Our text today is particularly
in 1 Timothy 1.15, but we'll get to that. So how about we
begin in prayer. Heavenly Father, it is true that
there's not one thing that we can do in this world without
your grace, your strength, and your help. And we just praise
you that. We have that in your Son, our
Lord Jesus Christ. I pray, Father, that you will
cause us to have empty hearts when we come to your word, Heavenly
Father, that you might fill them. I pray that you continue to reveal
the wonders of the glory of your Son, even in the small and everyday
things of our lives, Heavenly Father. Help us to know, help
us to see that grace, that amazing those amazing miracles that are
constant in our lives, if you'll give us the eyes to see. And
I pray, Heavenly Father, as we come to your Word today, that
you'd be pleased to just move in our hearts, to cause your
gospel to take root in our hearts, to bring refreshment to our souls,
comfort to us and to strengthen us. We thank you, Heavenly Father,
for church and the great opportunity is to come and be reminded again
and again of our great King and Saviour and his finished work
on our behalf. Father, give us love for your
gospel. I pray you bring unity in that
love amongst us. and give us compassion for this
world of sin that we live in. And pray all things for your
glory sake, heaven and father, and for the good of your people.
We pray in the name of our King and Saviour. Amen. So yeah, 1
Timothy 1.15 is, the verse I want to look at eventually.
This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am
chief. And I particularly want us to
consider the term chief of sinners or of whom I am chief, because
we hear it used so often in the world, don't we? It's used in one way or another
by either religion or just the world itself. So often we hear
people in religion say, well, I'm the chief of sinners. And
yet it's almost a cliche. It seems to come across as an
intellectual acknowledgement that they do sin sometimes. rather
than an enlightened view of just how fallen that particular individual
feels before the holiness of God. See, it's not much different
in the rest of the world. People often say, no one's perfect. Everyone makes mistakes, but
they say it. Well, they seem to say it as
if to justify their own bad behavior. and to pacify their own troubled
conscience. I don't know about any of you,
but my time in religion, I would use that term very often
and it would, in a sense, be something that was false humility,
something designed to elevate my righteousness before men.
and in some senses have men look at their own works and activities
in a way that esteems me for my activities. But when the Lord
taught me the gospel, all that changed. I came to see my sin in light of the holiness of God
rather than in the light of the knowledge of good and evil that
men have I saw the value of the gospel
in the most amazing ways and the need of the gospel in the
most amazing ways. And one of the most important
things God taught me was that I sin in everything I do and
I have absolutely no chance of attaining to the required holiness
to be in the presence of God. In our text today, this is a
personal declaration by the Apostle Paul, and he calls himself the
chief of sinners. See, it's another faithful witness
of the gospel in the scriptures, and I'd like us to understand
particularly why Paul introduces this term here. I'd like to understand it in
light of the context that he uses it in. So I guess my hope
today is the Lord would be pleased to reveal to us just what Paul's
meaning in this statement and how it should relate to all of
us today. So I just want to begin by reading
through the chapter and just look at the context and exactly
how this expression fits into this passage here. So I just
want to start at verse one and we'll just read through and I'll
make some comments and see where the Lord takes it all. So it
starts, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the commandment of
God our Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope. So you see here, Paul has received
the commandment directly from God. And in a sense, the scriptures
are God the Spirit speaking to us. And so there's a sense there
where with this appointment by God, it's God speaking, and he's
speaking God's truth. In verse two, he says unto Timothy,
my own son in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God our
Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. And so we have Paul talking with
authority to Timothy, a son in the faith. And we need to see
the picture here. Paul represents the truth and
authority of God, and Timothy here represents believers. He
represents the church. So Paul's writing to Timothy
in the first letter. And it's interesting to note
what the greatest priority here is between the Lord and his people. So verses three and four. As
I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into
Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no
other doctrine. Neither give heed to fables and
endless genealogies, which minister questions rather than godly edifying,
which is in faith." And then he says, so do. So it's interesting,
he's preempted a problem in the church, he's left Timothy there
when he went away, and he's given this charge to Timothy. And of
all the things they could be talking about, this one is of
the greatest priority. It's purity of the gospel, isn't
it? Now there's some, he says, And
he doesn't mention names, but there's always some, isn't there? Thankfully, it's not all in this
church, but there are some that trouble, some that have turned
from the truth. It's a great picture of ourselves,
even after, well, ourselves after conversion. We're faithful in
so many ways and we long to be more faithful. And we grasp the
scriptures Lord willing with a passion. We come before our
God with an understanding to some degree of the gravity of
his presence. And yet our flesh is ever present
within us. And just when we think things
are going well, Our flesh. The Lord, using our flesh, pulls
the rug out from under our feet and humbles us again and causes
us to realize, in some senses, we still are the same sinners
in the flesh. The greatest charge is that you
preach no other doctrine. There is just one truth. Any diversion from that one singular
truth And it's a lie. In fact, it's the same lie that
Satan told in the garden. And look how it's described in
verse four, fables. Anything other than the truth
is a fable. It's a story. It's a theory. It's come from man's men's wisdom. It's not the truth of God. An endless genealogy, so many
times, so many people we see in the scriptures and in religion
like to tell us of their credentials, where they come, where their
authority has come, how they've achieved their position and what
we should do to follow them in their footsteps. Paul's authority
is from God. And to divert from this one truth leaves questions, doesn't it?
It doesn't answer any problems. It doesn't solve any problems.
It leaves questions. It leaves confusion. The law doesn't save. It doesn't solve the problem.
The law, in a sense, is the problem to sinners. But that one truth, that one
gospel that we declare, it edifies. To edify is to grow, to strengthen,
to comfort, to teach. to bring forth fruit to God. See, the issue of law and its
purpose is misunderstood so often in church. Where does the law
fit in? Let's read on. Verse five, now
the end of the commandment is charity, or that word's love.
Love out of a pure heart and of a good conscience and of faith
unfeigned. See, the end of the law, the
purpose of the law, the result, the goal in the law, in a sense,
the fulfilment of the law, the outworking of the law is love. You see, if we could ever possibly
keep the law, We would cause no offense. No offense to God. No offense to men. We would love
God. We would love the souls of men. And this love, unlike man's love,
it's a real love. See, it's a love that works in
the hearts of people by the work of the Holy Spirit. See, we can
only ever have a pure heart if God causes us to be cleansed
through faith in Him. We can only ever have peace with
God in our Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. And when the Lord strengthens
our faith, we walk in this world as sinners saved by grace. So the way of faith is the only
way to approach our holy God. And yet in verse six, some, having
swerved, have turned aside unto vain jangling. They've turned aside. They've
diverted and changed paths. They've consciously projected
the truth. See, it's an active projection
of theirs. Just as Adam did in the garden,
and just as we still do every single day. The word vain means empty, of
no substance, no help to you. And jangling, you can read a
little bit more about it in 1 Corinthians 13. But it's just noise. It's just words. And it doesn't
bring any comfort. It doesn't bring any relief.
And the Lord certainly doesn't inhabit it. Verse seven, where
does it all come from? They desire to be teachers of
the law. See, it's their desire. It's
their fleshly lust being fulfilled. And yet, they don't understand
what they say, nor whereof they affirm. See, they seek the esteem
of men. They seek to elevate themselves.
I did it in a religion. They give God's glory to man. The law in the wrong hands teaches
salvation by the wisdom and work of men. It's the same work Satan
did in the garden in Genesis 3. See, basically, in their role
as teachers, they don't know what they're saying, but they
are leading others. They're compelling others. And
it's the case of the blind leading the blind. If you have a look
there, they also affirm what they say. It means that they actually trust
in their own righteousness. It's a delusion. Their activities,
their words, and the way they treat others affirm their error. But believers know different,
don't they? Look at verse eight. But we know. When we meet the
Lord in conversion, there's a great deal we learn, and we never stop
learning. But we know that the law is good
if a man use it lawfully. It's good. It's successful. It gives glory to God and it
brings sinners to Christ. Lawfully means to use properly.
And like everything, to use it according to the scriptures.
To use it for its original, for its right intention. which is
God's purpose. See, law is actually our problem. And we'll look at it a little
bit more in a minute, but law's our problem. It's not the cure.
Law can never make anyone qualified into the presence of God. And
it's not that there's a problem with the law, it's that there's
a problem with our flesh. Believers also know, just looking
at verse 9 and 10, that the law is not made for a righteous man,
but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners,
for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers,
for manslayers, for whoremongers, for them that defile themselves
with mankind, for men-stealers, for liars, for perjured persons,
and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine." So the law's not made for a righteous
man. The only way we can know we're
righteous, in a sense, is for the law to test us. And if the law tests us and there's
no offence, then there's no condemnation. But we know that a righteous
man is a reference to the saints, isn't it? Those chosen from eternity
by God. Those who have been enveloped
in unity in the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and by His finished
work are presented righteous for all eternity. And in our conversions, when
we meet Christ and He comes and takes residence up inside us,
we know that He's the end of the law for righteousness. under law, we're under grace. We don't have to fulfill the
law. It's been fulfilled on our behalf. Now there's a list of sin there
and I'm not going to go into it, but what I will say is the
scriptures so often use physical illustrations to show a greater spiritual problem. And while these things are sin
in this world, and they do cause offense to God, and they do impair
one another, they often indicate a much deeper and much greater
problem that lies in every one of us. They're contrary, contrary, contrary. They're in opposition to the
truth. They contradict the truth. They're an alternative by man's
imagination. And they're a diversion from
sound doctrine. Sound means faithful. It means
reliable. It means a firm foundation, unerring. So what is sound doctrine? Well, we don't have to look too
far. Verse 11, according to the glorious gospel of the blessed
God, which was committed to my trust. The gospel is sound doctrine. Now all the scriptures, Old Testament
and New, all speak of the one subject. of the finished work
of the Lord Jesus Christ on behalf of the children of God. So we're still left with this
issue here of the law. And we need to look just briefly
as we go on, where the law fits into this passage. Again, we understand the law
from the scriptures. In Romans 3, the law brings the
knowledge of sin. In Romans 5, it sheds a light
on sin and sin abounds. See, the law reveals and it exposes
sin. But it can't save, it's a precursor. in a sense, to the presence of
God. It's an expression, to some degree,
of God's holiness. Like the tree of knowledge of
good and evil in the garden. Like the conscience that every
one of us walked out of that garden with. Like the flaming
sword that stands preventing the way into God's presence.
and even like a Mosaic law. All of them are an expression
of the perfect holiness of God. The law is a complete package.
And so if you enter the law at one point, you are obligated
to fulfill that whole law. absolute perfection at every
point, at every moment of your whole life. James tells us if
we break that law at one point, it doesn't matter how well we've
kept it, we're guilty of it completely. And in Romans 7, the Lord's spiritual
So as I said earlier, all sin, in a sense, is an illustration
with a spiritual connotation. Murder, adultery, they're used
throughout the scriptures. Most of these are used throughout
the scriptures, indicating a far greater problem in the religion
of men rather than the works of men. I'll give you a good example.
So often we're confronted by the sin of the world and it seems
lately homosexuality has made it into the limelight and we deal with it so often and
we see it promoted and reveled in in society and yet if you
read Romans 1 you'll see that homosexuality is, in the physical
sense, is an indicator of a much greater problem of the arrogance
of men's morality in religion, to be honest. And so all these
things, in a sense, show that the problem is much deeper than
what we realise. I guess the fact that the law
is spiritual opens a whole new realm to us. When we look at
things through physical eyes, through our fleshly eyes, we
compare everything to our wisdom. And yet when the Lord takes us
to a place where we look at the law spiritually, we see that
the only comparison is to the perfection of our God. which
causes us to be undone again. Look at Paul in Philippians 3.
The Holy Spirit allows him to write that he was perfect under
the law. Now, I can only think that there was, in a sense, a
physical perfection that he fulfilled all the right and proper sacrifices
because of his sin. We know from Hebrews that it's
not a true salvation. But Paul kept the law and his
morality would have just shamed all of us. And yet then he met
the Lord in saving grace. And according to him in Romans
7, he was undone. No matter how moral he was, When it came to facing God, his
morality was of no use to him, no help. And in fact, it had
been a hindrance in his life. Paul's experience of grace, our
experience of grace, completely dethrones man in our hearts. And that's a good thing. that
leaves only glory to God. Glory to God for doing all in
our restoration through the finished work of His Son, our Lord Jesus
Christ. It's important that the gospel
continues in this world. And it does because God takes
up residence in His people. and their witness becomes genuine. And God works through this world,
saving others through the gospel declaration. He's worked in the
hearts of his people and he's been doing it from generation
to generation, which is why Timothy's called a son here. Verse 18. This charge I commit
unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went
before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare. So these prophecies that went
before are the Old Testament. And it's interesting that the
Old Testament was what prompted Paul to write to Timothy about
this charge. And yet that same gospel is the
weaponry, the equipping for this war that Paul speaks about here. If you want to know more about
the war, you can just look at 2 Timothy and he'll explain far
more about it than I've got time to do here. But it's the same
gospel in the New Testament and the Old Testament. It's according
to the scriptures. It produces genuine and acceptable
offerings to God. Colossians 1 tells us that it's
the gospel that produces fruit in us, not our morality, not
the law. It's the gospel. It's the good
news of the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ in spite
of who we are. Hebrews 13 tells us that that
fruit is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to our God. See,
our declaration of the gospel, a genuine declaration from a
heart that's met the Lord, that's our vows. We're paying our vows
in that when we read in the scriptures. It's our offering. It's our tribute
to God. It's our incense. It's our praise to him. The gospel
is our Lord Jesus Christ. He is our gospel. which is why
the warfare is so important. There is just one truth and we
constantly, every single one of us constantly revert back
to the error in one direction or another. So this is why gospel
purity is so important to Paul here and to the church throughout
all the ages. It's why it should be really
important to us. See, the gospel's our only hope,
the only hope we have of salvation. And so we see again, just like
Genesis 3, we either trust in our God or we trust in some degree
in man, which is why Paul goes on in
verse 19 saying, holding faith and a good conscience which some,
having put away, concerning faith have made chipper." See, it's
faith, faith like Abraham, completely trusting our God for all the
righteousness necessary to be in union with him. It's a good
conscience, that peace that I spoke of, that we can only get from
the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. bringing us into our Father's
presence, a work that was done before the foundation of the
world. But these people have put those things away, haven't
they? And it's willful. They've done
it purposely. And again, like Genesis 3, they've
rejected the truth of the gospel. And they're shipwrecked. It's such a heavy subject. So the shipwreck depicts failure. They're unsuccessful in their
attempts to enter into the presence of God in their own wisdom and
works. They're unseaworthy, sunken, destroyed, overwhelmed by the
water, which is interesting, isn't it, that he uses that here?
because the water depicts the word of truth. And possibly it speaks of an
eternal destination. Again, carrying the gravity of
the matter. But our gospel, our gospel gives
hope, even to the chiefest sinners, saving even to the uttermost. Verse 20, of whom is Hymenos
and Alexander, whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn
not to blaspheme. I struggled with this, I really
did. It's a very fearful thing to
think of this. The fact that these guys have
been named, whereas in the passage there's some here doing this
and some, these guys have been named and their names will, the
Lord's word, all things will pass away except this word. These
guys have been named for eternity. And so Paul specifically warns
Timothy of these troublemakers in the church. But it's a shocking
term, isn't it? Delivered under Satan. And so I did struggle with this
and it's, there's a whole sermon in it in itself, but, but these people are undermining
the gospel and they're opposing God in that fight of faith. And
if God's in the midst of that, then they fight against him.
And it's a good question for us all to ask. We're here today.
Is God in the midst of this? Has God begun work? Is it God
that continues this work and keeps us faithful in it? If it
is, anyone who opposes the preaching of the gospel here isn't opposing
us. They're opposing God Himself.
They're rebelling against God themselves. It's a fearful saying. Paul uses
it in 1 and 2 Corinthians, and I don't want to turn there because
it's a different issue, but he uses that statement in a sense. He's giving them over like the
Lord gives people over in Romans 1. And he's letting them go their
own way. which is the way of the flesh,
which is the captivity of Satan it was since Genesis 3. But even in this, there's hope,
and I'm so thankful to find some sort of hope here. He says that they may learn not
to blaspheme. I guess at the end of the day,
if people reject the gospel, especially if they oppose it,
We need to just let them go. We need to trust that no matter
what their sin is, that if they're the Lord's in time, he'll bring
them back. We need to trust that the gospel
that we declare is the truth, and it is the power of salvation,
and that just maybe the Lord will work it in such a way that
it might just really teach them and hopefully restore them. Again,
in your own time, if you read that one and two Corinthians,
when you get to two Corinthians, you'll see there was a restoration.
There's always hope. And thankfully, we don't know
who the Lord's children are. We just have one mission, to
keep this message faithful. So just briefly looking at the
context, we have God speaking through Paul, he's speaking to
Timothy, he represents the church. We're dealing with the most serious
issue ever in this world, the purity of the gospel and the
rightful purpose of the law in the scriptures. And this discussion about law,
particularly its exposure of sin, has caused Paul to testify
of the grace that he personally found in the Lord Jesus Christ,
in spite of his own religious or moral performances, whether
good or bad. See, Paul's declaring the gospel
from his own personal experience, and looking at sin, its exposure
by the law has brought him here to this place. So let's look
back at our text, verse 15. This is a faithful saying worthy
of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to
save sinners of whom I am chief. and particularly this term of
Hermon chief or chief of sinners. So I just want to briefly now
consider the term and what Paul actually means. It's personal,
isn't it? It's a true witness that only
comes from a true experience of grace. So I've put down a
few reasons why this applies to each one of us in regard to
this statement being chief. Firstly, believers know that
every man stands responsible to God for his own sin. And our own sin, as revealed
in our conversions for believers, should be the most important
issue, not the sins of others. We're the ones that have to deal
with God over our sins. Second, we know that vengeance
is mine, saith the Lord. Romans 12. We're not to judge
another man's servant. Romans 14. All created beings are servants
to the Most High God in one way or another, and everyone stands
or falls not according to their activities. Everyone stands or
falls according to their master's will, who in this case is sovereign
over all things. and is able to make a man stand
if he so pleases. We don't have the wisdom to know
who the Lord's people are in this world. There's some indicators,
but we never really know, and we won't know this side of eternity. We may often judge people for
their sin, and find out later on that the
Lord had saved those people from eternity, and in His eyes, they've
had no sin. And at that point, we're like
Satan, just bringing the law as an accuser. Thirdly, we also
know that we have a union with our father, Adam, and that in
some way, by that union, Adam's sin is our sin. Each of us has union with all
humanity in Adam. And we can't possibly know the
circumstances that have led others to sin. But more importantly, we don't
know how we've influenced them in their lives. And so often
in a very real way, their sin is to some degree also our sin. Fourth, we know who we are by
nature, don't we? Our conversions teach us that
we have just the same potential to sin that lies in everyone
else. And even after our conversion,
that is still an issue for believers. We know that given the same circumstances
so often, we would do worse than what we look upon in this world.
Again, our own condition should be our priority before God. Fifth, we know that the law of
spiritual, I mentioned a little bit earlier on, and that the
physical illustrations we see in the scriptures and in the
world around us have a much deeper spiritual reality. So the sin that we observe in
this world should cause us, as it did Paul here in our text,
to consider ourselves not in light of man's wisdom, not in
a comparison to other men and their progress in this world,
but to consider it in light of the holiness of God. which makes
our own sinfulness all the more serious. And six, we can only know our
own heart responses to God. Circumstances, external evidence,
they don't ever fully reveal what's going on in a person's
heart. Each one of us has enough problems
with our own insincerity toward God. Look at the gravity of the gospel
purity in Paul's eyes. Should that not be our own attitude
to these things? So often, especially lately,
we seem to be constantly confronted by a society that openly and
even encourages gross wickedness. So often the Lord's people are
left like just like. They're vexed in their souls
by this world of sin that surrounds us and this rebellion against
our God left, right and center. But the question for us all is
how do we deal with these things that we might be faithful to
our God? and faithful to the souls of others. See, it's really
easy for us to become the Pharisee of Luke 18 who trusts himself
for righteousness and despises others of less morality. See, even though we've met the
Lord in saving grace, even though we've received a new nature,
we still retain the old man of the flesh, that Pharisee within
all of us who approaches God on the basis of man's wisdom
and works. The Pharisee that compares his
own moral performance with that of other men, and why? In an attempt to pacify his own
troubled conscience. We've all heard the term, there
but by the grace of God, go I. It's such a lie. Really, when
we look at this world, we should just say, there go I. What a hope in all this the Apostle
Peter is for us all. In Galatians, he fell from grace,
just like we all do. For a time he rejected the grace
of God for the works of men. And you know what? All he did
was move his cup and his plate. When the Jews came, he moved
from eating with the Gentiles. Imagine how those believing Gentiles
felt. They were shunned, suddenly shunned
by Peter. Imagine their confusion in regards
to the gospel. Thankfully, God strengthened
Paul and preaching the gospel, Paul withstood Peter and Peter
was restored. We should thank God for his glorious
gospel. And we should thank God for faithful
witnesses like Paul. And we should ask our Lord to
strengthen us and to guard us against that same feeling, that
same thinking, that same view of this world and its relationship
to God. we should be thankful to our
God. Recently, just briefly before
we finish, I just want to mention, when
we first started as a church for a period there, we had the
opportunity and the great privilege to bring meals here in the building. to meet people that were homeless
and meet people that were struggling and in bondage to great many
sin and problems. And the Lord was pleased to cause
us to have the time to spend with
these people. And quite a number of them came
in for a while and we got great opportunities to speak with them.
And we were honest with them from the start. We had an agenda.
We didn't want it to be secret. We wanted to make it known that
we were here looking for opportunities to share the gospel with these
people faithfully. And we had a great number of
people come and a lot of different and varied responses to what
we were doing. But there was a particular gentleman,
and I think he was actually 10 years older than me, and amazingly
he looked about 15 years younger than me. He had, I don't know,
he had 15 kids or something, quite a large amount of kids.
But he'd been, it's such a good opportunity to sit and talk with
sinners in relation to the gospel. he shared that he had such horrific
circumstances in his childhood and in his life leading up to
things. And when we met him, he was in such bondage to so
many issues. And I think the medical team
in Nowra probably know him, some of them that I know do. But when
we met him 10, 15 years ago, this guy was on their store,
he was, It was well known that if he had even one drink, he
would die. And at that time that we were
talking, he wasn't drinking, but he had other issues and other
problems. And he was just such a lovely
guy. And of so many people that came and had attitude towards
us, this guy just smiled and embraced what we were saying.
And who knows where it went. And throughout the community,
week after week, so often we saw him, you know, and we saw
him in the most terrible condition and it worried us. And we rode
in a sense like a roller coaster. But we just used to keep seeing
him in the crowd year after year. I saw him only a few months back.
I said, I'm pretty sure it was him. And it was just his face
looking at me through the crowd. And I went, wow, this guy's still
alive. And this guy's heard the gospel
and who knows what the Lord will do. And what a miracle he's still
walking around. The other day I heard he'd passed
away. and I was preparing this message
and I just thought of this importance and this gravity and this guy
was in such bondage he had absolutely no hope of saving himself and
it was obvious it was clear none of us have any hope of saving
ourselves but this guy was clear and these guys used to tell me
that they'd see the people in town looking at them and the
looks that they would get. And even though people in town
didn't realize, these guys were feeling that and feeling the
shame. And I'm so thankful to God that he created a situation
where we could be honest with these guys, where he moved us
in love to tell these guys the gospel. See, the greatest way
we can love anyone on this earth is to preach the gospel to them,
to love their souls more than they love themselves. to remember
that salvation's not about activities, and it comes to the greatest
of sinners, to the uttermost. It was an incredible privilege,
and I don't know what happened to that gentleman, but I do know that the Lord put
him on my heart for a lot of years, and it crushed me a bit
when I heard. But again, the only hope I have
is that this guy heard the truth, that one of those times, maybe
the Lord would apply that to him. But if I was feeding them to
glorify myself, and I was meeting with them to glorify myself,
and to flog them into a new bonnage, which would be the law, I'm not loving their soul. And
so I suppose coming back to our text, there is a gravity. that
we have here and a reason for what we're doing here as a church. And there's a reason to fight
hard for the purity of the gospel, because the greatest enemy of
the gospel lies in each one of us, that Pharisee within us. So may God give us the grace
to be compassionate and loving to the souls of other sinners
like ourselves, May you give us opportunities and hearts that
look for those opportunities. And when the time comes, may
you give us the gospel to proclaim again, but a gospel from our
own experience, not just a theory. Let's pray.