Follow the Promises: Three Giants and Two Springs

Three giants don’t wait for a convenient day to show up. They come daily, and they come loud: the world telling you to find life in substitutes, the flesh pulling you back into old coping paths, and the devil pressing shame like it’s the final word. We sit in Joshua 15 with Caleb as he takes the mountain God promised and drives out three giants, then we bring that picture straight into real life with a simple question: what are you actually fighting, and what are you fighting with?

From there, the story turns unexpectedly tender when Caleb’s daughter Achsah asks for “a blessing” and requests springs of water. A good field without water is still dry land, and that becomes a mirror for the Christian life when we try to live on self-source effort. We talk about abiding in Christ as relationship, not performance, and why Jesus can say, “Ask whatever you desire,” without turning prayer into a Ferrari wish list. The key is humility, dependence, and a heart shaped by God’s word.

We also name the mountains that can stand between us and joy: disappointment, fear, comparison, control, lust, and the subtle lie that God is mad at you. Then we lean into the only strategy that actually brings rest: grace upon grace, living water through the Holy Spirit, and truth that answers accusation. If you feel thirsty, stuck, or tired of digging your own well, press play and come thirsty.

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Transcript

Why Springs Matter For Life

Caleb Claims Hebron And Wins

The Three Giants We Face

SPEAKER_03 0:27

All right. Today's message is called Follow the Promises as we're studying through Joshua. We're up in chapter fifteen now and it's called Three Giants and Two Springs. Three Giants and Two Springs. Cool picture, right? Yeah. Thanks, Chat GPT. I'm not an artist, so I did not make that. But what are natural springs of water? I went down a rabbit hole. I opened up Google and I looked at what natural, because I've been up in the mountains of Colorado. You know, we actually have mountains there where they're really tall and big, not like these Texas hills, right? So way up at like 10,000 feet, 12,000 feet, 14,000 feet. There's springs way at the top. And I was thinking, I was trying to figure out how does this water just fresh water just up here? And so I learned that the water table breaks through and cracks through the dirt, and sometimes it's it raises above, and then sometimes it's snowpack. Uh well, whatever the science says, they're pretty amazing and they're pretty valuable, especially back in the day when you didn't have, and if you didn't, you had to live by a river, which is where all the animals and thieves lived. Or if and if you didn't live in all these places, you were in danger. Water source that was liable is super, super important. By the way, by the way, how do you make a waterbed more bouncy? You fill it with spring water. Volve groans. That was good to the side. Yes. So if you didn't have a well or a spring on or a river on your property, you better hope you you you could find a spring, uh, or you were gonna die. And your land was on Mr. Caleb in the book of Joshua. And last week we remembered his patient faith. He waited 45 years for God to fulfill the promise in his life that he made to him when he was 40 years old. So he's now 85, and he he's been walking in faith, and he's just as passionate about seeing God give. He's living by promises. And this entire book of Joshua is about following promises, living according to promises, which is how grace works. So Caleb is a wonderful exact uh example, his faith or his purpose, but he boldly declared, Give me this mountain, and that was last week's sermon. So if you're curious about that, go back and listen to it. Because God had already promised it. He wasn't promised that God had given. So now we get to Joshua 15, and it gives us a little more insight on this story of Joshua taking his mountain. Okay, so it says now Caleb or Caleb taking his mountain, and Joshua being there in the book of Joshua. Now Caleb, the son of Jephuna, he gave to Caleb, he gave a share among the children of Judah, according to the commandment of the Lord, to Birgeth Arbah, which is in Hebron. Arba was the father of Anak, and Caleb drove out three sons of Anak from there. Sheshai, Ahimai, the children of Anak. Ooh. So Joshua follows through on this promise that uh and that we get more of this story than we had last week. Last week we just heard Josh, uh Caleb took the mountain. Report it says, Caleb drives out three sons of Anak, three, and guess what? They're all giants. They're giants. Anak was a big giant, his kids were giants, so three giants, not just one. Take that, David. Okay, and I think we also fight three giants daily. So I'm gonna kind of put us in Caleb's sandals for the moment. We fight the world, the flesh, and the devil. Okay, so I'm gonna I'm gonna kind of equate these three giants that Caleb beats to theologically that we fight three enemies daily, the world, the flesh, and the devil. What's the world? How do we fight the world? Right? Are we are we called to go change the world? Well, the fallen world system that substitutes created things for the creator. The values, the the pressures of life that just leave Jesus out and teach us to find life in our stuff, in our status, in our self-improvement apart from Him. It's like this rock song that plays over the loudspeakers of Clayton's, I mean South Padre. And it's like a worldly song that says, you don't need Jesus, you don't need Jesus, you just need stuff, you just need what you need. Like the world is selling that, okay? And so that's the first thing that we're fighting. The second thing is the flesh. This is these old learned patterns of thinking and coping from before we knew Jesus. Now, some of us have known Jesus for like 10 years, 20 years, a hundred years, depending on how old you are. And before we knew Jesus, we had this self-made strategy for how to live life. And it involved lust and or religious self-reliance. You know, the before we knew Jesus, you could still be super religious. Maybe you grew up in a super religious house and family, but that still could totally be a flesh pattern because you're relying on religion instead of Jesus, just the same as people can rely on sinning instead of Jesus. It's the same deal. It's the flesh. Okay? But that's not your nature. You're new. And so, but the flesh has a way uh in our mind uh that that it it tricks us and thinks and makes us think it's still there. Okay, so we have this battle against our flesh. Even though our flesh has already been old flesh patterns, they still are there. That's why God says we have to renew our mind in Romans 12. We'll get to that in a second. And then the devil is the third giant, okay? The devil.

SPEAKER_02 7:35

And he's this uh reader in our in our soul, okay?

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He can tempt and he can lie, but he's been completely disarmed on the cross. So he's like a lion whose teeth have been knocked out by a punch. So he's just like blow.

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He can he can roar, but he can only accuse anything at all. He is a disarmed or detoothed lion.

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What do you call detoothed? I don't know. D-toothed bath gumming. He can gum you to death. It's these three giants daily. How are they gonna attack you? You gotta be ready. Well, the world it offers you substitutes.

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This will complete you.

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When the truth is, you're already complete in Christ. So you set your mind on things above, not on the world's measuring stick. You're not gonna be happy unless you have this, unless you have that, unless you feel this, unless you experience that. That's the world's attack. So that's that giant, that's how he moves. Second giant, the flesh. It suggests these old paths that we used to walk down. Do it your old way. Just indulge in the drugs they make you feel so good. Just indulge in the pornography, just indulge in the relationship, just indulge in the thing that you know met your needs at one point in your life. Maybe it was even running away, maybe it was self-improvement. The truth is, you are a new creation, you are called to identify and walk in this new creation we call the spirit now. What does God say about you? You are born again in the spirit. And when you walk in that, when you believe it and say, I'm gonna walk in what God says about me, you will not carry out any of these fleshly desires. That's how the battle's won. It's never won by me saying, I'm gonna try harder not to be fleshly. You're not as big as this giant, but it's already been won by Jesus, and we win it by faith. We can walk in that victory. Okay, the third giant is the devil. All right, and he is this toothless lion that whispers accusations and lies. So that's his attack strategy, but we resist him with guess what? Truth. We stand firm in the faith, which means Jesus has finished it, your sins are gone. So what does the and what does the devil do? He says one thing. When you sin, he says, you should be ashamed of yourself. God's disappointed in you. Your mommy's disappointed in you, your daddy's disappointed in you, your kids are disappointed in you, you should be disappointed in you. What is all that? It's shame and it's a lie because yes, we do sin, but every time we sin, we have a gospel, we have the blood of Christ that cleanses us and has cleansed us from all sin. So if we don't walk in that truth, if we don't say, I know that I'm forgiven, then we will believe this lie of shame, saying you should be in time out. God doesn't want to see you right now, He's mad at you. You're not holy enough. Okay? Faith is what makes us holy, not our actions. Faith, holiness is a gift, righteousness is a free gift, and that's the truth of the gospel. Oh, but Satan, he fills us with shame, and if he can't do it that way, he fills you with lies. He fills you with lies. There's no condemnation. The Bible says that's the truth, but Satan says, you're condemned.

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God's mad at you, it's hopeless.

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These are the lies that Satan tells us. So, how do we fight with the gospel, with the truth, and drive out these giants like Caleb did? Caleb drove out these giants. Okay, no problem. Uh so when the world says, prove yourself, take these substitutes, remember, I want you to remember that you're already complete and accepted. That's what the gospel says. I am you are complete in Christ and you're accepted by him. That's how to beat the first one. So the first giant comes down the hill, you pick up that and you throw it at him, or the sword, whatever image you want to use, that's how you win. Second giant, when the world shouts, prove yourself, or sorry, when the flesh grasp control, take control. You it's up to you through the patterns that I can teach you, the flesh says. The patterns you already know. It's up to you to, you know, I know that I believe that I'm filled with your spirit, but take control of my life, take control of my words, take control of my thoughts and my actions. Then we won't walk in those old patterns, those old patterns. So the person we were before, he truly is dead. And the new person, the new creation we are now is Jesus living through yourself to him. I'm telling you, that is the point where we don't want to do it. Okay, the first two giants were like, okay, I can believe that, I can throw that stone, I can use that sword, but when it comes to I have to completely offer myself to Jesus, we we we claim for us to let go.

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I'm gonna trust you, God.

Beating Shame With Gospel Truth

SPEAKER_03 14:08

That's how to defeat the third giant, though. Okay, so let's see how Caleb and his faith and his battle affects his family. His family. Okay, so it says, um, he who attacks curgeth Sephiroth and takes it, to him I will give Axa, my daughter, as a wife. So marriage was a big deal. So back then, becoming part of the family. Uh so Caleb has like, he's like, for me, my family, we're gonna serve the Lord, right? That's his and so his family, the the the it was all about faith. He's like, we're gonna trust God. And if you're gonna join my family, if you're gonna marry my daughter, guess what?

Faith That Shapes A Family Legacy

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You have to be a man.

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Our family, the Caleb family, the Calebites, we are going to have a crest that says, we walk by faith. Saying here, he's saying, My daughter, we she wants to be married. We're gonna open competition. Who's gonna live by faith? What do you think? We should do this in our day and age. Who's gonna hell for the island? I don't know. So, verse 17. So Othniel, the son of Kenes, the brother of Caleb, so Caleb's nephew, Othniel, took it. Well, yeah, you bet your biscuits, he does. He his name means Lion of God. Othniel, right? He takes the city, becomes the judge of Israel for 40 years. So after this period of time, after they get settled in the land, there's no king, they have judges, and they're just kind of like the leader, but just everyone kind of he spent 40 years suffering and waiting, right? But because he had faith, he now has a descendant, someone in his family that spends 40 years, his little son, his actual younger, you know, nephew, follows in his steps and gives the nation 40 years of rest.

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And you've had to be patient and wait.

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Have you ever considered that maybe it's because the future generation of your family is gonna watch you and is watching you as they see your faithfulness, they're going to walk in faith, and God is gonna give the world rest through them. God's gonna bless them with the kingdom of God like influence in their life. I know in my life my dad has influenced me by his faith.

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And he told me, and he sat the family down and he's like, We have tested, let's pray.

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And I was like, let's go beg or let's do something. But my dad had such confidence, he said, the Lord will hear and the Lord will provide. I I got on my knees with him and we prayed. And five days later, he's like, Oh, yeah, by the way, God provided and we're all good. I don't know how it happened. He told me at the time, but it was unremarkable. But God provided, God heard, and he got paid from something he wasn't expecting.

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And I knew I had time, I will never worry about money.

Ask For Springs And Blessing

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If I need something, I will ask the Lord. And I've now walked like 35 years from that day, and I really don't believe I've worried about money much in my life. I've had peace in that area of my life for that whole entire time. And there's been times of struggle, and there's been times, but because of his victory, I've been able to be at rest because I saw it and I learned it. You can have that impact on your kids. But you maybe you're like, well, I'm just started following the Lord yesterday. That's okay. Just walk in faith each day and see what happens. Fulfill promises that will to you that will make a bigger impact on the future world than you'll ever realize. Maybe not through your kids, but some way. Don't give up praying, don't lose heart, don't be a pussy cat, be a lion. Othniel, the lion of God. That was a good one. I like that one. All right. Verse 18. Now it was came to him. Uh this is his daughter, Caleb's daughter, that she, or sorry, yeah, that she persuaded him to ask her father for a field.

SPEAKER_02 19:33

Okay. So she fish, and she answered, Give me a blessing.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

I want you to underline that word blessing. Since you have given me land in the south, give me also springs of water. So Caleb's daughter, Axa, had her eye on this special piece of land. Okay? But it was dry, it was just land, but it had a pretty view, probably. She's like, I could do something somehow being diverted there or being given, you know, to her. So this field would be pretty much worthless without, you know, at this point. It's just a dry, natural, probably pretty barren. It's not very fruitful. Not very fruitful. Because you always need living water, Greek, where we get that term, it literally means bubbling up water. Water that bubbles up from the ground. It has a source, and it a springing water is the little definition. A spring, living water is springing water. And you pretty much always need this springing water to produce fruitful field or bubbling water in order to make a uh a fruit fruitful field. Caleb hears what his daughter's asking, and her husband, Othniel, and he doesn't try to dissuade mock her for choosing some dumb field. Like, why are you choosing this field? Looks like a barren wasteland. She's like, no, he's like, that's the field you want, and you know what you want. You location. How many real estate agents are in here?

SPEAKER_02 21:25

One, two, three, three, any more over here? Four. Yeah.

Abiding And Bold Prayer Promises

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So now Caleb has lived this life of faith. God gives him an opportunity to represent him to his family. He becomes a picture, he loves it. Your heavenly father is exactly a different level of communion with God that you can have through prayer, that you need it. But by seeking to understand, you can gain a heart that doesn't seek selfishly, according to your heart, according to your um spirit. But then some of you have discovered that you cannot where you open up your heart to each other. It's a deeper level than just asking for what you need and then just seeking to understand why you need it. But share their heart with him and listen to him share his heart with them. Isn't that a beautiful picture? And Jesus taught us this This will not go without an answer. Your father will meet with you. About anything. You can bring anything to him and he will meet with you. In first John, or sorry, in John 15, 7, it says, If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you can ask whatever you desire and it shall be done to you.

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That can't mean that, right? There's no way that that can be a true who believes that's a true verse? That's is that in your Bible? It's it can't mean that. But it does.

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Why would Jesus make such a reckless statement? Does he know how many Ferraris are gonna be asked of him? Well why doesn't J Jesus limit to the Father's part in this? He doesn't. There is no limit to the Father's generosity. There is no limit. What does Jesus really mean? It cannot mean what it says. It sounds like the only thing we need to concern ourselves with is abiding. And then your prayer life is gonna be really powerful. What does that mean? Abiding is about relationship. Relationship. Abiding is not about following the rules or being perfect or measuring up to a standard. It is always and only relationship, a new covenant relationship where I come with humility and faith, and God brings and gives all the grace that I will ever need. Have you ever heard of that before?

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I hope so at our church.

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That's the grace relationship. It's a relationship with God where we are the objects of God's love and grace and provision. He wants to give you answers to your prayer. You are not slaves and you are not disappointments, you are beloved. And we can expect generosity from our Father. What does it mean to abide in Jesus? Having a relationship with him with humility, saying, God, it's not about me and my kingdom and my Ferraris. It's about your kingdom and faith. I'm gonna trust not in me and my Ferraris and my degrees and my abilities and my own wisdom. I'm going to trust in your truth, your word, and your grace. It's that relationship of a father, a gracious father, and a child, a humbly dependent child. That's the relationship. And the father says, if we're in that relationship, expect everything you ask to be provided for you. As Caleb gives these springs to Axa, you're just like that, your father freely supplies everything needed for your life. Everything you need to be godly and righteous is given to you already freely in Christ. And look at this, but I want you to see this.

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Caleb gave her not one, but two springs that she can use to make her land fruitful.

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Two springs to make it fruitful. Two springs to make this life fruitful. And I want you to see how Jesus does the exact and we beheld his glory. The glory is the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. And grace for grace. What that he's rich in, he gives it to us. Grace is always given. Give is the language of grace. Grace has to be given. As soon as it's not given, it can't be grace and only be given. If you think you have to earn his grace, you're not going to get it at all.

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That's how it works.

Grace Upon Grace And Living Water

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And he's full of grace for grace. Grace upon grace upon grace. He wants to give another and then another and then another. And each grace is a he gives you one grace so he can follow it up by giving you another grace, and then another grace, and then another grace. There's one source, which was the mountain that belonged to Caleb. Because where were the springs? They were on his mountain. So his daughter says, I like this field over here. Caleb's like bingo. I can divert my springs to you, and I can give you two of them. You'll have an abundant. You ever heard that term abundant life before? Like in John 10:10, where it says, The thief does not come except to steal, to kill, and to destroy. But I have come that they may have life and that they may have it. They are united in one purpose for you to give you an abundant life. They want to join you to their abundant life, their life-giving life, their spiritual life. As far as spiritual fruit with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control. He had them all in space. He had joy, he was the happiest person that ever lived. He had joy, he had wisdom, he had everything, and he's full of it, and he offers it all to you. Two springs flowing. Grace upon grace flowing. In John chapter 7, Jesus stood up. Now I gotta set the stage for you. It says, On the last day, the great day of they would carry buckets from the springs they had there in Jerusalem, and they would carry buckets. All the priests, they would carry these buckets up to the top of the steps, and they would as a celebration of God's life, of God's grace. They were pouring out the water, just like we pour this out as an offering to you, God. But all the people are like, the water spraying everywhere, and you're just like, man, I'm thirsty. I get that way. On that day, when they're pouring out the last day, Jesus stands up in the middle of this scene where they're pouring out.

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Let him come to me and drink.

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He who believes in me, as a scripture, rivers of living water, springing water, bubbling water, rivers of them. How many rivers? Probably two. But this he spoke concerning the spirit that oxa thirsted for a fruitful, abundant life. She asked her father if he can do the same thing. Each one of us desire to be fruitful, and and part of the kingdom work that our father is doing. That's not about figuring out how to change the world, guys. It's not about the strategies, it is about each one of us getting alone. And Jesus said, Come to me.

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What does that mean?

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It means abide in me. Come to me and abide with me in a living relationship, and I will give you the living waters of the Holy Spirit. Come to Him and believe. As we do that, He gives us the springs, right? Rivers, rivers, that's the spiritual life that we have all been promised. It's yours, it belongs to you. And that's why we must live by promise and not by effort. Because self-source living is a dry desert life. Could she have dug a well? Apparently not. There are springs right there that your father could easily give you. But you know what? A lot of us would rather spend 50 years digging our own well than just getting on our knees one time and asking our father, Would you give me? And that just leads to our religious life. Religion is an endless sand dune horizon of living.

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There's no oasis.

Your Mountains Flattened By Grace

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I hear his voice. I hear him offer me life, but this mountain that's in front of me, that's between me and God. What if there's a mountain? Maybe that mountain is like some disappointment from the past, shame and sorrow of yesterday. Maybe there's this fear of losing your salvation or falling out of fellowship with God that is like this mountain always to growth, and you're just like, I can't see how I can let this go. I just, I was grown up this way. And I believe you have to just work so hard to follow Jesus. It's so and lust and control and comparing myself with other people and self-reliance. These are all flesh patterns that we've learned. Maybe those are your mountain. I am what I own, I am what my bank account says I am, I am what I feel. That's where I find my truth, what the world says about me. Or maybe you have these accusations, and none of this is true. What if God really doesn't love you and God's really not able to give grace to you because you suck?

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These can all be in your life. And it's like Jesus is way over there on the other side of those mountains.

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That you have to see. Look at Zechariah 4-7. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel, you shall become a plain. You know about that in Texas.

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And he shall bring forth the capstone with Shadow.

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Now he's making a prophecy to Zerubbabel that he's gonna build the temple. But in Zerubable's mind, building this temple after that they were um in Babylon and coming back, it was one thing. Grace, grace to it. There's one solution for every mountain, all the mountains that are in your life, there's one solution. Grace it cannot stand. It will become a great plane. What do you do? Just keep shouting grace, grace to it. Figure out how to fix this myself. I am going to ask the Lord, I'm gonna ask, seek, and knock. And that's my entire strategy. Therefore, gird up the loins of your mind.

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I love that term. So weird.

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And rest your hope fully. There is no other hope, there's no other rest, there's no other strategy that we have except grace. You don't need to follow the living word, believe his words, and then the Holy Spirit. Look, Father, Son, Spirit, this is amazing how it always works that way. The Holy Spirit was given as the springs of water that you asked for from your Father, given through. We can rest in his life of the Holy Spirit, living water. And you got to rest fully, you got to rest exclusively. There's no little corners of your mind that can be worrying about what if God is gonna let me down, what if Jesus is gonna fail me? I've tried this before and it hasn't worked. None of that on the grace, God will not let you down. The new covenant of grace, it changes and heals everything. Every mountain becomes a plane, everything that's broken in our minds, like we learned about Caleb last week. When we come to Jesus exclusively, we discover his grace flows into us and through us, and it's given to us in everything.

Thirst Prayer And Closing Worship

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What are we not at rest in today? Where is the dry land that we through and to Are we thirsty? For something else, knowing that we and he cried out, saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to me. Father, we need you.

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There's so many thirsts and wounds, and every single one of them will bow before your grace. Every single one of them is for the fields that we've been given. Thank you for the things that we've gone through that have been painful. Thank you for the struggles that we've had, because if we're living waters, we would be um we would just not be thirsty. But Lord, we are thirsty because of these pains, because of the sicknesses, because of the disappointments, because of all the mountains, Lord, we know that we need your grace. And Father, we're gonna listen to your word this morning. We're gonna rest fully in the grace that is given through Jesus Christ. We cast ourselves before you, we confess our need to you, we confess we need your springs of life, we need them, we desire for you to give them to us. Share your life with us, share your heart with us, and help us to be fruitful and abundant in righteousness and holiness for you. I pray for each person in here that we would be fully resting in your grace. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Would you all stand up as we sing this song?