Will you turn with me, please,
in your Bibles to 2 Corinthians 2, Paul's second letter to the
Corinthians. I shall read in your hearing
verses 5 through 11. 2 Corinthians 2, beginning with
verse 5. But if any hath caused sorrow,
he hath caused sorrow not to me, but in part, that I press
not too heavily, to you all. Sufficient to such a one is this
punishment which was inflicted by the many. So that, contrarywise,
you should rather forgive him and comfort him, lest by any
means such a one should be swallowed up with his overmuch sorrow. Wherefore, I beseech you to confirm
your love toward him. For to this end also did I write,
that I might know the proof of you, whether you are obedient
in all things. But to whom ye forgive anything,
I forgive also. For what I also have forgiven,
if I have forgiven anything, for your sakes have I forgiven
it in the presence of Christ. that no advantage may be gained
over us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his devices."
Now there is one great principle that I wish to extract from this
portion of the Word of God this morning and then to apply it
in some very specific ways. But if we are to see the biblical
taproots of that principle, we must first of all have a feel
for the passage in which it comes to us. And so as we begin our
meditation this morning, I want to begin by giving you a brief
description of the larger context of the passage which was read
in your hearings. As many of you will remember,
one of the problems the apostle had to address himself to in
his first letter is the problem dealt with in 1 Corinthians chapter
5. It was a case of incest. A man
was living with his own stepmother. And the apostle had to write
in very strong language to the Corinthian church rebuking them
for their laxity in dealing with this sinning brother. He rebukes
them sharply, he tells them that he has already in principle exerted
an act of excommunication, that they are to gather together in
the name of the Lord Jesus and to deliver this one unto Satan
for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit might be saved
in the day of the Lord Jesus. Well, by the time the Apostle
writes the second letter, he has received information from
Titus, and this is recorded in chapter 7, verses 5 through 8,
that the Corinthian church did indeed receive the severe rebuke
of the Apostle and did indeed excommunicate this brother. Furthermore,
the excommunication had accomplished its God-intended end. It had
been owned of the Spirit of God to produce in this man genuine
repentance. The man was swallowed up with
true grief for his sin. He had manifested this repentance
before the church so that by the time the apostle writes the
second letter, He not only records something of the repentance of
this man, but he must, in the language of the passage read
in your hearing, he must exhort the Corinthian believers to confirm
their love to this sinning brother. So much, then, for this description
of the larger context of the passage. Now, very briefly, a
running commentary upon the passage itself. The Apostle begins by
saying that if any has caused sorrow, he has caused sorrow
not to me, but in part that I press not too heavily to you all. In
other words, he is saying now as he stands on the threshold
of dealing with this problem, don't be concerned about the
grief and pain that this sinning brother caused me, though it
did cause me pain, but he said at this point, We don't want
to burden the man down with any unnecessary pressure in the area
of feeling guilt for his sin. If there has been true repentance,
now is not the time to rub the conscience raw. Now is the time
to manifest in your congregational life in your relationship to
this man, the disposition which God has manifested to a repentant
child of God, namely one of forgiveness and acceptance. And so he goes
on to say that sufficient to such a one is the punishment
that was inflicted by the many, that is, the act of excommunication,
so that now, he says, contrary-wise, forgive him and comfort him. So the great burden of this section
of the exhortation of the Apostle is, forgive this man and comfort
this man. Where I had to write you previously
and say, cast him out from your midst, a little leaven, leaveneth
the whole lump. It is in the best interest of
his soul and your congregational life to cut him off. Now he says
with language that is equally plain and explicit, forgive him
and comfort him. And then he goes on to tell them
why. He says, if you do not do this,
there is the danger that he will be swallowed up with his overmuch
sorrow. Wherefore, verse 8, I beseech
you to confirm your love toward him. For to this end also did
I write, that I might know the proof of you, whether you are
obedient in all things. But to whom ye forgive anything,
I also forgive. Remember, the act of excommunication
was a congregational act with the full sympathy and endorsement
of the Apostle. He said, When you are gathered
together by my Spirit and in the Spirit of the Lord Jesus,
deliver such an one to Satan. Now, he says, as surely as you
as a congregation excommunicated him, He has repented and you
have now restored him in the context of forgiveness. I want
you to know that I too extend my forgiveness to this sinning
brother. To whom ye forgive anything,
I forgive also. For what I also have forgiven,
if I have forgiven anything, for your sakes have I forgiven
it in the presence of Christ. that no advantage may be gained
over us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his devices. And the strange conclusion of
this exhortation is the conclusion of verse eleven. It's, as it
were, the summary statement giving a rationale for this entire directive
to the Corinthian church with respect to the repentant brother
who had been excommunicated. He says you must follow these
directions in order that no advantage may be gained over us by Satan,
for we are not ignorant of his devices." And the word devices
means his thoughts, his intentions. The apostle indicates that he
knows how Satan seeks to work in congregational life. And one
of the ways he seeks to work was manifested in the previous
condition at Corinth. Satan had brought that congregation
under the spell of a sinful spirit of indulgence, which they mistook
for Christian forbearance. So a man living in incest was
not only among them, but it was known and they were boastful
about it. They had no shame. Satan had
deceived them into misconstruing for true Christian love, a wicked,
carnal spirit of sinful indulgence. Now the same deceiver comes along,
and after the man has repented, there is apparently some reluctance
on the part of the Corinthian church to make their love and
acceptance as visible and as earnest, as had been their act
of rejection in the act of excommunication. And he says, behind this I see
the thoughts of Satan. I am not ignorant of his thoughts,
of his devices, and if we do not act in the light of these
directives, an advantage will be gained over us by the evil
one. Now then, having given a description
of the larger context of the passage, a brief running commentary
upon the substance of the passage, now, thirdly, and this is the
burden of the message this morning, what is the vital principle contained
in this passage? Well, the immediate or specific
expression of the principle is obvious. that whenever we as
a congregation must engage in the very unpleasant responsibility
of church discipline, we should always count it our joy to engage
in the congregational act of restoration when it is evident
that there has been genuine repentance. That's the obvious application
of the principle. But that is rooted in a broader
principle, and the Apostle indicates it in verse 11, and it is that
broader principle that I wish to open up this morning and apply
in your hearing. And it is this. Discouragement
in the face of sins repented of is a great tool of Satan to
hinder the believer's progress in grace. Discouragement in the
face of sins repented of is a great tool of Satan to hinder the believer's
progress in grace. The apostle says, confirm your
love to him, forgive him and comfort him. Why? Lest he be
swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. You see, the grief of his penitence,
as genuine as it is now, can become a crippling, discouraging
grief unless this dear brother, who has repented of his sin,
has manifested in the attitude of the congregation the disposition
of God Himself, one of forgiveness and of restoration, and the apostle
recognizes that if that poor brother was allowed to go on
limping under the pressure of discouragement over sins already
repented of, Satan would have gained a tremendous advantage
in the church of Corinth. And what was true of them in
that specific historical context is true of every single believer
in any context. The sin may not be so gross and
evident a sin as to warrant public rebuke, let alone public excommunication. But any discouragement in the
face of any sin of which a believer or towards which a believer has
truly repented becomes a great tool of Satan to hinder the believer's
progress in grace. And perhaps at no point is the
character of the devil more evident than at this point. Jesus said
in John 8, 44, Ye are of your father the devil, and the lust
of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning. And then he goes on to say, He
is a liar, and the father of it. When you were contemplating
that particular sin, which this morning holds you, as it were,
in the grip of discouragement. What was the lie of the devil
to you? Oh, you're a Christian. You believe in Christ, whose
grace and forgiveness is greater than any sin. That's a little
sin. Surely the grace of Christ can forgive you and cleanse you
if you indulge that sin. And so by listening to the whisperings
of that arch deceiver, that fiend of hell, you became bold to sin
with your eyes wide open as a Christian. Your eyes were wide open. And
you sinned deliberately and willfully because you believed the lie,
oh, it is but a little thing. The grace of Christ is greater
than that sin. Where sin abounds, grace does
much more abound. Ah, but now what's happened?
God has uncovered that sin. For some of you, in great measure,
he's used the ministry of the past weeks that Pastor Nichols
has been bringing to us from Ephesians chapter 4, 25 and on
into chapter 5 to lay bare our sins. And now that God has been
pleased to work in you a spirit of penitence, a spirit of true
acknowledgement of your sin, and you have turned in the direction
of the Lord and of His grace, what has that archfiend now whispered
in your ear?" He's changed his story completely. Oh, wait a
minute, you weren't simply surprised by that sin? It wasn't that you
were walking along with your face set to Zion and were suddenly
surprised by a flank attack of the enemy. You conceived that
sin willfully and deliberately and walked into it with your
eyes wide open. There's no forgiveness for sins
like that in the gospel. That is the willful sin that
can only bring upon you the ultimate judgment of Almighty God. Why
even bother to go to the throne of grace? You sinned willfully.
You sinned deliberately. You sinned against light. You
even sinned against the present promptings of the Spirit of God.
You were conscious of that pull of grace away from sin at the
very point that you indulged your sin. Your sin is too great
for the grace of God. He's a liar, isn't he? He told
you a short time before it was a little thing. Oh, grace can
sweep that away in a moment. Now grace has arrested you. The
spotlight of truth has burned in upon that sin. And like David,
you have to say, though I had covered it, though I had sought
to hide it from the living God, I can no longer do that. And
you have to cry out as he did, have mercy upon me. But this
very morning you are crippled as a Christian. Why? Because
though you have to the best of your knowledge truly repented
of that sin or those sins, Your spirit is bowed down with some
doubt as to whether or not that sin is truly forgiven and you
are truly cleansed, so that your standing before God this morning
in Jesus Christ is a perfect standing. My dear Christian friend,
listen this morning. Whenever you allow discouragement
In the face of sins repented of, you fall prey to the influence
of Satan, who is seeking to hinder your progress in grace. And I know from pastoral dealings
with some of you that this is not a theoretical danger. And
it is not merely something that occurs to one or two of the people
of God occasionally. If the apostle was very conscious
of the present activity in the church at Corinth, then I would
be a fool to be less than conscious of the present activity of that
wicked one in this assembly of God's people. Oh, do you see
the principle? Satan will gain a tremendous
advantage If you allow him to hold you in the grip of discouragement,
even when your sins have been repented of and confessed to
God. Well, you say, Pastor, how in
the world can I come out from underneath that crippling discouragement? When you described the kind of
sins you're talking about, you were describing me. How can I
be brought out from underneath that? Well, the apostle had a
specific prescription for these people, and basically for them
it was this, manifest in your congregational life to this man
in tangible ways that he can read and understand the disposition
of the living God toward him. Let your attitude as a congregation
be a mirror of the attitude and the disposition of God. And likewise,
my brothers and sisters, there are some specific things which
you and I can and must do if we ever find ourselves, if some
of you find yourselves this morning under that crippling power of
discouragement in the face of sins committed, yes, but sins
truly repented of. And let me suggest three lines
of thought that I trust will be helpful to you. Number one
is this. There can be no such discouragement
while pleading the infinite worth of the blood of Christ. There
can be no such discouragement while pleading the infinite worth
of the blood of Christ. I read two very familiar portions
of the Word of God, 1 John chapter 1 and verse 7. But if we walk
in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one
with another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, goes on cleansing
us from all sin. Now, notice there are no qualifications. The only condition described
is the condition of the believer who's walking in the light. He
is not seeking to hide from God or hide anything from God. He's
living under the searching exposure of the light of God's countenance,
God's law, God's holiness. And in that context, sin is continually
discovered. The discovery of sin is no proof
that he's not walking in the light. It's an evidence that
he is. It's only the man in a pitch black room who has no consciousness
that he looks in the mirror, that his face is dirty, if indeed
it is. But the moment the switch is
flipped on, if his face is covered with mud and he looks in the
mirror, he discovers his true condition. And so John assumes
that the one walking in the light stands in need of continual cleansing. And so he gives this gracious
promise, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. And John was not at all afraid
that he would overstate the virtue, the infinite worth of the blood
of Christ. He was not ignorant of the fact
that at that very hour in which he wrote this epistle, there
in the churches to which the epistle would come would be believers
who had sinned willfully, who had sinned grievously. Some would
sin subtly, and others who had sinned in ways that caused shame
even to the congregation. Yet he dared to write the blood
of Jesus Christ, God's Son, goes on cleansing us from all sin. As surely as sinners dishonor
Christ by being indifferent to his blood, indifferent to the
overtures of mercy in the gospel before they are saved. It is
an act of insult, highest insult to God, when Almighty God should
stoop in grace and mercy and say, In my Son is a fountain
open for sin and uncleanness, for the vilest of sinners. Acknowledge
your vileness and plunge and be cleansed. What an insult to
walk by that fountain, either in the deception of self-righteousness,
saying, I need no such fountain. That was the Pharisee's problem.
My, thank thee, I am not his other man. Or to believe that
your sins are greater than the efficacy of that fountain. To
stand by that fountain and say, oh, to think that a fountain
is open for sin and uncleanness. What a blessed thing. What a
wonderful thing that the fountain does not have that which is necessary
to reach the depths of my sin-stained soul. O unbelieving sinner, such
unbelief in the efficacy of the blood of Christ is an insult
to the Lord Jesus and to the Father who sent Him and to the
Spirit who attends the preaching of the gospel. As many of us
sitting here this morning by the grace of God, have found
that that initial self-righteous indifference or that unbelieving
hesitance have been overcome, and we have plunged initially
into that fountain open for sin and uncleanness. And we can sing,
O happy day that fixed my choice on thee, my Savior and my God! Well may this glowing heart rejoice! and sound its music all abroad. But now what's happened? After
the flush of your newfound faith in Christ gave tremendous impetus
to your early days as a believer, and in a sense you almost thought
that you were forever done with sin. God wonderfully, often wonderfully
neutralizes much of the power of indwelling sin in a new believer,
lest he be swallowed up with discouragement. But then God
begins to bring you down to the world of reality where the rest
of us live. where you're very conscious that
the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.
These two are contrary, the one to the other, so that you may
not do the things that you would. Galatians 5, 17. And as you began
to discover more and more of your potential for sin, even
as a believer, you have fallen grievously, and in some areas
you have fallen repeatedly. Child of God, you do insult to
that fountain open for sin and uncleanness if you show any reticence
to plunge as quickly and believingly now as you did at the first. That's why John can go on to
say in verse nine, if we confess our sins, he does not say if
we do penance, If we rationalize them away? No, no. If we confess
them, if we say the same things about them that God does, He
is faithful. You notice? We confess, He is
faithful. From our confession, we are taken
immediately to something totally objective to us. From our confession,
Our attention is riveted upon the character of God. He is faithful
and righteous. And then upon the activity of
God to forgive and to cleanse. To forgive what? Our sins. What sins? All the sins that
we confess. Even the willful sins. Yes. Even the sins against life. Yes. Even the sins against privilege.
Yes. He is faithful and righteous
to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all, all, all, all unrighteousness. Why? Because the blood of Jesus
Christ, God's Son, goes on cleansing from all sin. And as surely as
unbelievers dishonor God and insult Him by their refusal to
plunge initially, child of God, you dishonor God and cripple
yourself with discouragement by failing to plead and believe
in the infinite worth of the blood of Christ. There can be
no discouragement in the face of sins repented of, if there
is a believing plea with respect to the infinite worth of the
blood of Christ. Then secondly, there can be no
discouragement while resting in the prevailing power of the
intercession of Christ. There can be no discouragement
while resting in the prevailing power of the intercession of
Christ. And if you have your Bibles open
to 1 John, just keep them there. Chapter 2, verse 1. My little
children, these things write I unto you that you may not sin. And if any man sin and notice
he does not put a parenthesis, by that I mean a sin of surprisal. By that I mean a sin of ignorance.
By that I mean an unpremeditated sin. No such qualification is
given. Now I'm fully aware that later
on in the epistle John writes those strange words, there is
a sin unto death. I do not say that you should
pray for it. If you see a brother sin a sin not unto death, I'm
fully aware that that language is used, but I'm also fully aware
that I doubt there's anyone who can expound with certainty the
significance of those words except John. Whatever the sin unto death
is, it has nothing to do with that believer whose heart is
broken over his sin, who desires with all of his heart to have
restored communion with his heavenly Father. Whatever it is, it is
not that. And so we have the word of assurance,
and if any man sin, we have. At the very point of our sin
that would cry to God in terms of the rectitude of his law,
that judgment be meted upon us, if any man sin, we have. And
in point of time, the intercession of Christ is coincidental, it
is there. The time we sin, He does not
cease to be our intercessor. But as our intercessor and advocate,
He is there at the right hand of the Father. If any man sin,
we have an advocate, we have a lawyer, we have one who pleads
our cause with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one. And He is propitiation for our
sin. Thank God for that word propitiation. It's a big word, kids, isn't
it? But it basically means the turning away of divine wrath
by the offering of the sacrifice of Jesus. For God to be propitiated
means that his wrath is turned away And Christ Himself at the
right hand of the Father is the embodiment of all the virtue
of His death upon the cross. And as our great intercessor,
He pleads our case. How can a Christian be discouraged
over sins committed and repented of while there is a resting in
the prevailing intercession of the Lord Jesus Christ? Now let
me ask you, do you honor Christ and His work by groveling, shriveling,
drawing back, going limping all your days? No, my friend. You honor the Lord Jesus when,
in the holy reservation that is always present in true repentance,
you may have to say with faltering tongue, And with a chastened
spirit, I have grievously sinned. I have dishonored my God and
grieved and quenched the Spirit. But I believe that my sin does
not take me out of the orbit of the intercession of my Savior,
that my sin does not cast me off from the sphere of His pleas
on behalf of His own. There can be no discouragement
in the face of sins repented of while resting in the prevailing
power of the intercession of Christ. And then finally, there
can be no discouragement while rejoicing in the covenant faithfulness
of Christ. You remember when our Lord Jesus
instituted what we now call the Lord's Supper or the communion
services we sometimes designated. He said, this cup is the new
covenant in my blood. And all that the Lord Jesus was
doing in his death and resurrection had reference to that new covenant. And in that covenant God has
promised to do some wonderful things. We find a summary of
what he has promised to do in Hebrews 8 and in Hebrews 10,
quoting from the Old Testament. The briefer summary is found
in chapter 10 of Hebrews, verse 16. This is the covenant that
I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord. I will
put my laws on their heart, and upon their mind also will I write
them. Then, saith he, that their sins
and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission
of these is, there is no more offering for sin. Having therefore,
brethren, boldness You see, the boldness which is the opposite
of the discouragement, the shrinking, the drawing back, can only be
ours when there is an intelligent, present rejoicing in the covenant
faithfulness of Christ. He died to effect the promised
blessings of the new covenant which are given to us in this
language. Their sins, their iniquities
will I remember. No more. And you see, part of
the problem is we remember. And because we remember, we believe
God must still remember in the sense that he has not put the
sin away and truly forgiven it. And it is no part, no little
part of the Christian spiritual wisdom. to know how to handle
the actings of his own memory. What do I do when, in the midst
of the day, the thought of that grievous sin comes back to me? What do I do? Well, I must do
one of two things. I must believe what is true about
that sin or what is not true. One or the other. I must believe
that somehow that sin fails to come in the category of the promise
of the new covenant. Yes, God still remembers that
sin, and therefore, because He does, I must keep it a distance.
I can have no boldness in prayer. I can have no joyous communion
with Him. I must go on in my so-called
evangelical penance for a period of time. until somehow the walls
of my own memory are scrubbed and I can no longer remember
before I'll believe God no longer remembers. But I will magnify
the grace of God in Christ by believing the promise at the
point where my own memory calls the sin back and I feel, as it
were, the inner shock and the inner horror that I, a Christian,
could do such a thing. It's at that point that I need
to rejoice in the covenant faithfulness of Christ and believe that for
Christ's sake that sin is remembered against me. No. Ah, but someone
says, Pastor Martin, won't people take such a doctrine and use
it as an excuse to sin with a high hand? If they do, that's their
problem. And they'll answer to God for
their wicked abuse of grace. And if there's anyone here this
morning who, listening to such teaching, would say, oh, in the
light of all of that, man, I can just go out and sin as I please,
and then I just ask the Lord. My friend, listen, even to think
that way shows that you're not a Christian. You see, because the Christian
does not want to sin with a high hand. He has seen His sin in
the light of God's burning holiness. He has seen His sin above all
in the light of the agonies of the Son of God upon the cross. And even at the point when He
sins most grievously, He does not sin with total abandonment. There is within Him the principle
of divine grace so that he can never, as it were, just utterly
throw himself on the crest of any sinful passion and ride it
to the shore and catch the next wave and ride it in again with
glee and with delight and then pick himself up and say, oh well,
now I'll go and get a little cleansing. No, no. No, no. No,
no. Anyone who talks that way knows
nothing of the grace of God. I'm speaking to those of you
who are true believers. who do with all your heart long
to be rid of all sin. If you could, you would live
a life of sinless perfection. If you could, you would. And
it is that for which you yearn and long and that which makes
heaven heaven to you. above all else in the language
of Robert Murray McShane is that you love him with an unsinning
heart. Now can you say from the depths
of your being an amen to that reality? Oh Lord, if I could
live but one day free of sin, free from dishonoring you, disobeying
you. No, that's the disposition of
the true Christian. But the reality is that such
a person sins. And not only sins ignorantly,
which he does, and not only sins by surprisals, that is, a sudden
temptation. You whack the finger and before
you know it, some of the old language poured out, a sin of
surprisal. But even Christians sin willfully
and deliberately. They sin as willfully and deliberately
as David sinned. When he looked, he lusted, he
took, and then covered his sin. Sin as willfully as Peter did.
When he cursed and denied and cursed and denied and denied
again. The Bible does not cover up the
reality of the magnitude of the sins of the saints. But it's
against that very backdrop that it magnifies the glory of the
grace of God. That God's grace is such that
the sin of His children does not disinherit them. The sin
of His children does not put them outside the orbit of grace. And I plead with you this morning
who are walking with lead feet, and with bowed shoulders and
downcast eyes. Thank God you're still plodding
on your way to the celestial city, but you're a terrible advertisement
for the gospel. You're a terrible advertisement
for the gospel, because the gospel can do something more than it's
done for you. And the gospel is that you, as
a child of God, are immediately and fully cleansed and pardoned
by the infinite worth of the blood of Christ when you confess
your sins, and that resting in the prevailing intercession of
Christ and rejoicing in the covenant faithfulness of Christ, you may
go on your way rejoicing in the grace of Christ. But you say,
Pastor, won't that lead us to treat sin lightly? No, no. There
is no more powerful preventive against the repetition of sin
than the joyous knowledge of the full pardon of sin. Do you hear me? There is no greater
preservative against the repetition of sin than the knowledge of
the full pardon of sin. Because if you're discouraged
and bowed down and you find no joy in Christ, you are vulnerable
to sin yet more. For you say, I find no sweetness
in Christ. And with a discouraged spirit,
you're vulnerable to sin. Satan gains an advantage. But it's the man who is so rejoicing
in the privileges of greats, who realizes when temptation
comes, what? Shall I exchange the joy of my
Father's countenance and the ebullience of conscious communion
with my Savior for this little trinket of time? Not upon your
life! You see, it was when Christian
was looking at his robe Considering the scroll in his hand, it was
then that he found himself, you remember, most preserved against
lapses into sin. No, no, my friend. God keeps
us in the way of grace, not primarily by legal terrors, but by the
powerful pressure of the knowledge of the greatness of His grace
in Christ. And so I have bared my heart
to you in a pastoral exhortation this morning, and that exhortation
is based upon the principle of 2 Corinthians 2.11, that Satan
gain no advantage over us. We are not ignorant of his devices. Discouragement in the face of
sins repented of is a great tool of Satan to hinder the believers
progress and oh how the enemy would love to gain an advantage.
when in past weeks the Lord by the Spirit has taken that Ephesians
4 and 5 passage, shined the light upon many of our hearts. And
I know from phone calls I've received, people getting things
confessed to me, attitudes and other things that I didn't know
were there. Thank God, and I know from talking
with some of the other elders, others of you have been dealing
with sin and getting matters right with God and one another,
but oh, how Satan would gain an advantage precisely at this
point? That having lost the ground of
keeping us in the position of covering our sin, rationalizing,
excusing it, now that we're prepared by grace to deal with it, then
to tell us the sin is greater than the grace of our Savior. Well, it is not, and we would
not Allow that wicked one to gain any advantage in our assembly,
but by the grace of God, magnify the worth of the blood of Christ,
the certainty of the intercession of Christ, and the glory of His
covenant faithfulness to us, His people. You see, you who
are not Christians, we're not a bunch of sad sacks. Well, there
are times when we're cast down because, you see, our greatest
burden is the very burden that will press you to hell unless
you repent. It's the burden of sin. And because
God took it so seriously to send his only son to die upon the
cross, we take it seriously. And until you take it seriously,
there's no hope for you. But if you begin to take your
sin seriously, my friend, there is hope. And don't believe the
whisperings of the devil that there's no hope for you. There
is hope, and it's found in Christ, but in Christ alone. Let us pray. Our Father, what thanks can we
render to you for the greatness of your grace and kindness to
us in the Lord Jesus Christ. We think of the number and the
magnitude of our sins. We acknowledge that if we were
the ones in the place of judgment, in the place of disposing the
destiny of creatures who would dare to rebel against their creator,
we would have disposed of ourselves a long time ago. But we thank
you that you are not like us. You are rich in mercy. great
in compassion, infinite in love. And we pray that the Holy Spirit,
who alone can convince sinners of their need, and who alone
then can convince them of the adequacy of the provision in
Christ to meet that need, oh, that He may work mightily this
morning in the hearts of those who have never once plunged into
that fountain open for sin and uncleanness, And particularly,
Lord, in the hearts of some of your struggling saints who are
bowed down this morning with discouragement, though they've
repented of their sins, though they've acknowledged their sins,
yet they go on crippled because they have fallen prey to the
devices of Satan. O God, deliver them this morning,
we pray. Give them such a joyous, believing
sight of the efficacy of the blood of Christ and the glory
and power of the intercession of Christ, that their hearts
may leap within them in the knowledge that the blood of Jesus has indeed
cleansed them and goes on cleansing them from all sin. Bless, then,
the truth preached this morning. May it prove efficacious in every
heart. Hear our prayer. And may the
blessing of your grace and presence rest upon us and abide with us
as we leave this place, further to sanctify this day to your
praise and to our prophet, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.