Flee Idolatry
Tom Shrader opens by revisiting 1 Corinthians 10:13, unpacking God's faithfulness in testing—His knowledge of our limits and His promise to provide endurance—before moving to the command in verse 14 to flee idolatry. He broadens the concept of idolatry beyond statues and false gods to include anything that claims supreme loyalty in the heart over God, from money and possessions to unchecked appetites. Drawing on the Lord's Supper as a sign of union with Christ, Shrader argues that participation in idol worship and participation in Christian communion are mutually exclusive, urging the church to give undivided allegiance to the one true God who is a jealous God.
“Whatever we live for, whatever excites us, whatever we're enthusiastic about, whatever we give our time, energy, effort, and money toward, if it's other than the one true God, it's an idol.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Life Management
Recorded: 2001 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 39 min
Themes: idolatry, temptation, faithfulness, communion, loyalty, money, testing, worship, struggling with materialism, divided loyalties, new believer, feeling overwhelmed by temptation, young adult, questioning priorities, seduced by culture, seeking spiritual endurance
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 10:13, 1 Corinthians 10:14-21, 1 Corinthians 1:9, 1 John 5:21, Exodus 32, Exodus 20, Exodus 34:14, Deuteronomy 4:24, Deuteronomy 6:15, Joshua 24:19, Job 42, Matthew 6:24, Philippians 3:19, Revelation 19
Theological Themes: idolatry, the lord's supper, divine jealousy, union with christ, sanctification, biblical fidelity, temptation and trial, exclusive allegiance
Full Transcript
Returning to the Foundation
Open your Bibles, if you would, to the book of 1 Corinthians and to the tenth chapter. That is exactly where we stopped last week. Verse 14, 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 14 reads this way: "Therefore, my beloved, flee idolatry. I speak to you as wise men; judge what I say." What Paul is saying in verse 15 is, I trust you to figure this out. This is not overly complicated. This is fairly simple and straightforward. You have enough information to figure this out — you listen, you judge.
In verse 14, Paul does three things. First, he calls them "beloved," sharing again his love and his concern for them. Second, he gives them instruction: flee idolatry. Third, and most importantly, there is that very first word. If you have been around East Valley Bible Church for any length of time, these are the kinds of words we look for when we study, because they are key words. When we see a word like "therefore," we know immediately that there is some connectedness of idea, and we know we had better understand what comes before it, because what comes before it is what is driving into this conclusion.
Revisiting Verse 13
So we look back at the verse we stopped with last week, verse 13 of chapter 10. I said in all five services last week that we wanted to come back to this verse, spend some time on it again, and make sure we begin to mine more deeply the treasure that is here. First Corinthians chapter 10, verse 13: "No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that you may be able to endure it."
When we hear the word "temptation," we immediately think of something bad or evil. It connotes a trap, a trick, or a scheme that Satan or one of his demons is going to use to pull us down into sin. And indeed, that is one way the word can be used. But the word itself is essentially neutral. Here is what it means at its core: to test or to prove. Words like "trials," "test," and "testing" all come from this same Greek word.
Tests Are Common to Mankind
Paul tells us some things we need to know about these tests, trials, and temptations. The first is this: these tests are common to man. There is a tendency in the midst of a trial to become very myopic and almost self-indulgent. All of a sudden we are moving along saying, nobody has ever really suffered quite like this, nobody has ever had a trial of this depth, you are not possibly going to understand what I am going through. The first thing Paul does is blow that away entirely. The word literally means that these things are typical to mankind. Your trial may have a little different twist to it, but you need to understand you are not going through anything different than anyone else has gone through. You are not that special. Problems come in life. In marriage we have challenges, with children we have challenges, with school and work, life has its tests and its periods of testing.
So if you are here today and you are involved in something very difficult, understand that there are many people who have gone down this road before you.
God Is Faithful
The key thing Paul wants to communicate is that God is faithful. This is at least the second time Paul has used this exact phrase. Back in chapter 1, verse 9, he said the same thing: God is faithful. Because of God's sovereign, unchangeable promises, we are assured of His grace — past, present, and future. We can persevere. That is all we need to understand. You may waver, but God is faithful. He is unchanging, immutable.
Immutability is not always the attribute of God we race to first — it is not the snappiest of those attributes. But it is so important to us. It means He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His promises are the same. The law of sowing and reaping is the same. Consequences are the same. He will judge sin the same and reward the same. We can rely on that. He is faithful.
He Knows Your Limits
God demonstrates His faithfulness in the area of testing in two ways. First, He knows your limits. Second, He will give you a path of escape and allow you to endure. When a test, a trial, or a temptation comes into your life, you can never say the devil made you do it. You can never say it was so overpowering there was no way you could have withstood it. You have all the spiritual resources you need. You may not have accessed them, but He is faithful — He will not test you beyond what you can handle.
Let me add this: you do not know your own limits, but He does. And oftentimes your limits are far beyond what you think they are. The phrase we have used before is that God knows the maximum elasticity of your faith. He knows how far you will bend and how much you can take. The process may often go like this: God gets hold of us and begins to pull, and we say, "Oh God, I don't think I can take anymore." And He keeps taking us further, and we say, "God, we are on the very limits." And He continues — until finally there is a point where
hospital, and we were going through all of that, and the challenge and the difficulty and the concern. And I know that some of you were watching our family to see how we were going to handle that. And I know that some of you were encouraged by watching us handle that. And that was the most powerful testimony I probably have ever given — not a word from a pulpit, but just living life in front of you. The third thing is this: it builds your faith. You begin to trust Him more. You begin to say, Lord, I don't know what You're doing, but I know You're going to do something. And the fourth thing is that we glorify God through it. Our lives are not about us. They're about Him. And when we endure, when we persevere, when we come out the other side, God gets the glory. That's the point.
God Provides a Way Through Every Trial
So let's pull all of this together. Here's what he says in that verse. "But with the temptation He will provide the way of escape also that you may be able to endure it." He's faithful. He knows your limits. He's not going to let you be pushed past what you can handle. And when you get to the end of yourself, that's exactly where He wants you, because that's where He can work. Our way out is through it. And He climbs right in there with us and says, we're going to endure this together.
Now I have no idea what's going on in your life, but I know this: you don't have to despair. You don't have to worry. You don't have to fret. You don't have to feel sorry for yourself. You don't have to say somebody dealt you dirty. God is going to take care of that. God is going to handle that. That's why I've said to you many times: we don't even know what's good or bad. Obviously, I don't mean morally. If you're thinking about stealing, don't steal — that's bad. What I'm talking about are circumstances that come into our lives. We have circumstances come into our lives, and we don't know if they're good or bad.
I love the illustration of Dave Dravecky. Here's this pitcher — he's a stud, he's getting guys out, he's winning ballgames, he's a great player. All of a sudden, he has a problem with his arm. He rehabs a little bit, he comes back, and now he's throwing again. I talked to a guy who was on the field the last time he pitched, the time he threw and that arm snapped. He said it was just like somebody broke a twig — you could just hear it crack. Everybody rushed out and they knew it was serious. When they got in and examined it, they realized it was cancer, and they had to take that arm.
Here's what had happened. For years, Dave Dravecky had prayed, "God, I want to be used by You in powerful ways. God, I'd love to be able to speak to millions of people." Well, God heard that prayer, and here's what He said: "Dave, the only thing standing between you and speaking to millions of people is that arm. I'm going to have to take that now." So when it happens, we go, "Oh no" — but that was the answer to the prayer. Dave Dravecky sits with Barbara Walters, and millions of people watch as he shares about Christ in his life.
We get all hung up on side issues. Here's what we say: "God, I want to speak to millions of people — on my terms, my way, no pain, no suffering." But do you know what would happen in that instance? You wouldn't have anything to tell them. You wouldn't have anything to say. I remember going to Larry not long after I became a Christian. I said, "Larry, I think someday I want to be a teacher." He said, "Can I give you a piece of advice?" I said, "You bet." He said, "If you're going to teach, have something to say." I thought, I better write that down. I told him I was looking for something more than that, but if that's all he had, I'd go with it. But what he was saying wasn't just about knowing the material — it was about seeing it in your life.
Four Reasons God Allows Trials
So why would God do this? Why would God bring those trials, those difficulties, and allow those temptations? I jotted down four things.
Number one: we would see Him work. We'd persevere, come to the end of the line, and say, "Isn't God something? Look at what He did. Look at the way He worked." And when difficulties come again, we'd say, "We don't know what He's going to do, but we know He's going to do something."
Number two: as you endure, these tests and trials are spiritual aerobics. They test you. They strengthen you. They pull you apart to put you back together again so you come out even stronger.
Number three: you now have a testimony to others. Haven't you had that experience where somebody goes through something and you look at it and say, "That is so encouraging to me. I can't imagine how you possibly could have done that"? So often the most powerful message we have is not so much what we say, but what we say and how we live in the midst of difficulties and trials. In our own life, we've had a lot of challenges, but probably nothing more visible than a few years ago with Sarah's car accident. We were at the hospital, going through all of that challenge and difficulty and concern. I know some of you were watching our family to see how we were going to handle it. And I know some of you were encouraged watching us handle it. That was probably the most powerful testimony I have ever given — not a word from a pulpit, but just living life in front of you.
Number four: it builds your faith. You begin to trust Him more. You begin to say, "Lord, I don't know what You're doing, but I know You're going to do something." And woven through all of it is this: we glorify God through it. Our lives are not about us. They are about Him. And when we endure, when we persevere, when we come out the other side, God gets the glory. That's the point.
God Is Good Even in the Darkest Moments
Most of you weren't around at the time, but Sarah had a severe accident on a Friday night. She was in an ambulance, in intensive care, with a brain seizure, broken jaws, and all sorts of complications. As it became clear that she was not just going to live but was probably going to be okay, people began to say, "Isn't God good? Boy, God is good. He let Sarah live." And I said, wait a minute. God is good even if she dies. God's not good because Sarah lived.
I look back on that now, and I've heard from different people — I've spoken a lot of words — but for many people, that was the moment where they said, "You know what? It's not just a guy talking. Now we've seen how they handled that." We even had one of the nurses in intensive care who was concerned that we were in denial. She kept saying, "You're in denial." But it was simply a foreign concept to her.
Hardship Strengthens Our Faith
There is a third thing that happens in all of this: it strengthens us. Our faith grows because we see it tested, and we come out stronger. You are stronger for the hardship. You are stronger for the trial. You are better than ever before. I see that in my own life.
There is a sense in which I find a certain affinity for people who have failed, because failure is not fatal. Hardship, trials, and failure, if handled correctly, make us stronger than ever before. Now I have something deeper to say. My faith is more real.
Job: From Hearing to Seeing
Here is the last thing: trials take faith and bring it to reality. When we think of trials, difficulties, or hardship, there is probably no biblical character who comes to mind more rapidly than Job. Job is cruising along, and the devil goes to God and says, "Why wouldn't he worship you? Look at what he's got." In our context, he has a car and another one in the garage, a boat, a great house, the kids are doing well, he is out of the tech stocks — everything is fine. "Why wouldn't he? Any mullet could serve you in this deal."
So God says, "What do you want to do?" And the devil says, "Let me get a piece of Job's action and see how Job handles it." So he begins to whittle away. You know the story. At the end of it all, when God finally says that's it, we're done, and begins to restore Job, Job replies. This is Job chapter 42, and I am reading from the New Living Translation.
"Job replied to the Lord: I know that you can do anything, and no one can stop you. You ask, 'Who is this that questions my wisdom with ignorance?'"
What had happened is that Job had reached a point where he had had enough, and he was starting to waver. He said, "God, I have a question for you." And God said, "Okay, hang on a second, Job. Before you ask Me a question, let Me ask you — who hung the stars? Where do we store the snow? How do birds fly?" He has three or four chapters of this. And finally He says, "Okay, Job, I'm sorry — what was it you wanted?" And Job said, "It was me. I was talking about things I did not understand, things far too wonderful for me."
The Verse That Changes Everything
Verse five of Job 42 is a key verse — one you return to again and again. Job said, "I had heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my eyes." God, I had heard about how faithful You were. I heard about how gracious You were. I heard about Your love. I heard about all these things. But now that I have had hardship in my life, now I have seen it.
My daughter Haley just finished an anatomy class, and like many science classes it had two aspects: the classroom and the lab. We can sit and study and break things open and get into the Greek and the Hebrew, and here is what we learn — God is faithful. We recite the verses and everything that goes with them. But you do not truly understand that He is faithful until He takes you and puts you in a set of circumstances that really test you, that really drive you to your knees. And now you say, "You know what? He really is faithful. Let me tell you how faithful He is. Let me tell you what happened to me." That is what Paul is communicating in all of this.
The Primary Concern: Flee Idolatry
What is interesting to me is that none of that has to do with the immediate context here — but it was worthwhile to go through, and I believe that verse has application across all of those areas. Primarily, though, do you see it? Paul's primary concern is about idolatry. He says you are going to be tested, but do not worry — God is faithful. He will be there with you, and He knows your limits.
Remember, they are living in the corrupt city of Corinth. There are false gods everywhere, temples everywhere, temple prostitutes, sexual immorality, drunken orgies — all of this going on. People are bowing down before these false gods. And Paul says, "Here is what I want you to do: flee this. Get away from it."
Ray Stedman offers an interesting insight here. Obviously Paul is saying do not go into that worship. But he is also saying that for some of these people, the problem was that all the action was in the temple — that is where the best parties were, that is where everything was happening. So the temptation was at least something like this: "I am not going to do any of that worship, but I just want to hang around and see what happens." And Paul is saying, get away from it. Do not even go near it.
Flee Idolatry
Flee idolatry — it is not just an Old Testament concept. In 1 John 5:21, John writes, "Guard yourself from idols." When we talk about idolatry, we tend to run through a familiar list: money, possessions, power, and so on. What follows is a list of forms idolatry takes — not exhaustive, and borrowed liberally from John MacArthur — but useful as a reminder of things we already know.
The first form is worshiping the true God in the wrong way. That is what we looked at last week in Exodus 32. The people had taken their gold, molded a calf, and as they worshiped it, they said, "This is your God, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt." The idea was to worship the true God through some false, unbiblical, ritualistic means. A second form is worshiping an image, picture, or statue. The object itself is not necessarily the problem — but when people begin to bow before it, when a tortilla bearing Mary's face gets placed in a case with candles burning before it, we have a serious problem.
A third form is worshiping angels. In John's vision in Revelation, he falls at the feet of an angel and worships him, and the angel responds in Revelation 19: "Don't do that. I am a fellow servant of yours." Fourth is worshiping demons — which is nearly self-explanatory. Fifth is worshiping the dead. The Israelites had picked up bad practices from Moab, one of which was eating sacrifices offered to the dead, and God moved quickly against it.
Perhaps the clearest definition of idolatry is this: supreme loyalty in our heart to anything other than God. Jesus said, "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." What are your ambitions? What are your desires? A sixth form appears in Philippians 3:19, where Paul speaks of people who have walked entirely away from God, saying of them, "Their God is their appetites." Appetite itself — the lust and craving for things — becomes the idol.
I found something yesterday that I had written in my second Bible years ago, and it serves as a fitting summary statement: whatever we live for, whatever excites us, whatever we are enthusiastic about, whatever we give our time, energy, effort, and money toward — if it is other than the one true God, it is an idol. Anything that crowds into your life and takes that place becomes an idol.
The Holy Spirit Coordinates What We Cannot
I want to mention something I have brought up before, and anyone here can verify it: Gary and I do not coordinate in advance where I will be teaching and what music he will use. It is not a matter of capability — Gary is more than capable — but I simply do not know far enough in advance where I will be in the sermon series. So what we always say, tongue-in-cheek but very sincerely, is that the Holy Spirit will put it together.
Could the Holy Spirit have arranged a worship time more perfectly suited to the teaching? There is no way we could have planned it ourselves. Today we introduced a new song, and its title is "Only a God Like You." Consider the words you sang:
*For the praises of man I will never, ever stand. For the kingdoms of this world I will never give my heart away or shout my praise. My allegiance and devotion, my heart's desire, and all emotion go to serve the one who died on that tree. Only my God and King could be worthy of my praise, and all my hope and faith to only the King of all kings. Do I bow my knee and sing and give my everything to only my Maker, my Father, my Savior, my Redeemer, my Restorer, Rebuilder, Rewarder. To only my God and King do I give praise.*
And then four times over: *To only You, my God. To only You, my Lord. To only You, my King.*
We worship the one true God in the way He prescribes. He will have no other gods.
Mutually Exclusive Loyalties
God says to flee idolatry, and Paul begins to speak about the temptation and hardship the Corinthians were facing. Part of what he addresses is the reality that certain things are mutually exclusive. Jesus dealt with exactly this in Matthew 6:24 when He said, "No one can serve two masters, for you either hate one and love the other, or hold to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon." You cannot hold things that are mutually exclusive together.
Paul's point builds directly on that principle. He is saying you cannot call yourself a Christian, cannot be involved in communion, and also be involved in sacrifice to demons — those things are mutually exclusive. To make this case, Paul first turns to the Lord's Supper and presses it with two questions: "Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ?" The word *sharing* carries the meaning of having in common, participating with, being in partnership.
What Paul is saying is that when we take communion — when we eat and drink — we are united with Christ. We are acknowledging our union with Him, declaring our fellowship and partnership with Him. This argument presumes that believers are regularly involved in the Lord's Supper. One thing that distinguishes East Valley Bible Church from many other Bible churches and community churches is that we take communion every Sunday when we gather together.
The Lord's Supper as Worship
We believe that as you look at the early church, what you saw is they gathered together not just for the apostles' teaching, but for the breaking of bread. The Lord's Supper was an integral part of that worship. That is exactly what Paul is saying — the Lord's Supper was a central act in Christian worship. All of your life is worship, but on Sunday when you come, from the time you arrive to the time you leave, this is all part of worship. The singing of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs is worship. The act of Holy Communion is worship. The teaching is worship. This is all worship to Him.
Paul says that what we are doing in the Lord's Supper unites us with God — not just with Christ, but also with each other. "Since there's one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of one bread." There is fellowship with Him through this, and there is also fellowship with one another. He then points to the nation of Israel: "Are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar?" Even then, when a burnt sacrifice was brought, the priests would partake of it, and oftentimes so would the one who brought the sacrifice. They were all involved together.
Sacrifices to Demons, Not to God
Paul then asks the same question you are probably asking: what does this mean? The New Living Translation is helpful here. He is essentially asking, "Am I saying that the idols to whom the pagans bring sacrifices are real gods, or that these sacrifices are of value?" And his answer is no. What he is saying is simple: "The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God, and I don't want you to become sharers in this." He does not want them involved in demon worship, in idolatry.
Verse 21 is even stronger. "You cannot." He is saying you cannot be of God and be involved in this idolatry. They are mutually exclusive. He is not saying that these demons are not real — he is saying they are not real gods. There is one true God, and they are not God. But are they real? Are they powerful? Absolutely. And what do they want more than anything else? To destroy you, and they will do it any way they can.
How Demons Infiltrate
They will try to come into the church any way they can. There was a story in the newspaper a few years ago around Christmas. A church had brought in a Christmas tree and decorated it, but another group in the congregation believed it was a pagan symbol. That group dragged the Christmas tree out to the front yard, and then the first group dragged it back in, and then the second group dragged it back out. The two groups eventually met in the parking lot to settle the issue once and for all — and they settled it the way real men would, in the love of Christ. My guess is that did not help their testimony in the community. But demons do not care. They do not care how they do it.
Do you think they do not love getting into a Christian marriage and turning one spouse against the other until you say you have irreconcilable differences? We say "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me," and that is a wonderful truth, but apparently for some people that does not extend to marriage. And do you think Satan and the demons do not set their sights on students? There are so many students in this service, and what demons want more than anything is for you to walk onto that campus and look like, dress like, and act like everybody else. They want you to blend in, and they tell you that will not hurt you.
A Warning to Students
Two weeks ago I was talking to a lady who said she had just had an awful day. She had just done a drug intervention for her daughter, and it had not ended well — it ended with them having to call the police and have her put in jail, asking them to keep her there as long as possible. She wanted me to understand that this was a great kid, just like your kids — a great student with a scholarship, a great future ahead of her. But she started hanging out with a bad crowd. I warned her about it, and then one night, just as this mother tells the story, this girl tried a little ecstasy. And she was gone. There is somebody totally different inside her now.
Do you think the demons did not have a voice in that moment, saying, "Come on, it is not that big a deal. Your mom and dad are goofy. They give you rules at home, but they do not really love you. I bet your folks did stuff like this. Come on, it will not hurt you." It is destroying her life. It is destroying her family. And beyond all of that, she is not a Christian. Beyond all of that, it destroys your testimony. You cannot live like every other kid in that school. You are different. You are unique.
Mutually Exclusive Devotions
That is exactly what Paul is saying. What are you thinking? You come in here for communion, you sing songs of praise, you are involved in worship, and then you go off and worship idols. You cannot do that. They are mutually exclusive. He ends this section with two pointed questions: "Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we?"
We cannot outmaneuver God. If I am truly a Christian, God is going to move. God is a God who is jealous, and for me that is a difficult term, because when I think of jealousy I think of my own. When I was dating Susan, I became very jealous over her and another guy — very jealous. And honestly, I was not primarily concerned about him, and I was not that concerned about her either. I wanted what I thought was best for me. Now, obviously, what was best for me in this case happened to be best for Susan as well, but that is the nature of human jealousy.
God's Jealousy
God's jealousy is a perfect jealousy in that He is going to have no competition in your life for what is the supreme loyalty. All through the Old Testament and into the New, we see this truth. Exodus 20, after the law is given: "You shall not worship these false gods or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God." Exodus 34:14: "For you shall not worship any other God, for your Lord whose name is Jealous is a jealous God." Deuteronomy 4:24: "For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God." Deuteronomy 6:15: "For the Lord your God in the midst of you is a jealous God." Joshua speaks to the people in Joshua 24:19: "You will not be able to serve the Lord, for He is a holy God. He is a jealous God."
God's Faithfulness in Every Trial
Here is what Paul is saying: in your life you are going to have all sorts of difficulties, challenges, and trials. God is always faithful. You can never say that He did not give you enough strength to endure. That is a broad statement with applications across so many areas of life, but specifically in this passage he is talking about the temptation to revert back to the old way of living. He says you do not have to succumb to that.
If you are truly God's, you cannot be ultimately controlled by the things around you — He controls you. He owns you, and your stuff does not own you. All of a sudden your life has perspective. The drives, the desires, the appetites, rather than being out of control, are all driven now by that relationship with Him. A relationship with Christ changes your life entirely.
What Paul is saying is not that there is no pain — there is pain. But even in the midst of the pain, what we are reminded of is that we are dependent on Him. All sorts of things may come into your life over a lifetime, and as they come in you may say, "I could never handle this," but now you know you can.
There is no reason — other than your own self-pity or your own willingness to follow emotion rather than fact — to be afraid. There is no reason to worry, no reason to be anxious, no reason to be bitter, no reason to be hurt, no reason to be offended, because He is faithful.
Trusting God With Wrongs Done to Us
You may say, "But these people did me dirty." Yes, that is acknowledged. But here is what God says: "Vengeance is Mine, says the Lord." He will take care of that. Do not waste energy on it — He will take care of it. The direct application is to the Corinthians' temptation in the area of idolatry, but the applications to our own lives are almost endless.
Looking Ahead
Next week Paul talks yet again about eating meat offered to idols, returning to the idea of Christian liberty one more time, and then we move into the beginning of the powerful teaching in chapter 11 as it deals with the Lord's Supper. That is what is ahead in this book.
Closing Prayer
Father, please help us see this truth. Help us understand these things. God, teach us what You have for us. I pray especially for those who are here today who are hurting and wondering if they can hang on — let them know they can, not because they are so strong, but because You are.
For those who have a root of bitterness growing in their heart, who have been hurt or offended — God, let them let it go. Let's get on to the next thing and see what You have for us. Maybe there is somebody here today who says they cannot relate to any of this — I pray for them, because if you have not been in the midst of this, you will be.
Help us remember, God, that what You bring into our lives is common to all, and You are faithful. That is what we need to know. You are faithful. You know our limits, You will provide a way of escape and endurance. God, thank You for who You are. We pray to You this morning in Jesus' name. Amen.