Thank you, Joy. Good evening,
everyone. Let's open tonight's service with hymn number six
in the hardback tenor, number six in the hardback. Let's all
stand together. ? Come Thou Almighty King ? ? Help
us Thy name to sing ? ? Help us to praise ? ? Father all glorious
? ? O'er all victorious ? ? Come and reign over us ? ? Ancient
of days ? ? Come Thou incarnate Word ? ? Gird on Thy mighty sword
? ? Our prayer attend ? ? Come and Thy people bless ? ? And
give Thy word success ? ? Spirit of holiness on us descend ? Come,
holy Comforter, Thy sacred witness bear, In this glad hour, Thou
who almighty art, Now rule in every heart, And e'er from us
depart, Spirit of power, ? To the great one in three ? Eternal
praises be ? Hence evermore ? His sovereign majesty ? May we in
glory see ? And to eternity love and adore Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles together
to Psalm 40. Psalm 40. I mentioned Sunday that surely
our Lord prayed these Psalms to his heavenly
Father while on the cross and this would have been one that was written by David about what
happened on the cross. Psalm 40 verse one, I waited
patiently for the Lord and he inclined unto me and heard my
cry. He brought me up also out of
a horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock
and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in
my mouth, even praise unto our God, Many shall see it and fear
and shall trust in the Lord. Blessed is that man that maketh
the Lord his trust and respecteth not the proud nor such as turn
aside to lies. Many, O Lord my God, are thy
wonderful works which thou hast done and thy thoughts which are
to usward. They cannot be reckoned up in
order unto thee. If I would declare and speak
of them, they are more than can be numbered. Sacrifice and offerings
thou didst not desire. Mine ears hast thou opened. Burnt offering and sin offering
hast thou not required. Then said I, lo, I come. In the volume of the book it
is written of me. I delight to do thy will, O God,
O my God. Yea, thy law is within my heart. I have preached righteousness
in the great congregation. Lo, I have not refrained my lips,
O Lord, thou knowest. I have not hid thy righteousness
within my heart. I have declared thy faithfulness
and thy salvation. I have not concealed thy lovingkindness
and thy truth from the great congregation. Withhold not thou
thy tender mercies from me, O Lord. Let thy loving kindness and thy
truth continually preserve me. For innumerable evils have compassed
me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me so that I am not able to look up. They are more than
the hairs of my head. Therefore, my heart faileth me. What a glorious mystery. that
the Lord Jesus, who was himself without sin, would own the sins
of his people as his own. Be pleased, O Lord, to deliver
me. O Lord, make haste to help me. Let them be ashamed and confounded
together that seek after my soul to destroy it. Let them be driven
backwards and put to shame that wish me evil. Let them be desolate
for reward of their shame that say unto me, aha, aha. And let
all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee. Let such
as love thy salvation say continually, the Lord be magnified. but I
am poor and needy. Yet the Lord thinketh upon me. Thou art my help and my deliverer.
Make no tearing, O my God. Let's pray. Our glorious and merciful Heavenly
Father, how we find our hope and comfort
in knowing that You hear the cries of my children because
you heard the cry of thy son, that he was faithful in giving
to you that which you required as a sacrifice for our sins and
that you were faithful Lord and rewarding him with life, raising
him from the dead and making him the firstborn among many
brethren. Our Heavenly Father, we ask for
your Holy Spirit, as we've already sang, to come in power and enable
us this hour to set our affections on Christ. Lord, we've been far
too attracted to the things of this world, and we pray for your
mercy and your grace to forgive us of that sin. Thank you that
our Savior bore those sins and put them away. In this hour,
Lord, enable us to worship. Cause us to rejoice and trust
Christ. For it's in his name we pray.
Amen. Number 23 in your spiral handbook. Let's all stand together. Number
23. Pass me not, O gracious Father,
sinful, wretched though I be. Though you might in truth condemn
me, let your mercy fall on me. Love of God so everlasting, blood
of Christ so rich and free, grace of God so strong and saving,
magnify them all in me. ? Pass me not, O blessed Savior
? Let me hear your gracious call ? I'm a guilty, helpless sinner
? Savior, at your feet I fall ? Love of God so everlasting
? Blood of Christ so rich and free Grace of God so strong and
saving, magnify them all in me. Pass me not, O mighty spirit. You can cause the dead to live. Speak the word of saving power. Give me faith and make me live. Love of God so everlasting, blood
of Christ so rich and free, grace of God so strong and saving,
magnify them all in me. ? Pass me not a poor lost sinner
? If you will, you can save me ? Reach down with your hand of
mercy ? Saving others, Lord, save me Love of God so everlasting. Blood of Christ so rich and free. Grace of God so strong and saving. Magnify them all in me. Please be seated. Thank you, Tom. Joy. Did y'all
notice in both of those hymns that each one of the stanzas
addressed a different person of the Godhead, the Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit? That was a blessing. We're going to be in 2 Thessalonians
again tonight, if you'd like to turn with me there in your
Bibles. The Apostle Paul, under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, spends a lot of time in both of these epistles
that we've been looking at, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, encouraging
the brethren in the hope that they have of life eternal. We've looked on several occasions
over the past few months back to Acts chapter 17 where Paul
went to Thessalonica for the first time and preached the gospel
and some of the circumstances surrounding that and how he was
only there for three weeks and a riot broke out and he was forced
to leave town and the believers were left with the persecution
of that city. There's another passage of scripture
that mentions this church that I think sheds some light on the
circumstances that they were experiencing. If you'll turn
with me to 2 Corinthians 8. 2 Corinthians 8. Now the city
of Corinth would have been a Roman city of some wealth and some power. The cities in Macedonia, on the
other hand, were small and generally made up of very poor people. Macedonia would have been Philippi,
Thessalonica, Berea, though we don't have an epistle to the
Berean church, we know there was a church there. And so when
Paul speaks of the churches in Macedonia here in 2 Corinthians
chapter 8, he's encouraging those much more wealthy believers in
Corinth to follow the example of their brethren in Macedonia. And we have a better understanding
of why the Apostle addresses this issue of the coming of Christ. I've titled this message, The
Believer's Hope. These believers needed a word
of hope. They needed an encouragement.
They needed to know that there was something beyond the struggles
of of this world. Look with me at 2 Corinthians
8, the very first verse. Moreover, brethren, we do you
to wit of the grace of God bestowed upon the churches of Macedonia.
We want to bring to your understanding how God has poured out his spirit
and his grace on these believers in Thessalonica. how that in
a great trial of affliction, the abundance of their joy and
their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberty or
liberality. For to their power I bear record,
yea, and beyond their power, they were willing of themselves,
praying us with much entreaty that we would receive the gift
and take upon us the fellowship of the ministering to the saints."
Now, the Apostle Paul would take up offerings from these Gentile
churches to support the displaced Jews back in Jerusalem. The believers
in Jerusalem were cast out of their homes. They had lost their
jobs. They were ostracized from their
families. And so Paul would take back gifts
to help support those poor Jewish believers. And And when the churches
in Macedonia wanted to help, Paul said, no, no, no, no. You're
not any better off than they are. You keep your money. And they said, no, no, no. Well,
they begged Paul that he would take their gifts in spite of
the fact that they were in poverty themselves. And so And so Paul's
writing to the church at Corinth and saying to them, verse five,
and this they did not as we hoped, but first gave their own selves
to the Lord and unto us by the will of God, insomuch that we
desired Titus that as he had begun, so he would also finish
in you the same grace also. So Paul's using, the poverty and the persecution
of the believers in Thessalonica as an example of encouragement
to these believers who were not having those same experiences
in Corinth and saying to the Corinthians, follow their example. It's not surprising that this
church in Thessalonica needed to be reminded, and it's a very
prominent theme in both of the letters that Paul wrote to the
church in Thessalonica. It's not surprising that they
needed the encouragement of being reminded that the Lord was coming
back and that they had the hope of life eternal. Is there not
a direct correlation in our lives between the attachment that we
have to this world and the attachment that we have to Christ? It is a great mercy that the
Lord would show us the vanity of this world and in spite of
the fact that we have such an attraction to the things of this
world, he would cause us to see the vanity of it and cause us
to desire Christ. And as we grow in grace and the
knowledge of Christ, that we long for him more. And it's a
mercy that the Lord would, in our latter years, cause us to
have less enjoyment for the things of this world and pry our hands
loose from these things causing us to strengthening our desire
to be with the Lord. These faithful, joyful believers
were poor and they were suffering. And the message that keeps being
repeated in these letters is the Lord is returning and he
will bring with him his reward, which is himself. The return of the Lord Jesus
Christ is the believer's hope. And we have a very keen interest,
and even more so as we are given by God's good providence struggles
in this life, we're given good reason to desire of being with
him more and more. And we're not talking about the
second coming of Christ in the sense that the religious world
is curious as to the events that might surround his coming and
how they relate to the world events in which we live. This
isn't a curiosity thing. This is a heartfelt desire to
see him in the fullness of his glory and to be made like him,
to be rid of sin and to be done with the battles that that believers face in this world. And it's not just the theme of
these letters, it's the theme of Scripture, is it not? When
the apostles were gripped with fear over what the Lord told
them about his imminent death, He immediately said to them,
let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also
in me, for in my Father's house are many mansions. If it were
not so, I would have told you. I go and prepare a place for
you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come
again. I will come again, and I will receive you unto myself,
so that where I am, there you may be also. And the last word
that the Lord gives to the disciples at his ascension from the Mount
of Olives was from those two angels dressed in white who said
to the disciples, you men of Galilee, why stand you gazing
up into heaven? This same Jesus which has been
taken up from you is coming again in like manner. He's coming back. It's okay. And the very last
word of scripture is come, Lord Jesus, even now, come. These believers in Thessalonica had good reason to anticipate
with joy the coming of Christ. It should be no surprise that
the enemies of the gospel would try to rob us of that hope, but
that's what was happening in Thessalonica. They were receiving
letters and they were having false prophets come in and tell
them that the Lord had already come or
that he wasn't gonna come and Paul has to write them and say
to them, look at chapter two in 2 Thessalonians chapter two, verse one. Now we beseech you
brethren by the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and by our
gathering together unto him, Here's the ground upon which
we are here to encourage you. We're going to be with the Lord. That you'd be not soon shaken
in mind or be troubled neither by spirit nor by word nor by
letter as if it was from us, that the day of the Lord is,
and the proper understanding of the last phrase of verse two
is that the day of the Lord has already come. They were getting letters from
men who were professing to be apostles. They were hearing messages
from men who were professing to have received a word from
God. They were these false prophets
coming in and robbing them of their hope and robbing them of
their joy. And Paul's saying to them, don't
let your mind be troubled by that. How many things would rob
us of our hope? Let no man deceive you by any
means. Look at verse three. For that
day shall not come except there come a falling away first and
that the man of sin be revealed and the son of perdition. Paul's
saying, there's got to be an apostasy. That's what the word
falling away here. is the word apostasy. And what
the Lord's saying to these believers, it can't be that the Lord's already
come because the church has not fallen into an apostate stage
yet. And that's got to happen first.
Well, that was 2000 years ago. Has the professing church ever
been as apostate as it is today? Everything that the Lord said
was needing to happen before his coming has happened. We have
reason, you and I have reason to anticipate the Lord's return
more than any believers ever have. The Old Testament saints all
longed for that day. They looked for a city, the scripture
says, whose builder and maker was God. They couldn't find any
place in this world to be settled. They couldn't find their comfort
and their hope. That's a mercy, that's a blessing
that God gives to all of his people. Yes, we get way too attracted
to the things of this world and get way too comfortable in the
things of this world but when it comes down to it, the Spirit
of God will not let you find your peace in this world, will he? When Elizabeth, John the Baptist's
mother, And Zacharias, her husband, John's
father. Remember, Zacharias was made
dumb by the spirit of God. He couldn't speak during her
whole pregnancy. And then finally the child was
born and he said, you call the child John, not Zacharias, call
him John. For God has been gracious, which
is what the name John means. And Zachariah writes that wonderful
passage of the coming of the Messiah as a result of the birth
of John. And then in the very next chapter
of Luke, in chapter 2, there is Simeon who sees the Lord Jesus
being brought into the temple to be to be circumcised and Simeon
takes Christ and holds him and he says, the consolation of Israel
has come. And that word consolation is
comfort. And he's referring back to Isaiah
chapter 40. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people.
Speak ye comfortably unto Jerusalem. The comfort of Israel is here
now. And then Simeon says, Lord, you
can take me home now. You've fulfilled that promise
that I would see the Messiah before I died. Let thy servant
now depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. The Lord has put a need into
our hearts. for him. And what a blessing,
what a mercy it is. The unbeliever doesn't know anything
about this. They're so invested in the things
of this world that they have no hope. Without God, without
hope in this world, the scripture says, of those who are without
faith in Christ. But not so with those who have
been born in the spirit. They have a longing, desire. In another place, the Lord tells
us after describing his coming, he says, comfort ye one another
with these words. Remind each other That in spite
of all the troubles and trials, in sight of all the sin and distractions
that you have, God's going to be faithful to his promise. That's the believer's hope. For the unbeliever, God is nothing
more than a tool in the bag of their self-help things to, you
know, to help them just have a better life. That's what most
folks use God for. You know, I just want to have
a better life here. But the truth is that We don't
make such, the Lord never made such empty promises. He said,
he said, if you, if you come to me, you're going to have to
deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. I'm not going
to give you an easier life in this world, but in a lot of ways,
it's going to be more difficult. You're going to have an old man
to struggle with. You never knew you had before. You're going
to live in a world that's going to hate you. You're not going
to be able to find your peace and your joy and comfort in this
world like everyone else is going to do. But here's the hope, you're
going to have life eternal, life eternal. Keep your eyes fixed on the prize. What is the prize? Well, Christ
Jesus, the Lord, is the prize. That's what Paul said. I press towards the mark for
the prize of the high calling in Christ Jesus. I've not yet
attained. I've not yet apprehended that
which has apprehended me, but this one thing I do, forgetting
those things which are behind, I press, I press. Let us live with an expectation
and anticipation of the Lord fulfilling his promise and revealing
the fullness of his glory, translating us. Scripture says that Enoch
walked with God and he was no more because he was translated.
He was given a new body. Oh, our life is not in this world. If in this world only we have
hope, the scripture says, we are of all men most miserable. And if there is no life after
death, let us eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we shall
die. No, we're not. It's not about that. It's about life. It's about eternal
life. Second Thessalonians chapter
one, we saw last week from verse 11, wherefore also we pray always
for you that our God would count you worthy of this calling. And
we saw that the word there was vouchsafe, that you are safe
because the Lord Jesus Christ has stood in your stead and he
has vouched your cause before his father and therein you have
Safety, you have hope. I go and prepare a place for
you. The Lord Jesus ascended into glory. He took his rightful
place at the right hand of the majesty on high. And the father
looked at him and said, sit here at my right hand until I make
all thine enemies thy footstool. We come into this world at enmity
with God, do we not? And the Lord, by his mercy and
grace, causes us to do what he did for Mary and sit at his feet,
at his footstool. And that one thing that is needful,
the one thing that is needful, yeah, there's a Martha in every
one of us, isn't there? The Lord rebuked Martha, Martha. You're encumbered by so many
things. We are too. Thank God there's
a Spirit of Mary in each one of us as well. That though we
find ourselves so attracted to and distracted from the Lord
Jesus, we attracted to the things of this world and distracted
from the Lord Jesus, we We also have the spirit of God that keeps
causing us to sit at his feet and to listen to his word and
to rejoice in his promises and in his mercy and his grace and
to place all the hope that we have in the forgiveness of our
sin. And count you worthy. Keep you in faith, looking, looking
to Christ and fulfill. Look at the last part of verse
11 and fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work
of faith with power. How petty are the things that
that so easily distract us? Oh, if we could, if we could
set our affections on things above rather than the things
of this world. where Christ is seated at the
right hand of God. By God's grace, we will. And
I pray that the Lord will remind us again right now to do that. And in that place, we find the
things that we get so, we get so, concerned about and worried
about that they're not so important, are they? They're not so important. They find it easier to forgive
and easier to love and easier to let go of those things that
are so much a part of our life in this world. Turn with me over,
we've spent a few weeks and a few months actually in 1st 2nd Peter,
turn over to 2nd Peter and let me remind you of a passage in
2nd Peter along these same lines. As I said, this is not, The coming
of Christ and being with this is not an obscure theme in God's
word. It is the message of salvation. This is the believer's hope. Second Peter chapter three, look
at verse 11. Seeing then that all these things
shall be dissolved. The things of this world are
gonna be dissolved. The things that we get so caught
up in. What manner of persons ought
you to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and
hastening unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens,
being on fire, shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with
a fervent heat? Nevertheless, we, according to
his promise, look for a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth
righteousness. This is our hope. This is our
hope. Lord, turn my eyes upon Jesus. Look full in his wonderful face. And the things of this earth
will grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace.
Isn't that the way it is? Go back with me to that verse
we just read in 2 Thessalonians 1, verse 11. Fulfill all the
good pleasure of his goodness. Oh, Moses. Moses had seen the 10 plagues
of Egypt? Well, before that, he saw the
Lord. He saw the bush burning, didn't
he, that was not consumed. And he heard the voice of God
speak to him there. And then he went to Egypt and
saw the plagues. And then he saw the dividing
of the Red Sea. And then he saw the mountain
quake. The manna that fell from heaven
and the water that came from the rock and all these glorious
manifestations of God's glory that Moses saw, he experienced
those things. And then he said, Lord, show
me your glory. Show me your glory. And the Lord
said, in order for you to know my glory, I'm gonna have to put
you in a rock. I'm gonna have to hide you in
a cleft of a rock and I'll pass by my goodness will pass by to
you." Now that's what Paul's saying here, to fulfill all the
good pleasure of his goodness. What is the good pleasure of
his goodness? Christ is the good pleasure of his goodness. Surely David said in Psalm 23,
surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my
life and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever, forever. David said in Psalm 17, verse
15, as for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness and
I shall be satisfied when I awake. with thy likeness." I'm not going
to be satisfied as long as I'm in this world. I'll be satisfied
when I awake with thy likeness. To see him in the fullness of
his glory and the goodness of his grace. Right now, we look
through a glass darkly, don't we? We know in part and And when
we cry, Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief. But in that
day, there'll be no unbelief. We'll see him in full righteousness. That he will fulfill, fulfill
all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith
with power. Faith is the work of God and
it takes the power of God to cause an unbeliever to believe. It's a spiritual birth. It's
a work of grace in the heart that only God can do. And what
Paul's saying, oh, this is my prayer, that the power of God
would give you the faith to believe on Christ and to look to Him
and rest in Him and watch for Him and wait for Him. A man said, what work can I work? What can I do to work the works
of God? Well, the Lord said, this is the work of God that
you believe on him whom he has sent. And he wasn't saying you
believe in order to do the work of God, he was saying your believing
is the work of God. It is the work of God that enables
you to believe. It is the power of God and it's
all to his grace. Look at verse 12 in our text,
that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you
and you in him according to the grace of our God and the Lord
Jesus Christ, that he'd be glorified in you. The Lord Jesus Christ in our
hearts would be glorified. that we would rejoice in Him
and give to Him all the praise and all the glory. That's the power of God. That
your heart would be filled with rejoicing and thanksgiving because
you know that your salvation is all of grace, it's all of
God. And you've seen enough of him, you've tasted of the heavenly
gift. That's what the scripture says. If you've tasted of the heavenly
gift, you've had just a little taste, a foretaste of glory divine. And the fullness of his glory
is going to be revealed in that day. That he may be glorified in you
and you in him. I must look outside of myself to find the glory of God. I must
look to Christ. And when the Lord Jesus Christ
is glorified in heaven, he's gonna parade his bride as
the trophy of his grace before all of creation and show what
he did. How beautiful, how beautiful
she's going to be in him. How perfect. Here's our hope. This is the believer's hope. According to the grace of our
God. But there must be a falling away
first. The seeds of the falling away
had already begun. We find this word falling away in
one other place in the New Testament. If you'll turn back with me to
Acts chapter 21. And I have to I have to tell you, I don't understand
James in this passage. James, this is the James that
wrote the epistle of James. This was the pastor of the church
of Jerusalem. And I just don't even know what
he was thinking. But Paul comes back from his
missionary journey to the Gentiles, and he reports back to the other
apostles in Jerusalem. about what God had done in saving
the Gentiles. And they rejoice in the message. And then in chapter 21, look
with me at verse 21. Verse 20, and when they heard
it, they glorified the Lord and said unto him, thou seest brother
how many thousands of Jews there are which believe and they are
all zealous of the law. James says to Paul, that's wonderful
what God did among the Gentiles, but look at all the thousands
of Jews there are in Jerusalem and they're all zealous for the
law. And they've heard, they have
been informed of thee that thou teachest all the Jews which are
among the Gentiles. See that word forsake? It is
the word apostate. It's the same word and it's the
only other place where it's used in the New Testament. It's the
same word that's in our text. In 2 Thessalonians 2, there must
first be a falling away from the gospel. And now they're saying,
it's been reported that you are teaching the Jews out there among
the Gentiles to forsake or to apostate Moses, saying that they
ought not to circumcise their children, need to walk after
the customs. You don't have to follow after
these Old Testament customs anymore. Do therefore this that we say
to thee, we have four men which have a vow on them, them take
and purify thyself with them and be at charges with them,
that they may shave their heads and all may know that these things
where they were informed concerning thee are nothing. but that thou
thyself also walketh orderly and keepest the law. He's not
talking about the moral law, he's talking about the ceremonial
law because now what James is telling Paul to do is enter into
a Nazarite vow. We've got four faithful men here
that have made a Nazarite vow. They've shaved their heads. What
was the end of the Nazarite vow? A blood sacrifice. A blood sacrifice. And James is encouraging Paul
to quiet the opposition by conforming to the Old Testament types and
enter into this, well God didn't let, Paul started But the Lord
didn't let him finish. A riot broke out and Paul was
arrested and ends up on his way to Rome. God didn't let it happen. What
am I saying? The falling away, the seeds of
the falling away had already begun. They had already begun. It was already within the church
membership, a man that were promoting the law as a necessary means
of salvation. And then, now this would have been around 50
AD, John wrote around the late 90s. So 50 years later, when
John writes, he says the Antichrist is already among us. So now there
was a full-blown apostasy. 50 years later, the church had
become apostate. What did they do? They forsook
the gospel and brought in to the church A works salvation. And that's what Paul's referring
to in 2 Thessalonians when he says the coming of Christ can't
happen until there be a falling away. Has there ever been in the history
of the church as many who call themselves followers of Christ
who have fallen away. They have denied the gospel of
God's grace and they have added to the work of Christ their own
works. And here's what I'm saying. If the Lord has kept us from
falling away, And we have reason to rejoice that our salvation
is all of him and that we haven't been caught up. That's what Paul
said there in 2 Thessalonians, don't let your mind be deceived
by these apostates. Your eternal life is at stake
here. And if Christ is your life and
he's all and he's in all and he's all your salvation and you're
not adding anything to him, then you have reason to rejoice in
knowing that he has kept you. And that all of his promises,
all of his promises to reveal himself in you and for you to
be glorified in him is your hope, is your hope. Our heavenly father, thank you
for your word. Thank you for the hope of salvation. Thank you for the work of your
spirit that causes us to find all the hope of our eternal life
in the glorious person and accomplished work of thy dear son. For it's
in his name we pray, amen. 304, let's stand together. Savior, more than life to me,
I am clinging, clinging close to Thee. Let Thy precious blood
apply, keep me ever, ever near Thy side. ? Every day, every
hour ? Let me feel thy cleansing power ? May thy tender love to
me ? Bind me closer, closer, Lord, to thee ? Through this
changing world below Lead me gently, gently as I go,
trusting Thee I cannot stray. I can never, never lose my way. Every day, every hour, ? Let
me feel thy cleansing power ? May thy tender love to me ? Bind
me closer, closer, Lord, to thee ? Let me love thee more and more
Till this fleeting, fleeting life is o'er Till my soul is
lost in love In a brighter, brighter world above Every day, every
hour ? Let me feel thy cleansing power ? May thy tender love to
me ? Bind me closer, closer, Lord, to thee