Goodness gracious. My goodness. Good to see Miss Julie in here
this morning about them apples. Happy birthday this week to Hannah. She's going to be 25. That's
hard to believe. I can remember her bouncing,
bouncing, me bouncing her on her knee, reading her children's
stories when she was little. I remember those who requested
prayer at Linda Husky. Julie's here and doing better.
I still remember her prayer. Fred is not feeling quite up
to snuff this morning. Jim Poe has recovered from his
surgery and took out his gall and left all the wormwood. And
the Troy Coe family, remember them in your prayers also. Seek
the Lord's help for them. Dee Parks starts his experimental
stuff for that cancer tomorrow. So remember him in your prayers.
Seek the Lord. It's good to see Larry Hill,
or half of him. Hadn't seen Larry in a while.
It's good to see you, buddy. Boy's lost a person. 130 pounds. That's fantastic, buddy. Wonderful. Okay. Also, I'll be leaving for
Winston-Salem this afternoon. I'm going to preach at Chaluper
Baptist Church tomorrow afternoon. Tomorrow evening at 7. And I'll
be coming back on Tuesday, so remember me in my travels, if
you will. Okay, let's begin our worship service this morning
with hymn number 268, How Firm a Foundation. ? How firm a foundation, ye saints
of the Lord ? ? Is laid for your faith in his excellent word ?
? What more can he say than to you he has said ? ? To you who
for refuge Fear not, I am with thee, O be
not dismayed, For I am thy God, I will still give thee aid. I'll strengthen thee, help thee,
and cause thee to stand. Upheld by my gracious, optimal
tent hand. When through the deep waters
I call thee to go, the rivers of woe shall not thee overflow. For I will be with thee, thy
troubles to bless, and sanctify to thee thy deepest distress. When through fiery trials thy
pathways shall lie, supply. The flame shall not hurt
thee, I only design thy dross to consume and thy goad to refine. The soul that on Jesus hath leaned
for repose I will not, I will not desert to his foes That's
all, though all hell should endeavor to shake I'll never, no never,
no never forsake I can't sing a hymn without thinking
about Jenny Willnote. She used to sit on the front
pew there. She'd just close her eyes and
throw her head back, and we'd sing How Firm a Foundation is.
Sweet. After scripture and your prayer,
we'll sing hymn number 63. Take the name of Jesus with you.
If you have your Bibles, turn to 2 Kings chapter 13. I'm going to read verses 23 through
25. But Hazael, king of Syria, oppressed
Israel all the days of Jehoazaz. And the LORD was gracious unto
them, and had compassion on them, and had respect unto them, because
of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not
destroy them, neither cast he them from his presence as yet.
So Hazael, king of Syria, and Ben-Hadad, his son, reigned in
his state. And Jehoash, the son of Jehoahaz,
took again out of the hand of Ben-Hadad, the son of Hazael,
the cities which he had taken out of the hand of Jehoahaz,
his father, by war. Three times did Jehoash beat
him and discovered the cities of Israel. Let us pray. Bless
you and thank you for your word, which is divine, pure, unsullied,
and the truth. We thank you that the option
of opinion is not given to us in this matter, but we are to
bow and to believe and to trust. We thank you, Father, that the
word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path gives
us understanding even to the simple. We thank you, Father, we have
it. We can open it up and see the very words of God from heaven
for his people. We know that the secret things
belong to you and that which is revealed belongs to us and
our children that we might do all the works of this book. Father, we praise you and thank
you Good news of the recovery of those who are recovering from
the illness. We're thankful to see Julie here
this morning, and Larry. Father, we pray you continue
to minister to them, those who are sick and in trouble, the
families that lost loved ones, the families that are grieving,
and ask your help for them. For ourselves this morning, Father,
we ask that you be pleased to open up your word to us. Teach
us, Lord. calls us to learn, for we know
that thou art our teacher, the Holy Spirit takes the things
of Christ and reveals them unto us, leading us into all truth.
Help us this hour to worship you in spirit and in truth, giving
glory to your name, we pray in Christ's name, amen. Hymn number 63. ? Take the name of Jesus with you
? Child of sorrow and woe ? It will joy and comfort give you
? Take it then where'er you go ? Precious name, oh how sweet,
hope of earth ? Precious name, oh how sweet ?
Hope of earth and joy of heaven ? Take the name of Jesus ever
? As a shield from every snare ? If temptations round you gather
? Breathe that holy name in prayer ? Precious name, oh how sweet
? Hope of earth and joy of heaven ? Precious name, oh how sweet
hope of earth and joy of heaven. Oh, the precious name of Jesus,
how it thrills our souls with joy when His loving arms receive
? Hope of earth and joy of heaven
? Precious name, oh how sweet ? Hope of earth and joy of heaven
? At the name of Jesus bowing ? Falling prostrate at his feet him when our journey is complete. Precious name, oh how sweet. Hope of earth and joy of heaven. Precious name, oh how sweet. May I ask Stan and Steve to receive
the officers of mourning, please? Let us pray. Father in heaven,
we come in the name of Jesus Christ, that name that is above
every name, the only name under heaven given among men whereby
we must be saved. We are thankful that indeed we
have the name of Jesus with us. It is stamped on our hearts and
in our minds and in the very depths of our soul. We thank
you that you did that, for we had no interest in these things
until you awakened us by your spirit to receive the things
of Christ. As we render unto thee that which
you've given us, let us do so with joy in our hearts, knowing
full well that everything we have, this sign of an eternal
damnation, is by your mercy. and your grace. Thank you, Father,
in Christ's name, amen. you And I invite your attention back
to 2nd Kings Chapter 13. This is the fulfillment of a
prophecy that Elisha gave to Joash as Elisha was stricken
with the sickness that would end up in his death. Joash came
to Elisha, Elisha worried and troubled, and Elisha told him
to take his bow and his arrows and take the arrows and strike
the ground three times. Joash struck the ground three
times and Elisha was mad and said you should have struck the
ground five or six times because now you're only going to be able
to defeat Syria three times instead of five or six times. What is recorded for us here
is the words of God concerning the people of Israel who at this
time just as Joash and Jehoahaz and Jeroboam and all the kings
up to this point did evil in sight of the Lord. The people
were idolatry. The Lord always fulfills His
promises. He said in the book of Malachi,
I am the Lord. I change not. Therefore, because
I change not, ye sons of Jacob are not consumed. And what that
is saying is the sons of Jacob deserve an eternal punishment.
But the reason they are not going to have eternal punishment is
because God has made a covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
and He will not destroy them. Elijah is told, Joel asks what
is going to happen, and he always keeps his promises. That is the
measure of God's prophets in the Old Testament. is that they
prophesy, and what they prophesy ALWAYS comes to pass, just as
the Lord has given them to prophesy. The mark of the false prophet
is that he may get it right SOMETIMES, but not every time. When God
gives His prophet a word, it ALWAYS comes to pass. All the
promises of God are yea and are amen in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, as we read here in this passage of Scripture, the overriding
principle in every episode of the life of the nation of Israel
as we study the Old Testament considerably is this matter of
covenant mercies. Covenant mercies they received
as an elect nation. Now, they were an elect people.
That means God chose that nation out of every other nation upon
the face of the earth and did for them what He did for no other
nation. gave them a place to meet with
him, gave him ceremonies that pictured the Lord Jesus Christ.
He didn't do this for everybody. Gave him the law and the testimonies,
the oracles, the priesthood, all these things he gave to them.
He only met with one man one time a year in a 15 by 15 foot
cubicle. That's the only person he met
with. And that was only about the nation whom that man represented
and he went into that holy of holies with the names of the
twelve tribes of Israel on his vest and on his shoulder arches. You think of all the nations
upon the earth at this time. Think about the geographical
layout of the earth, the miles that it covers, the peoples that
it had. God only met with one man one
time a year in a 15-foot cubicle and not anybody else, and He
did it for a people that He had chosen. Now this choosing, this
election, was not unto salvation, though many times they were delivered
and saved by God from different circumstances. We're just dealing
in Exodus right now about Him delivering Israel from Egypt.
They were not a people that were elected to salvation. Now, among
them, there were those that were chosen unto salvation. But the
underlying principle in both of those cases is covenant mercies. Covenant mercies. We know that
the election of the nation of Israel was typical as to kind
or type. Their election was not to salvation,
but to illuminate the kind or type of people that the Lord
has chosen unto salvation. But the nation as a whole revealed
that election unto salvation was the election of grace because
this nation showed that they were ONLY elected naturally.
A cursory study of this nation in the recorded history reported
in the Divine Canon reveals that there was NOTHING about them
that could INDUCE God or ENTICE God to save them or to elect
them. And so it is in kind. There is
nothing about those chosen of God unto salvation. There is
NOTHING about them that would induce God to choose them. If He chooses them, it is going
to be by grace or by mercy. Israel is a prototype, a defining
example of the undeserving person. They are a definition of rebellion.
They were bent toward wicked idolatry. They were quick to
murmur, complain, and generally were dissatisfied with a whining
horde of miscreants. God, for 40 years, supplied their
every need in the wilderness. A 40-year trek that should have
taken only 11 days had they not rebelled in the first steps of
their sojourn. God sacrificed nations for this
people. for their security. He had freely
given them a land of milk and honey, houses they did not build,
livestock they did not raise, gardens they neither tilled nor
hoed, and the promise from God of a bright future. And to all
this they turned up their noses. Two and a half tribes refused
to enter the promised land at all because things were a little
better on the outside of the promised land. They lived among a nation steeped
in idolatry and various forms of rebellion. In many cases,
the pagan nations that surrounded them had a better moral compass
than they did, if you read the scriptures. Morally, a lot of
the pagan nations had more morality than the Jews did. This is the
natural nation that God has chosen to show us and to reveal to us
the kind of people that He's chosen to spiritual salvation.
There's nothing to them. nothing to them. I think it was
Spurgeon who said, you add a man up to zero, you've gone too high. You've gone too high. Those who
have been recipients of the election of grace have been given a glimpse
of what they are in nature. We don't know the extent of our
depravity, and if we have any sense, we don't want to delve
too far into it. Find out how rotten we really
are. What we know of ourselves is enough. Now look at Israel. and find an extensive and accurate
catalog of their own depravity. We can look at Israel, where
this is a TYPE of election that shows the KIND of people that
God chose to salvation. It is no wonder that self-sufficient,
self-righteous, morally upright religion balks at the mention
of election of grace. They simply cannot count on us
a salvation that was freely bestowed on the LIKES of this unworthy
people, this rabble. They hold that there must be
worthiness in a sinner, a spark of divinity expressed in their
free will to make a wise and prudent choice or decision toward
God. But it is precisely for the glory
of His grace that God has chosen this kind of people to show to
all that He loves unconditionally and saves those who have not
one scintilla of merit at all and has accomplished it for the
for Christ's sake, and for the glory and exaltation of His grace. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings, according as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation
of the world, that we should be blameless, holy and blameless
before Him. in love having predestinated
us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto himself
to the praise of the glory of his grace. Everybody he gave all spiritual
blessings to. Everybody he chose from the foundation
of the world. Everybody he predestinated to
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto himself. Everyone
he made holy. Everyone. had no merit because it was all to exalt His
grace. That is who He chose. These wretched
sinners had been chosen before the world began, before they
even existed in the covenant of grace wherein God the Father
and God the Son contracted to save them. God chose them. Christ died for them to satisfy
the law. and the Holy Spirit made them
aware of what had been freely given to them in this wondrous
covenant of ungracious promise. The gospel does not tell you
what you can do, it tells you what God has done. And if God
gives you ears to hear and eyes to see and opens your heart and
gives you faith, you'll just be in wonder the rest of your
life in utter amazement at the fact that God saved you. And so he sent somebody along
to stand on his hind legs and tell you about it. to tell you
that not that you could be saved but that God has saved His people.
God has saved the elect. God has redeemed them by the
blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and God saves them and informs
them of their condition and estate and even fixes it through regeneration
and faith that they'll end up asking for it according to Ezekiel
16, verse 36. He says, You will inquire of
me for this. You'll ask for it. How does He
do that? He jiggles their willer, as the
old fellow says. They WILL come to Christ because
they are taught of God. And though the prophecy of these
three victories given to Joash has come to pass before that
takes place, God reveals the underlying REASON that the prophecy
was fulfilled. Once again, we view Israel not
in the depths and lengths of their depravity, but through
the eyes of grace. We know what they are. We know
what we are. And how does God look at us? Every deliverance, whether natural
or spiritual, reveals the salvation of the sinner. But rather than
view the sinners as rebels, they are rebels. They are accounted
as oppressed. They are accounted as infirm.
They are accounted as imprisoned. They are accounted as dead. They
are accounted as dying. They are accounted as pitiful.
This is how God sees them. They're rebels. They're actively,
openly murmuring and whining against God, cursing God. They care not for the things
of God. Oh, they're religious, but they don't care about God.
And God says, what pitiful people. Verse 22, He says this, Now hath
the other king of Israel oppressed Israel all the days of your age?
They're an oppressed people. That's how our Lord said it.
He oppressed them. He oppressed them. We must always
remember how God views a thing is how it really is, and that's
just so. We find that in the New Testament
accounts of Old Testament saints has said one way in history,
but said a whole different way in the New Testament when God
assesses or tells us the truth about the situation. A good example
is Moses when he killed that Egyptian, and we know that he
knew he was about to get caught. And he acted like a person who
was about to get caught. He looked this way and that way, buried
the guy in the sand, and then took off. That's all the forensic
evidence you need right there of a guy that's on the run. He's
on the lam. How does God record that in Hebrews 11? That he would
not countenance to be a part of the queen's court. Wait a
minute. How God sees a thing. is how
it is. We know in our hearts we are
rebels and undone and unclean, unworthy, having no merit whatsoever. How does God see His elect? Well,
let's see. Verse 23 says, The Lord was gracious
unto them, had compassion on them, had respect for them, because
of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not
destroy them. because of that covenant, neither
cast he them from his presence as yet." This is how God sees
them. Religion refuses to accept the
fact and holds that character and conduct must play some part
in God's view of men. Character and conduct count,
or they matter, but they don't count. They matter. But they don't count. You know and I know that as children
of God there are a whole lot of people in this world that
are morally superior to all of us. Just are. They don't count. Religion says
that MUST count. God says that DON'T count. The
believer has to consider his own carnality and be filled with
joy unspeakable and full of glory that God has considered him as
a needy, oppressed, and sick soul. I'm a sinner, unclean and undone. God looks
at me and says, That poor thing. Bless his heart. Verse 23 is a perfect demonstration
of a covenant mercy that can be found in all of holy writ.
Here's the reason for the existence of the world and all that is
therein. The reason this is still going on and don't think it's
going to get better. I mean it ain't. All them people trying to save
the earth are going to say something's going to melt with the fervent
heat. It's been on a downhill run since Eden and it ain't going
to get better. think she'll wax worse and worse.
The love of many she'll wax cold." I said, Lord, boy that's coming
true, isn't it? It seems like everybody in the
world is just full of hate. Over the least, silliest little things. I saw a woman on YouTube or something
the other day. She was in her car She was crying,
and I mean seriously, tears flowing down her face, and she was choking
up. She was almost, one of those gasping cries, you know, and
she said, why is it that people won't call me by my pronouns? I'm serious. Why is it the world won't bend
to me and call me a they or a them instead of a you or a me? I said,
that's just stupid. Well, yes. and she hates everybody,
don't do it. For nothing. God said that his people are
sick and oppressed. Six things. The Lord says, I
was gracious, the Lord was gracious unto them. Immediately we know
that things are going to turn out well for them. and also are
made aware that they do not merit what is being done FOR THEM.
But this can be okay. This is God's glory. I will be
gracious unto whom I will be gracious. Grace is God's sovereign,
free, uncalled for, and unsought, unstoppable act toward His children.
Grace is effectual. Grace is sovereign. God was gracious
to them. Three times they fought against
Syria, and the fourth time Syria was going to wipe them out, but
God was gracious to them. It says, secondly, He had compassion
on them. He felt their dire circumstances
in His heart. That's what compassion is. He
not only felt for them, He felt with them. That's what compassion
is. and when a little nine-year-old
girl was asked that one time, what is compassion? He said,
she said, your pain, your pain in my heart. He had compassion
on them. He felt for them. That's what
it says in Psalm 103 when the old wise David talks about these mercies that God
has given him and continues to give him. Psalm 103, this was one of his
favorite Psalms, he'd ask me to read it to him every time
I'd come to the hospital, over and over again. Psalm 103, verse
10, it says, He hath not dealt with us after our sins. Boy,
I'm glad to read that. Nor rewarded us according to
our iniquities. That's good news too. For as the heaven is high
above the earth, So great is His mercy toward them that fear
Him. And that word fear don't mean
slavish fear, it means love, respect, honor, worship. As far as the East is from the
West, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us. Like
as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that
fear Him, for He knoweth their frame. And he remembers that
they're dust. They're dust. As for man, his
days are as grass as a flower of the field, so he first, as
the wind pass over and is gone, and the place thereof shall know
it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is
from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him and his
righteousness unto the children's children. He felt for them. one of the men that our Lord
healed in the New Testament in Mark chapter 5 was the demoniac
of Dira. He said, I want to go with you
and the Lord said you can't go with me but you can go home.
Tell people what I did for you and tell them I had compassion
on you. Tell them I had compassion on you. Then it says this and
this is part of that covenant mercies. He had respect under
them. Now we know that God is not a
respecter of persons, but times where this truth is thus stated,
and it's stated several times in Scripture, it has to do with
the glorious exercise of His unmerited favor. He does not
exercise grace or mercy because He finds something respectable
in a person. Respect here in the original
has nothing to do with supposed esteem. It literally means to
turn and look. That's what it literally means.
He turned and looked on them. Again, this is the view of God
that counts. The words suggest that God took
notice of their plight. And though they did not deserve
it, they found grace in His sight. He looked on them in mercy. like in Ezekiel 16 when he passed
by that child, cast out, not wanted, discarded, none helped
her, not swaddled, nor washed with water. He said, when I saw
thee in thy blood, it was the time of love, and
I covered thy nakedness. Not only that, he says this,
I will not destroy thee, I will not destroy them. Back in our
text. When God will not do something,
then it will not be done. God will not destroy those for
whom Christ died. Not one person for whom Christ
died shall perish eternally. The Lord said they'll never perish.
He said, My sheep are my watch, and they follow me, and I give
unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish. They'll never
perish. Think on that. The word here,
destroy, suggests that destruction was an imperative as to their
nature and situation and intimates that they deserved destruction. But he said, I'm not going to
destroy them. One does not make an oath to not destroy if destruction
is not on the table. It would be foolish to do that.
Why else even mention destruction? God said they deserve to be destroyed. I'm not going to destroy them. He said neither cast them from
his presence. The word is interesting here
when he says this. He says this in the last part of
verse 3. And would not destroy them, neither
cast he from their presence? As yet. interesting little phrase
there, as yet. What does that mean? It applies to the fact that this
is an election of a nation as type and not an election of salvation
because He did discard Israel. Read Malachi, read Isaiah. He
set the Old Covenant aside. That doesn't mean He didn't save
some in Israel. He saved some out of every kindred
nation, tongue, and people but he said he gave them a decree
of deforcement in Isaiah he said I won't destroy them as yet but that term is never used in reference to
those he's elected to salvation he said I won't destroy them
The election of grace is never attached to such a disclaimer
as this. You'll never find any word that implies probability
or anything else. Anything less than eternity attached
to the doctrine of salvation by grace is ALWAYS attached to
eternity. The Lord said things like, I
will NEVER leave you, nor forsake you. He said things like, I am
with you ALWAYS, even to the end of the earth. Finally, God gives the reason
for this deliverance and pictures the reason of our salvation.
I do all of this because y'all are really special people. I do all of this because of my
covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Now, if you want to
trace that out, it's not the Noahic covenant, not the covenant
handed down at Sinai. Genesis, start in Genesis chapter
12 and trace those three names through the scriptures, you'll
find that all those have to do with salvation by grace. All
of them have to do with salvation by grace. Romans chapter 9 clearly
states, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. in isaac shelton and
he says that in reference to the fact that israel had all
those good things they had the priest, they had the book, they
had the law, they had the testimony, they had the oracles, they had
the ceremonies, they had all that stuff and it didn't do them
any good and somebody said well you see there, God's word is
in effect he said it's not as though God's word is in effect
all that are of israel are not israel in isaac shall thy seed
be called in Galatians Chapter 3 it says all those who believe
on Christ are Abraham's seed. In Galatians Chapter 4 it says
as Isaac was so are we. So are we as persecuted children
of God. The believer is saved because
God made a covenant with His Son on their behalf before the
foundation of the world called the second covenant because it
was revealed second, but it was actually the eternal covenant,
the one where Christ was slain from the foundation of the world,
the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. All that God has
done for these people, He has done because of grace and mercy,
this covenant of mercy, this covenant of grace that God has
established. This is why we are here today
as children of God, saved. No other reason. God looked at
Sam and said, I remember my covenant. That's what he said. I remember
I made a covenant. I don't break my covenants. Never
break my covenants. Over in Deuteronomy chapter 9,
as the children had finally finished their 40 year journey in the
wilderness, 30 days prior to that, going into the promised
land, wrote the book of Deuteronomy. This whole thing takes place
in 30 days. One month he wrote the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy
means second law. That no means a second law from
sign. That means the laws that will be applied in Canaan. And he said to them in chapter
9 verses 4 through 6, he said, Speak not in thine heart. that
the Lord thy God cast them out, that is the enemy before thee,
saying, Don't you say this, he said, for my righteousness the Lord
has brought me in to possess the land. Don't you say that. I did it because of the wickedness
of the nations that the Lord doth drive them out before thee.
Remember always, first the destruction of the enemy, then the release
of the captive. This is how it works in scripture. Not for thy righteousness, he
saith, or for the uprightness of thine heart dost thou go to
possess their land, but for the wickedness of these nations the
Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that
he may perform the word which the Lord sware unto thy fathers,
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Understand therefore that the
Lord thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it
for thy righteousness, for thou art a stiff-necked people. Remember
and forget not how thou provokest the Lord thy God in wrath and
in wilderness from the day that thou didst depart from the land
of Egypt until you came into this place. Ye have been rebellious
against the Lord. I'm not doing this because you're
righteous and don't say it. There you go. say salvation is by anything
other than grace, you've said it's because of my righteousness.
God said don't say that. Don't say that. Covenant mercies. We're now going to receive the
Lord's table. I'm going to ask Sam and Ed This covenant that our Lord said
in Hebrews chapter 10. He said, Lord, I come with the
Bible and the Book of Deuteronomy to do Thy will, O God, and take
away the first, that is, the sign of Thy covenant. And He
established the second, which is actually the eternal covenant,
the covenant of grace. In that covenant, mercy was to
be shown, but not at the expense of justice. not at the expense
of the law being satisfied. Because mercy is not shown when
the law is not fulfilled. The old prophets used to say
that mercy flies on the wings of satisfied destiny. Now that
justice was satisfied 2,000 years ago on a lonely hill outside
Jerusalem called Golgotha or the place of the skull. There,
the blessed spotless impeccable Lamb of God, hung in the hand
of Jesus' blood, dying in the room instead of His people. And
in doing that death, He satisfied what the law demands for sin.
The soul that sinneth it shall die. So God made His Son to be
sin for us. I have no idea, honestly. I've
been living this for a long time. I can't explain it. it's too
wondrous. God made His Son to be sin for
us. He knew no sin. But we might be made in the righteousness
of God in Him. And in that perfect day, the
law was satisfied. Sin was paid. Death was paid
for all for it to be done. What a wondrous thing. And because of that, The children
of God were made righteous before God. Now, they are not righteous
in the sense that they are righteous people. They are righteousness
because Christ has been made to be their righteousness, just
as He was made to be sin. And once the law is satisfied,
you're no longer guilty if you're a child of God. You see what
I said? It never changes. The law has been satisfied to
you as a record of your death and income. So we gather once a month here
at Sequoia, last Sunday of the month, and we take the table
of the Lord. It's not the Eucharist, not some
way of grace coming down from heaven and going through your
mouth into your belly. That's not how it's done. This is a commemoration of one
thing. He said, if you take this bread
and eat it and drink this cup, you can show forth my debt. He
said, I've come again. What are we showing forth? That
thing that assures us, because of His work, that the law can
find no fault in us. The law cannot accuse us. God
cannot accuse us. Satan cannot accuse us. Conscience
cannot accuse us. There is no more accusation against
us. There is no grounds for us. God has put our sin away. We just made it. In Psalm 103,
as far as the east is from the west. That's exactly what he
actually did in that transgression. Take this table. Jesus Christ
took the bread, the unleavened bread of the Passover feast. He broke it and gave it to his
disciples and said, this is my body broken for you to eat. That
wasn't his body. It was a picture of his body.
And he took the wine, and he blessed the cup, and he said,
this cup is the new covenant in my blood. And as you eat this
bread and drink this wine, you're going to show forth one thing.
I'm dead until I come again. Our religion is the religion
of death. It's substitutionary. Let's take a break. Father, we
ask that in the name of Jesus Christ, who is our God of healing,
who is the one mediator between Him and God, the man Christ is,
who indeed gave His body to be broken, and gave His life, that we might
have life and have it more abundantly. We thank you that He was willing
voluntarily to leave the glories of heaven, come down here and
live among people like us, and then die for us. And in that death, secure our
eternal salvation. Thank you, Father. Thank you
for giving us this ordinance that we can actually commemorate
that event and that person who did the work. Help us now to
do so in Christ's name. Okay. I love you. Yeah. One night I was betrayed and
took the bread of the Passover feast and the breakfast and decided
to take it and eat it. So all I had to do was do this
and drink it straight. And the second night, he took the
cup and after he blessed it, he said, this cup is a new covenant
for me and my brother. So all I had to do was eat this
bread. and reconstruct it and show both
my dead until I come again to do this. And on that night, the
Countess had sang a hymn at the party. My Lord went out to be
betrayed with the Jewish kids. Let's sing again. ? Washed and washed
away my sins ? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, gracious is the flow that
makes me white as snow. No other found I know, nothing
but the blood of Jesus. This is all my hope and peace,
nothing but the blood of Jesus. This is all my righteousness,
nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, precious is the flow that
makes me white as snow. No other fount I know, nothing
but the blood of Jesus. Well, y'all express your love
for one another, and then we'll go eat supper. God bless you.