37 On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.38 Whoever believes in me, as1 the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”39 Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Footnotes
[1]7:38Or let him come to me, and let him who believes in me drink. As
17:1 All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” 3 But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” 4 So Moses cried to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 And the LORD said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah1 and Meribah,2 because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the LORD by saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Israel Defeats Amalek
8 Then Amalek came and fought with Israel at Rephidim. 9 So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose for us men, and go out and fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”
Footnotes
[1]17:7Massah means testing [2]17:7Meribah means quarreling
37 On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.38 Whoever believes in me, as1 the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”39 Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Footnotes
[1]7:38Or let him come to me, and let him who believes in me drink. As
17:1 All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?” 3 But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” 4 So Moses cried to the LORD, “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” 5 And the LORD said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah1 and Meribah,2 because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the LORD by saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
Israel Defeats Amalek
8 Then Amalek came and fought with Israel at Rephidim. 9 So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose for us men, and go out and fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”
Footnotes
[1]17:7Massah means testing [2]17:7Meribah means quarreling
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Joel Brooks:
Before we open up God's word tonight, I just wanna say just a couple of things. As you know, we we've grown a lot as a church. For the first time in our history, we actually have a lot of visitors. Normally, we could identify visitors. It was the the one person nobody recognized, so it was kind of easy to find them, to pursue them, to get them plugged in.
Joel Brooks:
We're no longer at that place, and I just wanna encourage you if you're visiting Redeemer. I'm not telling you to go away. I'm not. But I also don't want you to come and just occupy a chair. We really are striving to live in what I would call a gospel centered community in which our lives are woven into one another.
Joel Brooks:
What we do here on Sunday is not church. It's it's a part of it's the church gathered, but we don't invite people to ever come to church. We invite people to come and meet our church, for we are people. And this is where we gather, and we hear God's word, and we worship, and we pray together. But our lives are really interwoven with one another throughout the week through our home groups, through our times of prayer.
Joel Brooks:
And that's I hope if you're visiting, I just want you to know that's the direction we expect you to move, and not just to come and to sit. But we really want you to be part of a community. And so I am glad you're coming, I really am. But I wanna just be clear about the direction that I'd like for you to move. All right?
Joel Brooks:
All right, with that let's open God's word. Let's turn to John chapter 7. We've been in a study on 2nd Corinthians, but we've taken a break. Also, the last Sunday of each month, we've been looking at a different aspect of the Lord's prayer. So we're gonna do that in a couple of weeks.
Joel Brooks:
But tonight, just based on a number of conversations I've had over the past couple of weeks and where we left off last week, I I really want us to come to John 7. John chapter 7, we'll read the Exodus passage in just a little bit. Let me read just three verses. On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, If anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.
Joel Brooks:
Now this he said about the spirit and those who believed in him were to receive. For as yet, the spirit had not been given because Jesus was not yet glorified. Pray with me. Lord, the only reason we ever come to you is because you first came to us. Only reason we draw near to you is because you drew near to us.
Joel Brooks:
The only reason we will ever find you is because you are already near, ready to be found. God, we believe that you are near and that you're calling us to yourself. Lord, there's a lot of things that can distract us. I can be a distraction here at this time, and so I pray that you would remove me and we would be able to hear from you. May my words fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore.
Joel Brooks:
But Lord, may your words remain. And may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. I've read that humans are the only species with a chronic sense of longing.
Joel Brooks:
It's both a blessing and a curse, this chronic sense of longing, but no other creatures do it, just humans. I've got a dog, a lazy dog named Daisy. And, Daisy spends her days just finding a patch of sunshine, laying down on it, and sleeping. If she's not sleeping, she'll she'll walk to the food bowl, and she'll eat, and then maybe she'll want to go on a run, and that's pretty much her day. Daisy does not stay up late at night contemplating the meaning of life.
Joel Brooks:
She doesn't she doesn't wonder why she exists. She doesn't wonder why why am I so unhappy or is there is there some deep desire? Why are my deep desires not being met? If she has food, water, if she gets to run outside, her her needs are met. Humans are the only ones who feel those things, and we do it chronically.
Joel Brooks:
We're never quite happy. We're we're always longing. We always feel like there's there's something in our life. There's there's gotta be some purpose, some meaning in which we could find. And Jesus picks up on this.
Joel Brooks:
We looked at that last week when we looked at Isaiah 55, and Jesus called to come to him all who are weary and heavy laden, and he will give us rest. And that Jesus is the answer to that longing that we have. Whereas Augustine said, our hearts are restless until they find rest in thee. And I want us to pick back up on that theme tonight. Earlier in the gospel of John, Jesus is talking to some religious people, and people who had grown up hearing the scriptures, going to, temple, going to, every Sabbath worshiping.
Joel Brooks:
And he said to them in John 539, he says, you search the scriptures because you think in them that you have eternal life. Yet these bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you might have life. And it's here that Jesus teaches us 2 really important things about scripture. 1, he teaches that all scripture ultimately points to him. The purpose of the Old Testament, the purpose of the law, the purpose of the prophets, all are to point us to Jesus.
Joel Brooks:
The purpose of the tabernacle, the temple, the sacrifices, the laws, the festivals, all of that points us to Jesus. And actually, if you're reading through the gospel of John, you can already see that. You have John chapter 1, the word became flesh and tabernacled among us. John is pointing to the fact that Jesus, he's the fulfillment of their tabernacle. He does what the tabernacle always pointed to.
Joel Brooks:
You come to John chapter 2, and Jesus says, hey. You tear down this temple, and in 3 days, I'll put it back together again. Of course, he wasn't referring to the temple itself. He was referring to his body which had come to replace the temple. He's saying the temple pointed to me.
Joel Brooks:
I'm the fulfillment of all that it pointed to. You get to John chapter 3 and Jesus says, just as the son of or just as the serpent was lifted up in the wilderness, that bronze serpent that people could look to and were healed after they were snake bit. Says just as Moses lifted up that bronze serpent, so the son of man must be lifted up. And once again, he's saying, look at the old Testament and you see that was a sign. That was a symbol pointing to me.
Joel Brooks:
And John chapter 6 he talks about manna and the bread that came down from heaven. He says, that's really all about me because I'm I'm the true bread that comes down from heaven. I am the bread of life. All these things are pointing to me. And what you realize is the Old Testament isn't just giving you the foundation in which you can understand Jesus, it's really giving you the language, the language necessary in order to to describe Him, to worship Him, to understand who He is.
Joel Brooks:
So Jesus teaches us about scripture that all scripture points to him, but it doesn't just point. The purpose of scripture is not merely to explain Jesus, but to lead us to experience Jesus. We don't come to the bible merely to learn more about him. We do learn more about him, but we come to his word in order to know him. And that's why Jesus is always bidding you to come to him.
Joel Brooks:
Come. He doesn't say come to a doctrine. Come to a philosophy. Come and turn over a new leaf. He says, come to me.
Joel Brooks:
Behind all of his words, there is a person bidding you to come. And this is what you in this room, everybody in this room, this is what you were made for is to come to Jesus, to come before God, and to be in his presence. That's what your heart is longing for. In John chapter 7, this is what Jesus is picking up on. In verse 39, John explains that Jesus was talking about the spirit, the spirit whom those who believed in him had yet to receive.
Joel Brooks:
Now, when we think of the spirit of God today, we primarily were thinking of a power or we're thinking of of gifts. But the primary role of God's spirit is really to manifest God's presence. You can think when you when you see God's spirit, think God's presence. It's not a impersonal power we're talking about here. God is a him, not a who or not a what.
Joel Brooks:
So God's spirit is given to us because it's how we actually know God and not just about God. And so when God's spirit comes to us, then God becomes more than just an idea. Little black words or white pages become more than that. We begin to hear God himself talking to us. And he becomes a real person that we can know.
Joel Brooks:
And this is what Jesus is communicating here. There's a great urgency to his words in John 7. Look at verse 37. It says that he he stood up and he cried out. Now, if you read through all of the chapter, you realize that this is quite a dangerous thing to do because people are seeking to kill Jesus.
Joel Brooks:
Just a few verses earlier, it says that officers had already been sent to come and arrest Jesus. So it'd be best if he just kind of stayed quiet if he stayed hidden. But there was something happening, something so urgent that Jesus is going to take the risk here. He simply has to get up and he cries out and Jesus rarely cries out. He cries out at the tomb of Lazarus.
Joel Brooks:
He cries out a couple of times on the cross, But other than that, Jesus really doesn't cry out except for here. But this message is so urgent. He's he's risking his life and he is standing up, and he is crying out. So you have to ask yourself, I mean, what's, what's going on here? What, what's stirred up Jesus to have to do this?
Joel Brooks:
We go back to John 7 and you can read. John tells us that Jesus did this on the last and the greatest day of the feast. The feast that he's talking about here is the feast of booths or feast of tabernacles or feast of tents, And, this is a Jewish feast. It's a week long feast in which people set up all these temporary structures made of, you know, sticks and palm branches. The kids absolutely loved it because, really, it was an excuse to kind of go camping with your parents.
Joel Brooks:
Alright? And so, they loved this week long festivity. And the reason they set up all these temporary structures is because it was a way of remembering how God had delivered their fathers from Egypt and had led them into the wilderness where they lived in these tents and had taken care of them. In particular, they remembered how god, he led them by his spirit and how he provided water from a rock. When they were all about to die from thirst, god, he he sprung water out of a rock to quench that.
Joel Brooks:
And so in celebration of this festival, every day the high priest, he would go and he would take a golden pitcher, and he would get water from the pool of Siloam, and he would come back through the water gate into the into the city towards the temple. And as this procession moved for, people would would recite Isaiah 12:3. With joy, you draw water from the wells of salvation. And when the high priest would reach the temple altar, the people would sing songs from the Hillel, which is Psalms 113 through Psalm 118. We read Psalm 113 at the start of the service.
Joel Brooks:
Psalm 114 has lines like this. Tremble over earth at the presence of the Lord. At the presence of god of Jacob who turns the rock into a pool of water. The flint into a spring of water. And while they sung these songs, the high priest, he would get this pitcher of water and he would he would pour it out.
Joel Brooks:
He would pour it out onto the altar, and this was a way of them remembering how God had brought water from the rock, but also in anticipation of a day when God would pour out his spirit. So they both remembered back and they looked forward at this moment. And this is what they did every day during the festival booths except for the last and the greatest day. On this day, the high priest, he would march around the altar 7 times before pouring out the water. And each time he would pass around the altar, excitement would build and people would sing and cry out louder and louder.
Joel Brooks:
Until finally, the 7th time, the high priest, he would stop and he would hold the pitcher high above his head, and then the people would hush. And he would just wait, pause a moment or 2 before pouring it out. And it's likely at this moment on that last and the greatest day of this feast, at this last and greatest moment, that Jesus, who who could not have done anything more dramatic, he stands up and he breaks the silence. And he says, If anyone thirsts, come to me. Come to me.
Joel Brooks:
Everything that this represents points to me. Come to me. You see, for the last few days, something had been building in Jesus as he watched this ritual happen over and over. And so finally, he reaches this point where literally he just he just erupts. He just stands despite the consequences.
Joel Brooks:
He stands, and he just has to declare this at this moment. Let's look at what made him do this. Let's go back to Exodus 17 and find out. You should have a copy of that annual worship guide. Exodus 17.
Joel Brooks:
This is shortly after god has delivered the people from Egypt. They're in the wilderness at this point. Verse 1, all the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of sin by stages, according to the commandment of the Lord encamped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore, the people quarreled with Moses and said, give us water to drink. And Moses said to them, why do you quarrel with me?
Joel Brooks:
Why do you test the Lord? But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, why did you bring us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst? So Moses cried to the Lord, what shall I do with these people? They're almost ready to stone me. And the Lord said to Moses, pass on before the people taking with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile and go.
Joel Brooks:
Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink. And Moses did so in the side of the elders of Israel, and he called the name of the place, Massa, and Meribah because of the quarreling of the people of Israel and because they tested the Lord by saying, is the Lord among us or not? So here we see the Israelites. They had left Egypt, and it didn't take them long to start complaining again. Earlier, they're complaining about food.
Joel Brooks:
Even though, I don't know if you caught this, they had livestock. They actually had all of their sheep and all their cattle in abundance. They just didn't want to eat that. So they say, God, we're hungry. We're hungry.
Joel Brooks:
And so God provides manna. And now they're grumbling once again that they don't have any water. Actually, the word's not grumble. It's they're not really even complaining. Verse 2 says that they are quarreling with Moses.
Joel Brooks:
This word is actually used in a judicial sense here. The people are bringing an official accusation against Moses. They actually say, Moses, you deliberately took us out here to kill us. This was premeditated. This is man 1, alright?
Joel Brooks:
And because of this you deserve the death penalty. We're gonna stone you. And then God commands Moses to do something absolutely astounding after the peoples said, we're ready to stone you, and they bring this accusation. Moses runs to God and he prays, and then and then God tells him to do something. Now when when I noticed this the first time years back, I literally wept, and I don't know if I've been able to read this without being moved since.
Joel Brooks:
Look at verse 5. And the lord said to Moses, pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel and taking your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile and go. Alright. So real quick, Moses says to pass before is to walk by this this angry mob that wants to execute him, and then he's to go get some of the elders of the community and then get his staff. And what's happening here is Moses is setting up a trial.
Joel Brooks:
He gathers the elders, which are gonna stand as the witnesses. He then gets his staff, and it's not just any staff we we read that they point out what kind of staff this is. Get the one that you struck the Nile with, and that it turned to blood. Get the staff that brought judgment with you. So this is a rod of judgment that he is bringing.
Joel Brooks:
Now now if you are one of the people here, you've got to be terrified because it's now dawning on them. Oh, oh, my gosh. This this is what's happening. It's too late to back out of this though. Because they've just made an official accusation against Moses, and Moses says, fine.
Joel Brooks:
You want a trial? We're gonna set up a trial. Go get the elders, and I'm bringing the staff. And you have seen what the staff can do. Get the verse 6, The drama heightens.
Joel Brooks:
God says, behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink. Now I know when you first read this, it doesn't seem like that much is going on here, but understand this. This is the only time in scripture that the Lord ever stands before anybody. I spent hours going through every single reference of the phrase standing before or stood before, and this is the only time that the Lord ever stands before anybody. Because only inferiors stand before other people.
Joel Brooks:
One stands before a king, but a king never stands before the people. And so every other time in scripture that you find the words stand before and you find the Lord together, every other time it's going to be something about how people are not able to stand before the Lord. Or you have 1st Samuel 6, who is able to stand before the Lord? Yet here, god is standing before his people. What's happening is God is now acting as the inferior.
Joel Brooks:
So we have a trial. We have witnesses gathered. We have Moses acting as a judge. The people are the plaintiff, and God is the defendant. And the accusation is, God, you don't care about us.
Joel Brooks:
You brought us out to this experience pointless suffering in the middle of this desert and life would have been better if you just left us or you just killed us. And Moses, he summarizes their argument in verse 7 when he says that they tested the Lord by saying, is the Lord among us or not? That's the question. God, are you real? And if you're real, are are you for us?
Joel Brooks:
Do you care for us? Do you love us? Are you really here with us? That's that's a fundamental question I think every person feels. Then what happens next?
Joel Brooks:
It shocks us. God is is standing on the rock and the staff is in Moses's hand, and and there's a grumbling people waiting for God's judgment. And God says, Moses, strike the rock. Strike where I stand. And so so this staff of the Lord's judgment falls where he is.
Joel Brooks:
It strikes where he is standing. The people are not struck down. The people don't receive judgment. What they receive here is grace. I mean, when this rod of judgment hits the rock here, Where the Lord is standing, water flows from it and the people drink.
Joel Brooks:
The people deserve judgment, but the Lord, in a way, he's pointing towards a substitute. He's standing as a substitute receiving that blow and he's giving life giving water. So they sin, but because of God's grace, they're drinking delicious, refreshing, life giving water to satisfy their thirst. Back to the feast of booths. Jesus is thinking of this.
Joel Brooks:
As his festival progresses, Jesus is remembering these things. And so so he gets up and he says, all of it points to me. Don't miss that. All of it points to me. I'm the rock who receives the judgment that you might receive life.
Joel Brooks:
I'm the one who delivers you from slavery. I'm the one who always listens to your grumbling and to your complaining. I'm the one who takes the punishment for your sins and your ingratitude. I'm the one who's gonna give you life instead of the death you deserve. I'm the one who's gonna give you grace.
Joel Brooks:
I'm the one who's gonna satisfy your thirst. So come to me. Not just to receive water, but to receive living water. But come to me. Now, remember, all scripture, it it points to Jesus.
Joel Brooks:
It points to Jesus, but but now we have to come to Jesus. We have to come to him. Scriptures clearly pointed to him in this, but now we have to come to him. This is why Jesus doesn't say, hey, you know, everybody that rock in the, in the old testament that points to me. Isn't that so cool?
Joel Brooks:
And just, and just leave it there. Said it points to me. Come to me. Come to me. Jesus says that when we come to him, we're given a fountain of living water.
Joel Brooks:
It's going to make our hearts burst as we are filled with his presence. His spirit, if you look at the description here, his spirit is not like not like a cup of water in which we, you know, take the sip of salvation. It's not even like a deep lake. Maybe one of the great lakes. It's not one of that.
Joel Brooks:
Something like that, but it's a fountain. It's a never ending fountain. And what Jesus is saying here is that not only will you be satisfied and you will always be satisfied, but you will become satisfying. Your life is going to be so flooded with God's joyful presence that that life is going to over flow into others. You'll be satisfied and you'll become satisfying.
Joel Brooks:
It's one of the marks of Christianity is that your life becomes satisfying to others. And then we read that Jesus said that this was about the spirit who had not yet been given because Jesus had not yet been glorified. And John, when you read through Jesus' glorification comes at his death. And so really saying this, the spirit hasn't been given because he hasn't struck the rock yet. The the rock hasn't been struck, so the water hasn't flowed yet.
Joel Brooks:
I met with somebody earlier this week who was just going through a really hard time. Was depressed, not not just depressed, but, spiritually depressed. We went and we met at Avondale Brewery. We talked for a number of hours. The person had grown up in what I would call very intellectual denomination.
Joel Brooks:
There's nothing wrong with being an intellectual denomination. We we probably lean on that side here. You should think through your faith. We don't think enough through our faith. But coming up through this, being where he was now in life, he was just I mean, I I don't know how to describe it other than he was just empty.
Joel Brooks:
I mean, it was just there there was no joy. One point he says, you know, I I I feel absolutely nothing. No affection whatsoever towards God. I I even at times, I'm just wondering does he even exist? Says but then I I mean, I remind myself of this that I wouldn't be having these doubts if I wasn't a believer, that only believers have these doubts.
Joel Brooks:
And so I comfort myself with that. And I've said, well, that's good. That that should be a comfort. I agree. I don't think non Christians are staying up late at night wondering if they're saved.
Joel Brooks:
But let me ask you this. Does your life resemble what all the old testament saints look forward to and long for? Or are you going through the exact same anxieties, the exact same grumblings, the exact same struggles as a people whom the Spirit of God had not been poured out upon. God gives you His Spirit not just so you can understand in an intellectual way, and and and He could walk through every aspect of doctrine. It's not just to explain, but to really feel and experience him.
Joel Brooks:
I remember I sat down years ago with a friend of mine, who was a pastor at a PCA church, and he he was a former mentor of mine, actually, and he had just got so beaten and bruised down. Life wasn't going the way that he really wanted. God was just so distant to him. I finally reached a point I I had to drive. We don't live in the same state.
Joel Brooks:
I drove over to meet him, and we went down in his basement, where he had set up his office. And, literally, his entire basement and entire wall was nothing but theological books all the way across. And he just wept. He said, Joel, I I Would you please just tell me the gospel? Would you please just tell me the gospel?
Joel Brooks:
That's what he needed to hear. Simply that God loves him. God has pursued him. God has atoned for his sins. God is drawing him near, and now he needs to come.
Joel Brooks:
I realize that some of you get a little jumpy when you hear Christians talk about emotions or pastors, and and and I don't terribly much, But the spirit of God has been given to manifest the presence of God to us, and and there's an assurance. There's a heartfelt assurance. And the old testament saints look forward to what we can now enjoy. A life that's characterized by joy despite any circumstance we're in, a life that is characterized by rest and no matter what our work is because we have come to Jesus. If this is not you, I hope you will hear Jesus's words, his invitation to come, and that you will take comfort.
Joel Brooks:
Because he says all that you need is to be thirsty and to believe. To be thirsty, you can define thirst not by what you have, but by what you lack. You you when you lack things, you're thirsty. So if you come to him confessing your lack of joy, your lack of virtue, your lack of any moral integrity, your lack of righteousness, even your lack of desire. You come to him confessing your thirst, what you lack.
Joel Brooks:
Then you come to him believing, believing that he is the rock that was slain for you, believing that there is really joy that comes from his presence. This is you. I hope you will come. Let me end by one of the last words in the bible from Revelation 22. The spirit and the bride say come.
Joel Brooks:
Let the one who hears say come. Let the one who is thirsty come. Let the one who desires take the water of life without price. Pray with
Caleb Chancey:
me.
Joel Brooks:
Our father, once again, we can never draw near to you unless you have first drawn near to us. Our hearts have no inclination whatsoever to pursue you unless you grab it, seize it, and you draw us to yourself. And I'd pray that through the power of your spirit, you would do that now. For those of us here who have had cold hearts for quite some time, crack that open. I pray that the word of God has gone forth like a hammer shattering a rock.
Joel Brooks:
And in this moment, as that rock is shattered, may you place a fountain. Jesus, we love you. We thank you. It's in your name. We pray.