Good morning, everyone. It's good to have you here this morning. If you are a visitor at Northbrook today, we welcome you in the name of the Lord, and trust that you will be blessed if you hear the word of God proclaimed. And I understand that there's going to be a bit of a celebration after the message, so hang on, don't get up and leave, hang in there, there's something following.
I was going to preach today on the theme of an all-time great loser, and I tried to search my mind for a word that would cover that idea of all-time great. And I came up with the word ultimate. Ultimate, that's a good word. It means the best or most extreme of its kind.
So I want to talk about that today, that idea of ultimate. And being a curious soul, I googled the word ultimate just to find out if there were other ultimate things one could think about. And I found when I googled this, ultimate, the ultimate, I had 19,100,000 hits. There are a lot of altimates out there.
I kind of thought that ultimate would be a very restricted theme, 19,100,000. I'm sure there were some repeats in that group, but listen to what I found. There was the ultimate warrior. I don't know what that is.
The ultimate fighter, the ultimate showdown, I don't know, wild west or something, the ultimate dream vacation, the ultimate gift, that's what guys are always looking for. For their friends, the girlfriends, or their wives. The ultimate dining card, some of you have that maybe, the ultimate chili recipe. Yeah.
Yeah. The ultimate veggie burger. Oh, oxymoron. You can't have a burger and have veggies in it.
No. The Greek salad. How's that? The ultimate chocolate chip cookie.
Are we getting close? All right. The ultimate spin mop. I don't think it should be in the same phrase, right?
Ultimate and spin mop. The ultimate, and I hope this is okay because I didn't know what it was. The ultimate chicken horse. I hope that's okay to say in church.
I don't really know what it means. The ultimate chicken horse. And then I know I had gone too far. I knew I had gone too far when I found the ultimate leaf fan.
Now if you're long-term Canadian, you understand what that means. If you've just moved here from afar, you might not know what an ultimate leaf fan is. And we're not talking about Unime Akpan, who is a big leaf fan, right? Leaves.
We're talking about people who follow the Toronto Maple Leaf hockey team. And are there some here? Are you brave enough? Good for you.
Good for you. God bless you. God bless you. The ultimate leaf fan.
I knew I had to stop at that point. The ultimate, the word ultimate, is an overused word, isn't it? It's an overused word. And I wanted to use it for the title of this message, the ultimate failure.
And then I look back at the last message I preached. And it was the ultimate requirement for salvation. I'm overusing this word. But I do want to talk about the ultimate loser, the ultimate loser today.
Everybody wants to be a winner. Nobody wants to be a loser, right? We all want to be winners. When my oldest son was a little boy, just five years of age, we enrolled him in T-Ball.
Are you familiar with T-Ball? It's baseball, it's baseball sorta. And only at home plate, instead of waiting for the pitch to come in, at home plate, there's a plate. And then there's a stand that comes up from the plate, fasten to the plate, upon which you place the ball, so that the little guy who's standing at the back can possibly hit it, right?
Because if you're pitching it to him, he's not going to hit it. Because that, in five years of age, I-N coordination is just not there, right? So there's T-Ball, you have a home plate, you have all the people out in the field, not knowing what they're doing, but they're all out there. And then you have a little home plate with a stick sticking out of it, and a ball, a little plastic ball resting on top, and the children take swats at that to try and hit it.
And it's amazing. They never hit it. They keep hitting the stand, the stand keeps getting hit. And we played an entire summer watching that stand get hit and hoping and praying that maybe a ball would get out into the infield somewhere.
You know what? This summer, all the teams in that league, every player in that league got a trophy. Everyone. Friend, that is not life.
That's not real. We all don't get trophies in life. Maybe in T-Ball, but not in life. There are 31 teams in the National Hockey League.
31 teams. A maximum of 23 players per team. That gives you a maximum of 713 players. Only 23 maximum will win the Stanley Cup this year.
Who are the others? The people who don't win. They're losers, right? It doesn't matter how far you go.
If you don't get the cup, you're a loser, right? Two teams left. Anybody still watching hockey? Anybody still watching?
Yeah. There's two or three. Yeah. Most of you, because your team has already lost, have stopped watching, right?
They're already losers. There are two teams left. Those teams are going to play. Somebody will win.
Somebody will lose. And only the 23 or so players on that team will be called winners. All the rest are losers. Do you realize that of all the people who try out to get to the NHL, there's only the small group of people that make it.
And then of all the people who play in the NHL, only 23 people perhaps are going to get their names on the cup this year. That's 3% of the entire population of hockey players in the NHL. My point is that most of us are losers, right? We don't want to think of ourselves as losers.
And I know you're going to ask that this message is going downhill fast. But listen, we need to know this. We are born losers. We're born losers.
Somebody was so wise to think, you know what, we're all losers. So I'm going to write a comic column about this, a comic strip. Have you ever read the Born Loser? Are they still printing newspapers?
In the newspaper, if they're still printing them, there's something called the Born Loser. I go right there to read it because I have an affinity for this guy. I understand him. I'm him, the Born Loser.
We are born losers. Hockey is a game. It's a game. And it doesn't much matter, does it?
We shout and we cheer and we jump up and down and we go home sad when they lose. But it doesn't much matter. But think about other ways in which we can lose. There's social loss.
Think about people who lose their social standing. There are people out there that we're thinking about people in the news that have lost their social standing, haven't they? There's economic loss. You can lose economically.
If you want to know more about that, come and talk to me. I can tell you about that. There's political loss. There's a race going on in Ontario right now for the premiership there.
Some are going to win. Some are going to lose mostly. They're going to lose. Right?
And probably one of the greatest of all losses is relational loss. We've all felt that at one time or another. A breakup in relationship. A distancing.
You lose your friend perhaps over something. Maybe sometimes you lose your mate, your spouse. Relational loss. It's a terrible loss, isn't it?
Far more losers than there are winners. But who are the ultimate losers? The Lord Jesus Christ answers that question. He's the only one who can really answer that question.
I'd like you to turn, if you have your Bibles, to Matthew 16. Matthew 16, and we're going to look at what the Lord Jesus Christ says about this. Now, he doesn't use the term ultimate loser. That's something that I'm going to use.
But he did describe the ultimate loser in Matthew 16, verse 26, where it says, for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? Now, just with that one reading of that verse, what do you think is the most important thing, Jesus is saying? What is the most important thing in this world?
Is it the hockey game? No. Is it your financial success? No.
You know, is it political, relational, social? What is the most important thing in verse 26? Your what? Your soul.
Your soul. He's saying, what would it profit a man or woman if they should gain the whole world? And none of us are going to get close to that. But what would it profit you if that did happen and you lost your soul?
Or what will you give in exchange for your soul? The ultimate loser is the one who loses their soul, since Jesus Christ. Us praying. Father, help us today as we look at your word together to understand this and to appreciate this, to take it to our hearts as it were, the value of our soul.
And may there be someone here today who would make it their intent not to lose their soul. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. I want you to go with me, please, to Luke's gospel.
We're going to stay in Luke's gospel pretty much. So if you can find the gospel of Luke, third book in the New Testament, then we're going to hang around there most of the time. Now again, we'll take a foray off into some other area, but we're going to stay in the gospel of Luke, mostly. And we'll get three men in this gospel, three men that the Lord Jesus Christ spoke of.
And I think they represent three steps to becoming the ultimate loser. You want to know how to become an ultimate loser? Follow these three steps. Three simple steps.
All right? Isn't that great? The central question of life is this question. What would you give in exchange for your soul?
I want you to ask that question to yourself right now. What would I give in exchange for my soul? I want that question to be ruminating in your mind. What is it that I would trade my soul for today?
And we're going to look at these three men right now. First of all, Luke chapter 18. Luke chapter 18, we're going to pick it up at verse number 18. Luke 18 verse 18, and we're going to call this man.
We're going to give all three of these guys a name. We're going to call this man the burdened man, a burdened man. He had a burden on his heart. The burdened man, Luke 18 verses 18 to 23.
A ruler questioned him, a ruler questioned Jesus Christ, saying, good teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? And Jesus said to him, why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments.
Do not commit adultery. Do not murder. Do not steal. Do not bear false witness.
Honor your father and mother. And he said, that is that ruler said, all these things I have kept from my youth. When Jesus heard this, he said to him, one thing you still lack. Sell all that you possess and distribute to the poor.
And you shall have treasure in heaven and come. Follow me. But when he had heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. The burden soul.
A longing soul. The burden man, a longing soul, if you will. Here's a man who has real potential for God. He is actually seeking God.
And the gospel writers, all three of the gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, referred to this story. They speak of this man. Luke says in Luke 1823 that he was rich, extremely rich. We read in Matthew chapter 19 verse 22 that he was young.
And again in Luke 18 verse 18, he was a ruler. So he was rich. He was young. And he was powerful.
Think of that. That's a hat trick of success, isn't it? Rich, young, and powerful. His last name was Trudeau.
Maybe. Okay. Rich, young, and powerful. Well, who could ask for more?
Some people become rich over time, but by the time they get rich, they're so old they can enjoy it, right? Few people get to be powerful, but this man had it all. He had it all. Rich, young, and powerful.
But he knew something was missing. He knew that this wasn't, his life wasn't complete. Maybe he had heard it from his mother's knee. Maybe a friend of his had come by and tapped his shoulder and said, hey, buddy, I need to talk to you.
Or maybe he had just come to realize, even as a young man, that all of this stuff, the riches and the power, didn't satisfy. And now, this young man knew that this wasn't all there was to life. And so he came. Mark's gospel says he came running to the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's a wise move. That's a wise move. He came running to the only one who can give an answer to what is important in life. And he had this question.
He said, here in verse 18, or yes, verse 18, good teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? That's a crucial question, isn't it? I want to have eternal life. I have riches.
I have youth. I have power. But I don't have eternal life. What do I have to do?
I have to ask that question. Has it ever dawned upon you that this life is going to end? That this is your terminal? This is short.
Like grass we were reading earlier on. We're like grass. We just grow up and we wilt. We're gone.
I have four grandchildren. I cannot believe. I remember, and my memory's not that good, but I can remember being a teenager years and years ago. And it seems like yesterday.
And suddenly I'm in my 60s. What's with that? Life at best is very brief. Like the binding of a sheaf, like the falling of a leaf.
Our life is brief. And when you're young, it's stretching out ahead of you and you think, man, I got forever to live here. No, you don't. It'll come and it'll go.
Do you ever think about eternity? Do you ever think about your soul? Do you give it a passing thought? You ought to because eternity is a long, long time compared to this little blip, this little time called time.
This young man knew that he needed eternal life. And so he came. The rich, young ruler sought the answer to that most important question that any person can ask, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? We might paraphrase it.
What must I do to be saved? He came to Jesus Christ running. What shall I do to be saved? The Lord brought before him the law.
Did you notice that? He brought him to the law. He said, you shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder.
You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not lie. You shall honor your father and your mother.
If we run through those only five of the 10 commandments, how do you stack up on that? In order to have eternal life, you must, Jesus said, honor your parents. You must not lie. Sometimes when we hear the commandments, we're thinking, you know, I hear that shall not murder.
That's what I hear, right? Yeah. I don't want to hear that shall not lie. I don't want to hear that shall not steal.
I don't want to hear that you'll honor your father and your mother. Because I know I've broken those. I'm hoping that I haven't committed adultery and that they'll never commit murder. So maybe that's good enough.
No. Complete total obedience to the law is what God requires. And so the Lord Jesus lists off these five commandments and the young man says, like you and I would say, oh, I don't pretty good at that. I don't all right with that.
From my youth up. You know? Pretty good guy. Pretty good.
No. No. No. No.
Because the scripture says that if we hate our brother, we're a murderer. The scripture says that if we look at someone else and lust after them, we've committed adultery in our hearts. Do you know that? God sees what we would do if we could do and get away with it.
And so we have broken his commandments. This young man didn't realize that. He didn't see that. The Lord Jesus didn't take him through the commandments and explain all that to him.
He went to this one commandment. He went to the first commandment. The greatest commandment, if you will. I told you we're going to be in Luke, but if you can flip over to Mark and keep your finger and Luke because we are coming back there.
But if you went to the gospel of Mark, one of the scribes asked the Lord Jesus Christ in verse 28, Mark chapter 12, excuse me, verse 28, the scribes came to him and he heard him arguing with religious people and he recognized that the Lord Jesus Christ had answered well. And that scribe, that lawyer, he came before the Lord and he said, what commandment, Mark 1228, what commandment is the foremost of all? What is the most important commandment? And the Lord Jesus Christ quoted Deuteronomy chapter 6 and he said, the foremost is here, Israel, the Lord, our God is one Lord and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.
And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. There's no other commandment greater than these. What's he saying? God shall be your first love.
In fact, the first commandment says, you shall have no other God before me. And that means you shall have no other God, period in my presence. There shall be no other God. This young, rich young ruler, he had another God and his God was his wealth.
He loved his wealth. And so when the Lord Jesus Christ says to him, here's what you need to do. He said, what must I do to inherit eternal life? He said, well, you say you've kept the commandments.
What about that first commandment? To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. How are you doing with that? I ask you, how are you doing with that?
How am I doing with that? Here's what you do to prove your love for the Lord Jesus said, you deny your other gods. We would call that repentance. You turn your back on the other gods of your life, whatever sin it is, whatever it is that you're holding on to that is more important to you than God.
You turn your back on that and you turn and face God. And the Lord Jesus said to this young man, he said, you are trusting and you are loving. You are worshiping. You are serving the God of success and the God of money and wealth.
Turn from that. It's decision time, wasn't it? Now repentance doesn't save a person, by the way, but it is the first step. If you're going to cling to your sin, if you're going to cling to your God, whatever that God is, you will not cling to the one true and living God.
You cannot be clinging to your sin and to God. You cannot. And so repentance was the first thing that the Lord Jesus Christ brought before this man and the man at that point turned and walked away grieving because he was rich and he wouldn't give up his riches. You know what he thought?
He thought it's too costly. It costs too much to have a secure soul. It costs too much. And so I choose to walk away.
Choose to walk away. The Lord Jesus Christ said, you will have treasure in heaven and come and follow me. You will be my disciple. But that young man would not do that.
I asked the question. Would you do that? I asked the question. What would you give an exchange for your soul?
What is it? What is it that stands between you and Christ this morning? If this dear soul could be here today in this room, if he were standing at this podium instead of me, 2,000 years later, if he were able to speak to us, what do you suppose he would say? Do you think he would encourage us to make the same choice that he made?
Never. Never. He would be pleading with us to take the offer of salvation at any cost. No matter what that cost was, take it.
It's a deal. It's a deal. But he considered the cost of salvation too high. The burdened man kept his money and his possessions, but he lost his soul.
He lost his soul. I want to go to the second man now. Luke chapter 12, just back a few pages. Luke chapter 12, we have a burdened man in the beginning running up to the Lord Jesus Christ with a question on his heart.
What must I do to inherit eternal life? Now we have a businessman. I'm looking at this. They're not the same guy, but I'm looking at this as three steps to becoming an ultimate loser.
Let's just pretend that this is the same guy. Let's just pretend that because now he's gone from being a rich young ruler and he's moved along in life and he's become the businessman. Luke chapter 12, Luke chapter 12, the businessman, beginning at verse 15. The Lord Jesus Christ said to them, be aware and be on your guard against every form agreed for not even one.
One has an abundance as his life consists of his possessions. And he told them a parable saying, the land of a rich man was very productive and he began to reason to himself saying, what shall I do since I had no place to store my crops? And then he said, this is what I'll do. I'll tear down my barns and build larger ones.
And there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, soul, you have many goods laid out for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink and be merry. But God said to him, you fool.
This very night your soul shall be required of you. And now who will own what you have prepared? So is the man who stores up treasury for himself and is not rich toward God, the businessman, the businessman. He's prepared for this world, for this life.
He's a financial success. He said bumper crops and he's too busy for God. There's no mention of God, no thought of God anymore. If it's the same guy, if it were the same guy, you see, he had a longing soul at one time.
He longed to know God, he longed to have eternal life, but now it's not important. What's important is my business. What's important is doing well, succeeding. He's too busy for God.
The burden is gone. Where has that burden gone? He's been hearing this morning from Luke 8. He is the thorny ground where the seed that comes into the ground is choked out by the worries, riches and pleasures of this life.
There's no room for God in his life. How about you? Is it room? You're busy?
Too busy for God. This man was too busy for God. And this man was confused. Did you notice in verse 19 what he said, I will say to my soul, you have many goods laid up for many years.
Many goods, many years. That's not soul. That's body. That's temporal.
Many goods, many years. The soul is eternal. He had confused his body with his soul. I hope you don't do that.
I hope you don't confuse this life for eternal life. Two different things. His preparation was only temporal. That verse 19, it was good.
It was many years. No preparation for the soul. And many like him are making that same mistake. And God says, God says, you're full.
You're full. Verses 20 and 21. God said to him, you fool this very night, your soul is recorded of you. And now, and now, who will own what you have prepared?
It's one thing when your peers think you're full. That's quite another thing when God says you are, isn't it? I'd much rather be called to fool by my peers than have God call me a fool. This young man was a fool.
He was a person lacking in judgment and prudence, one who was in want of mental sanity. Is that you? Is that you? God said, in tonight, you're going to die.
I wonder if that man would have changed anything if he had a chance. Like if a few weeks earlier, God said to him, you know, a couple weeks time you're going to die. You better get your house in order. I wonder if he'd have changed anything.
I wonder if you would change anything if you knew that tonight you're going to die. I can't tell you the day of your death. I can't tell you the day of my death. But what I can tell you is this.
Hebrews 927 says it is appointed unto men once to die. You know what that means? You're going to die. You're going to die.
There's a one-to-one correlation here. You're born. You die. You will die.
So you may not know the day of your death. You may not know the time of your death, but you know this. You're going to die. And when you die, you will leave behind everything.
That's what God said to this man. You're leaving behind everything. Who's going to have the things you prepared? Won't be you.
And it won't matter to you. Will it? It won't matter. It is appointed unto man once to die.
It's an appointment we will all keep. But what then? And what of you at that time? The business man lost his business.
He lost his things. But that's not the tragedy. The tragedy is he lost his soul. He lost his soul.
If this man were here today at this meeting and he was able to speak, what would he say? I believe he would say, don't be a fool like me. I thought I was too busy for God and I crowded him out of my life. And now I'm a lost soul.
That's what I am. That's all I have. A lost soul. The first step in becoming an ultimate loser is to think that being a Christian is too costly.
The second step is to be too busy for God. I want to look at the third step in the last man. He's in Luke 16. We have a burden man in Luke 18.
We have a busy man in Luke 12. And we have in Luke 16 a buried man. He's buried. His is a languishing soul.
He's not an active young zealot. He's not an enterprising businessman. He's dead. He's dead.
Let's read verse 19. Now there was a rich man and he habitually dressed in purple and fine-lining joyously living in splendor every day. So happy guy. It's happy.
Happy in his wealth. Very rich. And there was a poor man. Verse 20.
His name was Lazarus. He was laid at the rich man's gate and was covered with souls and longed to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man's table. That rich man wasn't even going to give to this poor hungry man. He was so stingy.
He wouldn't even give to this guy. Besides even the dogs were coming and licking his sores. Now the poor man died and he was carried away by angels into Abraham's bosom. And the rich man also died and was buried.
And in Hades he lifted up his eyes being in torment and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus sent his bosom. And he cried out and said, Father, Abraham have mercy on me and sent Lazarus so he would dip the tip of his finger and water and cool my tongue for I am an agony in this flame. I'm going to stop there. He's the buried man.
He's a royally rich man as we begin reading the section. He's royally rich. He's joyously living in splendor every day. He had it made.
He had made it and he had it made. He was rich beyond our wildest imagination. He was stingy. He cared for no one else, just himself.
But guess what? He died. Verse 22. He died.
He like all others kept that appointment with death. He didn't miss it. He kept it. And his body was buried.
And to his amazement, his soul was in Hades. Hell. Hell. The destiny of everyone who thinks it's too costly to be a Christian.
Hell. The destiny of all those who are too busy to make time for God. Hell. The destiny of all who are too late to be saved.
This man's body was in the grave but his soul was in hell, in torment. And he cried out for his 24 sis. He cried out. He cried for mercy.
Have mercy. But it's too late for mercy when you've died. It's far too late. Now is the accepted time.
Now is the day of mercy and of salvation the scripture says, not after you die. There is no mercy after you die. Horrible, helpless, hopeless cry. Have mercy.
Can you hear his cry, Christian? Do you hear the cry? Do you hear unsafe, friend? Do you hear the cry?
Will that be your cry? Have mercy. Will that be your cry? If it would be your cry, be it your cry today.
Be it your cry today. Not after you've been buried. That rich man is still in Hades. It's 2000 years later and he's still in Hades.
But that's not the end of it for him. Go with me to Revelation 20. Revelation 20. And listen to these words.
Beginning at verse 10, we go to 10 to 15. Revelation 20 verse 10. And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever in that place called the lake of fire.
Then I saw a great white throne and him who sat upon it from whose presence earth and heaven fled away. That's God. And there was no place found for them. Earth and heaven fled away from the face of God.
And I saw the dead, the great and the small standing before the throne. And the books were opened. And another book was opened which is the book of life. And the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds.
And the dead which were in it and death and Hades gave up to dead which were in them. And they were judged every one of them according to their deeds. It is appointed unto man once a day. And after that, the judgment.
Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. How tragic.
How horrible. This man who is presently in Hades and hell. His future is not a bright future. His future is a lake of fire.
And so will yours be. If you have not come to Christ for salvation, what a loser. He's lost his soul. The third and final step to being an ultimate loser is to be too late to receive God's salvation.
I'm going to ask you this question. Are you well on your way to becoming an ultimate loser? Are you well on your way? And if you are, let me ask you this question.
Why? For heaven's sake. Why? Too busy?
Are you thinking that becoming a Christian will cost you too much? I want to ask that question that I asked in the beginning. I want you to answer it in your heart. What would you give in exchange for your soul?
Don't know the answer. I'll answer that question. Whatever it is that is keeping you from trusting Christ as your Savior this very minute is what you would exchange for your soul. Think of it.
What is it? What is it right now that's keeping you from trusting Christ? What is it that's in the way that is what you think your soul is worth? The Lord Jesus Christ thought it was worth his life.
Your soul to him was worth his life. And so he died on the cross to pay the penalty for your sins. And you say, well, I don't want to lose my soul. I don't want to lose my soul.
I don't want to spend eternity separated from God in a place called the Lake of Fire. Do you know the answer to the question? What shall I do to inherit eternal life? Do you know the answer to that question first?
Renounce everything that stands in your way. Turn from those things to God. That's called repentance, turning. Turn from the past.
Turn from whatever it is you're holding on to and turn to God. And then as X, 16, 31 says, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Put your faith and trust in the one who died on the cross to pay the penalty of your sins. That's what God requires.
That's it. Isn't that amazing? All my sins. All my sins.
All my debt. All my debt. The sacrifice of Christ Jesus on the cross of Calvary. And all I need to do is embrace that.
That's wonderful news, isn't it? If you will do that, if you will embrace Christ as your Savior, listen carefully. You will still lose. You know what you lose?
All your sin and all your guilt. Lose your sin, lose your guilt, or lose your soul. I'm not too smart, but I know the better of those two deals. Do you?
Have you trusted Christ as your Savior? I pray that you will. Like this very moment, realize the value of your eternal soul. And trust the keeping of your soul, the salvation of your soul, to Jesus Christ at this moment.
Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word today. Thank you that there is a Redeemer. There is one who would give up his life for us.
And that person is the Lord Jesus Christ, the very Son of God. It's not just another person. It's the very Son of God who died for us and paid that ultimate price. And I pray that there's someone here today who does not want to lose their soul, their eternal soul, that they will turn to Christ away from their sin, away from whatever it is they think is so valuable and just turn to the only one who can save them.
May it be so today in Jesus' name. Amen.