Sermons: Campbell Road Church of Christ

The Bible In 8 Verses #1

The beginning of the Bible story gives us a prophecy of hope after the fall of man in the garden. It tells us about the victory of the offspring of the woman. It also tells us about the hostility that continued for all those who choose to be offspring of the woman instead of the serpent. The prophecy tells us the hostility will cause pain, but ultimately will end in victory. Can we help you with your walk with God? We'd love to hear from you! https://www.thebibleway.com/contact/send-a-message

Duration:: 36m
Broadcast on:: 05 Sep 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

This next few months, we are starting a series, Jordan and Ricky and myself, something a little different we're going to do. We're going to be preaching through eight different lessons that all are going to coordinate together, and we're calling this series the Bible in eight verses. Now that should sound really bold to you, and with that in out, when you do one of these things, it's kind of risky because you only get eight. And so for sure, we're going to leave out somebody's favorite verse. For sure, we're going to leave out a verse that you're going to say, "How could you forget this one?" We didn't forget, we just had to make choices. And so we're going to do our best to just try to walk us through the Bible story over these next few months and try to encapsulate that in only eight verses. And I hope that will be helpful to you. It's a very good thing, I think, for us at times, to try to zoom out. To get our lens a little bit farther out from the Bible story and get the big picture of things and get the bigger message of what we're reading. So that's our goal for the next few months, what we're going to be starting. And what should seem an obvious first step for the first lesson is doing something from the beginning of your Bible. And so, in fact, this morning, we are going to be in the book of Genesis. We typically call this the book of beginnings. It's really what the name means. The beginning of the Bible story begins in the book of beginnings in Genesis. And I think there's something that's important for us to think about when we think about Genesis. And this is true of all Scripture, that the Bible is written for us, but it was not written to us. And Genesis had an original audience. Israel was the original audience for the book of Genesis. It was a book that was supposed to help them and their struggles and their problems and what they needed. However, I think what we should also see from Genesis is even though it wasn't written directly to us, it's really our story as well. It's not just Israel's story. Israel was a nation that was trying to find their identity and was trying to find out who this God was and how they were supposed to live in light of Him being their God. And the fact is that's our story today as well. We still need to find our identity and we need to learn things about our God and how to serve Him. And so the Genesis story is for Israel, but the Genesis story is our story as well. And so where we're going to start this morning, then Genesis 3, 15, so I hope you'll turn there with me, to Genesis 3, verse 15. Now to some of you, you might look at that and that might be a very familiar verse. You might think, oh yeah, I know exactly why you chose that. Others might think I don't really remember what Genesis 3, 15 says. Hopefully after this morning, we'll have a better idea of what this verse is getting at. But Genesis 3, 15 is our first verse in going to the Bible and 8 verses. Before we jump into that verse, I want us to kind of get caught up to speed with what's happened in the first few chapters of Genesis. This all started in the book of beginnings. And in Genesis 1, 1, you get several things, as one of Reina's hit songs puts it, you get the win and the who, and just a little bit we're going to get the what did he do. But first we're going to start with the who. And in Genesis 1, 1, it says in the beginning, God, so when the beginning, before there was time, before there was matter, before there was this earth, before there was any flesh and bone, before there was anything, there was God. It answers several questions that people try to solve today. What is the beginning of all of these things and all of these people in Genesis 1, 1 answers that question for us. It begins with God. The interesting thing here in Genesis 1, 1, is that the word used for God is Elohim. Elohim. And it's really kind of a generic term. Elsewhere in Scripture, you'll find false gods, gods with little G's that aren't really gods at all being referred to as false Elohim. So it's not really a specific term. It's kind of generic. And so you open up the story, hearing about this God, but you don't really know anything about him yet. And what the rest of the story is going to do and what we're going to see in Genesis 3, 15 is we're going to get a fuller picture of who this God is. But in the very beginning, it all starts with God. Israel's story started with God. Your story starts with God. And the next thing we find is what he did. He created. And the Genesis writer will put it this way to show us that he created everything. He created the heavens, and he also created the earth. He created all of it. There was nothing that was outside of God's reach. He was over every single thing that was created, and he tells us the way it was created. By his words, he spoke all of this into existence. The very words of God have the power to bring life and to bring creation and to bring order. And so all things were created by God and they were created by his words. And what we also find in this story of creation is that there's a trajectory to this creation. And what you find is essentially the apex of all he created is man. He created the heavens and the earth. He created everything in them. But you get the idea when you read Genesis 1 and 2 that it's all for man. You created the world for man. He created all the things in the world for man. And so God creates, and he creates man. And you find again that there is purpose throughout all of this. God is not making things haphazard. God is not doing things randomly. God is not doing things without design, and he's not making things unpurposefully. And he's not making things without purpose. Even in the structure of creation you see essentially three domains made, separating light from dark, and separating waters and sky, and separating water from dry land. And then he fills those domains with things on the subsequent days. And so in six days everything's created, and then finally he creates man, and he gives man a purpose. And the first indication we have of that is that man was made in the image of God. He is in God's image and in his likeness, and so that gives him purpose. We also find out that man was supposed to have dominion over things, dominion over the world, dominion over the animals. And that word really just means rule. They were supposed to rule over things. And for this reason some people have made the comment that we should see Adam and Eve as co-rulers, if you will, with God. God is the ultimate sovereign. He's the Almighty. He rules overall, but he gave man a portion of rule. He was supposed to rule over the earth, and so they were supposed to be ruling together. And you also find that man has a job description. He's not just living randomly on the earth, but he is supposed to work and keep the garden as the ESV puts it. Those aren't the same words by the way. They're supposed to work the garden, but they are supposed to keep the garden. The idea there of that work can be used elsewhere as to guard something, to protect something. And so they had a job to do, to keep this garden and to protect this garden. And up to this point in the Genesis story, everything is going to the summary word is good. It's all good. Everything's great. A man is doing what he's supposed to do. The stars and the sun and the moon, they're doing what they're supposed to do. The animals do what they're supposed to do. Everything is really good, but then sin happens. You see, there was something else that God told man and woman. There was a warning. Not only did they have a job description, but there was something they weren't supposed to do. There was a tree in the middle of the garden, a tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And they were not supposed to take from that tree, but along comes a serpent we're introduced to. And he's more crafty, more cunning than any beast of the field. And he tempts the woman, specifically the woman. And he tempts her essentially by saying this. He asked her a question. And when the woman responds with God said, essentially the serpent says, "God lied." I know he said, "Don't take of the fruit and that you will die when you keep it, but you will not die," is what the serpent says. And he gives the motivation behind why the woman should trust him. He says, "The reason God said that to you," essentially is because he's holding out on you. He doesn't really have your best interest in mind. He knows that you will gain something from this, and that's why he's keeping it away from you. He's holding out on you. And so really here in the beginning of the Genesis story, we see one of the most fundamental problems of mankind, one of the most fundamental sins of mankind, is believing the lie that God doesn't have your best interest in mind. Because the whole creation story's been telling us just the opposite. God created the world for man. God created man in his image. God gave everything to man. He made him rulers over the land. God is showing how much he cares about man, but the Satan has tempted the woman to believe otherwise. And so she takes of the tree and she gives to her husband Adam, and they both eat. And so sin enters the world, and everything is different after that. And what happens after that is God comes into the garden and he starts asking questions of the man and the woman, and then the blame game starts happening. A lot of fingers are getting pointed in lots of directions. The woman says, "No, it wasn't me." The man says, "No, it wasn't me." And so what that leads to is a conversation between the man and the woman and obviously with the snake as well. And that brings us to our verse in Genesis 3, verse 15. And so what I want to do is I just want to walk through this verse with you, see the significance of it, and see how that leads us to the bigger ideas of what we're going to see in the rest of this Bible story. I want you to notice the first thing about this verse. It says, "I will put," but what we see from this is that God is the one that's in control. God is the one that is putting this enmity as we're going to see in just a second. It doesn't say that man did this. It doesn't say that the world does this. It's not that somebody else is creating this enmity. God himself is the one that's doing it. God is acting. He's the one that's in control of the situation. He doesn't look at the fall and man's sinning and start biting his fingernails. He's not worried about the situation that he can't handle it. He goes to work. He's taking action. And in fact, he's the first one to take action. He's initiating these things. God doesn't wait on man to do something. He is acting first. And the interesting thing is that what he does is he puts enmity. We might have expected something else in response to the fall. Man's sins. And so God put his spirit. God placed his love. God placed his kindness. Something else. But God here himself is putting enmity. He's creating enmity in this situation. What does that mean? What does that have to do with the story? Why does that make sense? Well a few things to point out. Number one, this word is really the structure of this entire verse. It's all about enmity between three different groups. Three different beings if you will. And the first one that we see, the first group is between the serpent, between Satan and the woman. You think about enmity and you think about Satan and the woman and it kind of makes some sense to you. Why God would want enmity between Satan and the woman. That's his woman if you will. That's his creation. That's the one that he made and Satan's trying to steal her away. And so God wants that enmity. And so we can see from that standpoint it is something that's good. Enmity is the idea of hostility or a war or you're making an enemy and God wants the woman to make Satan her enemy. And so we can see how that's a good thing. But this is the question I want us to ask and think about is how did God do that? How did God make enmity between the woman and Satan? Many have speculated that this is something that is miraculous in the sense of God. Change the thoughts of man's mind. That now when they look at sin they'll recognize that sin is something that's not beneficial. Even though they're still tempted to sin, God didn't take that away. He put in man's mind the idea that sin isn't really going to be beneficial. I do it even though I know it's wrong. Here's the problem with that interpretation. That's already the situation in the garden. Me and a woman already know that sin is wrong. They've already seen the consequences of sin. I think this is much more practical. Genesis 3.15 doesn't tell us specifically how God is putting enmity between Satan and the woman. But I think you see it throughout the rest of the Bible story. This idea of enmity, hostility, I think, is the idea that God is now vying for. He is competing for the affection of mankind. Maybe we can put it this way. God created enmity by not leaving this world that had been corrupted by sin. God didn't look at the fall and see man fail and say, "I'm done with this." Satan, you can have him. He didn't look at it and say, "I'm just going to wipe everything off the earth. I'm just going to destroy it." There would be no hostility if that was the case. The God looked at mankind choosing the serpent, choosing Satan, looking at him, vying for their affection. And he said, "The war is on. I'm sticking in this war. I'm going to fight for my creation." And so man has a choice to make now. He can go to the serpent. He can go to Satan in that desire, or he can choose this God, who throughout the story is simply showing mankind who he is. God will tell us who he is. God is love. And so man can look at what they desire, but then they look up and they look at the God and the war begins. The war begins in their heart and their minds. God created enmity by staying in the world and showing man his love, thus creating a choice, thus creating hostility between what they are going to do. And so as we go throughout the story, and you see this enmity that's created, you really get a fuller picture of who God is. He is a God that fights for the people that he loves. He's also a God of justice and mercy, and we're going to see that as we develop. All these themes are going to be developed throughout this story. And so there's hostility between Satan and the woman. Maybe one last thing that I'll say on this point before we move on to the next group is that some people look at the Genesis story and they wonder why did God even allow for sin to happen. Okay, yes, he's valiant in fighting for his people, but why even put a bad tree in the garden? He didn't have to do that. I think there's many answers to that question. I'm going to offer you one that I think is sufficient. You know, you know, that if someone doesn't have a choice but to love you, it's not really love. God knew the same thing. God knew that if he wanted his creation to love him, if he wanted his creation to be in his image, to be in his likeness, to be like him in love, he had to give them a choice. And so he does. He could have forced man to do whatever he wanted to, but that's not what he did for mankind. He put them in the garden. He gave them everything they needed. And even when they fall, he decides I'm going to continue to fight for these people. And so we're already getting a little fuller picture of this Elohim. Again, think about Israel reading this story. They have all kinds of false Elohim around them. Gods that only are appeased. Gods that don't really care about their people. Gods that just want to get the right kind of sacrifice so they won't smite them. Gods that are fickle just like man, but that's not the God of Genesis. That's not the God of Genesis 3. And so we already see that with the enmity that's created between Satan and the woman. But it continues. The next group that we see here is that there is enmity between not just Satan and the woman, but between Satan and the woman's offspring. That word is kind of interesting, offspring that's used there. It's singular, but it can be used in a plural as well. You could say that someone's son is their offspring, but you could also say that their great-great-grandson is their offspring. So there could be a multitude of offspring or it could just be the next child. It could be used either way. And I think there's some intentional ambiguity here in this prophecy that who is going to be this offspring, that there's going to be hostility between Satan and the offspring. The idea is that it's going to continue to the next generation, but how far? Now, of course, we're on this side of the Genesis story, and so we already have some ideas about that. Our New Testament helps us out with this idea and spoiler alert, we're not talking about hostility between people and snakes, even though there is healthy hostility to be had between people and snakes. I highly recommend it, that's not really what this text is talking about. Again, this serpent is representing Satan in his offspring, represents something as well. Jesus helps us out with this. Notice in John 8 verse 44, "Your father, the devil, and your will is to do your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in truth because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, where he is a liar and the father of lies." So Jesus gives us the idea here that Satan, the devil, can be your father. You can, in fact, be his offspring. John will say in 1 John 3, 10, also this, "By this it is evident who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil, whoever does not practice righteousness, is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother." And so we get the idea here. What does it mean to be an offspring of Satan? What does it mean to be an offspring of God? That's simply how you live. It's how you conduct yourself. It's not something that was decided before time began. This is a choice that you get to make. Are you going to live righteously or not? If you do not, then you are an offspring of Satan, and if you do, of course you are an offspring of God. That's where the hostility is going to be. But, again, remember that when the first readers were reading this, they didn't really know if this offspring was going to be generations down the line or just the next one. Do you remember what the next story is in Genesis, in Genesis chapter 4? It's a story about two offspring, Cain and Abel, and in that story we see there is hostility. There is enmity between the two sons, between the offspring that Adam and Eve have, and there's a sacrifice that's made, and God becomes angry with Cain. He didn't regard Cain's sacrifice, and that leads us to an important verse. I want you to look in Genesis 4, verse 7. Notice what God says to Cain after this. If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, then is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it. I want you to notice a few things from this text in verse 7. Number one, the idea here, that God comes down and he's talking to Cain, and he's essentially asking a question, and he's telling him that you have a choice, Cain. If you do well, will you not be accepted? And he tells him you must rule over this, you must rule over sin. He doesn't tell Cain, I'm sorry buddy, Adam messed it up. Your mom messed it up. You know, it's really about what your brother can do. No, he says, Cain, you must rule over sin. The Genesis writer is going out of his way to make sure we understand the nature of sin. That sin is a choice that we all make. It's not because of what Adam and Eve did. They brought sin into the world, but now Cain, the very next offspring, has a choice to make. Will he rule over sin or not? And if he doesn't, we already see what that's going to lead to. We see the consequences of sin. It results in exile. In fact, that's exactly what happens with Cain. He gives in to temptation, he gives in to sin, and what happens to him. He's exiled. But I also want you to notice in the story that God, while he's just, an exiling Cain, he also shows his mercy because later on, we're going to find out that Cain is worried about someone else killing him, that people are just going to destroy him if he's sent away. But God says, no, I'm going to arc you. I'm going to cover you in a way so that people will not take your life. And this actually harkens his back to the story that we've already been talking about in Genesis 3. You see, God is a just God. And so he will send away an exile, people, when sin comes, but he's still a merciful God. Do you remember what he said to Adam and Eve about what would happen when they took the fruit of the tree? In the day you eat of it, you surely will die. Now, here's the thing. I think God made true on that promise because I think they were spiritual death when they were separated from God. But you can't help to think when you read the narrative. I really think they're going to be dead, like I think God's going to kill him. I mean, the idea of Adam being alive, like he was like, a body was formed and God put his spirit on him. And now he's like up and walking around. I think it's going to be the opposite of that when you take the fruit. But that doesn't happen. Do you know why? Do you know why that doesn't happen? Do you remember what the text says at the end of chapter 3 about what God is doing with Adam and Eve around verse 20, 21? It says, "The man called his wife, Eve, because she was the mother of all the living, and the Lord God made for Adam, and for his wife, garments of skins, and clothed them." Okay. This is the first time that there was a death in the Genesis story. The skins that Adam and Eve were wearing were not alive. They were dead. So God had to kill an animal in order to cover them. We might say that God covered their sin with the death, someone else, with something else. And so we already see this pattern that's established right in the beginning of the Genesis story that sin enters the world, and God sees that and he must be just. He's going to send them out, but he does something in response to their sin, the death of an animal for the life of the man. And you see the same thing happening in the Cain's story. Yes, he is exiled. Yes, there is judgment, but there is also mercy. God is covering Cain so that he does not die. And so we're getting this fuller picture of who this Elohim is, what kind of God he is, a God of justice, and a God of mercy, and a God that's creating this hostility between Satan and woman's offspring. But again, here's the thing with the Cain's story is that you read this prophecy and we hear that it's going to be hostility between your offspring and her offspring, and we look at what happens with his offspring and her offspring in the Cain's story and we say, "Wait a second. This isn't working out so well." Satan's offspring won. He bashed Cain or able over the head and he died. I mean, God's offspring didn't win in this battle. What's going to happen after this? Again, the interesting thing about this that we already know is that it doesn't necessarily only refer to the first offspring, but the generations to come. And so what you're going to see throughout this Bible story as we walk through this in the next few weeks is most of the time, it actually seems like God's offspring is on the losing side. Most of the time they are outnumbered. Most of the time those that are the righteous, those that are of God, aren't the majority. And even when they have victories, there seems to be a defeat that follows right after. No one will be a righteous man and he'll get through the flood, but then right after that what happens? It's in again and you'll see Solomon essentially taking the kingdom to its highest height only to watch two brothers of Israel essentially rip it apart. And so at every victory there seems to be another defeat and you keep looking at this prophecy and you're thinking, "Are we going to win this war? Is God's offspring going to be the victor and you might get some anxiety as you walk through it?" But really only that anxiety comes if you don't read the last part of prophecy because God didn't just put hostility, he didn't just put enmity between Satan's offspring and the woman's offspring. He promised hope, he promised victory because in the end he says, "He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel." Notice the word that's used here, he, that might again clue you into the idea that we're narrowing down to an individual, but really that's really just tied to the word offspring here. It's kind of ambiguous. Is this going to be a single person or is this going to be multiple people? Now, when we read this, our mind automatically goes to what you're already thinking, right? This is a prophecy between Satan and Christ. He is going to bruise the head, right? And Satan is going to bruise his heel and absolutely this is a prophecy that points us to what Christ is going to do, but I think there's a little bit more to it than that, but let's start there. That he is going to bruise your head. Christ is going to bruise the head of Satan and he is going to bruise his heel. Again, at the beginning of this Genesis story, it's not just a story that there's going to be war, it's a story that there's going to be victory and that's a message that God's people need today because there's still hostility today all around you and sometimes it seems like you're outnumbered and sometimes it seems like the people of God are so small in reference to the whole world around you, but what God is doing from the very beginning is saying there is hope and there is victory. And the way that it happens with Christ, essentially what this text does is it tells us how to read our gospels. It tells you how to read the story of Jesus in those first four books of your New Testament. You don't find what Jesus is doing is accidental. Things aren't happening outside of Jesus' control. Jesus isn't getting opposition and getting beaten and being taken to prison, all of these things by accident. No, this is a willing choice. This is the plan from the beginning. Jesus will be taken away at night out of the garden and Peter is starting to swing swords and Jesus says no, no, and he heals a man and he gives himself up willingly. This is all within his control. But Satan himself didn't even realize it because all through the trial and the beating and the mocking and eventually the crucifixion of Jesus, Satan thought that he had won. He thought that he was over and even after they buried Jesus and he was in the grave for three days, what we find is all that was for the creator of the world was just a bruise on his heel because the third day he rose and when he rose he did something to Satan. The idea of bruising his head, there was a critical blow given to Satan because Jesus shattered the power of death and he did that by shattering the power of sin. It's not that men never die anymore, but it's that we don't have to fear death. We get the idea here in Romans 623 and for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life and Christ Jesus our Lord. The wages of your sin is death. The wages of Adam and Eve sin was death. The wages of Cain's sin was death. Paul will say earlier in the letter in Romans that all have sinned, so here's the idea in Romans. We all have a paycheck that was coming our way. You all earned something and what you earned was death. However, Jesus did something to Satan when he rose. Hebrews 2 14 says, "Since therefore the children share in the flesh and blood, he himself likewise per took of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil." Jesus was destroying Satan's power over death. Not the people no longer die, but people no longer have to fear death. Adam and Eve ran away scared when God came back into the garden. They were scared that they were going to die in that day. Cain was scared that people were going to kill him in the day that God exiles him, but Jesus took that fear of death away because he took the guilt of sin away. That is how Jesus, in fact, fulfilled the prophecy, that he bruised the head of Satan. There is something I want you to notice about this text that I think doesn't necessarily stand out at the beginning. The ESV says here that he shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. Now I think it does a good job because it translates the word that translated bruise the same way both times and there's good reasons because it's the same word. Now unfortunately, I think a few translations have went the route of saying something like he shall crush your head and you shall desire his heel or bruise or strike his heel. Like there's a different in severity of the blows, but that's not what the text tells us. The different of severity is where it's being given to, the head or the heel. It's like a picture of a man stepping on a snake. It's a deliberate act. Jesus is coming to step on the head of the snake and all the snake can do is try to strike at that heel that's coming his way, but it's the same type of strike. They are bruising each other. They are striking each other. Okay, Janssen, why are you making a big deal out of that? Because it's not that Jesus completely destroyed Satan at the cross. We know this from our New Testament. You know this today. I mean, we get a look at this prophecy and we might think the idea of if he crushed his head, why does Satan have any power today at all? Why not at the cross was Satan just completely done with? The text isn't telling us that Jesus was annihilating the serpent at the cross. He was giving him a critical blow. He was giving the critical blow to his power over death. We even see this flesh out more when we look at passages in our Testament like Romans 1620. The God of peace, Paul says, will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Paul says they're still a crushing to be had. Right? Peter will say he is roaming around like a lion. Satan is not dead yet. There was a bruise to his head, but the final conquering of Satan has not happened yet. Paul says that is going to come Romans. And this is where we get the idea that the he here is tied to the offspring and it's not just about Jesus. It's about his offspring as well. Here's why that matters. Because people will look at what Jesus did on the cross and they'll say things like this. That the war was completely won on the cross. That Jesus did everything on the cross and everything was finished and in a sense I can say yes and aim into that. But let's not get the idea that everything was finished on the cross and so now we just choose to be on his side and there's no part for us in this war. Notice what the text doesn't say. He doesn't say I'm going to put enmity and then I'm going to take the enmity away. That's not in the prophecy. Now this hostility, this war continues on today. There is still hostility between the Satan's offspring and woman's offspring. It was throughout the Bible story. It continued after the resurrection and it continues today and this is so important for us to understand that we are walking through life not in cruise control. We're not walking through life where it's just about a nine to five job and it's about going to a certain place, a certain day of the week and we just do things that Americans do. We are in brothers and sisters a war. There is hostility still in this world but the hope is given. The victory is already given from the very beginning. So don't act like there's not a war going on. Don't act like there's not those in the world that are Satan's offspring but also don't act like it's a losing cause. Don't act like there's no hope in this and in fact the last thing that this text tells us is how the victory is going to come. Again, Jesus is referenced as the He but I think also His offspring is in view here. How did Jesus have victory over Satan? The bruising of His heel was involved. You see the victory came through pain. The victory came through suffering. The prophecy is not that God's people are going to have it easy and that God's people can just relax and God's people don't have to worry about the things going on around them. No, it is through suffering. The victory is going to come. Jesus didn't give us victory so we could avoid the suffering and so that we could endure the suffering and so we shouldn't be surprised by the hostility in our lives but we shouldn't be surprised when things are happening in your life that you think how could this ever happen? Why is this happening to me? Maybe it's Adam and Eve's fault. No, there is a choice that was made by all of us and because of the choice of sin this is the world we live in and so don't be surprised by the hostility but don't forget the end of Genesis 3.15 that there is victory that there is hope in this fight for God's people. Throughout the rest of this Bible story what you're going to find is you will easily identify those that are the offspring of Satan and you'll easily identify those that are the offspring of God by how they live and maybe a question for us when we look at Genesis 3.15 this morning is who's offspring are you? Are you an offspring of Satan or are you an offspring of the woman, God's offspring? It is a choice that we make daily that we're going to step up to the war and the hostility that's going all around us. Make no mistake that it is all around you. You don't have a choice whether to be in the war or not but you do have a choice which side you're going to take. You have a choice when you look at something you desire that you want, that you want to be in control of, that you know God did not put there for you, it was not your purpose and the war begins will you choose it or you choose this God that's going to continue to show us through the story how much he loves you and how merciful he is. That's the beginning of our story for the next few months. Thank you for connecting with us this morning, we're so thankful that you were able to do that. If you have questions we'd love to have the opportunity to talk to you, you can contact us at www.thebibleway.com or questions@thebibleway.com. Questions@thebibleway.com. We'd love to have you in person come if you can but thank you for connecting with us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.