Let's turn to the book of Titus,
chapter 2. We're looking at the end of the
chapter. And Paul has been addressing
all people, as in all kinds of people that are believers in
the Lord Jesus Christ. He's speaking to the church,
and he's speaking to those gathered by the Lord, called and gathered
by the Lord of every kindred, tongue, people, and nation. And he speaks at the end of verse
10 He speaks of adorning the doctrine of God our Savior in
all things. He speaks of adorning the gospel. We adorn the gospel with the
spiritual blessings which are given to us of God in the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's how we adorn the gospel. It's out of this flesh. This
flesh doesn't adorn anything. This flesh doesn't make anything
beautiful. This flesh fades, it withers,
it dies, it corrupts, it is corrupted. It's the blessings of Christ
whereby we adorn the gospel. It's that work of our Lord bearing
fruit in us that adorns the gospel, that beautifies the gospel. So
the walk and conduct of our life of our lives is founded upon
this gospel of our God and Savior. The Apostle John called it the
doctrine of Christ. In his second epistle, verse
nine it was, he calls it the doctrine of Christ. Our walk and conduct here is
born out of that hope that we have of this gospel, what's revealed
to us in Christ. And this spiritual life that
we now have is given to us by the Lord Jesus Christ, and it's
from this life of Christ that we understand the gospel, that
we've heard it. And with the ear of faith, the
hearing of faith, and believe this gospel, that's all the fruit,
that's all the workmanship of the Lord Jesus Christ. And by that, by that life which
He's given to us, that's where your desire, your interest in
Him arises. It's out of that life, it's the
blessing of His life in you. He's given you His Spirit and
He's formed in you a new creation that was not there in Adam. a
new creature, born of the seed of Christ. It's his work in us. And so Paul, and as I mentioned
in the last hour, Paul is a pattern given to us. He told that to
Timothy. He said, I'm a pattern of the
long-suffering Christ for his people. I'm a pattern. And so,
Paul as our pattern here, we see him desiring to win Christ. If you look in Philippians chapter
3, he desired to win Christ. That is, he didn't care about
any accolades or whatever else his imagination could think of.
He wanted to win Christ as his inheritance. He just wanted to
be found in Christ. And that's what he says there
in verse 9. He said, I want to be found in
him, not having mine own righteousness which is of the law. I don't
want it to come down to me and what I've done. That which is
through the faith of Christ. His faithfulness. His obedience
to the Father. Our obedience is faith in Christ.
His obedience is faithfulness to the Father. He kept the Father's
will, and that is the righteousness which is of God by faith. That's where I want to be found,
in Christ's faithfulness. I don't want to be found in man's
righteousness, that which comes by his doing. That's not where I want to be
found, and what I've done but I want to be found in the perfect
righteousness of God my father who sent his son to to redeem
me that I might be to establish righteousness and to wash me
in his blood that I might be found in his righteousness alone
and he adds in verse 10 that I may know him and the power
of his resurrection You know, we see something of power, you
know, with the lights, or with engines, or with bombs, or whatever,
we see something of power. Well, you can just imagine how
much power it took to raise someone from the dead. That's power that
we know nothing of. Man has all these inventions
and ideas that he wants to execute and he's very often limited by
the resource of power. He's limited by power, right?
God's power is infinite. Infinite. Out of His stores,
it never diminishes or depletes. It's power. Unlimited in God. And it's that power that I want
to know Christ. The power of His resurrection
which raises a dead, filthy, blind, darkened, formless, void,
lifeless sinner to life. a life, spiritual life, that
I may enter into the fellowship of God by the Lord Jesus Christ. That's power. And be made conformable
unto his death, willing to suffer as Christ suffered, laying down
his life to give life to his people. I want to be made conformable
to his death. To die to this world and the
things of this world and the cares of this world. It means
nothing that Christ be glorified in all things in me. And that's what he makes us to
do. And so how are we going to adorn the doctrine of the gospel
of our God and Savior? By the power of God that raised
Jesus Christ up from the dead, that blesses us with life, spiritual
life, and all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus. in all things, whether it be
suffering, dead to self, and life to God. Whatever it is,
whatever form it is coming in, it's fine. It's fine. He makes
us content with his will. Because he shows us that He is
trustworthy. He's worthy of all our trust
and confidence. Though we be stripped of something
physically, he blesses us overwhelmingly in spiritual things in Christ. It's all for our good. And he
turns us from complaining about things in the flesh to trusting
him in the spirit. He does that. He works that by
his grace and power. So to begin, let me just first
acknowledge that Paul is writing this to Titus, and Titus is a
minister of the Gospel, and a true minister, a faithful minister
of the Gospel, does this work depending wholly upon the Spirit
of God. We don't turn to the things of
the law to work in obedience in you. We don't turn to the
things of the flesh to try and get something that we think is
good from you. We keep preaching Christ. We
keep preaching faith. We keep preaching His grace.
knowing that it's the Spirit that works in you. It's the Spirit that's given
to give you a new heart, to circumcise the heart, to remove the veil
of flesh that's over us and darkening our eyes and understanding and
to give us light in the Lord Jesus Christ. We're waiting on
Him. We're hoping on Him. So we don't
turn to fleshly things. We're trusting Him, trusting
Him, trusting Him. I like what Paul said. to the
Galatians there in Galatians 3 verse 5 he said he therefore
that ministereth to you the spirit and worketh miracles among you
you know that is still happening today miracles miracles done
under the preaching of the gospel what miracle when God raises
a sinner from the dead and gives them life in Christ that is a
miracle brethren How does that miracle happen? How does the
Spirit be given to you? How does God give you the Spirit?
Through the preaching of the Gospel, waiting upon Him, not
doing tricky things, not doing fleshly things, not playing games,
just preaching Christ and trusting Him to do it. And Paul asked,
does He do those things? Does He raise people from the
dead? Does He Faithfully preach the gospel
whereby the spirit is pleased to bless that word to our hearts.
How does he do that? Does he do it by the works of
the law or by the hearing of faith? Yep, by the preaching
of the gospel, the hearing of faith. That's how it's done.
So Titus is a faithful gospel minister depending wholly upon
the spirit to transform you, to conform you to Christ, to
give you life in him, to save a man from his sins and to give
him life and fellowship with the Father. And so what Paul
is saying here is we don't want to do anything that distracts
men from the gospel, that would turn men away from Christ, that
would cause you to withdraw from the gospel and to turn back again
to Mount Sinai and the works of the law. We don't want to
do anything that does that. Sadly, it does happen from time
to time that we stumble and fall, but by the grace of God, he'll
humble that minister and strip that minister and bring that
minister low in himself that he might find his all in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And so, we don't want to do anything
that upsets that. that takes your eyes off of Christ.
So we adorn the gospel, therefore, and how we adorn the gospel means
we want it to be presentable, to be beautiful, to be appealing
to you. We want it to be appealing, not
in the flesh, but in the spirit. We want you to see the perfection
and the sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ to save to the uttermost. And so Paul then reveals that
there's a why. Why we do this? Why do we want
to adorn the doctrine of Christ? Because Jesus Christ is the only
salvation given by God to save a sinner from their sins. So
the last thing we want to do is give you any refuge in some
other false hope or turn you away from Christ by something
we do. We want you to go to Christ. Christ, because he's the Savior.
He is salvation for his people. And so he says it there in verse
11, for the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared
to all men. So we don't want to turn you
from that, because this is the Savior. This is salvation, the
Lord Jesus Christ. And in this salvation, what we're
talking about, I remember when I was a young man, not even knowing
what I was talking about, another person who was hearing me declare
Christ to them as best as I could and didn't know nothing. She
said, saved from what? What am I saved from? Well, you're
saved from the wrath of God. Christ delivers us from the coming
wrath of God when he comes out of his place to justly punish
the sins of the world. sins of the inhabitants of the
world. So that's one sense in which
we are saved. We are saved from the just punishment
of God who will punish sin, who cannot endure sin. It must be
punished. And this salvation is a giving
of life, right? So it's a deliverance from condemnation. It's a deliverance from eternal
death. And it's a giving of eternal life. It's a giving of life abundantly
so that we enter into fellowship with the true and living God.
To know Him. This is what our Lord meant when
He said, I am come that they, my sheep, might have life and
have it more abundantly. It wasn't just given to us. it's
given and made known unto us that we would enter into these
things now being given a down payment and earnest of our inheritance
by the giving of the spirit which is given to you whereby you know
these things are made to know these things to see Christ to
understand him I was talking to a man that claimed to be a
Jew right an Israelite and What I took away from that conversation
was that he called what I knew Jesus glasses. He said, you have
Jesus glasses on so that whenever you read the Old Testament, all
you see is Jesus. I said, you're admitting that
if you look to Christ, And you go back in the Old Testament,
all you can see is Jesus. And I said, those Jesus glasses
is the Holy Ghost. It's the Holy Spirit, which is
given to you, whereby you see Christ in all the scriptures,
all the scriptures. And yet he denied Christ. And
he didn't want to hear it, because what? He saw all he could see
then is Jesus. Once you declare Jesus, all you
can see is Christ in these scriptures. It's all testifying of him. I said, and you will not come
to me that you might have life, as Christ said. Search the scriptures,
for in them you think you have life, and there they which testify
of me. It's a deliverance from the just
punishment of God, and it's a giving of life in and by the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's an abundance of spiritual
life. It is the power of the resurrection
which is given unto us, brethren. Believe him. Trust him. He is
able. And he does it. He accomplishes
this glorious salvation, and he put it all into the hands
of his darling son. not your hand, not my hand, not
our abilities, he put into the hand of Christ. And we're told
in Romans 10.4, if you want to go to Romans, I'm going to quote
a few passages of scripture from this book. But in Romans 10.4,
Paul tells us that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness
to everyone that believe it. And so that pattern, and I spoke
of this earlier, because it's been laid on my heart, but that
pattern of heavenly things, which comes from Hebrews 9, 23, I believe
it is. Yeah, Hebrews 9.23 says, it was
therefore necessary that the pattern of things in the heavens
should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves
with better sacrifices than these, right? The law was a pattern
of heavenly things, but we needed something more sure. We needed
the blood of the Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, to purge
us. Because we were coming in the
law, And we see that the law did nothing to save a sinner.
The law didn't give us life and salvation. Christ did. Christ
does. Christ is the one who is the
savior of his people. And so that pattern of things,
let's see. Oh, yeah. The pattern of heavenly
things by which we come to worship God under the law, that's done.
That's put away. We don't come in the law. We
don't come in this vain, carnal, dead, outward religion. We come
in Christ, alive, living and breathing and feeding upon Him,
upon Him. And so God is entirely just to
forgive the sinner for Christ's sake, who looks to Christ. Look
over at this explanation in Romans 3. Romans 3, 21, all explains
this. Romans 3.21, but now the righteousness
of God without the law, that pattern of things that's been
shaken and put away, without the law is manifested, being
witnessed by the law and the prophets. In other words, Christ
doesn't contradict anything that the law or the prophets said.
He's fulfilling it all. He's fulfilling everything they
said. Even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of
Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe. Right?
There's the manifestation of those for whom Christ did this.
They believe. They walk in faith, looking to
Christ. Right? And here's the glorious
grace of God in this. For there is no difference. As
in, doesn't matter if you're Jew or Gentile. Doesn't matter
how much religion you had or how little religion you had.
It doesn't matter. When Christ comes for you, and
when a day of grace is appointed for you, for your salvation,
he's coming. And he's going to bless you.
And with the power of his resurrection, come into your heart and give
you life and satisfy you in Christ. Give you rest and peace in Jesus
Christ. to have peace with God, to rest
in Him. There's no difference whether
you're Jew or Gentile, for all have sinned and come short of
the glory of God. We're all sinners, even those
who were set apart by God. And Abraham, according to the
flesh, who had the law and the prophets and the oracles, the
promises, the blessing of the promises, the threatenings of
the curses, that law couldn't make them righteous. So they,
too, needed to be delivered from that and fixed, established by
the blood of Christ, in Christ. They needed that, too. God's
righteousness, which He ordained before the foundation of the
world, that it might shine beautifully, extolling the virtues of His
grace, of His beauty, of His work, of His salvation, right? To praise Christ, to have every
knee bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, that
He's beautiful, that He's the fairest among 10,000, that He's
all. That's the confession He gives
us. In him, verse 24, Romans 3, 24, being justified freely
by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom
God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, right,
to satisfy the justice of God, to turn the wrath of God away
from us, to declare his righteousness for the remission or forgiveness
of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God, to declare,
I say at this time, his righteousness, that he might be just and the
justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. God is just to do it. Just to forgive. Because Christ
settled the debt. He satisfied the justice of God.
He paid the price that we owe. And we are established in Him. In Him, brethren. And so it's
all of grace. Salvation is all of grace. Sovereign,
free, unchanging, eternal grace. given to us in Christ. And he comes to the sinner with
power. Power we know nothing of, except
to say, I was blind, but now I see. I was lost, but now I'm
found. I was dead, but now I live. all
by the Lord Jesus Christ, who saves the other most, and he
gives us this life, which is seen in these three pillars of
hope and faith and love in him. Hope and faith and love, all
in Christ, by the Spirit, who makes us new creatures in Christ. We were born of Adam's seed,
we are born again of Christ's seed, and have the new creation,
formed in us and the Spirit ministers this gospel, this word, this
power to that new man whereby we confess Christ and believe
him and walk by faith in him all the days of our life. The
old is passed away, the dead form of religion shaken and gone
and put away, established by Christ so that we come to God
in a new and living way, by faith, trusting him, believing That's
what he does. And so this is the way that God
saves by Jesus Christ, whose blood and power reaches to the
deepest stain and purges that deep, deep stain of sin. He purges
us, puts it away, and he circumcises this heart and turns us to the
true and living God to confess him and to believe him. Back in Titus 2.12, we'll come
back to Romans in a moment, but Titus 2.12, he says, teaching
us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live
soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. The law,
me commanding you and telling you, stop that. Start this. Don't
do that. Do it like this. That's not going
to change your heart one bit. Isn't there a story we hear told
of a boy who was, I guess, getting a scolding from his mother? And
she said, sit down. You put your bottom down in that
seat. You sit there. And he said, I'm sitting on the
outside, but I'm standing on the inside. He was defying. He was defying her. That's all
of us by nature. And the law doesn't fix that
heart. The law doesn't make us willing to sit and to be fed
by Christ, with Christ. The law doesn't do that. But
his power does, his faithfulness, his spirit works that in us. So the law couldn't affect us
in our hearts. The law was given to show us
that we're sinners. And the law, like the Pharisees,
doesn't come in with one finger, so much as one finger even, lift
the burden off of you. All it does is put the burden
on you. To show us our sin, it's Christ
and Christ alone who lifts the burden off of his people and
gives us faith, comfort, peace, and hope with God in him. Paul explains this back in Romans
7. Romans 7, beginning in verse
7. He says, or asks, what shall
we say then? Is the law sin? Is there a problem
with the law? No. God forbid. Absolutely not. He's saying,
nay, I had not known sin, but by the law. For I had not known
lust, except the law had said, thou shalt not covet. And as
soon as somebody says, you can't have that, what do we want? That. We want that very thing that
you say, oh, I can't have that? I'll show you I can have it.
I'm going to take it. And that's what we do by nature. And the
law says, don't. You can't have that. And so that's
what we go for. But sin, taking occasion by the
commandment. And what he's saying is that
the problem isn't the law. The problem is this flesh. It's
the weakness of this flesh that cannot hear the law, that cannot
keep the law, that will not. But sin, taking occasion by the
commandment. wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law, sin was
dead. I was alive. Without the law
once, I was fine and free, and I thought everything was all
right. But when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. I saw then what a sinner I am,
and the commandment which was ordained to life I found to be
unto death, because I can't keep it. And so we see that the sin
of Paul, as he's learning Christ and being blessed of him, he
keeps sinking lower and lower as a sinner, all the way down
to the chief of sinners. He was a sinner, then he was
the worst of the sinner of his brethren, then he was the chief
of sinners of all. which he confessed to Timothy,
for sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and
by it slew me. And so all that the sinner, all
that you seek by the law to make a righteousness for yourselves,
it's fulfilled in Christ. Go to Christ. He is the very
righteousness of God for his people. It's in Christ Jesus. He is our righteousness, our
hope. And looking to him, he teaches
us, and keeps us, and blesses us, and turns us, and helps us
in our hour of need. It's all of him. We live upon
him. And then there in Romans 7, back
in verse 6, Paul said, but now are we delivered from the law.
that being dead wherein we were held, that we should serve in
newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter." There's
that shaking again of the pattern of things under the law. It's
put away. We don't come in dead letter
form of religion. We come in the spirit, believing
Christ, confessing Him, hoping in Him, believing Him by faith,
and loving Him. And let me just add from verse
four of that same chapter, wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become
dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married
to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we
should bring forth fruit unto God by him. He gives his spirit. He gives you life abundantly
in him. He forms hope and faith and love
in your heart to serve him, adorning the gospel that you confess and
profess to believe that you walk in, right? That's how we adorn
it, by his grace and power there. And so Paul then goes back on,
go back to Titus now. In Titus 13, we see this outline
in the next three verses. We see hope, love, I'm sorry,
hope, faith, and love in the next three verses, what we're
gonna look at here. So this hope here, he says, looking for that
blessed hope, that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of
the great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ. The blessed hope
is Christ. Blessed hope is Christ and the
promise he gave us of his return. He says, I'll come again. I wouldn't
tell you I'm coming again if I wasn't coming again. And I'm
coming again, he said. So it's Christ and the promise
of his return, and when he returns, hope that we have is when he
returns what he will work in us once and for all in that day
when he shall redeem our bodies I thought he redeemed us he did
redeem us but it's also called redemption when you come back
to the place where you bought it and you pick it up you're
redeeming that which you bought and so he's coming again to to
redeem our bodies And so the hope you have is because he gave
you the spirit as a down payment, the earnest of your inheritance,
whereby you hear and believe these things. That's the spirit's
work. But the body is still dead because of sin. But this body
ain't always going to be the way this body is. corrupted by
sin, tortured by sin, having lusts of the flesh and of this
world and the deadness we see in our members. It ain't always
going to be like that. Because Christ is going to come
and redeem this body, delivering our bodies from that law of sin
and death, which is yet present and works in our members. That's
why when you look around, you see loved ones dying. People
die because of the law of sin and death. That's the law of
sin and death still in these members. That's already been
defeated and going away. That's all going away, just as
what John said in 1 John 3, 2, when he shall appear, we shall
be like him, for we shall see him as he is. He's going to affect
a wondrous work in these bodies. Now, what are we waiting for?
We have the down payment. We have the earnest, the spirit,
whereby we understand the mystery of God and believe him and are
looking for him in hope, standing on the tippy-toe of faith, waiting
for him to come. And that's what he's working
in us. And so he's our blessed hope. And he fixed this hope
so that we're looking for his return. We're looking for him
to come again when he will deliver us once and for all. And Paul
called it the hope and resurrection of the dead. He called it the
hope of his calling. He called it the hope of the
gospel, the hope of righteousness, the hope of glory, the hope of
salvation, and the hope of eternal life. This hope, Peter described
it this way. He described it as the grace
that is to be brought unto you At the revelation of Jesus Christ,
that grace which is good to be brought unto you, there's more
blessings of grace just being poured out upon us. And when
he comes, there's more grace which is going to be brought
unto you when you shall be made like unto your God and Savior
without sin, without death, living unto him, being free of this
body of sin and death which we have in Adam. And so Paul, writing
to the Hebrews, said, which hope we have as an anchor of the soul,
securing us to the rock, both sure and steadfast, and which
entereth into that within the veil. We know these things by
faith. We have this hope. because of
Christ. Even though we can't see it right
now, there's still a veil there between us and heaven and that
life which is to come. But we know it. We're fixed in
it. It's ours. We're there. We're seated in
heavenly places with Christ Jesus right now. And so brethren, we
have the hope of eternal life through Jesus Christ, not a hope
founded upon my works, dictating whether I'm going to heaven or
not. If you do this, you're going to go to heaven. If you do that,
you ain't going to go to heaven. That's gone. All put away, gone forever,
because it's Christ who has determined your inheritance. And so this
hope here is accomplishing that which he works. Christ in you,
the hope of glory. Now, While we wait for that substance
of this hope to be revealed in us in that day, Our hope is strengthened
and longed for. God has a way of working this
hope in us and strengthening this hope. As we go, as we suffer
various tribulations, as we go through various trials and provings
and afflictions and hardships and difficulties, hope is strengthened. Because we hope, Lord, come Lord
Jesus today. Come today. because he works
that in us to conform us, to show us through afflictions and
trials, to show us the steadfastness, the faithfulness of God who promised
these things in His Word. He grows that. So Paul described
it this way in Romans 5. We glory in tribulations, knowing
that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and
experience hope. And hope maketh not ashamed,
because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy
Ghost, which is given unto us. And so he gives us trials in
tribulations, because we see the presence we feel, we learn
the presence of the Holy Ghost which is given to us that keeps
us looking to Christ and trusting Him. It's that patience and experience
and hope in those things. And so we stand, brethren, while
this world is crumbling around us and there's threats and worries
and all kinds of things going on, we stand and rejoice in the
hope of the glory of God. Why? Because you've been given
the spirit to keep looking at Christ and say, let it burn,
let it go, because I don't care. This isn't my inheritance. It's
all got to go away at some point anyway. So when it goes, it goes.
But we have Christ. That's our hope. That's our confidence
and our trust. And trust Him. He's going to
do what's right. So you don't need to fear. Trust
Him to do what's right. Then there is our faith. And
these will go a little quicker now. Our faith, which is the
gift of God, looking to the unspeakable gift, which is the Lord Jesus
Christ, whom He's given. Titus 2.14, who gave Himself
for us. that he might redeem us from
all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous
of good works." There's the foundation of our hope. It's Christ. And
faith believes that that's exactly what Christ has done. Christ
did this by his redemption, by his sacrifice, by his work as
the Lamb of God, the Christ of God, given to save his people.
That's where our faith lays whole, believing Christ, locked in,
fixed in to Him, which is His gift, right? His gift that He
gives to us. And so faith, you that believe
Him, that's the manifestation of His salvation. That's the
manifestation that He's done this for you, you that believe
Him, that it's all of Him. That's what He gives, that faith.
That He does this, that He has purified us in our hearts, knowing
it's not our works, but that it's all in Christ. It's all
in Christ. And we come in Him, brethren,
zealous for our Lord, zealous of good works. And so He gives
us this good hope, born of the faith which He's wrought in us,
knowing that God sent Him, He died, accomplished our redemption,
and God raised Him from the dead. And so shall I in that day when
he comes. We believe him. And then with
this life comes the removal of the enmity that was in us. A
picture of that enmity is when the voice of God came walking
in the garden and Adam and Eve took off. They ran away from
their enemy because they saw God as the enemy. Now, that enmity
which drives us away from God in fear, is put away by the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's removed, and stamped in
its place is love for God. We love Him. who loved us, who
provided this great salvation for us. We love him. And so Christ
is our confession, brethren. And we speak of him because we
love him. Don't you speak of him whom you
love? Don't you speak of the one that
you love and those you love? You delight to speak of them.
because there's love. And so Paul says in Titus 2.15,
these things speak. No problem, because I love it.
These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority,
let no man despise thee. And what that says to us here
is that there's a suffering for preaching the gospel. But it's
OK. We're willing to bear it, because
we love him. That's what he's revealing here,
is that there's a love and a passion for Christ. and a willingness
to suffer with Christ, being conformed to his death, it's
okay. Because I love him. And I know
he's true and faithful and right in all that he does. And I believe
him. And so that's where we see the
love that he gives us. And brethren, that's how you
adorn the gospel. With the hope he gives you of
these things, waiting for Christ's return, believing it, walking
in that hope, With the faith He gives you, you adorn it, trusting
what Christ has done. That is your hope. And you know
Christ did this. Christ saved me. You may not
be able to articulate it as well as Paul did, but you know that
salvation is Christ. He's the Savior. And I cannot
be saved apart from Him. And the faith I have in Him,
He gave to me. The spirit I have in me, which
believes in Him, He gave to me. The hope I have, He gave to me.
The love I have, He gave to me. It's all Him. And then that love,
so that you're willing to testify of Him, to bear witness. I was
blind, but now I see. I was dead, but now I live. I
was lost, but now I'm found. I'm only a sinner, saved by grace.
I don't know how else to sell it. Say it. That's the hope. And that, brethren, is how you
adorn the gospel, just faithfully walking in Christ. I hope, I
trust, I have faith in him, and I love him. And that is the adorning
of the gospel, brethren. You walk in that, and you're
beautifying that grace of God which is wrought in you. And
I don't know how any other way to say it. But to say him, look
to Christ, he does it. We adorn the gospel by his spiritual
blessings given to us freely, wondrously, gloriously by his
grace in Christ. I pray the Lord bless your hearts
with that, brethren, and fix you in Christ. Amen.