Let me start it. Sorry. Go to Genesis 25. While you're turning there, I heard something this past week. Reminded me a lot of Ben. So Ben, you got to step in here and hear this part. There was a preacher preaching a sermon on the importance of leaving a legacy. And that's the topic we'll cover today in Genesis 25. And so, you know, I'm researching things about a legacy and the legacy in the church as a Christian. And so I come across the story of this pastor who is preaching this similar type sermon. And as he's preaching the sermon on a legacy, he called on three men who were sitting in the front of the church. And he looked at the first man and he said to this man, he said, at the end of your life, when you're laying in front of this church and you're laying in a coffin and your family's gathered around, what do you hope your family is saying about you? And he said, preacher, I just hope they're saying that I was a good husband and a great father. And the preacher said, that's good. That's a great testimony to leave behind, and I appreciate that. He looked at the second guy and he said, same question, sir. When you are at the end of your life and you're laying in front of the church in that coffin and your family's gathered around, what do you hope that your family's saying about you? And he said, I just hope and pray that they're saying, I was faithful to Christ all the way to the end. He said, what a great response. And I hope that's a commitment for all of us to make. He looked at the third man who was sitting front and center, and he said, sir, he said, how about you? At the end of your life, when you're laying in front of the church in that coffin, your family's gathered around, mourning your loss, as they look at you, what do you hope they're saying about you? And he said, preacher, I hope they say three words. Look, he's moving. Ben, I thought about you on that. But Abraham, I feel like I've been walking with Abraham for months now. And I hope you can say this, I know I can say this, I've been learning so much for myself. And I've been finding, and I guess it should always be like this, Jason, for us who are preparing to preach, but like, I'm not just talking about Abraham on Wednesdays and Sundays. I find myself talking about the scripture randomly with people. A former neighbor we talked to last night, we're talking about some of these things. And I hope that, you know, that happens for you, that the word you're hearing here, you think about it and talk about it. But today we come to Genesis 25 and in this chapter you're going to see Abraham is going to breathe his last and we're going to kind of move on from Abraham to the next part. But before we do that we're going to just see the legacy of faith he's left behind. And it's a good one. I once heard someone say, and it was actually someone you know, it was Steve Jobs, you know, one of the founders of Apple, I guess he said, I want to make a dent in the universe. And that, that quote always stood out with me. And he did, didn't he? Because in most of our pockets or beside us right now, we have a phone and many of us have phones that I guess he had a part of. And he certainly made a dent in the universe when it comes to I guess, technology. But I want to ask this question. Do you want to make a dent in the universe for the glory of God? A dent in our little portion of the universe, do we want to make a dent for God's glory? Because here's the truth, and I'm looking around this room, for most of us, unless I don't know something about some of you, most of us are not going to be famous, are we? I like what one old person said back in the day for preachers. He said, you should just preach the gospel, die, and be forgotten. Just do your job while you're here and move on. Most of us are not going to be famous. Most of us are not going to be known around the world like a Steve Jobs, for example. But God has put us in a certain place at a certain time around a certain group of family. a certain group of friends, around a church family, and around others that you might work with or know. And God has put us in those places, in this place, at this time, so that we would make a dent in this universe, that we would make an impact with the people that are around us, not so that we would be famous and they would build a statue for us, not so they would one day put our name on a church chair or build a statue of us out beside our workplace, none of that. Don't ever do that by the way, I don't want my name on a church chair, that doesn't interest me. Okay, thank you. Now I know there's no statues coming, but I'm just saying. But our legacy, our greatest legacy is not those types of rewards and awards, our legacy is passing on to our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren, passing on to them not just money and material things and acres of land that you've accumulated, but more importantly than that, a legacy of character and faith and faithfulness to Christ. Don't we want that? Don't you want to say, when we're long gone, I pray that generations and generations after me are still following Christ? I mean, is that a guarantee? I mean some of us come from families where everyone in that family is not a Christian and did not always go to church. And we're trying to help begin or carry on that Christian legacy that was started before us. And I think I speak for all of us when I say we want that. I want my sons to always be in church. I want my daughters to always be in church. I want one day for their kids to come visit me in church if we're not in the same church, right? I want them to be a part of a gospel-believing, gospel-preaching church, and I want that for all of us, right? We want that for our families, and this is the legacy we desire to leave. And so Abraham is gonna give us this picture as we conclude his life here of a man who left a legacy, and in such a way that it's unmistakable. Look at chapter 25. We'll read verses one through 18. And it's not just his death here. We're gonna see his final years, then his death, and some interesting things happen. But let's listen to what the Word says. It's always the most important thing. What's the Word say? Genesis 25, one through 18. If you're there, let me know by saying Word. Then again, Abraham took a wife, and her name was Keturah. And she bare him Zimran, and Jokshan, and Midan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah. And Jokshan begat Sheba, and Dedan, and the sons of Dedan were Ashuram, and Latusham, and Laumamum. And the sons of Midian, Ephah, and Ephor, and Henoch, and Abida, and Eldah, all these were the children of Keturah. I'm glad these students are not on my class roll. Tough pronouncing. Verse five. This is an important verse here, key verse. And Abraham gave all that he had unto Isaac. But unto the sons of the concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts and sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived eastward unto the east country. And these are the days of the years of Abraham's life, which he lived in a hundred, three score, and 15 years. He was 175 years old. And Abraham gave up the ghost and died in a good old age, an old man full of years, and was gathered to his people. And his sons, Isaac and Ishmael, buried him in the cave of Machphala, in the field of Ephron, the son of Zohar the Hittite, which is before Mamre, the field which Abraham purchased of the sons of Heth. There was Abraham buried, and Sarah his wife. And it came to pass after the death of Abraham that God blessed his son Isaac, and Isaac dwelt by the well Lahoroi. Now these are the generations of Ishmael, Abraham's son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah's handmaid, barren to Abraham. And these are the names of the sons of Ishmael by their names according to their generations. The firstborn of Ishmael, These are the sons of Ishmael, and these are their names by their towns and by their castles. Twelve princes according to their nations, and these are the years of the life of Ishmael, a hundred and thirty and seven years. And he gave up the ghost and died and was gathered unto his people. And they dwelt from Havilah unto Shur, that is before Egypt, as thou goest toward Assyria. And he died in the presence of all his brethren. So we want to first talk about Abraham's death. And before we do, I wanted to give you a quick review of his life. I think we have that for you there. Is that on there for us to kind of glance at? Yeah, a basic overview of his life. And these are all things we've covered in the past few months. Genesis 12, God called him and made a promise to him, and God said, Abraham, leave, his name was Abram at that time, right? Abram, leave your land, go to a land I'm gonna promise you. I'm gonna make you great, I'm gonna make your name great, I'm gonna make you, your descendants are gonna be like the sand of the seashore, like the stars in the sky, and through your seed will be a blessing to all nations of the earth. It was this promise we see that God made to him over and over again. He journeyed down to Canaan, built the altar there, Eventually there was a famine, so he went down south to Egypt. We know the story right, he goes to Egypt and he says, well, Sarah, make sure you tell the Pharaoh that you're my sister so they won't steal you and kill me and all that stuff happens. He eventually leaves and goes back up to Canaan or toward Canaan. Him and Lot, his nephew, are separated. After they are separated, we know Lot is captured in this war that's going on. Abraham takes 318 men that are trained and he goes and fights a battle and wins the battle and brings his nephew Lot back. Again, the covenant with God is restated. God continues to restate this covenant with Abraham to say, through you, I'm going to make a great nation. Through you, you're going to bless the whole earth. So God continues to say that. We know that he's married to Sarai, and Sarai, who we know as Sarah, is not able to have a baby. And he's like, how can I have this blessing? How can I have these descendants without a child? And Abraham and Sarah decide to use Hagar, her servant. And of course, they have Ishmael, who we read about in this chapter as well, through Hagar. God changes his name to Abraham. He institutes this sign of circumcision, restates his covenant to him, again comes to Abraham and says, you're going to have a son. Him and Sarah are like, really? Can we really have a son at this age? We're both old and she was unable to have children. Are we really going to have a child? God promised again to have a son and they're going to call him Isaac. Then he intercedes for Solomon Gamora. You know the story of Solomon Gamora. The Lord rescues Lot out of there and destroys those towns because of their sinfulness. After this, Sarah gives birth to Isaac. There's an issue between Hagar the servant and Sarah, so Hagar and Ishmael are sent away. Then we come to chapter 22, such a key chapter where God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac on the mountain, and it was a test of faith, a great test of faith, which Abraham passed. After that, we saw that Sarah passed away, and after her death and her burial, we see last week that Abraham sent his servant to find a wife for Isaac. Her name is Rebekah. So that's a very short, quick snapshot of his life that we've studied over the past months and months and months. And what we learn and what we've seen it, and we're gonna see it again, as we walk through Genesis, we're gonna see it. What we see is that he left a legacy that impacted the entire world. As a matter of fact, I don't wanna jump ahead of myself here. I'll wait and share that in a minute. Let's look at his final years before I jump ahead to that point. The final years in Genesis 25, one through 11, something very interesting that you may not know, you may not have known this. In verse one, he took another wife. If you've read the Bible in Genesis, you probably knew that, but maybe not. After Sarah died and years go by, he takes another wife, which by the way is perfectly allowable, right, in the scripture. Her name was Keturah, and she bore him six sons. So as best we know from scripture, He had Isaac, he had Ishmael, and now six other sons. That's what the scripture tells us about Abraham's children. And from his children become many nations. The father of many nations comes through these sons. As you move down to verse five and six, I said it was a key verse. Tell me, who is the son of promise? Is it Ishmael? Is it the sons of Geturah? No, we know who the son of promise is, right? It is Isaac. In verse five, the scripture says, he gave all that he had into Isaac. We've talked about this before, but Abraham had accumulated so much. He took much when he left his land. In Egypt, God blessed him with things, and later on, God just continued to bless him, and he takes all that he has, and he's giving it to Isaac. Just showing us that Isaac is that son of promise that God will bring his promise through. He also, by the way, if you notice in Scripture there, in verse 6, God took the sons of his concubines, that's an interesting thing to say, isn't it? He had concubines, and I take that to mean Hagar and Keturah. As a matter of fact, 1 Chronicles 1.32 actually says that Keturah, even though she's called his wife here, refers to her as a concubine over in 1 Chronicles. So I don't think he had extra, it doesn't say that he had extra people on the side. But he took those sons, in verse 6, and he sent them away to make a distinction between them and Isaac, who would stay in the promised land for now and would be the son of promise. Can we say this? Go back one slide, Kendall. We know that Abraham has Isaac, and that's where we are now, and next week we're gonna see Lord willing Jacob and Esau. We know that Jacob's name is changed to Israel. Israel has 12 sons, one of them is named Judah. Through the line of Judah comes David, through the line of David eventually comes Jesus. It's all the promises that God has made to Abraham over and over again, although Abraham never got to see it on this earth, right? We know it come to pass through Christ. He breathes his last, he dies, Here's an interesting fact I was going to show you. Which Old Testament person is mentioned the most in the New Testament? Who do you think? Which Old Testament person is mentioned the most in the New Testament? Who thinks Abraham? Strict question. It's actually Moses. And I was like, even myself, I should have known that. Abraham was second. It's 80-ish and 70-ish, so it's pretty close. But that just shows you, right, how important his life was, how important his legacy is, that the New Testament writers time and time again, of course they reference Moses for the law, but they also reference back to Abraham. We've already referenced some of those verses in Hebrews and Romans and other places in the New Testament. So he breathed his last, he died, again, being one of the most important people in the history of the world, in my opinion, in the scripture's opinion. Can we say this, would you say this man, who's a great man, mentioned in the New Testament, the father of the nations, the father of faith, it says, would you say Abraham was a perfect man? There's none perfect, right? No, not one, except for who? Christ. But what we see from him is that he lived such a life, though he was not perfect, And we know that God's working all this out, right? I'm not saying Abraham did it all by himself, of course not. God's working this out, but he still lived the kind of life that left a lasting legacy. Why didn't God bless Ishmael or the sons of Keturah the way he blessed Isaac? I mean, God did bless them, by the way. It says he blessed Ishmael and he had children. Why, think about this to yourself, why did God choose to bless Isaac and make him the son of promise and not Ishmael? If it was Wednesday, I'd ask you to speak out loud, but can I say this? God chooses to give grace to whomever he wills. I could get stoned for saying that in some churches. But that's what the scripture says. We're gonna see it next week. There's two babies, right? There's twins in Rebecca's womb, and the scripture's gonna tell us before, they're in the womb, which by the way, we believe is life. They're in the womb. Before either one of them does good or bad, God has chosen to give his grace and his plan to Jacob. Why did God do that? Does that make God unfair? God gives grace to whom He will, but I'll say this, if you're here today and you say, I desire to have God's grace in my life, He will give it to you. He will freely bestow grace on us who desire that. Here's the secret, He's given you that desire as well. That is the grace. So we're gonna see that, especially next week with Jacob and Esau, but even in Isaac, We see that God blessed him. Look at verse 11 again. After Abraham is gone and buried in the same place with his wife in that cave, in that field that Abraham had purchased a chapter ago, or a couple chapters ago, verse 11 says, and it came to pass after the death of Abraham that God blessed his son Isaac. When you are one of God's people, he is going to bless you. Did I just say he's going to give you all the money in the world? Definitely not. We're all probably testimonies of that. Did I say God's going to always bless you health-wise, or you're always going to be healthy? No. We do not preach a prosperity gospel like some people do of health and wealth. But when I say God's going to bless you if you're his people, what I mean is this, he is blessing you with your salvation, with your eternal life, with forgiveness of sin, he's blessing you with joy and peace, he's blessing you with hope, he's blessing you with a church family that can help you and love you, and he's blessing you with family and friends, he's blessing you with things in this life, with just general common graces that we have, the oxygen we breathe, and as Jason mentioned earlier, We can say this, if we are God's people, we are blessed over and over again. The next breath you just took is a blessing. The next breath, a blessing. I imagine everybody that leaves here today will have lunch. That's a blessing. Let's move to verses 12 through 18. And so this is the generations of Ishmael. Quickly here, this is just, God had promised to actually bless Ishmael and make him fruitful, and we see that happen. He gives Ishmael children, and it talks about them moving off, and of course, they're off in another area there, and Ishmael dies here in this chapter, and it mentions his descendants. And so I'm not gonna say a lot about that right now, except for God kept his promise there, And there is this clear distinction between Isaac and Ishmael, and that clear distinction between Isaac and Ishmael, as we've talked about on Wednesday nights, is still in play in this world even right now, right, with what's going on in the Middle East. That's the basic explanation for verses 1 through 18. Let me give you our application. What do we do? What do we do knowing that Abraham lived a legacy, a life of faith and lived a legacy of faith? I'm gonna give you seven of these quickly. Number one, you and I need to consistently live by faith. If we are going to live a legacy for our children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren and our fellow church members, we need to live a life of consistent faith. With faith, hope, and love, with the desire for the scriptures, a desire for the Lord, a desire for church, that is how we can best leave a legacy. Y'all hear me talk about my memo from time to time because she left a legacy of faith. Because when I would stay over there sometimes at night, I would see her reading her Bible in her bed before every night. Her Bible was always sitting right there and I would see her reading it. It wasn't collecting dust, it was used, it was worn out. I remember seeing my papaw get up on Sunday morning, and I'd be over there trying to get my mom to iron my clothes for me, and he'd be reading through his little Sunday school book before church, just preparing. They taught me to pray before meals and things like that. And so they're gone, they're in heaven, but the life of consistent faith they lived makes me think about them weekly. Live a life of faith and consistency. Here's another thing, if we don't, it's still number one, but if we don't make church important, then it's unlikely our children and grandchildren are gonna make it important. So for us, the faith, Christ, the church, the things of God must be valuable to us so that they will also see them as valuable. Number two, follow God's will. And the only way to follow God's will is to know His will. And the only way to truly know His will is to seek Him through His word and through prayer. That's how we follow God's will, we gotta know it. And 99% of His will, by the way, is right here in the scripture. If we do what this says, we'll follow God's will. Some of those other little decisions that we have to make, He can help us as we follow His word. If we do our best to say, not my will, but God's will be done, we can leave a legacy of faith. If our children know and the people around us know he is doing his very best, she's doing her very best to follow God's will for her life and for his life, that will make an impact on others. Number three, teach, I think. Nope, number three is share or teach God's word. Now, every one of us are not teachers, right? I can stand up here and preach and I believe God's called me to this. Jason is called to preach and we also teach. But some of you teach and some of you could teach a class if you have to and some of you do. But I just mean share God's word. It could be as simple as this. I'm gonna talk about God's word with my kids. I'm gonna talk about God's word with my spouse. I met a friend at work or somewhere and we talk about life and somehow God's word is involved in that conversation. You can share God's word. There are people in my life I can think back who said things about the Lord and about his word that will stay with me forever. My youth pastor and certain pastors I've had from my past experience, certain men in church I've been around who shared things about God's word with me have stuck with me forever. Be one of those people that shares God's word. Next, number four, mentor or encourage others. We know that the apostle Paul took Timothy under his wing and trained him and taught him. And so maybe you can help mentor someone else and bring them by your side and read the Bible with them and talk with them and discuss the scripture and pray for each other and discuss life. All of us probably have things we're going through and we could use help and use somebody to talk to. Maybe you just need that one person, that one friend, that one person at church you can just talk with. So mentor and encourage others and also seek for someone to mentor you and encourage you. Look for that and the best place to find that should be in the church. This journey of faith we're on, life is up and down, isn't it? Good days and bad days. Some days you're buying a new house, some day the roof is leaking. Some days, everything's going great, and the next day, you have a flat tire, right? I mean, that's how I feel life is. Just when things are going good, something happens, ugh, a setback. But that's life, and that's okay, but we need to encourage each other in the Lord and in life to make it through this journey of life, this journey of faith. Be those kind of people. Number five, we need to serve people. What are things that you can do that serve other people? It might sound like not much to you. I don't know if it does. I think we all appreciate it. But we have Trey and Mark and today Ben. And it might not seem like much. But I mean, they're listening to the sermon, I can tell Trey's listening. But they're also back there to just keep us safe, right? God forbid something crazy were to happen. We always have people in the back back there that I feel 100% safe with back there. And I appreciate them for doing that act of service. And sometimes even Trey will hang out and make sure doors are locked and things like that. And just little things that's serving the church. Some of you are willing to make food. Some of you are willing to make a phone call. You know, Junior helps us with our video and audio and sermon recording. And sometimes, you know, Gracie sings. And we all have parts to play just pitching and helping the church. Anthony's told me, man, there's stuff around the church I can help work on. I want to help work on them. And we need that, you know, we need everyone who's willing to serve. And that's all of us should be serving. It's kind of like we're on a boat, right? And we're all on the boat together. And it's not just one person, we're all working together for the boat to go in the right direction. How can you serve people, not just in the church, by the way, but in life? How can you be a better servant? I promise you this, if you become someone who serves other people and puts other people's needs above your own needs, you will stand out for the glory of God. You will make an impact. I remember people who were great servants of God in my past more than I remember the people who were super talented. Does that make sense? I know people who are super talented, talented at preaching. I know some guys who are very talented at preaching. but they're too good to pick up a chair and move it in the fellowship hall. You know what I'm talking about? Unless in ministry you've seen this, I'm sure you have too. I've seen pastors that are talented, or people talented at music, but they're too good to shake somebody's hand. I know people like that. They'll do their music part and go sit in the back somewhere. If we're not servants, what are we doing? The Bible says that Jesus came and he became a servant. If our Lord is a servant, then we should be as well. May God give us hearts of servants. May you look and say, in the church, and in my family, and in my life, what can I do to serve other people? That leads me to number six, be kind. And when I say be kind, I just mean show the love of Christ in everything you say and do. In everything you say and do, and I know it's not always easy. We deal with people that are sometimes difficult, right? Can we be more kind in showing the love of Christ? I'll give you a tip. If you are with my wife, do not go into Walmart, ever. If it's in a town where she lives. We went to Walmart this week. Of course, I didn't wanna go. And I'm not saying she spends too much money, she doesn't. Here's what I'm saying, it's gonna take you two hours. We walk in Walmart. No, we gather truck in the parking lot. She stopped talking to people. And they're getting hugs. What's up, guys? How y'all doing hugs, talks. And I'm going, you know, we got to go. We move on past them, we get to the lobby. We see another woman she knows. They're hugging talking. I'm like, gosh, we didn't even the story. Finally, I think we split up doing yes. And I'm going this way. I'll meet you in a minute. We walk and I'm walking through Walmart. I look back and there she is hugging a tiny Hispanic kid. Who's this kid? I we get back together. I'm like, we got to go. I'm like, I'll push the buggy. I got to go faster. And then there's another person comes up, we get in the line. There's three people in the line. I'm like, let's just self check out and get out of here. We're never getting out. We're starting to put we check out we start pushing the buggy down the thing by the other checkout things. She stops to talk to somebody who's working there checking other people out. What are we doing? I want to go home. think we got back to the lobby and she's waving at somebody in the subway, the Walmart subway, like do not go in there. Why does that happen? Well, she's a little crazy, number one, but she just talks to everybody. And she's kind to people and she serves them and she brings a hug or a smile or a loving face or a loving word. And so when she goes in Walmart, they're there and they want to they want to receive that love. Does that make sense? And I can't do that. And some of us can't be that way. But I still think this if we're kind of people and treat people with respect and love. People are gonna want to see us. I'm that way. Have you ever done this? Are there people in your life, where you know they're gonna be so negative or so unkind, you avoid those people? On social media right now, I've gotten rid of all those people. I block and unfriend people left and right, because I don't have time for that in my life anymore. And I'll say that in person. There's people I see coming, like, whoop, let's go this way, because they're going to say something negative or unkind, or it's just going to pull me down. Be the kind of people, be the kind of person that's kind and nice and loving. And I don't just mean in a human way, I mean in a godly way, that people want to see you. people want to talk to you, that people want to hear from you. Show kindness. That's going to leave a legacy. I hope she lives to be 120. But I know for a fact that there'll be a lot more people at her funeral than at mine. I think even though I've stood in front of people week after week after week my entire life, and talked to hundreds and hundreds and I guess thousands of people, I think that'll be, I hope there's a few at mine at least, but I know that's gonna be the truth. Show kindness. Number seven, whatever you do in your Christian walk, persevere. Don't ever give up, don't ever quit. I know who I'm talking to this morning. I know for most of you, this is not even an option, is it? For most of us in this room, we would say this today, no matter what happens, I'm not, I can't quit the Christian faith. I'm not giving up on it. Why? Because God has made a change in my life, and God is guiding me and leading me, and he's holding me in his hand and will never let me go. I have nowhere else to go but to Christ. I will never give up on him. No matter how old you get, no matter how tired you get, no matter how stressed out you get, I've heard stories of people living in a nursing home and witnessing for Christ there. As long as we have the ability to breathe and a mind to think, don't ever quit serving the Lord. That's a testimony. That's the kind of testimony where I've been and I've done this many times, or a few times at least, where I've sat at the bedside of someone breathing their last, who was a Christian. And thinking to myself, this person loved Christ all the way to the end. A few of my I got a couple of my mind right now one where the family took up the Bible and started reading scripture, their fat, the person's favorite scripture as they breathe their last. I remember one where there was a bunch of people there and everybody just held hands and sang Amazing Grace as this man breathed his last. Because he had lived and she had lived such a life of faith and never gave up, the people around them, it made such an impact. Their faith made such an impact. You say, well I just don't feel like I do anything good spiritually. I go to church, I try to be a good person, I try to help out in the church when I can. I don't feel like I do any good. Well, let me tell you about somebody else that didn't, who may not have felt like he was doing that good. It's in the Old Testament. He's a man named Jeremiah. You don't know the story of Jeremiah? Here's the brief snapshot. God said, Jeremiah, go and preach and prophesy and tell the people to turn away from idols and turn to God. And he preached for 40 years. And some people say he had zero converts, although there might be two in there. Let me look at that closer. The point is, he preached 40 years and had zero converts. What would most people do by year 7 or year 10? Quit? But now, because he was faithful to what God told him to do, he has impacted literally millions of people because of his book in the Old Testament. So you may not always know that you're making a difference, and you may not always see the difference that you make, but if you follow these steps and just love the Lord and love people and seek to be a part of his church, if you do these things, you may not see the difference, you may not see the results, but I truly believe this, if we do these things, we will leave a legacy for the glory of God and for the good of people around us. And for me and for you, I hope you would say this morning, that's important. I mean, we're gonna be gone, I know, and we're gone from this life, but the way we, knowing that we can leave a legacy should impact the way we live right now. Listen to this final thing. It's a eulogy of Abraham, written by one of the Puritans. He said, above all, as a man of God, Abraham stands unrivaled. He is proposed and recommended as the model and pattern according to which faith, obedience, and perseverance of the followers of the Messiah are to be formed. Reader, while you admire the man, do not forget that God, the God that made him so great, so good, and so useful. I'm gonna say that again. While you admire the man, do not forget the God that made him so great, so good, and so useful. Even Abraham had nothing but what he had received from the free unmerited mercy of God preceded all his excellencies. But he was a worker together with God, and therefore did not receive the grace of God in vain. Go thou, believe, love, obey, and persevere in like manner. I pray we'll leave here in a minute. Before we do, we'll think about this. Am I living in such a way now to leave a legacy for the people around me? Let's pray.