history is a long time!  From the time when the exiles return to Jerusalem and rebuild the walls of the city to the advent of Christ in the New Testament we have 400 years of Biblical silence.  This series looks at what happened in those years and how they shape the time into which Jesus comes and how that impacts our faith today.

In part 4 we look at the Maccabean revolt that leads to the Selucids retreating from Israel. Through the revolt Jewish worship of God is returned to the Temple in Jerusalem.  Over the following 80 years Jewish society is built around religious practices, into which Jesus will come to challenge and call people to turn worship of God.

Transcript

Part 4 is called the Hasmoneans. I wouldn’t worry too much about the Hasmoneans in terms of remembering their name because they go by several names. We’re probably going to call them more often tonight, the Maccabees.  Has anyone heard of the Maccabees?  Good. So the Hasmonean is a family name.

Maccabee was a surname that was given and has a particular meaning. If you haven’t heard of Maccabees, you will know of something called Maccabeus.  Maccabeus is the tune to thine be the glory. The name of the tune to thine be the glory. So it does have a continued impact, certainly by way of name today.

And we start off where we left off a couple of weeks ago. We start off with Antiochus IV Epiphanes. Remember, this was the one whom Daniel spoke about, who would place the abomination of desolation in the sent in the temple in Jerusalem.  And really what he does is he starts to build a pressure cooker.

That’s not what he’s trying to build, but he builds a pressure cooker that will lead to where we find ourselves tonight. And by the way, tonight we skip over the 100 BC line, and we’re now less by the time we finish tonight, we’re now less than 100 years until the birth of Jesus.  So we’re talking within a century of Jesus this melting pot that happens a century before he comes, but it’s also a melting pot, as we will see, that actually creates another melting pot for whenever Jesus comes into the world.

So I’ve given you that diagram there, the rulers of Syria, Judea, and Egypt, after Alexander the Great, and I’ve helped you by putting a red box around Antiochus IV Epiphanes, to say that’s where we are.  Remember, there’s a few people to watch out for. Go down to the bottom left there the second line from the bottom, just in the middle of that left hand section, you have Cleopatra, that is the ever famous Cleopatra in the movies who married Julius Caesar.

And of course, as we come further down not there, but on that similar scale we come, as we finish tonight, with the name Herod the Great, who will be familiar to us as well. So that’s basically a hundred years there in front of you, from Antiochus IV Epiphanes, taking us down just to that second line from the bottom, and that’s where we’re heading.

Under your fellow Antiochus IV Epiphanes, Hellenism  was rampant. This was the guy that started really  institutionalizing Hellenistic religion. All of the things we’ve looked at, he ramped up and he put in place throughout his empire.  And remember at this time you have the Seleucids who are coming from the north, really down, and the Ptolemies from the south.

Antiochus Epiphanes, he was the one that really pushed the Ptolemies down south to keep them in Egypt. Remember, they were the ones who were really at the start of this story. But now, Epiphanes has that Greek background behind him. He really has most of that north  western world, as well as a little bit over to the east.

Hasn’t got as far as Italy and Rome. They will come to him. But he is the one who is ruling.  And he takes drastic measures against particularly Jerusalem.  He basically tells them they can’t worship. He’s telling the Jews that they cannot worship their God.  He’s clamping down, and anyone who defies him they’re simply done away with.

Now, on two occasions this evening, we’re going to look at documents called the First Letters of the Maccabees. And at the bottom of your page there, I put a wee caveat in that box at the bottom.  Protestants in the Reformed faith do not consider First Maccabees a scripture. We will not be treating it as scripture this evening.

And by the way, neither do the Jews, even though it is a very Jewish document, they do not consider it scripture either. So therefore, Maccabees, the letters of Maccabees will never be found in any of our Bibles.  However, the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church all have The letters of the Maccabees in their canons of scripture.

I want to clarify that because in case you’ve heard of Maccabees as being from the Apocrypha, we’re not treating it as scripture this evening. We’re simply reading it as a historical document.  So I just want to clarify that in case there’s any questions. But this is what the first letter of Maccabees chapter 1 and verses 44 to 50 says.

This is a report of how Epiphanes has been at work. And the king, that is Epiphanes, sent letters by messengers to Jerusalem and the towns of Judah. He directed them to follow customs strange to the land, To forbid burnt offerings and sacrifices and drink offerings in the sanctuary. To profane sabbaths and festivals.

To defile the sanctuary and the priests. To build altars and sacred precincts and shrines for idols. To sacrifice swine and other unclean animals. And to leave their sons uncircumcised. They were to make themselves abominable by everything unclean and profane so that they would forget the law and change all the ordinances.

He added, and whoever does not obey the command of the king shall die. Now that’s a pretty tough edict being sent down by Epiphanes, but this is how he wanted to rule.  And it all stems from a position of fear.  He didn’t want them to be religious. He wanted them to be nationalistic. And that’s actually what happens in these next hundred years.

He wants them to be so nationalistic that they will see Greek culture, Hellenism, as the way of life, which included religion, but it wasn’t Jewish religion or Jewish worship.  And this is really the spark that that lights the powder keg. Because in a little village that we’ll come to look at in a moment, a day’s march from Jerusalem, everything kicks off and changes the shape of the next hundred years.

But before we do, I want us to turn to God’s word,  and I want us to read some words of Jesus.  We’re going to read from John chapter 10, and we’re going to read from verses 1 to 20. And I just want us to listen to what Jesus says about himself, because we’ll be reflecting on what Jesus says about himself,  because of the significance of what we’re about to learn happens.

in the Maccabean Revolt.  So here we have John chapter 10 verses 1 to 20, and there we read, Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber.  But he who enters by the door is the shepherd To him the gatekeeper opens.

The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him. But they know his voice.  A stranger they will not follow,  but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers. This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.

Jesus again said to them truly I say to you I am the door of the sheep  all who come before me are thieves and robbers But the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door if anyone enters by me. He will be saved And will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.

I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.  I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.  He who is a hard hand, and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hard hand, and cares nothing for the sheep.

I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and my own know me. Just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.  And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it up again.

No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.  This charge I have received from my Father.  There was again a division among the Jews because of these words. Many of them said, he has a demon and is insane, why listen to him?

Others said, these are not the words of one who is oppressed by a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?  Amen. This is the word of God finishing at verse 21.  So we come to 167 BC. In a period of history, it’s only a couple of years, But it’s called the Maccabean Revolt, and what it brings about over really four short years or so, or three years, is a rededication of the temple.

And remember what has just been decreed by the king.  That idols will be worshipped, that swine will be sacrificed in holy places and holy precincts. And that anyone who does not obey what the king says will be put to death. Of course, the king’s intention is that his ways will be followed and it will be him putting to death those who do not observe it.

But up in a little part of Judea, in a little place called Modin, which is described as a dusty day’s march northwest of Jerusalem,  the king’s officers go to put in place what the king has ordered. And so there on your map, you’ll see it. There’s  Jerusalem and there’s Mudean just up there a day’s march away.

So just if you find Jerusalem in the middle and go to the 10 o’clock position, you’ll find it there.  And so there was a priest there,  who was a godly man,  and he said,  he was called Matthiathus, and he was a Hasmonean, the family of Hasmoneans, that’s where the Hasmoneans come from, and he refused to sacrifice.

They were looking to him as the priest to do what the king had wanted, and he refused to, and so whatever Jew then stood forward to do to obey the king, He then killed them,  and they were, he called them apostate, and he killed them. And what this action marked was the beginning of the revolt, the Maccabean Revolt, that would see them recapture Jerusalem, and then rededicate  the temple.

What’s amazing about this is a priest, and this is his family. This is not a military man. They don’t have the wealth of an army. They don’t have the skill of an army, yet out of this rag tag band that starts off as guerrilla warfare, they manage just in three years to capture Jerusalem. Now it just so happens that it coincides with the death of Antiochus the fourth Epiphanes,  and the Seleucid troops then retreat to Syria,  and it’s pretty sad.

Shouldn’t maybe belittle it, but it’s a little bit of an easy capture, retaking of Jerusalem for them. But it’s still significant because it’s Judas who is the son of Matthias and his men who then capture it. And in the early days of the rebellion, it’s Judas receives the surname Maccabee, hence where we get the term Maccabean.

And that means sledgehammer or hammer. And so they called him Judas Maccabee because of the force. and the might that he wielded in battle.  And so the Jewish victory over the Greeks was historic because it was an instance of the spirit of the fighters being as every bit important as military might in facing the Greeks.

And so the book of Maccabees tells the emotion filled moment when the Jews returned to Jerusalem as victor. And in the year 164 BC, three years after the rebellion began, And so this is what we read in chapter 4, verses 36 to 39. Then said Judas and his brothers, Behold, our enemies are crushed. Let us go up to cleanse the sanctuary and dedicate it.

So all the army assembled, and they went up to Mount Zion. And they saw the sanctuary desolate, the altar profaned, and the gates burned.  In the courts they saw bushes sprung up as in a thicket, or as on one of the mountains. They saw also the chambers of the priests in ruins. Then they rent their clothes, and mourned with great lamentation, and sprinkled themselves.

It’s quite the scene that they,  that we read there. And isn’t it  similar to what we’ve seen before in Scripture?  We’ve seen it when the exiles returned from Babylon. We’ve seen it when people were called to repentance of their sin.  They tore their clothes, they covered themselves in ashes, they mourned and they grieved the loss.

See, this may on the face of it seem like a revolt, but it was a taking a stand for the worship of God. This was a genuine, and it’s important to understand that at the beginning of this was a genuine call back to worship. And so much in fact, I’m sure we’ve heard of the Jewish holiday Hanukkah, which simply means dedication.

Well, Hanukkah celebrates the Maccabean revolt and the rededication of the temple. It celebrates the act of Judas Maccabee in restoring worship in the second temple in Jerusalem in 164 BC. He removed all of the statues depicting Greek gods. He removed Zeus from the temple. He purified it, and it once again became a place of worship.

And so what now happens is you have the Seleucids we’ll start with the Ptolemies. We have the Ptolemies. If you look at that map again, the Ptolemies are down in the south. They’re down in Egypt. Up in the north, you have the Seleucids, and they will stay up there. And you now have the growth of the Maccabees.

Their kingdom will spread, and what their kingdom spreads to, is almost the same border as when the tribes were sent out by Joshua. Whenever the land was Marketed for where the tribes would go. That’s what this looks like if you have a Bible with maps in it And it shows you what Israel looked like at the time of Joshua or at the time of the settlement of the land It’s pretty similar to what it is here.

They managed to get back What was the traditional Palestine, the traditional promised land? And there you have just some of the names that we’ll come across as we now look at the Hasmonean dynasty, or this family of the Maccabees.  And family lines are important,  but it’s not perfect, because although this started out as a good moment for  Jewish worship,  this is not a family that’s going to get on either.

They kill each other, in fact. So don’t allow, don’t be sucked into the belief that just because the first generation managed to do a good thing that it didn’t turn sour because again isn’t that after all the history of Israel as well? How many kings does it say they did not do what was right in the sight of the Lord?

In fact there’s a lot more of them than there was of kings who did do right in the sight of the Lord. And here you have the family tree, starting with  Matthiathus at the very top, that was the priest who really put spark to that powder keg. And then after him, immediately under him, Judas Maccabees.

And what was significant is you have a period where they are priests,  or they are high priests, and they rule as high priests, and then there’s a period where they rule as kings and as high priests.  And power corrupts, absolute power corrupts, absolutely.  So that’s what happens in this family, in fact so much so that as we’ll draw to the end a little bit later, the tables are turned.

And a new religious group rises up against the Maccabees because they are not keeping to Jewish religious practices. So what we’re going to do is, we’re going to go through this family and see, really from 142 BC, we’ll end up about 63 BC before Herod the Great comes on the scene and that’s where we’ll go next week to look and see about Herod the Great.

But he does appear a little bit earlier as well. Because there’s a significant moment in all of this. We’ll start with Judas, who ruled from 164 down to 161. He cleared the grounds, restored the structure of the temple, and one of the first acts he did was to build that altar. Renewed the altar so that it would be a place of worship once again, and sacrificial worship.

And so on his death in 161 BC, he was succeeded by the fifth, and if you look along the line there, the fifth and the youngest brother in the family that he had, and his brother’s name was Jonathan.  And he was to lead the nationalist movement. Really just keep going with the nationalist agenda that the Maccabees had for the next couple of years, 160 to 143 BC.

He really got their reign settled and significantly he was the first one to become the high priest in 19 in 152 BC. And his successor was the second oldest of those brothers, Simon.  And this is the period that we enter in the rule of high priests. And so Simon was called Simon Thassi, and he ruled 142 BC down to 135 BC.

And what he did was he consolidated the new independent state. If you go back to that map, you’ll see Simon is the third one down,  and he increases the territory quite a bit from what that original Judea was. area that they had. And so he really creates and settles this new independent state, but along with his two sons,  he is murdered.

So he is murdered within, that dates wrong, I don’t know why it says 135,  because he only survived a couple of months.  He was murdered by his sons in law, by one of his sons in law, so his time was short.  And then we come on to his brother, John Coinus  the First, and he escaped the assassins, and he succeeded his father.

And he sought to continue his father’s policies by way of showing that it was still a strong family to rule. And he was effectively king in everything but name. He couldn’t be king because of the,  they hadn’t established that yet, it wasn’t until after him that they established it. And he forced the Idumeans to accept circumcision and become Jews.

So this is the part of the territory, down here, Idumea, where he forces to come in to the Jewish state. He forces them to become Jews by circumcision. And what is significant about this, it is from this people group in this land that heard the great will come from. Herod the Great is from Idumea. Another name from Idumea,  Edom.

And so Herod the Great was an Edomite, and this is the land from which he came.  So already  we can see we’re just at the turn, coming to the turn of the century, 100 BC,  we can see that God’s already at work in getting ready for Herod the Great, because his family are brought into the Jewish context that he will become effectively Rome’s puppet.

as a Jewish king sitting on a Jewish throne, but ruled by Rome.  And so this is the point then, after John, Heraclinus  the first, that we now have this mixture of the rule of the high priests who are also kings beginning in 104 BC. And the first of those is Aris Bolas I, and he ruled from 104 down to 103.

He also didn’t last that long. His eldest son staged a palace coup. He threw his mother in prison where she then died of starvation, and to make sure that no one else could challenge him, he threw his brother’s into prison. He heard of a fourth brother who was going to come after him and kill him, so instead he had him killed first.

But he then soon died of natural causes anyway, and so he was taken out of the scene and he was followed by one of his imprisoned brothers, Alexander Janais.  Now he was also to leave a widow, Salome Alexandra, and she would succeed the throne  a little bit later to become queen in her own right. Only one of two queens to rule in their own right.

of the Maccabean, or in the Hasmonean dynasty of the Maccabees.  So Alexander Janais takes over, and he’s an aggressive Hellenizer. He’s actually the one who now begins the second revolt that will really set the religious landscape for Jesus.  He’s the one who actually thinks, you know what? Antiochus IV Epiphanes wasn’t such a bad thing.

It was a structure to society. It was a form that kept everyone in their place.  But the problem is, it didn’t go down well.  So his great grandfather was the one who had started the revolt on purely religious grounds, and ensuring  religious practice was adhered to as it should be. He’s now the one, this guy Alexander Janais, wanting to take them away from that by Hellenizing everywhere again.

But he also had a Leverite marriage with his brother’s widow.  So while acting as high priest at the Feast of Tabernacles in the temple, a sect of Pharisees staged a riot.  They called him unfit for the priestly office and there were about 6, 000 protesters died  When he called in the troops to quash their protest.

But then a rebellion went on for nine years. And that was fought and cost another 50, 000 lives. So that he could maintain power. And it only ended when he captured 800 Pharisees. That are leaders of the Pharisees. He had them crucified. Remember, crucifixion is a Roman tool, but it still happened outside of the Roman Empire, but he did it at an open air banquet.

So here you have someone who at the start of all of this is acting as high priest at the Feast of Tabernacles. Nine years later, he’s the one crucifying the religious leaders, the shepherds of Israel.  So you can see the turn that is now taken in this family.  And so on his death, you Then Alexandra becomes Queen, and on the advice of her first husband her first husband was Artabolus I.

She was then married to Alexander Janais, and because of his death, she now becomes Queen, but obviously some advice given to her by her first husband, she shows favour to the Pharisees. She tries to get everything back on an equilibrium. And she was to reign as Queen for nine years. And her death was to spark a succession crisis with her two sons.

Hyrcanus he would rule.  And then her second son, Aristolus II, who would rule from 66 to 63 BC.  So Alexandra is the one who sees that period of nine years of peace within the land. But unfortunately, she couldn’t get her succession plan sorted out.  And so once again, the country was turned into turmoil.  And the problem was, as it was plunged into war, into a civil war again, it couldn’t emerge on its own.

It took another power to come in.  And in 63 AD, that greater power would end the civil war. And so the power of Rome, whose general was called Pompey, was now seeking to extend Roman control over all of the Near East. And this was the prime opportunity for Pompey to come in and take over Palestine so that it would become Roman.

We’re 63 years away from the birth of Jesus.  The Romans are setting foot in Israel,  but have you noticed who have now poked their heads up above the parapets? The  Pharisees.  And so for the next two weeks, we’re going to look at Herod the Great next week, and that real Roman encampment in Palestine.  But we’re also going to be, in our sixth week, look at the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

Where did these groups come from in all of this history?  Because really they’re the ones who show Israel for what it is in terms of its worship, and why it was so significant that Jesus came into the world at just the right time. So that’s where we’ll take it in the next couple of weeks.  So a dynasty,  Hasmoneans, they rule for almost a decade.

They set their stamp on religious practice,  But even they themselves fall away from what the true religion was, and the Pharisees now see themselves gaining in power and authority. The story of God’s people is one in which they’ve always needed a saviour,  and no king, no high priest,  no well meaning, good being person has ever been able to do that.

And really this is the 11th hour of March.  What we’re seeing now  is the final throes of this society that Jesus came in to challenge.  So whenever Christ came into the world, we talk about Jerusalem, we talk about ancient Palestine being the melting pot.  It was the crossroads of the world. Rome had extended its power.

Every road led to Rome, but every trade route came through Jerusalem.  And so it was a melting pot of the world in these next 63 years as Rome advances.  And what we’re seeing here at the end of the rule of the Maccabees, and what we’ll see 63 80 years later, is really the depravity of humanity. We will see, laid before us, society  that needs a savior.

Humanity that needs a savior. And that’s why we’re drawn to John’s gospel this evening. Because it’s Christ that tells us why he’s come.  We often read John 10 and think of it against the Pharisees. And yes, that’s true. Christ is speaking against the Pharisees. They are the  Jews are the sheep that he came.

But he says he’s other sheep,  that he’s challenging the Pharisees, that they weren’t doing their job. But he was challenging the whole religious practice of Israel. And he’s saying, I have come to be the good shepherd. That’s why he calls himself the Good Shepherd in chapter, in verse 11.  I am the Good Shepherd.

The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Sheep being the people. It is Christ who will lay down his life as Savior, so that people will look to Him,  and not to a great religious person,  and not to a great king, because they cannot save. It is only  to the Messiah, the one who will lay down his life, that they can look to.

This is the reason why Christ came. That’s why we celebrate Easter. That’s why we have all of these biblical images.  Why this is such a rich one for particularly farmers or anyone who lives in the country being able to look out and see a field full of sheep and lambs and just knowing how they work.

We see Jesus said something  more significant  in the preceding verse.  He says in verse 10 that the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.  I came that they may have life  and have it abundantly.  We’ve looked at this with the girls and boys in children’s addresses. But yet how more significant is it when we see how the people of God have been misled?

Even though things started out well, they were misled. Remember, things started out well with Nehemiah and Ezra, but they were misled and they fell into false practices of worship.  But isn’t that why they were sent into exile in the first place?  And did it all begin whenever there was a king in Israel?  No one did what was right in their own eyes at the end of the judges.

And then in comes Saul and it looks like it’s a great new moment, but he fails them.  And David becomes king and David rules well and eventually being called a man after God’s own heart and Solomon does well. But towards the end of Solomon we see the slippery slope.  And as we know in the history of the two kingdoms, there are very few kings who, who go to rest with their fathers having done well for God.

But Jesus says  that each and every one who has come in their own name, is a thief who has come to steal and to kill and destroy.  The Pharisees may seem like they’re the ones who are keeping to orthodoxy now,  but they will be the ones who in the next  half century will dictate what worship will be like.

They will add their own rules. They’ll overrule the people, just in case they sin in the smallest areas. There’s no room for forgiveness with the Pharisees. No, it’s all about keeping the laws so you don’t need forgiveness.  But that’s not the purpose of the law, and that’s not the purpose for Christ.

Christ did not come to commit us to laws. In fact, he came to give us life,  to have it abundantly.  And so in the questions that we have there to take home with you,  the first one is, in what way can you learn from the initial revolt over the defilement of worship in Modane and the protest of the Pharisees during the reign of Alexander, Genes, and so on?

You have this period of time where it starts off so good but it disintegrates. What can we learn from that?  How do we learn about worship of God and how we are led in worship? The second one is how do the words of Jesus in John 10, which we’ve just read, help us to live today in the knowledge of our own salvation?

and also the invitation to salvation of the unsaved.  And how are these words timeless when we look at our world today and the shape of the world into which Jesus was born? Which of course we’re starting to see the real foundation of with the coming of the Pharisees. You see the question for us is how do we not fall into the same trap?

How do we not fall into the ways that God’s people have always done where perhaps they stop worshipping God.  And either worship practices,  or they worship the one from the front, rather than the worship of God.  It is a challenge because we can be very easily  tickled in that way. And I will say that’s probably, from my perspective, one of the greatest, Difficulties of pandemic.

I know of households, and if you’re one of them who you’re listening this evening, I apologize, but I know households who would have watched eight sermons in a row on a Sunday, from one to the other, starting early, finishing evening.  Was it to pass the time? I don’t know. Was it because it simply could be done?

I don’t know. Was it because of interaction, even through a screen?  I don’t know,  but I don’t think it was the best.  Because we then started saying, oh, that was good, based on a presentation style, or based on what was presented, rather than, there’s no way we can go through eight sermons on a Sunday and be able to critique each and every one biblically as we should.

And so we start looking to personality,  rather than to word.  And so the challenge  is not that we have slipped, like the people at the end of the Rule of the Maccabees,  Or indeed, what Epiphany, Antiochus, the fourth Epiphanies, had decreed. It’s not that we’ve slipped that far,  but do we run the risk of doing it?

Jesus says there are those who will come to steal and kill and destroy. Maybe not intentionally, but perhaps intentionally. It is only to Christ that we may have life and have it abundantly. When we look to Him,  and we feed on Him, and not gorge on whatever we can consume, but look to Christ.

He is the Good Shepherd. What he says about himself is true.  And what the people will learn as we get closer to his coming and his ministry  is that he is the only saviour to whom we can turn. The only saviour to whom we can trust.  And in these days,  as the world gets back to whatever the world thinks it needs to be doing,  let’s be careful  that we learn from our own history, that we learn from God’s history, that he continues to be the God over all, but he continues to be the God to whom we are to worship faithfully,  and that we’re not allow ourselves to be taken in any and each other direction,  because he is what he says.

He is the Good Shepherd.  Let’s pray.  Our Father God, we thank you that we learn.  From history, what it means to love Christ.  We know that there’s been a lot of dates, a lot of names, a lot of things that we’ll take in and perhaps we’ll simply go out again because there’s just too many of them. But yet we learn a story and we learn a habit  of humanity.

One minute we’re for you and the next minute we’re against you.  So forgive us for the times when we have allowed the world to suck us into itself  and help us to stay focused on you. Help us to know Jesus as the Good Shepherd so that we will look to Him and to Him only, that we will allow Him to speak into our lives,  that we will look to Jesus as the one who will direct and guide our paths so that we will know life more abundantly  and that we will know the promise and assurance of life eternal.

So be with us as we learn these things. May we live it out each and every day as we continue to look to you.  As we continue to read your word,  and as we continue to know our salvation in Christ, and in Christ alone.  And we ask all this in Jesus name.  Amen.