Mike Bickle emphasizes the beauty of God's heart, focusing on His graciousness and mercy. He explains that understanding God's emotions is crucial for building confidence in our relationship with Him, as it helps us realize that He enjoys us even in our weaknesses. Bickle highlights God's declaration of His name to Moses, revealing His merciful and gracious nature, and encourages believers to embrace this truth to overcome feelings of condemnation and despair. He stresses that God's mercy triumphs over judgment and that His kindness leads us to repentance, ultimately transforming our lives. The sermon calls for a deeper understanding of God's emotions to foster a vibrant spiritual life.

We're going to start in Exodus chapter 33. Get notes at the back table. I think you know that by now, but before we get started, I want to pray against the hurricane of Puerto Rico. It's breaking in there right now in this day or two. Father, in the name of Jesus, Lord, we ask you for peace and safety. We ask you, God, that the violent winds would be turned back. We ask for the body of Christ in that nation. We stand with them as many of them are crying out to you right now. Lord, we believe you that our intercession from this place here, together with many others, that we can make a difference. So in the name of Jesus, we rebuke that hurricane. We command the winds and the storm to stop and to desist and move in a different direction, away from the harm of people. We ask you for that in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. Well, here's session six. We're looking at the beauty of the Lord. Now, the ultimate beauty in the created order is the beauty of who God is. It's more than the beauty of what he has done. Now, when we think of beauty, we think mostly we think visual. I mean, that's the first thing we typically think of, visual beauty. And we'll look at that. But tonight, we're going to look at the ultimate beauty. It isn't what God does, but it's who he is. And it's about his emotions. And the being of God, God's emotional life, is the epicenter of beauty of the whole created order. I mean, that's the source and epicenter of it. That's what gives value and meaning. And that's what imparts. And that's beauty, and that's where beauty is derived in the whole created order, from his burning heart. Because if his heart was not the way it is, then his hand would not do the things that he does. And so, a responsible and thorough study of the beauty of God must be anchored in what his emotions are like. Now, this subject, God's emotions, it's the number one subject that has changed my life over the last 40-plus years. People have asked me, what would be the one truth that would be the emotions of God? Unquestionably, the emotions of God. I've poured over it. That's a subject I'm never weary of, that I constantly search out and talk to the Lord about. I make sure it stays in my conversation with the Lord. It's not just Bible truths that I get familiar with and move on, but I want it constantly in my conversation with the Lord. Because it's the place of his, I mean, the growing understanding of his emotions is where we gain confidence in our relationship with God. When somebody lacks confidence in God, often they don't have understanding of his emotions. They can understand his hand, and his power, and his demonstration, but at the core, they're retreating from God, and they're kind of hiding from him, and they're unsure if the great authority of all the earth is happy or mad at them. They don't know. And what we think about how God feels about us is one of the most important subjects that you will ever grapple with in your life in this age and the age to come. The subject of how God feels about you is really critical to your spiritual vitality, and even to your ministry, and I want to encourage you. I talk on this subject so much over the years. Make this one of the main subjects that you talk about as well. Well, let's start in Exodus chapter 33, paragraph A. One of the great prayers. Moses said, show me your glory. Now, you know, when we're talking about the personality of God or the being of God, glory and beauty is easily interchangeable. Almost every time, you can interchange the two words. In the book of Isaiah, glory and beauty is different commentaries. They interchange it all the time. So let's, for our study's sake, for this course, show me your beauty, God, show me your glory. Verse 19, the Lord says, okay, I will. Here's my beauty. I'm gonna make my goodness pass in front of you. I'm gonna let you see my goodness. But then, I'm gonna proclaim my name to you. I mean, imagine this. God proclaiming God's name. Because to proclaim God's name is to proclaim his own personality. Because God's name is synonymous with his personality. So here is the very pinnacle of God's glory or beauty is God preaching God to Moses. I mean, I can't imagine anything more dynamic. This is God preaching on God to Moses, and he's there taking notes. Paragraph one, God has the best personality in the universe. I know that sounds kind of a funny sentence, but it's true. He has a dynamic personality. He's very kind, very good, really smart, mysterious. Very mysterious, passionate, humorous, bold, gentle, kind, thinks through everything. I mean, he has the greatest personality you can imagine. And the privilege of God revealing his name to Moses or his personality to Moses. In a moment, we're gonna look at what God said when God revealed God. Paragraph two, we can grow deeper in our understanding of each one of the emotions that God's revealed in the scripture. Now, I'm gonna highlight five emotions in God's answer in just a moment. But there's more emotions that God reveals in the scripture. And as we identify them and kind of isolate them on our thinking and stare at them, I encourage you to thank God for them. I mean, actually, thank you for your long suffering. When's the last time you thanked God for his long suffering? Because it will grow in you, the understanding will, if you talk to him about it. But as you thank him, then ask him to reveal more to you about his emotions. And isolate each emotion and talk to him about it. Search it out in the scripture, study it. From the Bible, study it, from commentary, study it from Bible teachers. I study this subject any time I can get a book or an article on God's emotions, I'll do it if I can. And then share it with other people, not just in a public format, but one-on-one. I talk about God's emotions to people more than any other subject when I'm taught and wanting to encourage them. Because almost every one of them, almost every time, their problem, their discouragement, their negativity, their despair is rooted in lack of clarity about God's emotions. Yeah, I mean, that's the same answer to the whole human race. So I find that's the subject I talk most about. Paragraph three, the result is, when we grow in greater understanding. I love this phrase, I've used this phrase for years. We grow in the assurance that he enjoys us. That's the number one emotional need of the human family. The desire, the need to have not just that he loves us in a kind of technical way, the assurance he actually enjoys us, even in our weakness. Beloved, when we grow in that, confidence begins to grow in our life, and then you run to God instead of from God when you stumble. And if you run to him instead of from him when you stumble, the devil is defeated in your life. Because the devil's, his tactic is to wound you and to get you to run from God, to lick your wounds, and he destroys you. He isolates you with condemnation and disgust and all kinds of guilt, and then he pounds on you. That's the goal. He wounds you and then devours you. But when he comes after you and wounds you, you run to God, he doesn't have any recourse. He has nothing more powerful to overpower the truth about who God is. Well, here at paragraph B, now we're gonna look at the answer. It's in chapter 34, it's just a couple of verses after Moses prayed it. Show me your beauty. The Lord says, okay, I will. I'll tell you my name. Verse six, the Lord proclaimed his name. Again, his personality. He said, I am the Lord, the Lord God. And that would mean I have all authority. That's what it kind of means in one sentence there. I have all authority over the nations, over your life. But I have good news. The God with all authority, I am merciful. I am gracious. I am long-suffering. I'm abounding in goodness. And look at verse 14. My name is jealous. I'm deeply invested in the relationship with you. I'm not, you can't easily cast me aside. I won't go away. I'll come back far more relentless than you can imagine. I want you. My name is jealous, which means my personality is jealousy in the full, beautiful sense of loyal, dedicated love. It's not a negative, destructive, possessiveness that destroys, but it's a holy, glorious love that builds up and multiplies and enriches our life. Now, this is such good news, that the God with all authority. I mean, there's only one God who's going to judge you forever. You're going to stand only before one person. I mean, God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. But one person, you're going to stand before Jesus. And He's giving you the confidence that the God of all of creation, of all of history, He has graciousness and mercy in His life. Let's look at each one of these real quick. Paragraph D. He first starts and He says, now that you know I have all authority. I mean, what if He had all authority, but He wasn't tender? And that's how most people imagine God. And that's how the world religions are. The God they imagine is like that. Even many in the faith of, in Christianity, the God that they serve, they're not real sure what it's really like. They know He loves them and they'll forgive them, but that's kind of more just technical language. It's not something that's really made an inroad into their emotions. Paragraph D. He said, I'm merciful. He's tender in the way He relates to us. One of my favorite verses about God's mercy, I'll quote this several times tonight. He delights in mercy. It's one of His favorite activities. He loves showing you mercy and it connecting with you. And when you go, oh! And He loves what happens when it hits you that He showed you mercy. I could just imagine Him saying, oh, I really like it when they do that. But many believers, they're not anchored in this. They run from the mercy of God and they're unsure of it. He goes, no, no, no, I really delight in mercy. This is what I told Moses. This is who I am. Now, this is the first aspect of His personality that He told Moses of the five emotions because it's the part of His emotions that we need to know first. I mean, it's the very first one. He goes, I have all authority. I am the Lord, the Lord God. But I want you to know I'm so tender the way that I carry my authority. Now, some people resist. I mean, sincere believers. They resist God's mercy because it violates their sense of justice. They go, wait, I need to be in probation a little while. I mean, you don't know what I just did. I can't just walk free. I mean, come on. I mean, I wish it was, but that's come on. Let's be real. And God told Moses, I want you to know I'm very merciful. I actually delight in it. This is what I really enjoy doing. Justice has been satisfied at the cross. Beloved, we can stand with mercy. I mean, we can stand with confidence. You have confidence growing in your walk with God? Absolutely nothing can destroy you if you have confidence. Nothing can destroy you spiritually is what I'm talking about. Number one, lamentations three. It's because of the Lord's mercies we're not consumed. If God didn't have mercy, our sin would disqualify us and our sin would destroy us. That's what consumed means. We'd be disqualified. We'd be destroyed. We'd be left behind. But because of His mercies, we're not left behind. We're not disqualified. We're not written out of the plan. Jeremiah, of course, wrote Lamentations. Jeremiah the prophet, he said, I want to assure you His compassions never fail. You will fail, but His compassion will never fail if you ask for it. Never will it fail. Matter of fact, verse 23, they're new every single day. This is a verse I locked into many years ago in my 20s. I'm in my 60s now, so that was forever. I stumbled into this verse somehow, and I anchored it. I locked into this. I said, every single day is a new day, a new beginning. I'm pushing delete on yesterday, the good stuff and the bad stuff. I'm just pushing delete. Here I am, Lord, standing before you. Here I am, your favorite one. Everybody can claim to be God's favorite one, because Jesus said, I love you in the intensity the Father loves me. Every one of us can stand before God. And to some folks, that's kind of a cute little statement, but that's an issue of life and death to me. That's not just a cute statement. This is reality. Every single day is a new day. I don't care what happens tonight in the most horrible, sinful way, with genuine repentance. I don't mean a cavalier kind of, well, you know, let boys or boys, whatever. I mean a genuine, Lord, I'm at war against this. He says, I guarantee you, I promise you, my mercies are new every day. Isaiah 55, Isaiah builds this out. You know the famous verse, verse 8 of Isaiah 55? Let's look at it right in the middle. My thoughts are not your thoughts. Many people quote that verse about God's plans for their life. And they go, boy, sure was tricky. God's thoughts aren't my thoughts. I thought we were going this way, or we went that way. And it's OK to use the verse that way, but that's not what it's talking about. He's talking about the level of mercy I will show you. That's, read the whole context. Verse 7, he goes, let the wicked renounce his wickedness. Let him return back, and I'll have such abundant pardon on you. My thoughts are so much higher, because you wouldn't forgive you, and you wouldn't forgive him or her. But I'm not like you. My thoughts are higher than your thoughts. They're so much higher in the realm of mercy than yours are. I mean, that's amazing. Turn to page 2. I love teaching this, because it just converts me. I get converted every time. I've preached this so many times in 40 years. Every time I walk away, I go, Lord, I'm in this time, for real, no matter what. I appreciate you guys eavesdropping on my conversation with the Lord. I'm just going to close my eyes and finish this message, make it really personal. Number two, emotion. He's gracious. He doesn't give up on us. He won't give up. He's gracious in the sense he won't give up, and he's gracious in the way he evaluates, because we're accustomed to non-gracious evaluation. We run into it all over our life, you know, the teacher, the parent, the coach, the authority figure, the non-gracious evaluator. He says in verse 10, this is King David writing, he hasn't dealt with us according to our sins. That is a giant statement. He's not relating to you based on your sin. Now, he's talking to the sincere believer. He's talking to the believer who sinned, but who repented. So he's not talking to the person that says, hey, if that's how you are, I'm just going to do what I want to do. He goes, no, if you've really said yes to me, but Lord, it's the hundredth time. But you know, you can be sincere a hundred times. You know, that one guy will tell you after three times, hey, I don't want to hear it again. I'm tired. That's the third time you repented. God will take a hundred. He'll take 70 times seven. He'll take 490 times and still forgive. But the thing is he wants genuineness, reality. And now you say, if you're really real, will it be a hundred times? Sometimes, yeah, it will be. But he says, I'm not going to, David said he doesn't deal with me. He doesn't punish me the way my sin deserves. I mean, here's David committed these gross sins, murder, adultery, lying, and a number of things. And God's anointed him. He goes, wait, I should be completely set aside by now. Verse 14, I love this King David. He goes, here's why. He knows our frame. He knows we're dust, meaning we're weak. He knows our frame. He knows that we have a propensity to discouragement, propensity to dullness, propensity to bitterness, a propensity to just go the easy way. We're all made that way, a propensity to quit. He knows and remembers we're dust. So he's tender with us in a way that no human being is. Look at paragraph three at the very end here. King David, he added, I mean, because he's the one that wrote Psalm 103 and Psalm 18. Now, Psalm 18 is really important because David has just finished 16 months in the city of Ziklag. Now, if you've never studied the life of David, which I'm assuming a bunch of you haven't, and some of you have, some of you haven't, but 1 Samuel, chapter 27, the last four chapters of 1 Samuel, he's in Ziklag. 16 months, but he's in compromise. And he's crying out to God. He says, God, my tears are in the bottle. Oh, I need to get free. 16 months, he's not where he should be. And on the day God delivered him after 16 months, here's what he said. Verse 19, he delivered me because he likes me. The guys next to him could say, wait, David, I could picture David in the national interview. He just was delivered. It's a big story. I won't go into it. And he's getting interviewed by the paper. Why did God just supernaturally deliver you because he really likes me? The guy next to him says, David, I know what you've been doing. He goes, yeah, but I know the God that I lived before. He delights in me. That's why I got set free. See, we think that we get set free, then he delights in us. It's the other way around. He delights in us, therefore, we're gonna get set free. Then he went on in verse 35, and he said, talking now directly to God, he goes, you treated me so with such gentleness. I should have made some decisions sooner. You were gentle with me. Therefore, your gentleness has made me great, which means, it doesn't mean that his gentleness is gonna make him famous, but I'm gonna recover and go on to walk with you in a deep way. So my life will be great before you. So this is a promise that everybody can lay hold of. It's not like God's gentleness makes me famous before people, God's gentleness gives me a recovery, a recovery, a recovery, so I can go on to live in a way that God calls my life decisions great at the end of the day when it's all over. Beloved, if he's not gentle with me, I can't go on. I'll get consumed. Paragraph F, number three, now this is God talking to Moses, he goes, this is my personality, Moses. Go tell the people, build your life on this. Moses, build the ministry around who I am. I'm long-suffering. You know what long-suffering means? It means God suffers long. That's literally what it means. He's long-suffering. He bears with us. He doesn't write us off is the idea. The enemy comes and says God's about to write you off and God says, thus says the Lord, I suffer long. My heart grieves because I love you and what you have done, it grieves me, but I will suffer and not let go. I love you, I'm with you. Romans chapter two, Paul talks about this. He goes, some people, they despise the riches of God's goodness, the riches of the fact he suffers long with them. They despise it, they don't draw on it. They lightly esteem it, they go, ah, whatever. Paul says, no, no, draw on it, there's wealth there. If you draw on it, it will lead you to repentance because if you think God's given up and he's done with you, it's much easier to sin the next time. If you think God is standing there eager to embrace you, then it leads you to a deeper repentance. Paul understood that. Gee, number four, the fourth thing God told Moses, I abound in goodness. In Psalm 84, there is no good thing God withholds from those that will walk uprightly. Now, it's his time and it's his way, but you can stand assured that the very best for your life, you may not understand it as it's unfolding, the very best, he says, I will not withhold it from you. If you will continue to say yes to me, I promise you I will not withhold the very best in many areas of our life. I have claimed that promise 1,000 times over the years. Lord, you said, no good thing. If it's good for the will of God in my life and it's good for my spiritual development with you, if it's good, you won't withhold it. When the enemy comes and says God's forgotten and left you behind, you just throw the word of God right back at him. There's no good thing that God will withhold. Paragraph H, he's jealous. He has deep zeal to protect the relationship. He's deeply invested in the relationship. When it says he's jealous, he gives all, but buyer beware, in the most positive sense, he requires all. And it's not in the cold kind of taskmaster way. He goes, I give all, and because I know the value of what I'm giving you, and I know the value of who we are together, I'm gonna require all, so I'm gonna box you in. I'm gonna box you and I'm gonna ambush you. And I'm gonna move some options away from you until you give all, because in the giving all, your life is great and your life is free and your life has ultimate dignity in it. Because I'm not doing it because I can't make it without one more person serving me, but you're so valuable to me and you don't get who you are, so I'm gonna box you in that corner. I got you in that little corner there. Okay, that's where I got you. I'm not gonna let you out because I'm that jealous. Because if you give me all, your greatness and your liberty is in that position of heart. Paragraph I. You know, at the high priestly prayers, what we call John 17. John 17 is the prayer right before Jesus would go to the Garden of Gethsemane and go to the cross. It's that famous prayer, John 17. Most of you are familiar with it. But this is the last sentence of the great prayer. Then he goes to the cross. Or he goes to the garden and sweats the drop of blood. But here, drops of blood. Here's what he says. He's actually referring to the Moses encounter. Because in the Moses encounter, Moses said, God, show me your beauty, show me your glory. And God said, Moses, I will declare myself to you. And then the next chapter, he said, the Lord declared his own name. The Lord is merciful, gracious, long-suffering, et cetera. But here in John 17, Jesus said, he's in prayer to the Father, but he's touching this theme of Jesus declaring what the Father's like. It's God declaring God to people. Jesus is, in essence, saying, Father, I did to them what I did to Moses. I declared your name. But look what the net result is. I love this. This is one of my favorite verses. You know, you get 100 favorite verses, but this is like really at the top. John 17, 26, Jesus said, I declared your name, Father, to them, and I'm gonna keep telling them about you. And when God tells you about God, he's mostly telling you about God's emotions. Yeah, he'll tell you about his power and his wisdom, too, for sure. But the big subject is God's emotions, what his heart is like. He said, here's what's gonna happen. When I declare more about you, Father, to them, and he's gonna do it through the Holy Spirit, through the church history, because he's going to the cross, and so he doesn't mean his earthly ministry, he's done. But he means from the right hand of the Father, through the Holy Spirit, I'm going to make your name known so that the love, look at it, the love with which you love me would be awakened in them. The way that you love me will be stirred in them when I tell them about you. Beloved, when we understand God's emotions, it awakens love in us. That's why this subject is, this is the ultimate subject of the beauty of God. Paragraph J, Paul, now he refers to the Moses experience, the Moses encounter. I mean, Jesus did in John 17, we look at by standing in the position of God declaring God's name, that's what Moses encountered. But here it's the very same language, but a different word here. Paul says, we're beholding, as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord. It's that Moses said, Lord, let me see your glory. And Paul is actually, in 2 Corinthians 3, he's talking about the Exodus 33 and 34 passage. That's actually what he's talking about. And here's what Paul says. When you see the beauty and the glory, but remember the glory that Moses was shown was God's emotions, much more than God's power and God's wisdom, though God's power and God's wisdom reveals his beauty as well. But it's his emotions. It says it's gonna transform you from one degree of glory to the other. There's a process. Now here's the key phrase, one of the key phrase, beholding as in a mirror. Now a mirror in the ancient world is very different than a mirror of today's world. When you look at a mirror today, what you see is what you get. It's perfect. You go, oh no, give me another, I'm gonna get another option, I mean another opinion here. But you know, the mirror is, that's it. But in the ancient world, a mirror was very dim reflection. It was a piece of metal, you had to go like, yeah, I think here it looks, yeah, I think we're gonna, today's a good day. And you can't really tell. Because in a mirror, it's a very dim reflection. And here's what he's saying. And everybody in the ancient world knew a mirror was a dim reflection, not a clear one. He was telling them, even with a dim understanding of the glory, it will still change you. Don't wait until an angel appears, blows a trumpet in your face and says God loves you. Even a faint, dim glance will change you a little bit. Stay with it. Top of page three. Well, we're going back to this verse, we'll, I wanna hit a couple, but I want you to catch the whole thing in Micah 7. But Micah 7,18 is one of those verses you need to sing and preach and share and talk about and blog about and write about a thousand times. Micah 7,18, just put this one, I mean this one needs to be on your heart, really big one. Who is a God like you, Micah's asking. Let this sink in. He pardons all your iniquity. Iniquity and sin is the same idea. You could put the word sin there. He pardons all of your sin. He passes over all of it. What? Transgression, iniquity, sin, use whatever word you want. He passes it over. No God passes over sin, except for our God. He doesn't retain his anger. Why? He delights. He really loves showing mercy. He doesn't say, well, you know, I did kill Jesus on the cross, so I guess I do have to forgive you. You know, Father is the one who killed the son, not the devil. The father offered his own son up. It says in Romans 8, he delivered him up. The father delivered the son up as a just offering and paid for the sin. The justice of God's court was satisfied in the atonement of the son. And some people are like, well, you know, Jesus was killed, but God killed Jesus. Some people are like, oh, I don't like to say it that way. No, that's the power of it. That's how committed God is to it, and the father and the son, it's that dynamic. The father said, if I went to that extreme, you think I'm gonna lightly, you know, just look at your life in a light way and just pass over it? No, I'm that committed. I went all the way to get you forgiven. But sometimes we think, well, you know, God, you know, killed Jesus, so now he's gotta stamp my passport, forgiven. No, God says, no, I delight in it. I love giving mercy to you. Well, because paragraph B, God knows mercy triumphs over judgment. Judgment or divine discipline will wake people up, but mercy will move them deeper than discipline. And God will shower mercy on them because he knows that's more powerful than discipline is if they'll listen to it. But some folks don't listen to mercy. They cast it off. They go, oh, no, you know, I just want a little cabin on the edge of glory. I don't want to bother with God. You know, I don't want to bother you too much. I'll just go over here and just whip myself a little bit. And God, you know, there's a lot of condemnation complexes around the kingdom of God of sincere people. And to live in condemnation after the outrageous provision of the cross is like telling God my sin is bigger than his blood and bigger than your heart. And God says, no, it's not. You're arrogant if you think your sin is bigger than my son's blood and bigger than my heart. I delight in forgiving you. Mercy triumphs. And God will shower mercy. He'll give mercy mercy because he wants to wake us up with mercy. Paragraph C, this is where the mercy of God, it comes to comes to light in a really dynamic way at the dedication of Solomon's temple. You know, King David, the great king of Israel, you know, King David, he's a thousand years BC, thousand years before Christ. Solomon is his son, the next generation. Most of you know that. Solomon is the one that built this magnificent temple. I mean, it'd be like the convention center times 10 other buildings downtown. I mean, this magnificent complex of buildings, the temple. God told David he couldn't build it, but his son could. And when they built it, the glory of God came down on the temple, the fire of God. And when the fire of God came down on the temple, then the Shekinah glory was in the Holy of Holies. The very presence of God came down in front of everybody like fire and it stayed in the holy place. God was in their midst, but when they did it, when the cloud of God, the Shekinah glory descended from heaven and came down there, look what it says, right at the end of verse 13. All the singers and musicians are there and they're blowing trumpets and they're praising God. And look at the theme song, God, for he is good. His mercy endures forever. Beloved, every phrase is powerful. God's mercy endures. God's mercy outruns your sin. God's mercy endures what you and I can't endure. We give up on ourself, but mercy doesn't give up on us. What a powerful statement. And it endures forever, it lasts forever. And then the glory of God filled the temple. Then look at paragraph D, then all the festivities of the dedication. This is later on in the ceremonies, paragraph D. Now Solomon finishes offering this great prayer. Matter of fact, 2 Corinthians 7, that's the famous prayer. I mean, 2 Chronicles 7, if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, the Lord will hear and heal the land. That's this chapter, that's a couple of verses later. So Solomon's in this dynamic prayer that if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray, God will break in. And in the midst of that prayer, right at the end of it, the fire came down a second time. And the same thing, the glory of God was so intense that nobody could enter the temple. The glory of God was so overwhelming, but the singers kicked back into that song they sang earlier, the mercy, the mercy, the mercy. They were proclaiming mercy over the temple, over their nation, over their life. Beloved, that's the theme song of the kingdom. If I had to pick one, because paragraph E, this is the song most recorded in Scripture of any other song in the Bible, this one right here. And it shows up in all of these key, critical times of history, like Solomon's temple. It shows up two times, where they broke out with the chorus, your mercy, they're prophesying it over their life, their nation, the temple, they're prophesying it over their future. Mercy, mercy, we're hanging on to it, the glory's falling. Then years later, about 500 years later, you know, when Israel went into captivity of Babylon, then they came back out and Zerubbabel helped them rebuild the temple again, they did the same song. They sang, your mercy endures. When King Jehoshaphat, just a few years after Solomon, when he went into battle, you know, here's the enemy coming against Jehoshaphat, again, he's just a little bit after Solomon, but he, it's in the memory of the nation how powerful this song is, how meaningful it is. This big army comes and attacks him. I mean, this is really something. The prophet says, put the singers out first, not the soldiers. So they go to the choir, say, guys, sorry, you got your guitars and your horns, but we'll be behind you with, you know, the bow and arrow and the swords. So they went out in front, but they sang the song from back at the temple dedication. The Lord is good, his mercy endures, and God routed the enemy. This is a really key theme song, but make it a theme song of your life. It shows up at critical times of redemptive history. And I believe at the end of the age, as the church is walking through all kinds of pressures and being purified, it's, I'm good, the devil's a liar, I'm good, the devil's a liar. I am good, the devil's a liar, and my mercy endures all of your failure. My mercy's bigger than your failure. Stick with me, I am good, over and over. This is the theme song, and I don't know about the theme, but certainly it would be up at the top for the runnings of a theme song of the kingdom if there was just one, because it's the most recorded song in the Bible, and it shows up at the critical turning points of redemptive history. Well, I got my name all over this one. I'm gonna draw on this beyond measure, and you wanna do it for your life, but you wanna talk people into it as well. You wanna get other folks to go, yeah, I know, God have mercy, I got all that. No, no, you don't. This is way bigger than what you learned in children's church in your homeschooling years. This is really, really big. I mean, it's the same truth, but it's not just, yeah, I know, I know, no, no. This is what life is about right here. That's why you wanna study this. You wanna pray for, thank God for it. You wanna ask for revelation. You wanna write on it, study it, talk about it, sing it, share it, write it. You wanna live, you wanna be inundated in this theme. Paragraph F, Jesus told the leaders of his day in Matthew 9, he said, go learn what this means. I want mercy. Then a few months later, they were doing the same thing. They were rejecting the people God was forgiving, and then in Matthew 12, he says it again to them. He goes, wait, if you would have learned what I told you a few months ago, I want mercy. I want mercy to be central theme of the kingdom of God. Top of page four. Now, this is just kind of a repeat, so I won't take long on this, but I'm just reinforcing, if when God revealed himself to Moses at the establishing of the covenant nation, because Moses, God's making the covenant with Israel openly on the mountain with fire, and he goes, I want you to base the covenant on this revelation of who I am. I am merciful. I am gracious. I'm slow to anger. I'm long-suffering, et cetera. Now, Joel, this is the classic chapter on the solemn assemblies. You know, when there's danger coming to a nation, God says, gather together, cry out to God, and maybe the danger, and typically it's a military invasion, is typically the danger that's in view, or a natural disaster, an economic and an agricultural crisis of the locust plague was happening in Joel. So, Joel's day, they had a military invasion, and they had an agricultural economic crisis where famine and, you know, so it would be a natural disaster sort of thing as well. And so, whether it's natural or military, when a crisis is mounting up, God told the people of Israel, gather and cry out to me. Now, when you gather, take time to repent individually. Individually, whatever you're living, compromise and break your agreement with the compromise. And he says the same things that God told Moses. And so, we're not gonna go through them in a big way because it's the same thing, but I just want you to see that to avert a crisis for God to relent or to turn a crisis away in a nation, he goes, it's the same basis. If you'll cry out and have confidence in who I am, I'll respond to you this way. He says in verse 13, return to the Lord. And the verse before, verse 12, he says, tear your heart, not your garment. Break free of that area and give yourself to me, but I want you to give yourself with confidence. Here it is. I want you to know five things. I'm gracious, I'm merciful, I'm slow to anger, I have great kindness, and I do change the harm that's coming to a geographic area. Now, this is talking about a national calamity, but it's the same in our own personal life. I mean, the principles apply the same. So what God's doing here, he wants them to, Joel wants to give them courage that if they repent, it's doable and it matters and it will make a difference. We take one step, he'll take 10. We take one step, he'll take 10. Paragraph B, he's gracious. Again, he evaluates so differently. We got the verse we looked at from David. He doesn't deal with us according to our sins. He doesn't punish a nation according to what they deserve. If they'll repent. As high as the heavens are above the earth, his mercy is higher than the sky is above the earth. When it says the heavens, it means the sky above. Think how high the sky is, five miles. Well, the mercy is way beyond that. He says, I'll remove your transgressions, paragraph C, because he delights in mercy. He's merciful. Paragraph D, he's slow to anger. In Revelation chapter two, this is really graphic here, how God is slow to anger. This is the same thing as being long-suffering. To Moses, he's long-suffering. To Joel, he said, I'm very slow to anger. It's the same thing. Jesus appeared to the church, I mean, to John the Apostle on the island of Patmos, the book of Revelation, and he says, let me tell you about Thyatira, the church. It's in Turkey, modern-day Turkey today, that city of Thyatira. He goes, they're doing good on this and this and this, but, verse 20, I have something against you. He says, and what I have against you, not all of you, some of you, you allow this woman, Jezebel, you know, don't name your daughter Jezebel. That's just not a great name. I don't know why they did that. Give her a different name, but anyway, I mean, there's another Jezebel, you know, back in the old days, but anyway, because you allow this teacher, she was a teacher, to seduce my people with teaching that immorality is okay, but here's the point. I mean, we all know that's not good, but here's the point, verse 20. I gave Jezebel time to repent. That is remarkable to me. I mean, if God gives Jeze time to repent, how much more, no, I mean, this is remarkable to me. I go, Jesus, she's giving people confidence to move in immorality. He goes, I know, I know, but I still wanna give her time. That's who I am. I am blown away by that. He says, but verse 22, he goes, if she won't, go tell her, time is running out. I will throw her on a sickbed. Some people say, well, Jesus wouldn't do that. Well, you gotta, in the name of Jesus, rebuke Jesus here, because he said he would. Yeah, I'm going with the Bible. Jesus said, no, I will. I will get her attention, and I'm gonna wake up everybody that's following her. I'm gonna throw her on her sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her, I'm gonna throw them into tribulation to wake them up, and I want them to repent and break free from this. But if they repent, I'm gonna pass over it. Isn't that amazing? I gave her time to repent. I've used this many times over the years, this passage, and I always am stunned by God's mercy on Jezebel. Number four, he tells great kindness. Great kindness, I want to tell you this. The Lord wants us to know that his kindness, it will lead us to repentance, knowing that in our repentance, it will never be met with rejection by God. God says, I won't reject your repentance. If you will take my great kindness. And then paragraph F, number five, that he gives them the promise. Now this, again, he's talking to a geographic area. He says, the military invasion won't happen, or the natural catastrophe, I will relent. I'll draw it back, because you've cried out to me, because I just, even though the devil is involved in those things, the Lord says, I'm taking my hands off, and I'm gonna let the devil have more room, or let the catastrophe go. You know, one guy says, does God send it, or does God allow it? I go, if God's sovereign, I don't know what difference it really makes, whether he sends it or allows it, it does happen, and it can be stopped with repentance. And if that can be true of a geographic area, we know that's what God's personality's like. Amen, well, let me pray over you. Let's stand before the Lord. I wanna ask for a spirit of revelation to come and touch you. Again, you really wanna go deep on this. This is real simple doctrine, but I never get weary of saying it, and I've said this 30, 40 years, these same ideas, I love these ideas. I never, I never ever will outgrow them. Father, here we are before you. I ask you, show us your glory. Show us your beauty. Show us what you're like, not just what you do, what you're like. Let us be awestruck that you're so tender with so much power and so much wisdom, you are so tender. You're so invested, you're so kind, and we thank you in Jesus' name, amen.