Back teminal, number 23 in the
hard back teminal. Come we that love the Lord. Let's
all stand together. ? Of the Lord ? And let our joys
be known ? Join in a song with sweet accord ? And thus surround
the throne ? Let those refuse to sing ? Who never knew our
God The children of the heavenly king may speak their joys abroad. The hill of Zion yields a thousand
sacred streets. Before we reach the heavenly
fields or block the Please be seated. Good hymn. Thank you, Tom. Good evening. Let's open our
Bibles to Psalm 116. Psalm 116. We started singing that hymn.
I thought, well, that's exactly what I wanted to read from scripture.
Psalm 116, we begin in verse one. I love the Lord because
he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath
inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long
as I live. The sorrows of death come past
me, and the pains of hell hold upon me. I found trouble and
sorrow. Then called I upon the name of
the Lord, O Lord, I beseech thee, deliver my soul. Gracious is
the Lord and righteous. Yea, our God is merciful. The
Lord preserveth the simple. I was brought low and he helped
me. Return unto thy rest, O my soul,
for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee. Let's pray. Our heavenly father, we ask that
you would enable us this hour to have a spirit of worship where we could return unto our
rest where we could find in thy dear son all the hope of our
salvation, all the comfort, all the peace, all the forgiveness,
all the mercy and grace needed for our souls to live. Lord,
we live in a dying body and we live in a dead world. Lord, how
thankful we are. that there is life in thy spirit,
life in thy son. Lord, we pray that the light
of life would shine in our hearts now, that you would bless your
word, comfort our hearts, give us rest in our Sabbath. Lord, we pray for our sister,
Deanna, and we ask, Lord, that you would minister a special
measure of grace to her heart in this time of need. We pray it in Christ's name,
amen. Number 27 in our spiral hymn
book, 27, let's all stand together. Free from the law's great curse,
in Jesus we are free. For Christ became a curse for
us and died upon the tree. The rituals of the law and all
the law's commands have been fulfilled in Christ the Lord,
established by His hand. O continent with the poor, can
thou with us exist? Complete in Christ we stand by
grace, both free and ever blest. No more the dread of wrath, no
more constrained by fear. We worship and we serve our God
with gratitude and cheer. In Jesus we are free. In Jesus we are free. Free from all sin and from all
guilt. We live in liberty. We'll join the happy song. with all the blood brought from,
and sing the praises of the Lamb, whose grace makes us His own. Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles to John
chapter 9. John chapter 9. I've been looking at this miracle
for, I don't know, three or four Wednesday nights. I've titled
the message tonight, Christ Our Sabbath. Christ Our Sabbath. You know the word Sabbath means
rest. And what these Jews were so bothered
by in the Lord performing this miracle is that he was violating
their Sabbath laws. By spitting on the ground and
making mud, that was a violation of the Sabbath law. Placing that mud on the eyes
of this blind man, that was a violation of their Sabbath laws. Let's read these verses together.
We'll read verse 14 through 16. And it was the Sabbath day when
Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. Then again, the Pharisees
also asked him how he had received his sight. And he said unto them,
he put clay upon mine eyes and I washed and do see. Therefore, said some of the Pharisees,
this man is not of God because he keepeth not the Sabbath day. Others said, how can a man that
is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among
them. The Lord Jesus always creates
a division among men. He said himself, if you're not
for me, you're against me. And all men either love him or
they hate him. And it always has to do with
what the Lord does in robbing men of their righteousness. And
that's exactly what he had done to them. The Jews have two religious
books. They have the Torah, which is
the Old Testament scriptures. Sometimes the word Torah is used
to describe only the books of Moses, the first five books of
the Bible, but other times it's used to describe the entire canon
of the Old Testament scriptures. And then in the 5th century BC,
While they were in captivity in Babylon, and they didn't have
worship for those 70 years, the religious leaders of the Jews
in Babylon wrote a book called the Talmud. And the word Talmud
translated means instruction. And it was a book of 613 very
specific laws that must be observed and kept by the Jews. Most many
of those, I think almost 300 of them, had to do with the Sabbath. They had broken Sabbath laws
up into 39 different categories and each one of those categories
had I mean right down to how you could tie a knot on the Sabbath
and how many loops you could put in the rope otherwise if
you do more than that you're going to be exercising work. That's how legalistic and ridiculous
they were about the Sabbath. And of course much like religious
organizations today who violate the Sabbath in their attempts
to keep the Sabbath. They don't know that Christ is
their Sabbath. You look at all of the... And
the Calvinists are worse than the Armenians as far as Sabbatarianism
is concerned. The 1689 Confession of Faith
is for the Reformed Baptists, the Talmud for the Jews. It's their set of rules and regulations. It's their instructions on how
to act concerning certain things. The Heidelberg Catechism is the
Talmud for the Dutch Reformed people, and so on it goes. The Westminster Confession would
be the Talmud for the Presbyterians. And in all of those documents
written by men, there are very specific rules and regulations
concerning the Sabbath. You see, nothing's changed. Nothing's
changed. Most Christian denominations
today are declining. People are becoming less religious
and less attracted to particular mainline denominations. You know
which one is not? Which denomination is actually
growing? They've taken over all the hospitals
in Central Florida. the seventh day Adventist. Why
is that? Why is that? Because they can
satisfy their perceived requirements for heaven by going to church
on Saturday. You just keep the Sabbath. They're
the only ones keeping the Sabbath. And so they've been convinced
if you just come to church on Saturday. that will satisfy the
demands for the Sabbath. And you see, men still make keeping
the Sabbath. We were in Scotland many years
ago and I was invited to preach at a free Presbyterian church
in Scotland. And this is way up on the north
shore of Scotland. And the elders came. to meet
me the night before I was supposed to preach. And we're just talking,
conversation. And they found out in our conversation
that after services the next day, Tricia and I were planning
to drive about 15 miles from the church to look at this old
castle ruin in Northern Scotland. And when they found out that
we were gonna do that, they withdrew their offer for me to preach
and had someone else fill the pulpit the next day because by
going to that castle, I was going to be violating the Sabbath in
the free Presbyterian church. I had a man try to convince me that he was
going to go to heaven because he closed his businesses on Sunday. You see, what these Jews were
caught up in is still being practiced today in a little different format,
but it's still the same. It's an attempt to satisfy the
demands of God's law by by doing things and abstaining from certain
things on Sunday. And the sad thing is that the
religious leaders enforce these laws because this is the only
way to manipulate the people to come to church on Sunday.
You know, we don't have to put believers under the law to cause
them to want to worship, to want to meet together, to want to
be where the Lord promised to manifest His grace and His glory
on the Lord's day. We don't have to put men under
the law to get them to do that. So you see, It works both ways. It works for the religious leaders
and organizations because it assures their followers will
be there and it works for the followers because it assures
them that they're doing what's required in order to get to heaven. Exactly what's happening here.
Nothing's changed. The word Sabbath means rest,
rest. You know, Adam and I were talking
about this a few weeks ago. I think I put an article in the
bulletin about it and mentioned it in a message recently that
thirst is an involuntary reaction of the body when it's dehydrated,
we get thirsty. We don't make a decision to become
thirsty. And the scripture says, ho, everyone that thirsteth come
to the waters and drink freely. from the river of life. The Lord
has to create that thirst in us. Thirsting after righteousness. Hungering is the same as thirsting. You don't decide you're gonna
get hungry. Your body is deprived of nourishment and it says, hey,
I'm hungry. And you have to eat. And resting is the same thing.
Have you gone to bed and the other day I drank a cup of coffee
too late in the day and I went to bed and I tossed and turned
for hours trying to go to sleep. You ever had that happen? I wasn't
tired. I wasn't sleepy. I was wired
from the caffeine, I guess. And then there's other times
when you just work and work and work. And you're so tired, as
soon as your head hits the pillow, you're out. You sleep. Why? Because you're tired. Art thou weary? Art thou languid? How's the rest of that hymn go?
Art thou sore, distressed? Come to me. Come to me, saith
one, and coming, be at rest." Be at rest. We live in a world that's contrary
to us. And we're in a spiritual battle every day in this God-hating
world in which we live. Scott and I were talking about
this tonight. And how at odds we are with this world. and how
desperate we are to have a place to rest. We are the objects of
Satan's attacks in so many ways and temptations. He's not worried
about the unbeliever. He's already got them. But oh,
what concentration he gives to the children of God and what
accusations he makes against us and what temptations he puts
in our way. And oh, how that spiritual battle
that we have requires us to have a place of rest, we get tired.
The soul gets tired. Our own sin, our own unbelief,
our own flesh that we war against every day, oh, it just gets so
tiresome, doesn't it? It gets so tiresome. And we have
to have a place of rest. We seek to find peace and comfort
in so many places. And we find ourselves, we find ourselves in need of
Christ. We find ourselves exhausted, spiritually exhausted. We didn't decide we were gonna
get tired, but the spiritual battles that we face every day
causes us to have to have a resting place, have to have a place where
we can come. Men then, in John chapter nine,
and men today, violate the Sabbath. in their attempt to keep it. They violate it. Turn with me to Exodus chapter
31. Exodus chapter 31. Oh, if I can just not do this on Sunday and do
that on Sunday. They put themselves under the
law. None of the Ten Commandments
are called in the Bible a sign, except for the Fourth Commandment.
A sign is something that points to something else. You're driving
down the road, you see a sign that says, so and so, so far
ahead. or turn this way or whatever. A sign points you in the right
direction. The sign is not the destination.
The sign is the marker that points you to the destination. None
of the commandments except for the fourth one. And we know that
God gave the commandments to Moses on two tablets. And four
of the commandments were on one tablet and the other six were
on the other tablet, and four of them had to do with our relationship
with God, and six of them had to do with our relationship with
man. And most of them are thou shalt
not, thou shalt not. None of them were called a sign,
except for that one commandment that separates the first tablet
from the second tablet, the fourth commandment. The Sabbath is called
a sign. It's pointing to something else.
It's not an end in itself. Thou shalt not murder, that's
not a sign, that's a commandment. Thou shalt not lie, that's not
a sign, that's a commandment. Thou shalt not commit adultery,
that's not a sign, that's a commandment. Obey your mother and your father,
do not make any graven images. Those are all commandments, they're
not signs. They're to be honored. And they were perfectly kept
in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we look at them and
we love God's law and we, oh Lord, I've never been able to
keep that satisfactory in my heart, you know, but, but, oh
Lord, I know that's, that's not, that's not pointing me to something.
That's, that's, that's a commandment. Look at Exodus chapter 31. Verse
12, and the Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak thou also unto
the children of Israel saying, verily my Sabbaths you shall
keep for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generation
that you may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you. So, The Lord tells us the purpose
of the Sabbath, the purpose of this sign is to show us that
it is the Lord that does the sanctifying. What is it to be
sanctified? It's to be set apart, it's to
be made holy, it's to be made perfect in the sight of God. Verse 14, you shall keep the
Sabbaths therefore, For it is holy unto you, everyone that
defileth it shall surely be put to death, for whosoever doeth
any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
Do you see why in the Talmud, all of these rules and regulations
concerning the Sabbath, right down to how many loops you can
put in a knot, And whether or not you could take mud and put
it on a person's eye, or whether or not you could go and wash
on this, those were all violations of the Sabbath. You see why they're
so concerned? Because they're reading this. And then they knew
from Numbers chapter 15, that when the children of Israel were
in the wilderness, right after God had given them the law, that
there was an Israelite that was caught picking up sticks on the
Sabbath. He was just picking up sticks,
a few little sticks. I guess he's gonna make a fire
and maybe warm his hands or maybe fix a little something to eat,
I don't know. He was just picking up sticks. And they saw him and
they brought him to Moses. And Moses went before the Lord.
And Moses asked the Lord, what do I do? And God said, stone
him. And all Israel stoned that man
to death. for picking up sticks on the
Sabbath. And so these Jews and all the
others that I mentioned already today are trying to observe the
Sabbath in fear that they'll be stoned for doing any work
whatsoever on the Sabbath. None, there were, The Sabbath,
the rules concerning the Sabbath were non-negotiable and intolerable. There were no exceptions made. If you were caught doing any
work on the Sabbath, you were cut off, you were put out, put
to death. No other commandment, there were
exceptions to other commandments, but this commandment had no exceptions.
It was the harshest, penalized commandment of all the commandments. And yet God calls it a sign. Verse 15, six days may work be
done, but in the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the
Lord, whosoever doth any work in the Sabbath, he shall surely
be put to death. Wherefore, the children of Israel
shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout all their
generation for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of
Israel forever. For in six days, the Lord made
heaven and earth. And on the seventh day, he rested
and was refreshed. And he gave unto Moses when he
had made an end of coming with him upon Mount Sinai, two tables
of testimony, tables of stone written with the finger of God. A sign. Our Lord often, performed miracles
on the Jews' Sabbath. He went out of his way to violate
their Talmud laws on the Sabbath. You remember the disciples were
walking through a field one time and took some grain and rubbed
it in their hand blew away the chaff and ate it. The new King
James calls it corn, but it's probably some sort of wheat.
And there they are. And that was definitely a violation
of the Sabbath too. Winnow on the Sabbath day, that
was intolerable and it was worthy of death. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
4. You know where we're going with this. And I hope that somebody, I really
do hope that somebody who has been under the misconception
that their activity on Sunday was somehow earning them favor
with God and giving them Hope of salvation. I hope they'll
hear this. Because the Lord is clear about
this Sabbath, the fourth commandment, the one that tied all the other
commandments together. And here's what I want to say.
If a man keeps the Sabbath, he's kept all the law. And if he violates the Sabbath,
he's violated all the law. The Sabbath is the hinge pin,
if you will, to all the commandments of God. And in keeping the Sabbath, we have
kept every jot and tittle of the God's law, every bit of it,
in keeping the Sabbath. But is keeping the Sabbath have
to do with what you do or what you don't do on Saturday or Sunday? No. No, doesn't have anything to
do with that. Hebrews chapter 4. Verse two, for unto us was the
gospel preached as well as unto them, speaking of those Old Testament
Jews in the wilderness, but the word preached did not profit
them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. Faith
is the only way that this sign can be read. And the Lord gave
them a sign and said it was a sign, but they had no faith to read
the sign. They didn't know what the sign
was pointing to. For we which have believed do enter into rest. That's the word Sabbath. As he said, as I have sworn in
my wrath, that they shall enter into my rest, although the works
were finished from the foundation of the world. You see, it's not
by works of righteousness, which we have done. It's not by picking
up sticks or going to the Seventh-day Adventist church on Saturday
or obeying the Sabbath rules of the 1689 Confession of Faith
or not going to a restaurant on Sunday or making sure that
you got your, you know, in church on Sunday. It doesn't have anything
to do with that. That's not the sign. God gave
us eyes of faith so that we can read the sign. And men get so
caught up in the things of the world that they don't even see
the sign. I'll never forget one of the
closest experience I had to death. And Jennifer, our daughter, almost
both of us almost died. We were in North Alabama going
down a country road, unpaved road. I've been on that road
before. And it went to a bridge that
went over the Alabama River. And at that particular junction
on that road, there was about a 50-60 foot drop down to the
river and we're talking and having a good time and just I'm barreling
down that road headed towards that bridge. Get almost to the
bridge and there's no bridge there. Slammed on the brakes and we're
able to stop the car before we got to the cliff. Turned around
went back the other way There were two or three signs that
we had passed that said bridge out. And we didn't see them. We didn't see them. We weren't
paying attention. And that's the way God's given
us a sign here. And he's telling us which road
to take to get across the river. We've got to all cross that Jordan. And the Lord's given us sufficient
signs in his word to show us where the bridge is and where
the bridge is not. And there's no bridge to get
across the Jordan in what we do and don't do. Christ himself
is the bridge. And his works were finished And
when the Bible says from the foundation of the world, that's
biblical language for eternity. The works that God requires for
the keeping of the Sabbath were accomplished in the lamb that
was slain before the foundation of the world. And so for all
of eternity, these works have already been done. And the Sabbath
was a sign pointing to him. that we might rest our souls,
our weary souls, not in all the works that we do and not in our
struggles with all the world and Satan and sin and our unbelief
and our flesh and everything else. So if I just fight a little
harder and work a little harder, I can get there. Or do a little
bit more, I can get there. No, no. What's the Lord saying? Stop
trying to start trusting. You know, look. Rest in Christ. Calm. All ye that weary. Before we read the rest of these
verses, hold your finger there and turn with me to Matthew chapter
11. I want you to see the pronouns, the personal pronouns in Matthew
chapter 11 that our Lord uses. Me and my and I. Look, look. Look at verse 28
in Matthew chapter 11. Come unto me, all ye that labor,
laboring and heavy laden. Now there's a difference here
between laboring and heavy laden. Everybody labors, but not everybody's
heavy laden. Heavy laden means, Lord, my labor,
has depleted me of all of my strength. I have nothing else
to give. I'm spent. The weight of my labor
is so heavy that it has crushed me. I can't carry it any longer. And the Lord says, come to me. Come to me. and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. The Lord bore the yoke of sin when
he went to the cross. He put himself in that yoke and
all the weight of sin was poured out upon him on Calvary's cross. Oh, he fought the battle. He
carried the burden. And that's why he's saying, my
yoke is easy. It wasn't easy for him, but it's
easy now because the weight of it has been borne. The wrath
of God has been appeased. The judgment of God has been
satisfied. His blood has been spent, has
been shed. Take my yoke upon you and learn
of me. Me. Learn of me. Yes, we learn from
him, but we learn of him. For I am meek and lowly in heart,
and you shall find rest for your souls. I'm meek. I'm lowly. You need rest. And that word right there, Sabbath,
every time you find the word rest, it's the word Sabbath.
You find a Sabbath for your soul. My yoke is easy, my burden is light. Oh, and how
light it is. What comfort, what joy, what
peace, what rest. Oh, it's just a, it's a feather
bed. It's a, oh, we could just, we're
exhausted, Lord. We've spent all the energy that
we have in trying to find a place to, of hope and comfort and we've
got no place else to go. Go back with me to Hebrews chapter
four. Verse four, for he spake in a
certain place of the seventh day on this wise and God did
rest the seventh day from all his works. Why did God rest?
Was he tired? No, he is finished. It's finished. Everything was done. Everything
required. Nothing else could be added to
creation after six days. It was finished and God rested. And here's the sign. Here's the
picture. Here's what God's pointing us
to. And in this place again, verse
five, if they shall enter into my rest, seeing therefore it
remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it
was first preached entered not in because of unbelief. They
never, all the males over 20 years old died in the wilderness.
None of them made it into the promised land. Why? Because they didn't trust
Christ. They didn't believe God. Verse 7. And again, he limitheth
a certain day, saying to David, Today, after so long a time,
as it is said, Today, if you will hear his voice, harden not
your heart. Believe God. Trust Christ. Come unto me, it's finished.
The works were finished from the foundation of the world.
Nothing else can be added to it. And if anyone adds to the
words of this prophecy, the curses of this book will be added unto
him. And if anyone picks up a stick in the wilderness, thinking that
somehow it's going to, it's going to, help me and earn me some
merit with God. Listen, the blessings of God
do not come as a reward for doing right. The blessing is the desire and
ability to do right which comes with its own reward. What is
the blessing? It's to believe on Christ. And
that comes with a reward. God's not gonna reward us because
of something that we did. Well, if I can just believe,
if I can just keep the Sabbath, if I can just do this and do
that, God will reward me. No. No, that makes God a debtor. It makes the gospel a gospel
of works. And if Jesus, now, yes, spiritually
speaking, it was the Lord Jesus Christ, but the word here is
Joshua. And it's a reference back to the children of Israel
coming into the promised land. If Joshua had given them rest,
then he would not after spoken of another day. You see, The
rest was not the physical rest that they have when they came
into the promised land. That was again a sign. Moses could not enter into the
promised land. He's law. He had to die on the
east side of Jordan. Joshua had to bring him across. There remaineth therefore a rest
to the people of God. And here's the verse I want you
to see. Verse 10, for he that is entered into his rest, the
rest of the Lord Jesus Christ, the accomplished work, the burden
that he bore, the yoke that he was in, he that entereth into
his rest, they that believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and rest
their hope in him and his finished work and his glorious person,
He also hath ceased from his own works as God did from his. Cease from trying to pick up
sticks. Cease from trying to keep the Sabbath by what we do
and don't do in order to earn merit and favor with God and
get God's blessings and approval. Here's the labor because we There's
a part of us that we're all recovering Pharisees, we're all lawmongers,
we're all trying to, life is all about being rewarded for
hard work. And there's something in us that
still thinks that way. Here's the spiritual labor. And it's not a physical work.
It's a spiritual labor. to believe on Christ. Let us
labor, therefore, to enter into that rest. That's the labor. That's the labor, to enter into
rest. Lest any man fall after the same
example of unbelief. I looked up this word rest to
see where it was first mentioned because often the first mention
of a word gives us a good definition that can be carried throughout
scripture. The first mention of the word rest is found in
Genesis chapter 8 at verse 9. When the water began to assuage
and the ark rested on Mount Ararat, And Moses opened up the one window
in the ark and let the dove out. The raven went out, never came
back. The raven could feed off of the
dead carcasses that were left over from the flood. But the
scripture says, that the dove found no rest for her feet and
she returned to the ark. The dove found no rest for the
sole of her foot and she returned to the ark.
We're always returning to the ark, aren't we? Why? Because as God's doves, we fly
out there with the ravens and we see them feeding on the carcasses
and we can't find any rest for our souls there. We have to come
back to Christ, our Sabbath, our rest. Psalm 116 verse seven says, return
unto thy rest, O my soul. Revelation chapter 14 verse 13
says, these are they which rest from their labors. The dry husk of doctrine that
swine do eat will not feed the souls of needy sheep The sugary sweets of emotionalism
will not nourish the souls of God's hungry sheep. God's sheep
cannot find comfort or rest for their soul at Mount Sinai. The law doesn't help them. It's
quaking and fire only strikes fear in their hearts. The freewill gospel of man-made
religion only leaves God's sheep wondering and fearful, have I
done enough or did I really mean it? The broken cisterns of religious
ceremony cannot quench the thirst of God's sheep. Even knowledge concerning the
Bible doesn't give rest to the soul. Let me show you that and
we'll close with this. Turn with me to Isaiah chapter
28. Isaiah 28. Verse 11 of Isaiah 28. For with stammering lips and
another tongue will he speak to this people. You've heard
stammering lips tonight, trying to speak the truth about who
Christ is and what he's done to give his people rest. To whom he said, This is the
rest, wherewith he may cause the weary to rest. And this is
the refreshing, yet they would not hear." What did the Lord Jesus say to
those Pharisees? Search the scriptures, for in
them you think that you have eternal life, but these are they
which testify of me. And the Lord here is saying to
Israel, I sent you a man with stammering lips, to tell you
about the place of rest. And the revelation of that rest
was made in my word. And here's my understanding of
these next verses. Let me read them. But the word
of the Lord unto them was unto them precept upon precept,
precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a
little and there a little, that they may go and fall backwards
and be broken and snared and taken. You see, the Lord had said in
verse 10, I'm going to give you this message of rest, precept
upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little,
there a little. That's how we find Christ. He's in his word, and little
by little, comparing scripture to scripture, precept by precept,
what's the Lord saying? All you saw it for was precept
upon precept, line upon line, here a little, there a little,
and you fell over the message of the Bible, the person of the
Bible. I was reading an article just
today, You know that the Lord Jesus Christ is not the most
important message of the Bible. He is the message of the Bible.
He is the message of the Bible. And men can read the Bible and
they can learn doctrine and they can learn scripture and they
can learn precepts and laws and regulations and rules and Sabbath
keeping and never find rest for their soul. Come unto me. Come unto me. Art thou weary? Art thou languid? Art thou sore distressed? Come to me, saith one. And in coming, be at rest. Be at rest. two thirty nine. Let's stand together. Tom you
come please. Art thou weary, art thou languid,
art thou sore distressed? Come to me, saith one, and coming
be at rest. The path he marks to lead me
to him if he be my guide. In his feet and hands are moon
prints and his sigh. Is there diadem as monarch that
his brow adores? Nay, a crown in merry surety,
but a If I still hold closely to him,
what hath he at last? Sorrow vanquished, labor ended,
Jordan passed. If I ask him to receive me, will
he say the day? Not till earth and not till heaven
pass away. Finding, following, keeping,
struggling, is he sure to bless? Saints, apostles, prophets, martyrs,
answer yes.