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This is another one of those 
really strange stories in the 

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Bible and but it it hits a theme
that is, is almost universal, 

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which is lifes not fair and 
that's not fair. 

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There's a lot of things in the 
story that are not fair. 

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Now I'm going to say a couple 
introductory things here before 

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we get into it. 1 is that I, I 
really believe as you read this 

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story, chapters 29 and 30 in 
Genesis, that it's been it's 

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meant to be read almost as a 
comedy. 

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There's a lot of humor here, and
a comedy not in the sense of 

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trivializing this. 
These two chapters deal with 

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some very, very serious issues. 
Everything from sibling, sibling

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rivalry to deception and 
competition within a family, to,

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to, to infertility and to the 
struggles of of how how do we 

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live and how to relate and how 
do we connect and how do we see 

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ourselves in relation to God and
others when we want to have 

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children but can't have 
children. 

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These are very serious topics. 
And by saying they're comedy, I 

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don't mean that it treats them 
as trivial. 

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The best comedy deals with very 
serious things and helps us look

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at and examine very serious 
things in a serious way, but 

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also with some laughter 
involved. 

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And sometimes that laughter, 
like Mary Poppins says, a spoon 

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full of sugar, helps the 
medicine go down. 

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And sometimes that laughter 
really helps us absorb some, 

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some hard lessons in the tough 
realities of life. 

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And, and the fact that life 
isn't fair is one of those tough

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realities. 
And, and I got to think that 

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there were a lot of people in 
these two chapters that were 

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saying that's not fair. 
That's not fair. 

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When, when, when we'll just talk
about the story, the strangest 

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wedding story that I know of 
anyway. 

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When, when, when Jacob says to 
Laban his, his his uncle, we 

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think somewhere on there some 
sort of kin relationship there 

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with his mother. 
I think it I think it's his 

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uncle. 
And he says I want to marry your

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younger daughter Rachel. 
She's beautiful. 

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I love her. 
Let's get married. 

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I'll work seven years for her. 
And Laban says, fine, that's 

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great work. 
Seven years, seven years later, 

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the wedding comes and, and at 
that night, and I don't know, I 

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got to think there was alcohol 
involved. 

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I got to think there was maybe a
veil being worn somewhere along 

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the way. 
But But when it's time for the 

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the the honeymoon to begin, 
Laban sends his daughter Leah, 

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instead of his daughter Rachel 
into Jacob's tent. 

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And that link gives rise to what
I think might be the funniest 

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verse in the entire Bible, which
is when the morning came, there 

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was Leah. 
And I got to think Jacob said, 

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this isn't fair. 
This isn't fair with the Laban. 

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You've deceived me. 
Now there's part of us that can 

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say, well, you know, what goes 
around comes around. 

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Karma going on here. 
Not really a karma person. 

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But you know, the reason Jacob 
is here anyway is because he 

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deceived his father into giving 
him his brother's blessing. 

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And, and, and now, now Jacob is 
being deceived. 

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And, and again, there's a lot of
names for that in the Bible. 

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We talk about it being the 
principle of sowing and reaping.

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You reap what you sow And Jacob 
has reaped the life of deception

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and now he's getting deceived 
and he's not happy about it on 

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the receiving end. 
He's not happy about it. 

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But Laban says, oh, you know, 
it's just tradition around here 

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and you can't marry the younger 
daughter before the older one's 

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been married. 
So I tell you what, work another

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seven years, you can marry. 
Rachel didn't make him wait. 

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He just made him wait a week. 
Finish your week with Leah, and 

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then I'll give you Rachel. 
So Jacob gets married for the 

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second time a week later. 
And now he has two wives and 

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each of his wives has a female 
maidservant. 

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And and it's clear that Jacob 
loves Rachel. 

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Leah, not so much. 
Leah could say that's not fair. 

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That's not fair. 
But God saw that Leah was not 

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loved as much as Rachel, and so 
God blessed Leah and and she 

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conceived. 
Well, yeah, that's not fair. 

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Already jumping ahead, life 
isn't fair. 

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I already said that God sees and
God is faithful. 

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God sees Rachel or God sees Leah
and her distress. 

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And it really wasn't fair. 
We don't really know what the 

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relationship between Leah and 
Rachel is. 

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We don't know whether they were 
friends. 

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We do know that they were 
rivals. 

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We see that rivalry going on in 
the next chapter. 

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We'll talk about that a little 
bit here too. 

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But but we know that Jacob loved
Rachel more than he loved Leah. 

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And we see that that's not fair.
And we see that God sees that 

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Leah didn't ask for this. 
Leah's put in the middle of 

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this. 
I can't imagine what was going 

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through her head when her dad 
says, hey, you know, why don't 

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you go? 
I'll keep Rachel in the tent at 

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home. 
And I have no idea what was 

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going on in re in Leah's hat 
when he sent Leah and Rachel's 

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place. 
But now she's married and now 

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she's married and her husband, 
her husband is also married to 

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her younger sister and he loves 
her more than he loves. 

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He loves her sister more than he
loves her. 

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And God sees, God sees Leah in 
this situation, a situation that

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that as far as we know, she 
didn't ask for, she didn't 

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desire she's in and it's not 
fair and God doesn't make the 

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situation go away, but God sees 
and God blesses Leah. 

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God makes her fertile. 
When the Lord saw that Leah was 

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not loved, he enabled her to 
conceive and she gave birth to a

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son. 
And and and it didn't stop there

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because she conceived and she 
conceived and she conceived. 

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She had four sons, gave birth to
four sons for her husband Jacob.

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Still Rachel has not gotten 
pregnant. 

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But then Leah didn't get 
pregnant again either at that 

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time. 
And so she says, ah, I'm going 

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to got to keep going here. 
So well, Rachel, who couldn't 

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get pregnant, Rachel couldn't 
break pregnant, says, well, I'm 

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not getting pregnant. 
So she goes to her mate and 

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says, hey, Bill Ha, want to have
a baby with my husband. 

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Bill Ha says, all right, sounds 
good to me. 

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She goes in and she gets 
pregnant and she has a son. 

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And then she gets pregnant again
and she has another son. 

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And so now Jacob has six sons, 4
by Leah, 2 by Bill Ha. 

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And Leah's going. 
I got to get back in the game 

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here. 
So Leah says to her servant 

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Zilpah, hey, you want to have a 
baby with my husband? 

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All right, I'm thinking Jacob 
must have been good looking. 

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I, I don't, I don't see how this
would have worked if Jacob 

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wasn't good looking and, and, 
and, and reasonably, you know, 

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more than reasonably attractive.
So what's that? 

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Probably had hair. 
That's low. 

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That's low. 
Oh, my goodness, it's not fair. 

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So Zilpah gets pregnant. 
She has a son and then she gets 

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pregnant again and she has 
another son. 

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So now Jacob has eight sons, 4 
by Leah, 4 by Bilpa or two by 

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Bilhah, 2 by Zilpa. 
And at this point, and again 

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this is years are passing here. 
Rachel still has not conceived, 

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still has not had a child. 
And, and Ruben, the oldest son, 

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Jacob's first born, Leah's first
born, is out in the fields doing

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whatever he's doing in the 
fields, and he discovers some 

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Mandrake plants. 
Mandrakes, you know, if you're 

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watching Harry Potter, they're 
not going to kill anybody in the

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ancient world. 
And this is well documented in 

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that region, in the ancient 
world, mandrakes were believed 

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to be both aphrodisiacs and aids
to fertility. 

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And so Leah's son discovers some
Mandrake plants and brings them 

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back. 
And Rachel sees the mandrakes 

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and she's like, this isn't fair.
I want to have a baby. 

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And so she goes to Leah and 
says, hey, tell your son to give

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me the mandrakes or to give me 
some of the mandrakes. 

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Which gives rise to the second 
funniest and maybe the strangest

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verse in the Bible. 
Ah, yeah, Rachel, the strangest 

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verse in the Bible, which is. 
But she said to her, wasn't it 

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enough that you took away my 
husband? 

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Will you take my son's 
mandrakes, too? 

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This is Leah's response. 
Bad enough you stole my 

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husband's affection, my 
husband's heart. 

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You're going to take my son's 
mandrakes too? 

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But Rachel wants the mandrakes 
because she wants to get 

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pregnant. 
And Leah says, all right, you 

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can have the mandrakes, but I 
get Jacob tonight. 

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So Jacob come in, comes in from 
the fields and Rach and Leah 

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comes up to him and says, hey, 
you're sleeping with me tonight.

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I bought you for some mandrakes.
Check it. 

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That's exactly what she says. 
It's right there in the Bible. 

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Jacob goes in, sleeps with Leah,
boom, she's pregnant again. 

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Rachel still not so much. 
And then Leah gets pregnant one 

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more time. 
Six sons she's now had for 

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Jacob, and Rachel is still 
barren. 

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And then finally we are told 
this, that God then remembered 

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Rachel and he listened to her 
and he enabled her to conceive. 

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And Rachel gave birth to Joseph,
you know, the, the Technicolor 

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dreamcoat Joseph, the Joseph who
saved his people from starvation

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and gave them a place in Egypt. 
We'll get to Joseph later, but 

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this was Joseph's origin story 
here. 

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All of these things happen. 
And all along the way it's 

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possible to say it's not fair. 
It's not fair. 

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Wasn't wasn't fair for Leah, it 
wasn't really fair for Rachel 

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either to not be able to have a 
baby just because her husband 

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preferred her to her sister. 
And in all of this, God sees 

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life isn't fair. 
This is, I think one of the most

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important lessons we can teach 
our children is that life isn't 

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fair. 
I think, I think that that's one

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of the reasons why the Internet 
is such a hot mess and social 

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media is such a hot mess is 
because there's a lot of folks 

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that that don't get that life 
just isn't fair. 

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And God doesn't seem to be 
interested in making it fair as 

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much as God is interested in 
justice. 

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And that is a theme throughout 
the Scripture. 

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Justice for the poor, justice 
for the needy, for the 

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vulnerable, for the orphan, for 
the widow, and for the 

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foreigner, justice for for all 
folks. 

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God doesn't seem particularly 
interested in making life fair. 

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But God sees in the middle of 
the unfairness. 

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God sees now. 
I, I don't know what unfairness 

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is going on in your life right 
now. 

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And unfairness can come from a 
lot of different directions. 

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Unfairness can come at work, 
being treated differently for 

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the wrong reasons or, or, or 
whatever. 

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Unfairness can come in school. 
Unfairness can come in personal 

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relationships. 
It can seem that way in your 

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family. 
Anyone, I don't know anyone with

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young children that hasn't heard
the word, that's the phrase, 

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that's not fair in the past 
week. 

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Unfairness comes all over the 
place. 

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Unfairness comes in natural 
abilities. 

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Some people have to have hair. 
Yeah, there. 

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All right. 
God made a few perfect heads. 

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The rest he covered with hair. 
That's my story. 

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I'm sticking to it. 
When life seems really, really 

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unfair, God invites us to look 
for his blessing because even 

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when life is unfair, God is not 
blind. 

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God sees, God notices and look 
for God's blessing. 

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And I don't mean that to 
trivialize the realities of 

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unfairness. 
Again, this this one of the 

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major themes of these two 
chapters is infertility. 

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And, and that alone can be very 
devastating to couples, women 

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and men both. 
And, and it can be emotionally, 

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socially, relationally, 
psychologically and spiritually 

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devastating. 
And I don't mean to trivialize 

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that by saying, well, God will. 
You know, if God closes the 

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door, he'll open a window. 
Or if God takes away one 

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blessing, he'll give you 
another. 

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It's not simplistic like that. 
Sometimes we have to really look

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for the blessing. 
Sometimes the blessing doesn't 

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come for years. 
Joseph, Joseph who was sold by 

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his brothers into slavery, I'm 
thinking said this isn't fair. 

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And it was, it was years later, 
probably decades later before he

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was able to see the blessing 
that was in all of that and 

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through all of that, one of the 
extraordinary things about our 

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God. 
And, and I think this is 

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captured in the word redemption.
God doesn't make everything 

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fair, but God will redeem the 
unfairness. 

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And one of the things about 
redemption is, is it isn't just 

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fixing something. 
It's not just taking a broken 

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thing and mending it. 
It's it's redemption is 

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resurrection. 
It's, it's a new life, but it's 

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not just a restoration of the 
old life. 

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When Lazarus, when God raised, 
Jesus raised Lazarus from the 

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dead, it wasn't a resurrection. 
He just restored his whole old 

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life, and that life continued 
much as it had before. 

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When Jesus is resurrected from 
the dead and the resurrection 

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that we await, it's a new life 
and it's different in some way, 

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and we don't know exactly how it
will be. 

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We just know that we're going to
be like Jesus because we'll see 

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him as he is. 
But we know that that after that

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resurrection, Jesus was like he 
could be in one place and then 

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another, that he had scars, but 
he wasn't bound by the scars. 

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He had an incredible amount of 
peace, amazing power. 

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There is glory, Paul says, 
waiting for us in the 

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resurrection. 
It's a new life. 

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It's a different life and it's a
life that God gives us back and,

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and in redemption, God makes the
moment and then going forward 

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better than it would have been 
had it not been for the pain and

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the sorrow and the unfairness. 
I'm not saying that very well. 

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When we go through a bad thing, 
maybe a horrible breakup, maybe 

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a life shattering illness, maybe
the death of a loved one on the 

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other side of that, God has the 
power to make life even better 

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than it was before, even better 
than it would have been had the 

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bad thing not happened. 
And that's a thing that's 

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difficult for us to wrap our 
brains around because it doesn't

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mean that God wants the bad 
things to happen to us. 

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Doesn't mean that we should want
unfairness to happen to 

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ourselves or to happen to those 
we love. 

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Well, just because then you 
know, what it means is that 

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somehow God has the ability to 
make life better even than it 

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would have been. 
God did that. 

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He did it for Rachel. 
He did it for Leah, He did it 

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for Zilpa and Bilhah, and all of
this too, did it for Jacob, did 

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it for Joseph, He did it for 
Jesus, and he'll do that for us.

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So when we go through those 
unfair, unfair times when we are

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experiencing these things and 
we're in the middle of them, 

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it's worth stopping and pausing.
Or God invites us to stop and 

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pause and remember that God sees
that. 

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We're not lost to God in that. 
And then to look for that 

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blessing, however it may come 
and whenever it may come. 

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Here's a simple fact. 
We really don't want God to be 

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fair. 
We really don't. 

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If God were fair, it would not 
go well with anybody. 

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There's another great story of 
unfairness in the Bible, and 

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it's a story that Jesus told of 
the prodigal son. 

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Remember that? 
And the one son, the older son 

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who was dutiful and obedient and
loyal and faithful to his father

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all through his life. 
And then the younger son who was

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kind of a scoundrel and a waste 
roll, just a knucklehead that 

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that took everything his father 
gave him and wasted and found 

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himself destitute in a foreign 
land and, and, and he had 

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squandered his inheritance. 
He'd insulted his father 

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horribly by asking for his 
inheritance before his father 

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died. 
He said that culturally, he was 

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in effect saying, father, I wish
you were dead. 

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Give me my inheritance. 
Now he takes that inheritance 

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and he squanders it all. 
And then he comes back, and you 

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know the story. 
The father sees him from a 

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distance, and the father runs 
out to greet him, and he 

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welcomes him. 
And he puts his robe on him, 

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puts his ring on his finger, has
the fatted calf killed. 

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And he has a big feast to 
welcome his son home. 

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And his older son comes back and
sees what's going on and says, 

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that's not fair, that's not 
fair. 

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I've always been faithful. 
I've always been working for 

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you. 
You haven't had this kind of 

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party for me. 
But this son of yours who's 

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wasted your wealth, shamed you 
and our whole family, You're 

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throwing a feast in a 
celebration for him. 

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It's not fair, the father says. 
But my son was lost and he's 

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found. 
He was dead to me. 

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And now he's alive again. 
We're going to celebrate that. 

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And he invites the older son. 
He doesn't say, you know, he 

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just invites. 
He said, come in, celebrate with

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us. 
The story's left open in it. 

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We don't know whether the older 
son goes in or not. 

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We don't know whether he joins 
in the celebration or he stays 

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outside pouting about life being
unfair. 

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But the good news is, is if God 
insisted on fairness, that 

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younger son would never have 
gotten welcomed home. 

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The younger son would never have
been forgiven. 

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The younger son would never have
been restored and redeemed. 

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But because our God allows and 
sanctions and at times even 

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blesses unfairness, He was 
restored and He was redeemed. 

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Because of that, we can be too. 
That one day we can be, we can 

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and will be welcomed home by 
God, who will receive us as his 

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sons and daughters. 
Even when we failed, even when 

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we've sinned, even when we've 
wasted good things that God has 

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given to us, even when we spent 
a lot of time moaning and 

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groaning about how unfair life 
is. 

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When we return to God, God 
receives us, and we'll make our 

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life even better than it would 
have been had we never left 

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before. 
Had we never fallen away? 

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And that's not fair. 
That's not fair. 

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But it's good news for all of 
us. 

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I can tell you what wasn't fair.
Jesus dying on the cross was not

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fair. 
Jesus, the only truly sinless 

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person, the only completely and 
wholly good person to ever live,

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hung on the cross, abused and 
rejected and shamed and scorned 

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by the very people that He was 
giving life and breath to at 

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that very moment. 
And they were using that gift of

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life and breath to kill the one 
who gave it to them. 

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And they stripped him, and they 
put a crown of thorns on his 

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heads, and they threw him down 
on the cross, and they drove 

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nails into his hands and his 
feet, and they hung him up there

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in the air to die publicly 
shamed and disgraced. 

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That wasn't fair. 
That wasn't fair that Jesus's 

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body was broken in that way. 
And it wasn't fair that Jesus's 

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blood was shed, that that the 
one who said life is in the 

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00:21:23,960 --> 00:21:29,040
blood poured out his life's 
blood for all humanity. 

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The one who has blessed us with 
the love of family and friends 

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and children and snow and 
sunshine and rain should see his

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blood fall to the ground hanging
from a cross. 

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But Jesus did that, and he did 
that willingly so that we could 

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be redeemed, so that somehow 
life will be better. 

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Not only better after Jesus's 
crucifixion, but better than it 

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would have been had Jesus never 
been rejected and crucified. 

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How God does that, I don't know.
That's the power of a mighty God

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to redeem and to save, and 
fairness has nothing to do with 

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it. 
One of my favorite movies. 

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00:22:24,440 --> 00:22:26,680
This doesn't really go there 
anyway. 

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I got a couple extra minutes, 
might as well use it. 

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One of my one of my favorite 
movies is Unforgiving. 

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You ever seen that? 
It's an old Clint Eastwood 

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00:22:32,960 --> 00:22:35,040
movie. 
If you haven't seen Unforgiven, 

353
00:22:35,040 --> 00:22:38,520
watch Unforgiven. 
Got one of the best lines in 

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00:22:38,520 --> 00:22:41,000
movie history. 
So Will Money is Clint 

355
00:22:41,000 --> 00:22:44,360
Eastwood's character and he's 
the the anti hero. 

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00:22:44,520 --> 00:22:48,880
He's a bad guy that's trying to 
change and finds himself going 

357
00:22:48,880 --> 00:22:53,120
out on one more bad deed to try 
to save his starving family. 

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And his good friend gets killed 
in the process. 

359
00:22:56,080 --> 00:22:58,880
And he gets killed by Little 
Bill, who's the sheriff of the 

360
00:22:58,880 --> 00:23:01,320
town. 
Little Bill is supposed to be 

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00:23:01,320 --> 00:23:03,280
the good guy, but he's not 
really a good guy. 

362
00:23:04,800 --> 00:23:07,320
And Will comes back to seek his 
revenge. 

363
00:23:08,280 --> 00:23:11,680
And he walks into the bar and he
kills a bunch of folks and he 

364
00:23:11,680 --> 00:23:14,440
wounds Little Bill and Little 
Bills lying there on the ground.

365
00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:17,480
And William Money walks up to 
him and he loads his shotgun one

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00:23:17,480 --> 00:23:21,960
more time and he points it down 
at him and little Bill says it's

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00:23:21,960 --> 00:23:30,400
not fair. 
I was building a house and Will 

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00:23:30,400 --> 00:23:32,680
Money looks at him and says 
fair's got nothing to do with 

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00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:34,560
it. 
He kills him. 

370
00:23:35,920 --> 00:23:37,520
It's not a Jesus thing to do, 
right? 

371
00:23:37,680 --> 00:23:41,960
We could all agree on that, that
that's not the take away from 

372
00:23:41,960 --> 00:23:46,080
this. 
The take away from this is that 

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God with a the polar opposite 
attitude looks at us and says 

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00:23:51,880 --> 00:23:55,560
fair's got nothing to do with 
it, nothing to do with it. 

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For will money it was revenge. 
For God it's redemption, it's 

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00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:08,200
love, it's forgiveness and 
fair's got nothing to do with 

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00:24:08,200 --> 00:24:09,560
it. 
Let's pray together.