 I'm just starting the recording. Okay. Recording has just started. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, Pastor. Hey, Russian friends. Kiran, good morning. Let's pray and we will get started. Sure, the others will join us. Russian, why don't you please lead us in prayer and we will get started. Sure, Pastor. Father, we thank you, Lord. We thank you for this beautiful morning. Thank you for your faithfulness, the sustains us, Jesus, and your mercy, the sustains us, Jesus. We thank you that we get to live another day to testify your goodness and your greatness in our lives, Jesus. Thank you for this wonderful opportunity to learn from your word, Lord. Holy Spirit, continue to reveal and pour out your wisdom, Lord, as we as we study your word, Father. Help us to understand and reveal the beautiful things of your word like your word says, Father. We submit the rest of the session into your hands and lead us, Father. In Jesus' name, I pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you. All right. Welcome, everyone. I've put the lecture notes for chapters 4 and 5 in the coursework section so you could take it from there. So, we are starting to this beautiful book, Paul's Letter to the Romans. Like we said, it is one of those books which are heavy in doctrine and teaching. And he, of course, goes on into later on in the book. He will talk about Christian living. But the early part of the book, as we mentioned, Paul is establishing sound doctrine. And just to quickly review chapter 1 after the initial salutation and sharing about his desire to be and to go to Rome and minister to them, all of that. He starts off by saying, look, the first part is to establish that we have all sinned before God. And in the process, he establishes evidence for God, that the invisible attributes of God are revealed in his creation. So, none of us have any excuse because God has already revealed himself in creation. And yet, we have been very depraved in our minds and, you know, we've gone on in our wrong ways and God gave us up to our depraved minds. He didn't stop us. Then he says, okay, so basically, all of us have gone on into doing things that deserve the judgment of God. Chapter 1. Chapter 2, he establishes specifically for the Jewish people. He says, Jews, God has given you the law and he's given or he, God gave you the law and he gave you circumcision. Both the wonderful things. But don't think that just because you have received the law from God, or you have circumcision. Okay, sure, Thomas. Is my audio okay? Yes, your audio is fine. Okay, pastor, but why is it too low for me? I sit and reach. Oh, I see. Okay, fine. Okay. Yeah. So, in chapter 2, he's establishing with the Jews that though, don't think that just because God gave you the law and it gave you the sign of the covenant, which is circumcision, that you can judge others and you can escape the judgment of God. You, even though you have the law and you have the covenant, if you don't keep them, you, the Jews, you also stand before God as condemned. And in that process, he also says with us something, just something very interesting, which is the Gentiles. They don't have the law. They don't have the covenant. They were not given that. But God has put inside them in their conscience a law. That means their conscience is already telling them what is right and what's wrong. So, basically, if you put chapter 1 and chapter 2 together, every person has two witnesses from God. One is reason that observes creation, which can observe creation and say there is God. Second, conscience. Conscience that tells the person that is right and wrong. We call it morality, a sense of morality. Where did people get a sense of morality? Now, just a slight deviation. The atheists say that we are just a blob of matter. We were from dust. We are just a blob of matter. So, if we humans are just a blob of matter, where did we get our sense of morality? Because matter does not have a sense of right and wrong. But human beings have. Where did it come from? Paul told us, Romans 2, God has put a conscience in every person. That's where we get the sense of right and wrong. So, he discusses that in chapter 2. Then in chapter 3, which we went through last week, he says, okay, now, so chapter 3 is very interesting. In fact, a lot of the book part of Romans, the early part of Romans, Paul has a very interesting style of writing. He asks a question and then he answers it. So, it's like a question answer. He asks a question and he answers it. And most likely, these are the questions that his people, the people who he's writing to would be asking. So, chapter 3 is very interesting. There are almost like seven questions. He asks and he answers in one chapter. So, he begins in chapter 3. He says, so, does that mean it's useless to having received the law and the covenant? He said, no. God gave it to you. This is the early part of chapter 3. No, you choose the people that God entrusted this to. So, that makes you special in some way. But then he goes on the next question. So, does it mean that if we, you know, what happened if some people don't believe? Then he says, well, if people don't believe, that doesn't change who God is. God is faithful. God is just. Then he asks the third question, which we saw last week. This is Romans 3, verse 5. You know, is God unjust who inflicts wrath? Because if our wrongdoing is making God look good, then is he unfair and then punishing us for our wrongdoing? And we use the example of Judas. You know, Judas could have the biggest case before God. He can go before God and say, God, I know what I did was wrong. But the wrong I did resulted in, you know, ultimately resulted in people being saved. So, an argument like that is what Paul is presenting. Is God unjust? Then we do wrong. He looks good. He's faithful. He's just. So Paul says, no, God cannot overlook sin. Right? He has to, he's a just God and he has to judge sin. And so he also deals with in verse 8. Some people wrongly say that Paul is saying, come on, let's do evil so good can come. You know, he says, no, that's not it. We are not like that. So he does handle some of these questions and then he moves on and says, look, ultimately, verses, this is chapter 3, verse 9 to 20. Ultimately, no one is right before God because all have sinned. But they are a Jew or a Gentile. We are all standing condemned before God. This is Romans 3 19. The whole world is guilty before God. Having said that and said, he said, by the law, no one can be justified. Then in verses Romans 3, 21 to 26, he brings out this beautiful solution. He says, okay, we're all guilty before God. But God has provided the solution. He gives, we are guilty. We are full of blame and fault and condemned. But God gives us his righteousness, freely by grace, through faith, and because of the redemption in Jesus Christ. So three things he highlights there. God gives us his righteousness. I mean, God himself puts, you know, his righteousness, his faultless, blameless character and nature standing. He gives it to us, his righteousness, because of the redemption that is in Jesus, because of his grace. And all we have to do is to have faith. That's all he says. God gives us his righteousness. And we saw one very interesting thing in verse 25, where Paul borrows from the Old Testament a tabernacle, and he calls Jesus as the mercy seat. So in the, in the, in the, in the King James, the new King James, that word is translated propitiation, but the Greek actually means mercy seat, and some versions will translate it literally as mercy seat. So he's saying, God made Jesus of a mercy seat. So the mercy seat, you know, in the Old Tabernacle, in the Holy of Holies, there was the, the Ark of the Covenant. And on top of the Ark of the Covenant was the mercy seat. That is where, you know, the High Priest came and sprinkled the blood. And that is where, once a year, and that is where God met with the people. He said, my glory presence will be there, and that's where I will speak to you from. So he's saying, Jesus is our mercy seat, the place of atonement, where the High Priest sprinkles the blood, and God says, I will forgive the sins of the people, and I will now be able to meet with you, release my glory, give you my voice. So Jesus becomes our mercy seat. So that's a beautiful picture there in verse 25. And then, the last part, verse 27 to 31, which he ended with Romans 3, he says, so, you know, again, he asks, actually he's asking three questions there in those verses, in verse 27. Then again, he asks another question in verse 29, and again in verse 31. So what about the law? What about works? He said, okay, we cannot boast in the law, we cannot boast in works, because now everything is by faith. So he's slowly guiding them to the next topic that he's going to deal with, which is faith. Because he says, we cannot be justified by the law, we cannot be justified by works. How are we justified? Faith. So he's guiding them to that subject of faith. That's verse 28, you know, a man is justified by faith. Then verse 29, he says, you know, so God is now God, both of the Jews and Gentiles, or the Greeks. So though he gave the law to the law and the covenant to the Jews first, God is the God of both the Jews and the Gentiles, because he's going to justify everyone through faith. And then last question, verse 31, he says, then is the law void? I mean, is the law useless? No. He says, we establish the law. That means faith comes in, and faith is telling us, you know, it's not saying the law is not necessary, or he's telling us that faith comes in because the law was there, but we were unable to keep the law. We couldn't keep the law, we couldn't match up to the law, our works fell short of the requirements of the law. So faith had to come in. So faith is not doing everything, the law faith is fulfilling the law, faith is saying, yeah, this is the whole purpose. The law showed we couldn't do it on our own. So the only way we're ever going to be righteous is going to be through faith. So he's developed the teaching till this point. So now we get into chapter four, where really chapter four, yeah, you can break it into two big sections. The first is he establish, establishes again, he's addressing the Jewish audience, that this faith actually came before the law and the covenant, the mosaic covenant. So he says, you know, Abraham, now Abraham, and he mentions Abraham, for every Jew, Abraham is the patriarch, you know, for the Jew, that he is the forerunner, he's the father. So he says, you know, the patriarch, Abraham, he had faith. He received righteousness by faith. And this happened even before the law. And circumcision was, circumcision was given after he had faith. So both circumcision and the law came after faith. So what he's saying is, hey, faith is not something that just is showing up now because of Jesus. Faith was there way back with Abraham, even before circumcision and before the law. So now he's really got their attention. Yeah, so they can't say, hey, what is this, you're bringing something new. No, no, no, it is actually there. So that's the first part of Romans 4. And then the next part of Romans 4 is he gives us insight into Abraham's faith. So what he says is, okay, so this faith, therefore, is what both Jews and Gentiles are going to walk in. Whether you're a Jew or a Gentile, you're going to walk in the faith of Abraham. And this is the way Abraham had faith in God. And this is the same way we must have, whether we are Jew or Gentile, we must have faith in God. So that's the second part of Romans 4, which we are going to look at. And then from faith, he then transitions into the next part, which is in Romans 5, he talks about grace, grace. So slowly, slowly, he's taking them through various important aspects, or we would say doctrine of the Christian faith. Okay, so Prince, we will get to your question. I see your question, and we will come to it. Kiran, what is the problem? I see some face. I don't know what that means. What does that mean, a question mark or? Okay, I don't understand that emoji. Anyway. No, sir, something I was understanding took Prince question. Oh, I see. Okay. First time seeing that emoji. Anyway, okay, whatever it means. All right, Prince, we will come to your question a little bit. Okay. All right. So let's get started with Romans 4. Yes. So let's read, versus Romans chapter 4, verses 1 to 12. Somebody could read the passage for us, Romans 4, 1 to 12, please. Okay. What's then said, we say that Abraham our father has found according to the flesh, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say, Abraham believed God, and it was a counter to him for righteousness. Okay, anybody else wants to continue? Romans chapter 4 was four onwards. Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace, but as debt. But to him who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness. Just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works. Seven blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin. Verse nine, does this blessedness then come upon the circumcised only or upon the uncircumcised also? For we say that faith was accounted to Abraham for righteousness. How then was it accounted, while he was circumcised or uncircumcised? Not while circumcised, but while uncircumcised. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all those who believe though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be imputed with them also. And the father of circumcision to those who not only are of the circumcision, but who also walk in the steps of faith which our father Abraham had while still uncircumcised. Thank you. All right, it's just really amazing how Paul is just expressing the mind of God in helping these people see that faith is for both Jews and Gentiles. So he starts off again by asking the question, verse one. So what can we talk about? What can we say about Abraham, our father according to the flesh? That means he was the father, the forerunner. So the Jews immediately realized, wow, he's a father. And the Jews took so much pride in Abraham and David, the two great patriarchs. Abraham was the father of the entire race. David was this great king who established them in the land, where God had appointed them for. They're great, great, you know, they hold both these patriarchs in high regard. So he says, okay, let's talk about Abraham. And then he asks them this question. Was Abraham justified by works or before God? And then, see, the other thing about Paul is he quotes from the Old Testament scriptures, which we refer to as the Old Testament. So he was a scholar. He knew the scriptures, the Old Testament scriptures. So he's quoting and he's quoting from Genesis 15.6 right now. And he's saying, you know, Abraham, the Bible, the Old Testament Genesis 15.6 says, Abraham believed God. And it was a counter to him for righteousness. That means Abraham received righteousness based on one thing. He believed God. And he's pointing out, nobody can argue with that because that is the scriptures. So he says, hey, look at Abraham, our forefather. What does it say about what the scriptures say about him? He says he believed God and God granted to him righteousness. So then he says, you know, verses four and five, if a man works for something, then what he gets is not something by grace. He gets it as a debt, meaning he's paid what he's owed. But if a man doesn't work, but he believes, then he's receiving it purely by grace through faith, through faith. So he's saying, Abraham received righteousness purely by believing that it's by faith, not by works. So it was something God gave to him by grace. Now the grace part will come in chapter five. And then he points out, says, you know, even David, so now again, once again, he's quoted from the Old Testament verses six through eight. So even David said, you know, it is so blessed. Blessed is the man who sins are forgiven. You know, it's gone. So Abraham was blessed by this. Abraham received this blessing. But how did he receive it? Verse nine, he says, did he receive it when he was circumcised? Or did he receive it when he was uncircumcised? He says, he received it when he was uncircumcised. So, and then verse 11, and later on he received circumcision, which was a seal of the righteousness of faith. So God gave him this covenant as a, it came after the fact that God had given him righteousness through faith. And he says, the reason God did it is verse 11, the latter part of verse 11, so that Abraham could be the father of all who believe. So now he's kind of stretching their thinking. So the Jew said, you know, Abraham is our father because we are all circumcised like he was. But he's telling, look, Abraham had something before he had circumcision. He had faith. So Abraham is a father of all who have faith, whether they are circumcised or uncircumcised, whether they are Jew or Gentile, because he had faith before being circumcised. So that's what he says here, verse 11, that he might be the father of everyone who believe, though they are uncircumcised and righteousness might be given to them, and verse 12, and the father of circumcision. But not just being circumcised physically, but you also need to walk in the steps of the faith of Abraham, verse 12. So he's stating two things here about faith. Abraham received righteousness by faith so that he would be the father of everyone who walks in faith, even if they are uncircumcised, that means the Gentiles, and they also receive righteousness by faith. Secondly, he says he's also the father of the circumcised, but it's not really about circumcision. So you need to walk in the faith of Abraham, and that's what brings righteousness. So he's emphasizing faith that brings righteousness, whether you're circumcised or whether you're uncircumcised, it comes the same way. Is this clear, verses 1 through 12? Any doubts on that? Any questions on that? Yeah? Okay. So you can imagine a Jewish person reading this and listening to this and saying, yeah, I can't argue with what Paul is saying, because it is true. The scripture said, Abraham believed God, it was given to him and God gave him righteousness. That was Genesis 15. Only later in Genesis 17, later on, God said, you be circumcised. So that means faith and righteousness came before circumcision. And Paul is saying, God did that so that faith and righteousness is given to everybody, whether you're Jew or Gentile, respect of your circumcision. And even if you're circumcised, you've got to walk by faith, like Abraham. Now, the Jewish believe at listening, so yeah, makes perfect sense. I can't argue with this, because of a patriarch, he walked by faith. So we have to walk by faith. The Gentiles are saying, hey, wonderful. So I also am part of this whole thing through faith. I may not be circumcised, but through faith, like Abraham, I receive righteousness. So it's, you know, his whole audience, Jews and Gentiles are connecting to what he is saying. Right. So he ends there in verse 12, that we all must walk in the steps of the faith of Abraham. And he is the father of all who believe verse 11. He's a father of all who believe. Right. So then he now goes on from here to begin to explain that is, okay, let's get into Abraham's faith. Right. What was his faith like? And what can we say about Abraham's faith? So we will pick up from verse 13. We will read the rest of the chapter that's all the way through verse 25, and then we will highlight various things he's sharing here. Each one can read maybe three verses, we can just go through. So Romans chapter 4, 13 through 25, three verses each please. For the promise that he would be the heir of world was not Abraham or to his see through the law, but through the righteousness of faith for, for if those who are of the law are ears, faith is made word and the promise made of no effect because the law brings about word for where there is no law, there is no transgressions. Yeah, somebody else? Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace. To the end the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the father, faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. Sorry, sorry Dave. Yeah, let's maybe I'll just pause here. I'll comment on these four verses, verses 13 to 16, sorry, and then we will go forward. Okay. So over here, Romans chapter 4, 13 to 16, what he's saying is this, right? He's saying the promise that God gave to Abraham was something he gave at the point of faith and righteousness before circumcision, right? So the promise was through the righteousness of faith verse 13 and it's not just those who are circumcised, those who are of the law who receive this promise, but it is everyone verse 16, all who are of faith inherited this promise of Abraham. What was the promise? I will bless you. I will make you a blessing. So God said, look, this promise to Abraham and to his descendants, it was given even before the law and it's not just those who are descendants through the law, the circumcised, who inherit the promise, but it is everyone who receive it by faith, by faith, it is of faith through grace. So the promise verse 16 is to every, all the sea, not only those who are of the law, but those who are of faith and this Abraham is the father of us all. So it's really stretching the mind of the Jews saying, hey, Abraham is not just your father. Abraham is the father of all, all of us who are people of faith because the promise was given to him not after he was circumcised, the promise was given to him at the point when he was made righteous through faith, the very beginning. Okay. So he's kind of repeating, you know, once again that Abraham is the father of all who are faith and all who have faith now receive the promise God gave to Abraham and it is by grace according to grace verse 16. It is of faith that it might be by grace. It is not because of the works, it is not because of the law, but it is faith, righteousness, grace. That's what it is and it is given to everyone. Okay. Now verse 17 on he gets into the faith of Abraham. Let's go into that. Please go ahead, Dave. As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations before him whom he believed, even God who quickeneth the death and calleth those things which be not as though they were, who against hope believed in hope that he might become the father of many nations according to that which was spoken, so shall thy sin be. Somebody else? Verse 19, Aaron. He was then almost 100 years old, but his faith did not weaken when he doubt of his body, which was already practically dead or of the faith that Sarah could not have children. His faith did not leave him and he did not do God's promise. His faith filled him with power and he gave praise to God. He was absolutely sure that God would be able to do what he had and promised. That is why Abraham through faith was accepted as righteous by God. The word he was accepted as righteous were not written for him alone. They were written for us who are to be accepted as righteous, who believe in him, who raised Jesus, our Lord from death. Because of our sin, he was handed over to Ty and he was raised to life in order to put us right with God. Thank you. So in verse 17 to 21, we see the faith of Abraham. Now this passage is very interesting because what's the 17 to 21 is the Holy Spirit's summary of Abraham's life of faith. Now why am I saying it's Holy Spirit's summary? Because the Holy Spirit is inspiring the Apostle Paul to write. And through the Apostle Paul, the Holy Spirit is saying, hey, this is the gist, this is the summary of the faith that this man Abraham had. Notice that in these verses, verses 17 to 21, there is no mention of Abraham's struggle. There is no mention of Abraham's mistakes, nothing. In fact, if you and I, if we didn't know Abraham's real story from Genesis and we just read verses 17 to 21, it's like, whoa, what a man of faith. I mean, he had such great faith, but we know his real story. We know that he started in faith, Genesis 12 and God called him and said, Abraham, leave your father's house. He started out in faith. But we know he made mistakes two times. He was afraid for himself and for his wife, Sarah. I'm probably more afraid for himself and he lied about his wife and said, you know, at least it was a partial lie. I said, she's not my wife. She's my sister. Because if he said I was, she's my wife, they would kill him because he was the husband in order to have Sarah. But two times he did that. We also know that at one point, this is Genesis 15, Abraham was tired and he looked up to God and he said, God, you said, I'm going to have a son. And this must have been 15 years into the journey of walk of faith to God. Where is the son? Did you mean I will have a son that said, oh, did you mean somebody else? Did you mean anybody born in my house? So now he's wondering, hey, everybody else is having children. Sarah and I having no children. So did God mean all those other people are being born? Or did God actually mean Abraham, Sarah, we will have a son? We will have descendants. So he's tired, Genesis 15. And that is when God cuts a covenant with Abraham. We also know that he, even after that, after Genesis 15, we know that he prompted by Sarah, thought that, well, maybe God meant anybody that is born in my house. So, you know, he birthed Ishmael through Hagar. Now that's a mistake. Wasn't the right thing. So if you look at Abraham's life of faith, I mean, if you follow his journey, it was not a perfect journey. You know, he had ups and downs. Some of it is recorded for us. We don't know. He may have struggled a lot more. You know, he may have had those brilliant days when he was like, God, when is this son going to be born? He may have had all those days. You know, only a few things are recorded. But now when the Holy Spirit is looking back on Abraham's life, verses 17 to 21 is not making a single mention of any of his failures, of any of his low days. It's just saying, see, ultimately, this is what he did. So I think that's a very, you know, a powerful lesson for us that, you know, in our walk of faith, we may have these ups and downs and all of that. But God wants us to keep going, keep going. And ultimately, you journey into that place of perfect faith. And that's what happened to Abraham, that after Isaac was born and probably 12, 15 years after he was born in Genesis 22, when God tells Abraham, Abraham, take up Isaac, your son, your only son, go to a mountain and offer him as a sacrifice. Abraham did it. No questions. He didn't say, Hey, excuse me, God, I waited 25 years to get Isaac. And now you're telling me to go out for him this time? No, not worried at all. He just walked up, he goes up, says, Isaac, goes up ready to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. And Hebrews 11 says, Abraham did it because he was so convinced that he said, you know, that even if he offered Isaac, God will have to raise him up. And he had come to that place of faith. He was so convinced. This is what God has spoken. This is the sea that God is fulfilling his promise through Isaac. Even if I were to offer him a sacrifice, God will raise him up. No problems. And so much so, Hebrews 11 says, he received him as though he raised him up back from the dead. So as far as Abraham and God were concerned, it's like a resurrection to place. But he had come to that place of faith. Now, we know that for him to come to this place where he was fully persuaded, that God would fulfill what he had promised, it did not happen overnight. It was not a smooth journey there. It was not, you know, it was actually an up and down journey. There were mistakes along the way. But he got there. He got to this place where he was fully persuaded that what God had promised for his life, God will perform. And so the Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul is looking at that and highlighting that for us. And showing us how do we come to that place of mature faith? Or this is James 2. It's just, you know, through works, Abraham's faith was made perfect. The English word is perfect. The actual meaning is mature. So how do we come to this place of perfect faith or mature faith? The Holy Spirit is telling us through the life of Abraham, because it says we have all of us with the George Intel have to walk in the steps of the faith of Abraham. He has already mentioned that in verse 12. We have to walk in the steps of the faith of Abraham. We all have to follow his faith. But this is his faith. This is the summary of how he came to that place of perfect faith in spite of going through all the ups and downs and seasons of doubt and mistakes along the way. And, you know, he, all of that. But eventually he came to this place of perfect faith. How did he do it? Right? So that's what we will look at. We're 17 to 21. You know, so we're 17. So this is the promise as it is written. So he's quoting the promise. What was the promise God gave Abraham? I've made you the father of many nations. So God is saying, look, I have decided this for you. This is my assignment for you. This is my plan for you. I decided this for you. So, you know, let's try to personalize this passage, because for all of us, this is how we must learn to walk in faith, right? So God would put something in your heart saying, I have decided that I'm going to do this and this through you. Right? So it's between you and God. In Abraham's case, God said, I have made you a father of many nations. So, you know, so this is how God works, right? As far as God is concerned, it is a done thing. So I've made you the father of many nations. That's who you are going to be. Right? That's as far as God's plan for you. It's concerned. It's a done thing. I made the father of many nations. Now, in the presence, we're 17, in the presence of him whom he believed God. So he heard the promise. This is what I'm going to do in your life. This is my plan for you. And this was before God. I mean, this is the God who gives life to the dead. And he calls things that do not exist as though they did. So Abraham is hearing this promise from God. And who is this God? He's the God who gives life to the dead. And he calls things that do not exist as though they did. So two things about God. First, he's the God who gives life to the dead. Things that look impossible, look dead. God resurrects. God gives life. And I like this verse in Hebrews. You know, maybe we'll just look at it and we can go for a break and come back. But if you turn to me, keep your hand in Romans 4. And we'll just go to Hebrews 11. We all say the writer of Hebrews, most likely it was the Apostle Paul. But we don't know. But Hebrews 11 and verse 12. Somebody could read that please. Hebrews 11 verse 12. Therefore, from one man and him as good as dead were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude, innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore. Thank you. You just see how beautiful the language is. From one man, him as good as dead. Here's a man who was like, hey, he's as good as dead. From such a man came so many as the stars in the sky as the sand of the seashore. I just reading this verse is like, wow, from one man who was as good as dead comes something innumerable, comes a nation. So go back to Romans 4.17, right? So God gives life to the dead. Abraham, right now it may seem like you're as good as dead. And Abraham was about 75 years old when he called him 100, almost 100 years old when Isaac was born as good as dead. But God gives life to the dead. And from such a person came a big nation. So it tells us something about God and how he works in our lives. Sometimes when we are as good as dead, and I'm just using this metaphorically, when we are as good as dead, things in our lives are as good as dead, situations in our life are as good as dead. God releases something huge, something big, something unimaginable. That's exactly what he did in Abraham's life. But how did Abraham position himself to see that? And he's got to explain to us in the next few verses. So let's just take a quick break, 10 minute break. I will be back and we will just spend some time on this passage because I think it teaches us, you know, this is the steps of the faith of Abraham we should walk in. How did Abraham come to this place of perfect faith or mature faith? This will teach us. So we'll be back in 10 minutes. Thank you.