Don McClure explores Hebrews 11:32, focusing on the life of Samson as a profound example of both inevitable fall and God's restorative power. He emphasizes that while Samson had consecration without communion, authority without accountability, and glory without true greatness, he ultimately found restoration through humility and a renewed relationship with God. McClure highlights the importance of genuine fellowship with God and the dangers of isolation, urging believers to seek accountability and spiritual communion. The sermon concludes with the reminder that even those who have fallen can be redeemed and used by God for His glory.

Picking it up this morning in verse 32 and what more shall I say for the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and of Barak and of Samson and of Jephthah and David and Samuel and of the prophets who through faith subdued kingdoms wrought righteousness obtained the promises and stopped the mouths of lions. We're only going to do one name and all of that this morning but let's pray and then we'll look at it. Lord how we do thank you for this wonderful list of many people that you have put within your Hebrews hall of faith and a spiritual fame and Lord it's such an interesting list as we see some of these names and how different so many of them are and how different their lives were whether even Rahab the harlot and to see her listed here but a woman there who came to you and gave her heart and her life and though her life was so checkered Lord to realize there that you brought her not only into the family of God but Lord literally brought her into the very line of the Messiah our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ himself Lord thank you for that but as we look at some of these names we ask that you would take and feed us with them strengthen our lives our faith in you our ability to offer our hearts in our lives to you and to follow you even more and more for father we ask it in Jesus name amen. This morning we're gonna I'm gonna try to actually wrap up Hebrews 11 in the next week or two but I do want to just kind of look at it there's so many names but they're just listed here and so but some of their stories I think are such powerful stories interesting stories for us to realize that here are some people that as we look at their lives and they do end up here in Hebrews hall of faith where God looks at them is having you know and puts them up before the rest of the world before history and says here these are my men and my women of faith and what I want to look at this morning that to me it's always been such an interesting character I suppose in all of history and all the Bible so many ways is Samson and because it's to me as you look at Samson and we'll look a little at his life this morning but as you look at Samson and to me he's he's a study he's almost at the very I just think of him a tremendous study in and of himself on what I usually think of as the inevitable fall of course we know how that Samson and Delilah ultimately when Samson there fell that we you know with Delilah and the judgment that he brought upon his own life in this and ultimately in his life but he's a tremendous study in somebody falling and yet he is also a tremendous study in God's ability to restore somebody lovingly powerfully God's great desire to take any heart in life that he can get his hands on and and restore so he's a tremendous study to me on the inevitable fall in your God's ability to restore such a one just a little bit of a history when you would look at Samson he's in the book of Judges about chapters 13 through 16 we haven't got time to read through it all this morning but hopefully you will you will if I start boring you just turn to it read it it'll be better than what I probably have to say anyway but the otherwise I look at it later to see what you get out of those chapters yourself but Samson a few things about him he had very wonderful parents he came from a wonderful home they obviously love the Lord they serve the Lord they worshiped the Lord his father Manoah was of the tribe of Dan and his wife was barren as you may recall the story until literally the Lord visited them and told her and then ultimately the two of them how that they would have a child and this was a special child he was promised there that that God would use this child to deliver the children of Israel from their bondage now the book of Judges has over and over stories through the book of Judges thus it's called the book of Judges but of these judges that God raised up each time the children of Israel when they would fall away from the Lord in their own hearts their own life as a nation God would give them over to their enemies he'd give them over to whatever it was that was around them and it overtake them they'd overpower them they bring them into bondage they'd lose their wealth they'd lose their stability their strength their hope and as their spiritual life went so seemed to go the rest of their lives in so many ways and yet there when they would get down and they would kind of get to the bottom of the barrel so to speak and then they begin to cry out to God God would raise up and deliver and this deliver would then not only usually deliver them of course out of the hand of their enemy but more importantly bring them back hopefully into a stronger relationship with God that they could be spiritually once again blessed and the book of Judges is kind of these cycles over and over again or generation after generation seem to go through these same lessons again and again well at the time that Samson was born the children of Israel were going through one of these cycles and here they were in bondage and they're beginning to cry out and as they're you know crying out to God God is now planning and raising up a judge that was of course to be Samson to deliver them and here is God they'll promise this specific interesting way that he was going to do it with Samson he was to have a Nazarite vow in this Nazarite vow that he wouldn't touch his hair drink a strong drink let his hair grow and have then wouldn't touch strong drink and dead bodies and other things that had to touch dead bodies and things that had to do with the Nazarite vow it was an interesting thing that here Samson's parents took him they dedicated him they raised him this way he was under this vow he lived according to this vow and he was such an interesting character kind of as you watch him just a very brief outline we haven't got time to get into it too much this morning as I said he was very unique in the sense that his birth and manner of birth in a manner of life or literally foretold very clearly he ruled the children of Israel and the nation of Israel for some 20 years he of course was very supernaturally gifted with great strength and great power as we all know and he killed a lion he killed 30 Philistines on one occasion another time just with the bone of an animal he goes and he killed a thousand on another occasion he could break the strongest of bands that you could give him in these huge gigantic gates of Gaza he could pick and he could carry them you know for miles on his back without as if somebody carrying around a cardboard box or something and then ultimately he literally with his strength he pulled down the temple of Dagon where his pressers you know were worshiping and to destroy an entire temple and to bring it down upon them but as you look at Samson he was as long as he remained a Nazarite that is as long as he kept this vow the interesting thing is is he was literally inconquerable and it's interesting though it's some other things that just might mention that we'll look at a bit more in depth in a few moments but is that he's the only leader that I think is very important to understand a little bit the only leader or judge of Israel with whom with that is we have any history at all about that everything that he did during his entire life he did alone he did it single-handedly that is what he did he did absolutely alone and he did in his own strength he there's never a single word in all of the record of Scripture about Samson he ever meeting with any court any leaders any of the elders of Israel any of the priests any of the military ever calling the armies of Israel ever together for any reason at all he never sought any help any direction anything outside what he did he did entirely in his own leadership and it's interesting because as I said when you look at Samson he's a tremendous study on watching somebody fall and then of course as we'll see is at the end of this God's ability even then to renew them to faith in a most wonderful way but here are some aspects about Samson's life that if you're one to take notes you just might might think about it and you know note them down and maybe look at them later and that I think are quite interesting and that is the number one when you look at Samson you'll see a man who knew very well what it was to have consecration without communion and what I mean by that is Samson was a man that he was dedicated to the Lord by his parents he was raised up in a certain vow he was given a manner of life a behavioral of life he was given certain vows in a ritual and as long as he maintained that ritual as long as he kind of just maintained those standards the promise of deliverance it was being fulfilled through him it's as if you just don't get out of this process here's the form that you're to follow Samson here's how you're to live you live that way and you'll be okay but at the same time you don't have to look very far into Samson to realize that the same time that there is absolutely no mention zero mention of Samson at all with any fellowship with God all the way through the record about him there is not one record of any communion with God is absolutely non-existence any comment like that no spiritual life is even remotely referred to which makes him entirely different when you pick up the rest of the scriptures when you pick up the patriarch you pick up the other leaders of Israel you would pick up and look at the the other judges of Israel you realize that he's very unique when you start you look at Enoch a man who walked with God and he was not for God took him you look at a man like Joseph or Abraham to begin with perhaps I suppose a man constantly building an altar worshiping God seeking God renewing things with God getting things right with God being corrected by God spoken to by God speaking to God his whole life was he ultimately ended up to be a course is the great honor of being a friend of God you look at Jacob a man who wrestled with God who learned what it was to wait upon God and all of his spiritual life in his struggles he had but you realize this great connection that he's learning in his relationship with God Moses a man constantly at God's feet up on the mountain for weeks on end sitting before God waiting upon God getting direction from God what is he seeking God's will God's plan you look at Joshua man there who knew what it was to take off his shoes to seek God to bow down before him to wait upon him time after time for what God wanted for the nation and the children of Israel you look at a man of course like David constantly worshiping constantly singing writing music to God seeking God with all of his humanists and all of his struggles but yet at the very core of it the Bible goes to great extent to show that above all else that our life with God is with God it's to be in communion and fellowship with God I think one of the most fundamental things that there ought to be in life for anybody that it wants to have a right relationship with God has realized that the importance of fellowship with God something again not mentioned when you look at Samson through his life I think one of the great tragedies today oftentimes even many of the theologies today have an awfully lot to do with how to get things from God you know how to get God on your side how do you know the keys to open up you know God's blessing in your life and to have God working for you and but rather than than realizing that the great objective of all of life like Paul says is to know him and to make him known oh that I may know him and the power of his resurrection the fellowship of his sufferings if that by any means I might be made conformable unto his death that was the great passion of a man like Paul the great passion of a man like Moses was show me thy glory a man there who longed to know God face to face not just simply get things from God and to get life done by God and to get you know battles won you know by God and achieve things you know because of God but more than that it was to know him it was to fellowship with him to walk with him and the tragic thing is is that here you when you look at Samson you realize here is this man when you would read through the scriptures for 20 years leading ruling the children of Israel and yet there is no record of any communion ever at a time in a temple ever at a time and seeking guidance ever at a time in prayer ever at a time of anything he's it's quite amazing when you just realize how isolated he was spiritually is sense from God not a word about anything at all where you look at David as the deer paneth after the water broke so paneth my soul after thee or when you would look at the end of David Oh God thou art my God early will I seek thee my soul thirsteth and my heart paneth after thee in a dry and thirsty land so I look toward thee in thy sanctuary to see thy power and thy glory and because thy loving kindness is better than life thus while I live will I appraise thee I lift up my hands to thy name a man there constantly and before God was Samson none of that he essentially had consecration he had all of the outward externals but the inward wasn't there he knew what it was you know you'd see Samson he'd be in church he'd be you know a leader in church perhaps he'd be somebody there that all the externals here's the vow being kept you know here's the Nazarite thing here you know the guy's not out touching dead bodies he's not out with strong drink and he's not out doing all the things he's just straight and narrow good old Nazarite boy now he had all of the externals of a consecrated life without communion with God that's a life that's going to be in trouble that's a life that's just waiting for disaster that's why I look at him I think he's a study in an inevitable fall and it's going to happen he also interestingly enough about him that makes him quite different than the other leaders of Israel is he had authority without accountability and very simply I mean here was a Samson essentially a great authority over the whole of the nation of Israel he was their judge for some 20 years he ruled them and yet at the same time Samson was a man unto himself as I said earlier he never called upon any counsel any direction any input whatsoever from anybody else needed nobody else's encouragement guidance leadership he was couldn't be rebuked it couldn't be corrected when there was something and even there when somebody did start to see and they wanted to say what's going on he just had a way of being able to go on and being entirely untouched and what he did he did entirely unto himself he was an absolute loner now maybe he could justify it in his own thinking so you know I was born different I'm not like all the other men around and I just kind of grew up different and and I you know it's interesting I see a lot of men this is very very common with men to be loners women I don't know how I don't know how you're made so you work that one out I mean you're more social it's hard for women to be you know but I'm supposed everybody can have the problem but it's a classic problem with men we're raised you're supposed to be independent you're supposed to be strong you're supposed to be a leader which oftentimes is set you up almost to be a loner to never be anybody that needs anybody it's almost not masculine you're not you're not a strong person if you require other people if you need to look and get counsel and confirmation or direction or who you are or you can't receive correction from somebody else or help from somebody else but whatever the excuse is oftentimes I don't know how often is I mean it's well you know I'm just kind of a loner as if that is now justification to live that way then the carry-on you know I never really kind of open up you know it's always awkward for me to tell my needs and faults too and we have all these little excuses but the bottom line is is a lot of men they never know what it is you know to open up their heart in their life to God and to have others that whose counsel and whose help they need and it's a tremendous door in a window to me there through its Satan can call right into a person's heart in life when he can get them along I remember some years ago when we were fighting in Lebanon there was a the commanding colonel over all of the US forces in Lebanon was a man there known a very proud man a very strong leader I guess a strong person but he would get in his jeep at night and just go cruise around around the town and evidently they you know they checked him out and began to watch him and sure enough one night he got out in his jeep driving out in the streets alone and they set it up where they you know block the streets and caught him and then if you recall you know it's quite a news story for a while that they had him and then they ended up publicly hanging him there to mock him because of the fact simply the man they got him alone that's always been Satan's way if he can get somebody alone so all he's got to do is get you alone will you live your life alone the devil got Eve alone there in the garden David was a man when he fell David fell alone the second Samuel tells us at a time when Kings go forth to battle David tarried still at Jerusalem and then one night he walked out you know of course on his patio there and as he looks down and he sees Bathsheba but here he was a man he was alone when the devil can get you alone he can get you isolated and get you to live a life of isolation you're going to be in trouble Samson again he was a man he fell alone Elijah fell alone when he lied you know on one hand he could take on 450 prophets of Baal fearlessly but then when he could he was alone and hiding in the back of a cave he was easy for the enemy to get to him and to me when there's so many times you just see people they live their life alone they and yet they have great authority they run their home they run their marriage they run their family they run their business they run everything you know all around them but yet they're still all self-contained and they don't have anybody that they really look at and here Samson was a man there as he's living his life under the edicts of his own counsel in that alone he's in trouble that's why I think it's so important the Bible says forsake not the assembling of yourselves together that we know what it is there with our hearts and our lives to be open to correction open the council open to having others you know that would look into our hearts and our lives basically any time that I see somebody fall and we've all seen people fall and we and maybe there's many of us here that have fallen in this one area weakness or sin ourselves and you'll always see this pattern you'll see somebody to where you maybe could carry on the externals you had no you consecration there in a sense or look like a good spiritual life in a sense but it was without real communion you could have authority that was going on you're living your own life but there was no real accountability you got yourself out there in a way and alone that's what happened to Samson he was also a man to me when you look at him through the scriptures you realize he had what I just think of as glory without greatness in the sense there the man was he had this image people looked at him tremendously successful obviously wherever this man went he was a legend in his own time obviously he walked into a town and Samson Samson is here oh Jack God bless you my friend but Samson's in town and here this this man there that I mean kills a thousand people with the jawbone of an ass I mean you want to think hello that's all you could do it with you I mean you just find it and you I mean who is this guy he can do anything with anything and sometimes we live in a society today where you so often people are known by their achievements and they can have a glory whether it's there yet we live in a day and age where stardom I mean you be a turn on the news and everybody you know who it is that's the greatest in you know in the athletic world the golf world the tennis world the football world the the singing world the actor and actress world you know you just have the political world or by their achievements by their personal glory the things that they have done the businesses they have built the money that they have the power that they control and there's a glory that you can easily have but it has nothing to do with the human being themself Samson he had glory but he did not have greatness when you look at him as to his personal character what the man really was what the man thought I mean if somebody there he could just walk down the street he just saw some woman he wanted like some sort of a rock star get her for me have her in my room after the show sort of a guy and you realize here a man he had glory but when it came to character he did not know what it was to be great he would be great among you let him be the servant of all he was served by all he was somebody there that he knew how to take his glory when he came in he knew he was somebody as well as anybody else there was somebody in command I want this get this for me I'll have that and what a tragic thing to literally look at somebody going through their life in this plastic world this non-existent real world that to the economy of God is a shell and here's Samson it's actually happening to him consecration without community authority without accountability glory without greatness and then he was also a man he had sensuality without morality in the sense when you look at Samson again it wasn't just Samson and Delilah everybody of course knows the story is Samson Delilah but anybody that knows the story no she was just another in a string this was just the way the man functioned this was just the way the man seemed to think it's like Samson lived outside of all of the real fundamental characteristics that God wants within somebody he seemed to be able to live his life without a real comprehension of the real values of life that somebody ought to be looking at and wanting he recklessly just lived his way through life he was just great sinfulness courting disaster all the time and somehow or another God in his patience and in his mercy and in his care for the people whatever he just seemed to hold on to him and keep him but here was something there for a person like this you know again he had says it sensuality with without morality every human being has sensuality God created us that way we're all created in sensual beings we all have a desire put within us designed by God when God created Adam and Eve and there that they looked upon one another but initially says they were naked and there was not a shame but yet she was beautiful there was this wonderful desire that God created between a man and a woman a sensuality there was to be a glorious a celebration of God's created design and enjoyment of one another but it was also a directed sensuality that had a morality about it had a value system that here's you know she is yours he is yours nobody else is though and everybody has sensuality you know they were all born with it it's but it can be reckless it can be with absolute abandon where it's just everywhere you know we all have it if you if you're unless God's giving you the gift of celibacy maybe some of you you tomorrow know what he's talking about I don't have any sensuality about me well then maybe you have the gift of celibacy you know or you're just a liar you know or you need a doctor I don't know what it is but it's one of those things you know the I mean there God created this this way we are to have this but he also created somebody there were where we choose yet that that is to be directed towards one being one person where our love and our attraction and our adoration and our affection is poured out and then everybody else is ruled out and everybody else there are fences there barriers that are put up within our heart and within our life and it and otherwise it's just a lust that just to go overtake and destroy somebody and we seem to live in a day and age where the whole world is catering to lust between Paris and Rome and London and New York and the whole fashion world it just seems to have literally completely picked up on just a lustful reckless abandon that everything seems almost be designed by and for and around the concept of lusting you look at the you know you can't drive down the freeway any longer without having somebody you know it half-naked trying to sell you something you know in a lustful way taking their you know man's sensuality and wanting directed and into whatever it is they're trying to sell or move or have or shove upon society you can't all read a newspaper you know without pictures thoughts and constantly thrown that you can't pick up a magazine you can't watch a sporting event without having a thousand women trying to sell you a can of beer you know half-naked I mean we live in a world now where even Victoria doesn't have any secrets anymore you know sort of a thing if she ever did I don't see any secrets there's no secrets left with that woman you know sort of a thing we live in a world where it is all right out there in here when somebody just allows this to take over their art in their life that is not the way God designed this to where somebody just goes on all I have this I want this it'll destroy them everything is pure and precious and wonderful and yet something God created to be so precious I look at the book of Song of Solomon and you realize these two young lovers these two young husband and a wife and you literally see that as this man as he's off about his business and do work during the day and he's thinking about her and and by the way you mean you gotta read it if you're married don't read it if you're not married he's very you know graphic in the Song of Solomon on what he thinks about her and then what she is thinking about him but it's a sensuality with morality this is their mate this is where their affection is to be I know when I was a kid growing up and I worked both in a gas station and then when my dad owned a oilfield equipment business and I in the summers I could not work out in a shop some of these guys on the shop with their toolbox you know they get there and open up the tool box and there's miss whatever month it was there in the box and as they'd open up and they'd be talking to her half the day you know or hi you know whatever her name was and they all the jokes and the humor was all around this sort of a thing yet at the end of the day the guys closing down you know his box getting ready to go home and going home to the old lady you know or something now is but not Song of Solomon that guy when he's going home he's I'm going home to my old lady too he was excited because that's where his heart was and we live in a day and age where sometimes we you know we allow our hearts in our lives to get taken off in the wrong directions I remember some years ago counseling with a couple in ministry they're leaving the ministry and they're separating getting a divorce and trying to finally get them in to sit down and talk to him to try to help them and she's crying begging you know that we've got to work this out and couldn't get anywhere with them and finally she left the room for something and for a few moments I said what in the world's going on why won't you tell me what is the real problem here what are you leaving her for finally tells me says well I'll tell you something I haven't slept with my wife I'm sorry to be graphic on Sunday but this is I haven't slept with my wife in 10 years I said you got a problem and they said oh it's been her don't get me wrong but it hasn't been her for 10 years it's been my secretary or it's been somebody else and how does that happen that's when sensuality is without morality when somebody allows their somebody else to creep into their heart in their life in their marriage and the next thing you know when we live in a day and age you can't watch TV you can't go without all these people wanting to creep in to your heart and your desire and when somebody says no but tragically Samson was a man that he couldn't control it and these things destroyed him they just came finally one day you know Delilah finally one day that you know came there and you know to town and there set him up and of course down the man goes as his hair is shaved his eyes are taken out the strength is all gone he's now thrown down into the dungeon in a sense of life you know they're working a grinder there for the enemy and there is he's just made a mockery of and he's enslaved but you look there and you realize there was a tragic thing that can happen and it's so common we've all seen it many times and lives that seem to be utterly hopelessly destroyed and they're gone but the interesting thing is is there is Samson found himself down there in that dungeon eyes gone and the time began to go by Samson learned one last lesson the most important one maybe of life and that is Samson found the way of restoration through self-renunciation Samson was a man there that he went to essentially he went to town and he got stung he got set up and for all sorts of reasons one day they all lined up and they got him and he lost his sight but he was probably more hurt by you know all the memories than anything else because finally though he lost sight of himself he lost sight of his superficial you know authority Ed was gone his superficial greatness his superficial consecration without communion he lost sight of how others thought of him and he gained sight of some new values and there he found himself renewing his vows but this time they weren't his parents vows now they were his own his hair grew and as his hair grew back and there he let that grow one day they're in the temple worshiping Ged Dagon and they think hey go get Samson he's always good for a joke he's always good for fun so they haul Samson out and they bring him into their temple as they're worshiping but here he finds he's drawn in and he's brought in the next thing you know a man who never needed anybody now asked a little lad that tells us and in Judges 16 is a little lad to take his hand say can you tell me where the pillars of this temple are he says yes take me there here he's now able to submit himself to somebody else I need your help to a little boy and as he's taken over there the first prayer ever recorded as he asked God strengthen me again you never asked to be strengthened before he just assumed it but now it's a prayer God would you ever give me strength again would you ever touch my life again is such a thing possible and there is he cries out in a humility and in a brokenness asking God you know a man I don't think is ever so weak is when he thinks he's strong and yet a man is never closer to omnipotence is when he's weak and a man there finds himself God I I need you and I need your help and the next thing you know you find a man there now he has communion and now a man has accountability and now a man has greatness and now a man there has morality he has a whole new value about himself and there amazingly it tells us that is Samson brought down those pillars I love the verse there and send judges where it says that Samson he killed more in his death than he did in his life here he ruled for 20 years and he did a lot of great things for 20 years but in one day in his death he did more than in his life and that's always true a dead man when somebody's they're dead to themselves dead to their own dead do anything and everything else and Lord just take me I'm yours that man will always do more than a man who's alive in himself they'll always accomplish more and there in one day you watch God and how he takes this man who for years lived one way and yet at the same time isn't it amazing than the Hebrews chapter 11 Hebrews hall of faith God takes this man and he looks at him lifts him up and there he says he is my man of faith he is the man isn't it wonderful that on how you know you can live your life and have so many weird things about it and yet God and his mercy and his grace and his goodness can take it and in one day it can be entirely turned around in one day it can be renewed one day God can do such glorious glorious things yesterday I was up speaking in Twin Peaks and there was a couple there and they came up to me afterwards and this gal she she looked at me and she said you remember me and I did and I was teaching up at Calvary in Costa Mesa she used to be there on Wednesday nights and oftentimes coming up asking for prayer and here she is she says I want you to meet the man I'm marrying next month and she was praying that God would restore things well as she started talking I remembered her story she got divorced 11 years ago and she would come and pray that God would restore and God would restore their marriage had fallen apart they lost everything he had failed divorced 11 years ago she was standing there with him yesterday and she said God's restored us we're getting married next month and here's he smiled he said well it was all my fault and he says but God has been so gracious he's giving us back to one another that's what God loves to do he loves to take somebody that through all the failures and all the things in life that when by faith we just open our heart and say God help me perhaps today there's some of us that we just have things that we have you know we consecration we have all the external things people so they're fine person good Christian I'm sure but yet in our own heart we'd say who we kidding God there's no real communion my heart does not cry out for you day by day to help me and to impart your strength to me and to work within me I'm just a shell or maybe we would look there and realize I've got authority you know and I you know but I don't really know what it is to ask people to take my hand I could never even dream of coming to a little lad say would you pray for me or let alone somebody else say would you help me I'm a man to myself I'm a woman to myself instead of being on how I'd encourage you men get in the men's fellowship ladies get into the you know iron sharpens iron the Bible says that there's faithful even of the wounds of a friend if there's somebody there that even has to come and correct you or direct you or speak in your heart in life about who you are God keep me accountable to you and I'm not out there alone or you know and do I have a glory without greatness do I have something there to where people would look and say well they're quite the somebody but it's my character one that one day when my life is really done and over and it's being folded up and it's through the God you would look and I would be able to look and say life has been great great in you and great in your love and great in your mercy great in your grace you've taught me and you've helped me that's what he wants but on so often God just has to sometimes another bring us down into the dungeon and let us get our head shaved our eyes pulled out till finally I see some of you ladies looking over at your husbands who have a head like mine and say oh that's an Old Testament thing nothing new at all I hope but anyway but where we do look and say God get me where I want to be but the wonderful thing is that right now you may not you may have lived your life a whole one way but even today like Samson you say Lord help me Lord help me today forgive me do these things within me and just like that the Lord can lift you out and put you in his hall of faith and use your life mightily amen let's pray father we come before you and Lord how we thank you for your love thank you Lord for your word and thank you that you can take a life and do such wonderful things with it we live in a world that is so good at just making life seem so simple and superficial that we can go on thinking we're a great success in all sorts of superficial ways of immaterial ways of things that are not spiritual they're not right they're not eternal they're just stuff and yet Lord you look at us and say I love you and I'll help you cry out to me and I'll do a wonderful work Lord I just pray today even while we're praying now that maybe there's some here that would say Lord some of these things fit me I want you to touch my life and Lord maybe some of us would look and say Lord I I've had consecration but not communion help me Lord I just pray that right now we just cry out and we'd ask you maybe some of us look and say boy I am a loner I live my life alone I have all the excuses for it and explanations but Lord I need to begin to open my life and be accountable and let others know me and pray for me and me pray for them or maybe some of us we look and everybody seen this go by would say boy I wish I had what she had or he had there's glory but me may look and say Lord there's no greatness here and we want Lord to help us help us with greatness being great in your kingdom servant of all caring for others ministering to others teach us these things and Lord of course sensuality without morality Lord help us there to just direct our hearts to the where it ought to be in Lord to any other temptation these things that would draw us aside that we live in a world that is plagued with this Lord that we would find ourselves Lord like even Job says I have made a covenant with my eyes not to look upon the young women Lord that there would be something that we would look at our hearts in our lives and our marriages though whether the men you know with the women of the women that look and say I just want to know my husband and no other but Lord that you would just help and strengthen the depth of love and commitment to you and to one another Lord that our lives are the way you want them to be help us Lord thank you for your word and that Lord you could write our name down in Hebrews Hall of faith that we could look and say you know we had to do those same battles ourselves and we struggled and we even knew failure but his grace was greater than all of our sin all of our sin Lord that is what you love to do help us today in Jesus your wonderful name we pray amen