Well, let's open our Bible together
in Acts chapter 17. I really just want to look at
mostly the third verse, but we follow Paul on his journey. Now
when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they
came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews.
And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them. And three
Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, opening
and alleging that Christ must needs have suffered and risen
from the dead, and that this Jesus whom I preach unto you
is Christ." In the beginning of verse 4 it says, "...and some
of them believed." Where the Gospel goes, there will be some
of them who believe. Paul's manner was quite simply
to preach the Word. That's what his instruction to
Timothy was. You preach the Word. He says
in 1 Corinthians 1 that he just preached the word. He preached
the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. In 1 Corinthians 1.23, we preach Christ crucified unto
the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, but
unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the
power of God, and the wisdom of God. And in 1 Corinthians 2, he says,
for I determined, it was Paul's determination, not to know anything
among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. There's one purpose
of the church in this world, is to preach Jesus Christ and
Him crucified. Preach the Jesus of the scriptures.
Preach him out of the scriptures. He reasoned with them out of
the scriptures. Thirty times in the New Testament
the phrase is used, as it is written. as it is written. When he reasoned with them out
of the scriptures, he didn't have the New Testament scriptures,
he reasoned with them out of the Old Testament scriptures.
I love what that word reasoned with them means. It can mean
to dispute or discuss, but it also can be to lay one thought
alongside another thought. The scriptures picture the Lord
Jesus Christ both in prophecy that's so plain and clear that
no other human being in all of history can be related to it
in any way at all. But also the Lord Jesus Christ
is pictured in type, isn't he? He's the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. He is the Passover Lamb. And
when God saw the blood, He passed over. When God sees the blood
of the Lamb, He passes over. I love what Scott Richardson
said about that. He said, I'm very, very thankful that God's
eyesight is much better than mine. When God sees the blood,
he passes over. He passes over. He sees the blood
of his son. Paul opens, he reasoned with
them, he opened the scriptures. he rightly divided the word of
God. As I said earlier, Paul was empowered
in his ministry by the Lord Jesus Christ. So this opening of the
scriptures is a spiritual work, which is way beyond the power
of men. And when God does an opening of the heart, as he did
with Lydia, which is the same word, when God opens the mind
and opens the heart, when God gives the seeing eye and the
hearing ear, when God comes with power, through the preaching
of his gospel. There is an opening. There is
an opening. I love how it's described in
Luke 24. You know the story well on that
day after the resurrection and those two disciples were walking
along the road to Emmaus, discouraged. Why on earth are they walking
away from Jerusalem and not going to the tomb? I have no idea.
But there they were walking away from Emmaus, discouraged and
disheartened about all the things that happened. And who should
turn up and walk alongside them? The Lord Jesus Christ. He does to his people today.
Disheartened and discouraged and wondering what's happening
in this world, he comes and he walks alongside them. And what did he do? He took the
scriptures, the Old Testament scriptures, and did exactly what
Paul did in Thessalonica, which is exactly what Paul did in all
of his other preaching, exactly what Peter and Philip and Stephen
and the others did. They just opened the scriptures.
He says to them, he says, O fools and slow of heart to believe
all that the prophets have spoken. And he uses almost the same words
as Paul there, ought not Paul says that Lord Jesus Christ's
must needs have suffered. Ought not the Christ to have
suffered these things and to enter into his glory. And beginning at Moses and all
the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures. What are all the scriptures about?
The things concerning himself. That's what this book that you
have in your hand is all about. It's all about him. And when they got to that inn,
I love what they said, having had this remarkable sermon of
the Lord Jesus Christ, they didn't know who it was, it was just
another man preaching to them. And they constrained him and
they said, abide with us, stay with us. That's what happens,
isn't it? These people consorted with Paul
and Silas. They wanted him to stay with
us. He had to be dragged away from Philippi. He had to be dragged
away from being in the fellowship of his children, his bride. And he broke bread, and he blessed
it, and he gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, verse
31, and they knew him, and he vanished out of their sight.
And they said one to another. So he vanished out of their sight
because they are now to hold on to the words of a messenger,
like Mary at the tomb. They're not to hold on to him,
they hold on to him proclaimed and preached. And then they said
to one another, verse three, did not our heart burn within
us while he talked with us by the way and while he opened to
us the scriptures? That's exactly what he does in
the preaching of the Gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ, by His
Spirit, comes and He opens to us the Scriptures. He preaches
Himself. He came as a preacher of Himself. He preaches that the Christ must,
needs, have suffered and risen from the dead. That this Jesus
whom I preach unto you is Christ. Isn't it wonderful in that, just
that simple declaration in that one verse, we have the God of
absolute sovereignty. The Christ must needs. He must needs. He was put to
death, Peter said on that day of Pentecost, he was put to death
by the determinant counsel and foreknowledge of God. All the scriptures, says Peter,
are talks about the suffering of Christ and the glory to follow. The Christ must needs. Everything
in this universe is a must need. That's why David, David died
with that wonderful thought of God in his mind, didn't he? He
has made with me an everlasting covenant. He made with me an
everlasting covenant, ordered and sure in every detail. That's your life, brothers and
sisters. That's the life of everyone in this world, ordered and sure
in every detail. and that's all His salvation,
all His desire. Christ must needs, He must needs
have suffered. Here we have a sovereign God,
a God of substitution. Why did He suffer? He suffered
because of His covenant union with His own. He suffered because
he took responsibility in that covenant of Christ for all of
their sins and for all of their entrance into heaven. Their sins
must be put away. He's risen from the dead. This
is a sovereign God who comes as a substitute, the Lamb of
God, who takes away the sins of the world, and He's risen
from the dead. Why has He risen from the dead?
The Scriptures make it abundantly clear He has risen from the dead,
because God says it is finished, and God is perfectly satisfied. He was put to death because of
our sins, and He was raised because of our justification. This Jesus,
the name Jesus means saviour, God's salvation, whom I preach
unto you. So this Jesus is a Jesus who
comes as a preached Jesus to you. We preach Christ crucified. And the result of this preaching,
some of them believed. The result of this preaching
is that people will believe. They will simply find themselves
trusting this Christ who is preached. Trust him for what? See, Paul says, I know whom I
have believed. And I'm persuaded that he is
able to keep that which I have entrusted unto Him against that
day." He's worthy of everything. He's
worthy of all of our trust. This Jesus, this Christ, is the Christ of God. I'll just
go through some of the verses in Acts. If you go back and recall,
you'll see that whenever they got up to preach, they preached
the Christ. In Acts 2.30, it's God would raise up Christ to
sit on his throne. In verse 31 of Acts 2, in that
great sermon on the day of Pentecost, when 3,000 people were saved,
he spoke of the resurrection of Christ. He was saying that
this is what the scriptures were talking about. This is what David
was talking about. Verse 36 is a glorious verse,
isn't it? There was a nonsensical thing going around years ago saying, Make Jesus Lord of your life.
Brothers and sisters, he was made Lord of your life a long,
long time ago. And you don't make him anything. God made him. God made him. That same Jesus
whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. When Peter healed
the lame man outside the temple, he said, in the name of Jesus
Christ of Nazareth, rise up. and walk. And when Peter, given
all of that trouble, was there called upon yet again to testify
to his Lord in verse 18 of chapter 3. But those things which God
before had showed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ
should suffer, he has so fulfilled. But the next verse, two verses
down in verse 20, he speaks of this repentance that he works
in the hearts of his people, and he speaks of this, times
of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord. How
we need that. Your sins are blotted out. Times
of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord, from
the very throne of heaven, and he shall send It's a remarkable
statement, isn't it? In the preaching of the gospel,
he shall send Jesus Christ, which was before preached unto you. Oh, what a wonder, brothers and sisters,
that the triune holy God would send his son to you. to remind his people that he
takes up residence in you. And that's the hope of glory,
isn't it? What a wonderful thing. No wonder
you could do anything to these apostles. You could beat them,
you could imprison them, you can beat them with rods, you
can put them in stocks, you can send them anywhere you like,
and they would just have one purpose in mind, wouldn't they?
They just wanted to preach Him. They wanted to preach Him. They
wanted to preach Him in His glory. They wanted to preach Him in
His absolute sovereignty. They wanted to preach Him as
the God who reigns in Acts 4, verse 26. Peter goes on to describe
Him, doesn't he? The kings of the earth stood
up and the rulers gathered together against the Lord and against
His Christ. That's Psalm 2, isn't it? What
does the God in heaven do when all the men conspire against
him? He laughs at the conspiracy of
men against his son. And then he offers a remarkable
invitation, doesn't he, at the end of Psalm 2. He says, kiss
the son. You cannot kiss the son unless
you're in intimate fellowship with him. He sends him close
so you can kiss him and hold him. They gathered together,
didn't they, for a truth, verse 27 of Acts 4, for a truth against
thy holy child Jesus whom thou hast anointed. Well, that's another
word for Messiah. It's another word for Christ.
Both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people
of Israel were gathered together. What were they doing? but they're
getting outside of the sovereignty of God, for to do whatsoever
thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done. Now in the midst of opposition,
their prayer is, and now, Lord, behold their threatenings and
grant unto thy servants that with all boldness they may speak
thy word. They cease not, Acts 5.42, they
cease not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. That was their
daily activity, that was the manner of their lives, that was
Paul's prayer, that was his desire. Put him in a Roman jail and he'll
seek an opportunity to preach Christ and the jailers will be
converted. put him beside a river with Lydia
and he'll preach to the Lord Jesus Christ. He just has one
message all the time. You never have to guess about
what Paul was going to preach. He took the Old Testament scriptures
and said, this Jesus, this Jesus of Nazareth, this one that was
crucified, this one is the Christ of God. And that's what we preach. Philip went down to Samaria.
What did he do in Samaria? He preached Christ to them. He
got beside the Ethiopian unit, and what did he do? He preached
Christ to him. See, why has God ordained preaching? Why has he ordained preaching?
Couldn't he just write it in great big letters across the
sky? Couldn't he do it in some other way? There's some remarkable
things, isn't there? There are remarkable statements
attached to preaching. How shall I call on him? whom
they have not believed, Romans 10, 14. And how shall they believe
in him whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without
a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent as
is written? How beautiful are the feet of them that preach
the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things. Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. And you cannot call upon the
name of the Lord unless he is preached to you. Preaching of the Gospel is the
power of God unto salvation. Why are people saved by the preaching
of the Gospel? So many people think that they
are saved by some miraculous and marvellous experience and
so often you meet people and you ask them about their Christian
lives and I talk to you about these wonderful, mystical, marvellous
experiences that they have had. And yet the scriptures are plain,
aren't they? That it's in the preaching of the gospel that
people hear. It's in the preaching of the
gospel that people will call. Well, the very first one is that
it's humbling. It's humbling. It's humbling
both to the preacher and it's humbling to the hearers. See, all the members of the Church
have a unity because there is one means of salvation. There
is one means of salvation. There is just one Gospel. There's one Jesus, one Lord,
one Christ, one baptism. So all of the people in Philippi
were saved exactly the same way. When Lydia and the jailer and
their households got together, what could they say about their
salvation? Was it in some mystical experience?
Was it on account of Lydia's religion for all of those years
and her devotion? See, it has nothing to do with
those things, brothers and sisters. It has to do with the sovereign
grace of God. See, people, God's people are
a chosen generation. They're called out. They're called
out by the preaching of the word of God. They are the children
of God. They are the children of God
from all eternity. And I love how Paul describes
them. describing these people and all other believers. All
of the children of God, in Galatians 4.6, he says, because you are
sons, because you were sons in eternal election, because you
were sons in adoption, in the counsel and purpose of God, because
you are sons, God sent forth the spirit of his son into your
heart, crying, Abba, Father. Abba, Father. The cries of the
Church are the cries of the Saviour. The closeness of His relationship
with His Father is the closeness of their relationship with their
Father. God's children are eternally
elected. God's children are adopted and
called sons. God's children come to life by
the word of truth preached to them. Of his own will begat he
us with the word of truth, says James 1.18. Peter says almost
exactly the same thing in his epistle to these scattered people. In 1 Peter 1.21, there's a remarkable
verse where he describes being born again. who by him, verse 21, who by
him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead and gave
him glory, that your faith and your hope might be in God. He speaks of these people, they're
being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by
the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. May God
grant us to preach the word of God with simplicity, with boldness,
with persistence, with love, with the desire for the glory
of God. and then wait. I love how Paul
describes the fact that he didn't come with guile and he wasn't
after anything from them. He wasn't after anything for
himself in terms of glory and he wasn't after their money and
he wasn't after their affirmation. They had one means of salvation. The appointed means of salvation
is the preaching of the gospel. God grants faith. So all of the churches of God,
they all had one experience, didn't they? God opened their
hearts and they all joined together. People who have an experience
and are left to cling to an experience will find that experience a snare
to them unless the Lord sets them free. and they simply have
their faith and their trust in the Christ of the Scriptures
preached to them. God ordains preaching as the
means of doing this. At the cross of the Lord Jesus
Christ all believers are equal. Lydia, a worshipper seeking God,
moral upright in all sorts of ways, no doubt. The jailer, a
pagan idolater, saved exactly the same way. When they got together, one thing
mattered. I love how this is a family,
the Lord is gathering his family together. But in his family,
in his family tree, our Saviour has five women named in the scriptures. You know Mary well. And she gets
a clean bill of health, generally, even though she acknowledged
that she was a sinner. But the other four are a remarkable picture
of what you are and what the Church of God is. Tamar, do you
remember Tamar, Genesis 38? She's in the genealogy of the
Lord Jesus Christ. What did Tamar do? She played the role of a prostitute
to get her father-in-law, Judah, to cause her to be pregnant. Now she was mistreated very badly
by Judah, indeed. But she's in the genealogy of
the Lord Jesus Christ. The next one in the genealogy
of the Lord Jesus Christ is Rahab. You know what her title is in
scripture? Rahab the harlot. Rahab the harlot. And people
want to try and say, well no, she wasn't a harlot, she was
an innkeeper. Rahab the harlot is what the scriptures describe
her as. She kept a brothel in a cursed city of Jericho. And she's in his genealogy, she's
in his family, brothers and sisters. See, we were and we are Tamars
and we are Rahabs. The next one in the genealogy
of the Lord Jesus Christ is Ruth. If you know something of the
history of the Moabite nation and trace them back to their
beginnings, what you do is you find the shameful liaison between
Lot and his daughters. That's how the Moabite nation
came to be. They were pagan idolaters and
sworn enemies of the Jews. But God, God has Ruth in his
genealogy and he calls her to himself like he called Rahab
to himself. The next lady in the family line
of the Lord Jesus Christ is Bathsheba. Now no doubt Bathsheba was shamefully
treated by David. and we have to give her the benefit
of the doubt. There's not a word in scripture about her protesting.
Rahab was an adulterer. Under the law of God, Rahab deserved,
by God's law, to be taken outside of that city and stoned to death. The point is simply, brothers
and sisters, that God saves sinners. God saves sinners. God makes
his people to know that they are sinners. God saves sinners. And he saves sinners with a great
salvation, because they're great sinners. And he saves them with
great grace. And he saves them in such a way
that he gets great glory to himself. And he saves them in such a way
that the Christ of God is revealed as all of their salvation. Not
them and their experiences, not them and their works, not them
and their history, not them and all of the other things that
they've done. He saves them because he saves them. I love what he
says in Deuteronomy. He says, he loves them because
he loves them. And the cause of his love is
not in them, it's in him. And God's children find the Christ
of God a delight. It's the one word, this word
Christ, that comprises all truth. He's uncreated, he's living,
He is the Eternal Word, and knowing Him is life eternal. That's that verse in John 17.
The Lord Jesus Christ prayed that prayer, didn't he? And this
is life eternal. This is everlasting life. This
is life with God in heaven and the new creation. This is life
with God now. This is life with God forever. This is eternal life. That they
might know thee, the only true God. And Jesus Christ, whom thou
hast sent, is the Christ of God. He's only known by revelation. He brings his people out of darkness
into the light, just like that Philippian jailer was brought
out of the darkness and he had to ask for a light, he had none
on him. They are brought from death to
spiritual life. He was at the point of death.
He had a foot almost, as it were, in hell and the Lord saved him. They have to have eyes opened
because they're blind. They have to have ears opened
because they're deaf. They're trapped in a pit. and
they have to be set free by an irresistible hand of God. It's
only known by revelation, it's only known through irresistible,
regenerating grace. The Philippian jailer wasn't
asking for anything, and God saved him. power, the power of our Christ
to chosen vessels of mercy and is only apprehended by faith. I love how Paul describes it
to the Colossians, all the riches of the full assurance of understanding
to the acknowledgement of the mystery of God and of the Father
and of Christ in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and
knowledge. They are hidden. They are hidden
from this world. Paul walked through those two
big famous cities. He walked through and he went
to Thessalonica. He came to Philippi and not to
those other cities in Macedonia. He comes revealing himself to
the elect of God and he reveals himself in their hearts and he
dwells in their hearts by faith. One of the lovely verses in the
Psalms, it says, let us magnify the Lord together. The purpose
of gospel preaching is to magnify the Lord Jesus Christ. As big
as he can be possibly imagined, it's not big enough. As glorious
as he can be possibly imagined, he's far more glorious. His union with his people, is
so close and so tender and more intimate than we can possibly
imagine. The great question that he asked
his disciples, isn't it, is what think ye of Christ? What do you think of him? Whom
do people say that I am? See, error is always multiple
choice. The truth is always clear, isn't
it? You see, ultimately, low views
of the person of Christ is behind every error and behind sin. False prophets lead to false
doctrines. False doctrines lead to false
gods. And false gods lead to false
devils, and devils lead men to hell. People want to try and
obscure the glory of God. They want to obscure His sovereignty.
They want to obscure His love. They want to nuance it, to cloud
it, so that the death of the Lord Jesus Christ is in some
way sufficient for all, if all would believe. We want to proclaim
a Christ who doesn't ever try to do anything. Isaiah says,
He shall not fail nor be discouraged. See, right views of the Lord
Jesus Christ is the foundation of all truth. We want to stand
as God would give us, like Paul and the others, just stand in
this world and cop whatever comes our way from those that oppose
the gospel. because if the truths of God
are obscured, if the perfections of God are obscured, if our God
is represented in a false light, then people are led to entertain
false ideas of God. There are countless billions
that have passed through this world and live in this world
now who firmly believe that God loves everyone and everything's
right with me because God loves everyone. and that Jesus died
for me and salvation's in my hand and I can do it as a matter
of my will at a time of my choosing. Brothers and sisters, that is
not the Christ of this book. Why did he pass through Apollonia
and Amphipolis? Did people die in Apollonia and
Amphipolis? between the time that Paul passed
through and the time the gospel came to them. Just as in Bithynia
and Asia, if people want to tell you that God loves everyone and
wants to save everyone, take them to Acts 16 and 17 and just
ask them to read. Our God doesn't try to do anything. That's why Paul says he must
needs. There always is, with all of
God's activities, a must needs. He went to Thessalonica because
there was a must needs. It was the time of love in Thessalonica,
just as it was the time of love for Lydia and her household beside
that river in Philippi. Our God is sovereign. When God
is represented in a false light, people are led to entertain false
ideas of God. And every single time they have
a false idea of God, a God of their imagination, they'll always
have one. that will float and vary as they
wish him to do. What does the psalmist say, Psalm
50? He says, the great accusation
of God against all of mankind is that you think that I'm altogether
like you. That's what Luther said to Erasmus,
didn't he? He said, your thoughts of God
are far too human. Your thoughts of God are far
too human. Our God is the sovereign God. What think you of Christ? What do you think of him? So what people believe is determined
by the who you believe. If you believe the God of the
Scriptures, you'll believe all of the doctrines of the Scriptures,
and you'll believe the Word of God, and you will find your rejoicing
in the things that the people of this world rejected. In Acts
chapter 13, Paul was run out of that town. He was run out
of that town for a statement that he made. in Antioch. He said, and by him all that
believe are justified. Not might be justified if you
do something, they're justified by the sovereign hand of God.
Justified. To be justified is to be in the
courts of God having never sinned. That's what it is to be justified.
God has no sin. He can remember no sin against
you. There is no sin to be charged
with against you. That's what it is to be justified.
Believers are justified from all things which you could not
be justified by the law of Moses. He put salvation and justification
in the hands of a sovereign God and people will rise up against
it because their sense of self-worth and righteousness is taken from
them. That was the question, wasn't
it, in the upper room. Philip said, show us the Father.
Show us the Father. And the Lord Jesus Christ said
to him, you've seen me, you've seen God. All you're ever going
to see of God, you're going to see in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Lord's Christ. We might
have to, for want of time, speak more of Him next week. But to
be the Christ is to be the prophet of God, to bring God's word to
us, to reveal God to us. To be the Christ, to be the Christ
is to be the great high priest to represent us before God. See, we need a prophet to bring
and to reveal God to us because we're so ignorant and blind. We need a priest to take us to
God because we are so sinful. To be the Christ is to be the
anointed of God And there were those three officers in Israel. And no man ever held all of them. The prophets were anointed, the
priests were anointed, the kings were anointed. And there were
kings like David who was both a prophet and a king. But in the Lord Jesus Christ,
we have God's prophet, God's priest, and God's king. He's the anointed one. We need
a prophet to reveal God to us, to speak to our hearts. We need
God, we need a priest to take us to God. We need a priest to intercede
for us. He ever lives to intercede. Do
you realise, brothers and sisters, right now in heaven's courtroom,
there is the Lord Jesus Christ bearing the marks of your sins
and mine in his own body. And what's he doing? He's interceding
for us. Father, forgive them, he cried
on the cross, for they know not what they do. And every single
one, every single one that he had in mind was forgiven. He intercedes with them. He is the great prophet. He brings God to us. He is the
great priest and he brings us to God. But we need him as a
king. He's the anointed king, our Messiah,
our Christ. We need him to make us one of
his subjects. Thy people shall be willing in
the day of thy power. We need him to make us poor in
spirit. We need him to be lord of lords
and king of kings. We need him to reign over us,
brothers and sisters. We have made a mess of our lives,
and every time we get the opportunity to exercise our will, we make
another mess of it all the time. But he reigns. The Christ of
God must needs have suffered and risen again. He's risen to
the throne of God. And what's the throne? that our
God sits on. Hebrews 4 says, it's a throne
of grace. I love the fact that we have
a throne of grace. I love the fact as much as that,
that we have a gracious savior who sits on that throne. To be
the Christ of God is to be him as God and as man. man in union with his own. That's why he must needs have
suffered. That's why he must needs have
died. That's why he must needs have
risen again. It's why he must needs rain.
It's why he must needs come to his people and gather his church
to himself and reveal himself to them again. And he must needs
come back and take them to heaven. And he must needs come and wrap
up this universe. And he must needs have a new
heavens and a new earth, the home of the righteous. And he
must needs dwell with them in such intimacy that on that great
day he takes his bride and he wipes every tear from her eyes
and she is loved infinitely, loved securely, loved eternally
because of our great Christ. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father
we Thank you for the wonder of your grace and mercy in our lives,
Heavenly Father, of sending your Son into this world to die for
sinners like us. And in wondrous grace and mercy,
Heavenly Father, you've chosen to come and reveal yourself to
us and gather us together and cause your Son to be lifted up
in our midst. Oh, our Heavenly Father, we do
it with such frailty and such weakness and such deep awareness of how
much more glorious He is. But we thank you, Heavenly Father,
for the measure of the Spirit that you've given us, and we
thank you for the Church that you gather together, for it's
the Church in which you have begun a good work. And you have
promised that it's a church in which you will complete that
work. And we praise you, Heavenly Father, that our God is faithful. We thank you for your promises.
We thank you that they are all yea and amen in our Lord Jesus
Christ. And Father, we don't know. We
talk about suffering and his suffering, and we have no idea.
We really have no idea, our Father. of what his suffering was, but
we thank you for giving us glimpses of it, and we thank you for giving
us an understanding that his blood
is precious blood. Heavenly Father, make him precious
to us. Cause us to remember him. Cause us to be a people who stand
for him in this world, and preach him wherever you give a door
of opportunity, our Father. We thank you these people are
saved in eternity, and saved in this world, and saved for
eternity to come. Because our great God and Christ
reigns over all. Reign over us, our Christ. For your glory, for your Father's
name, we pray, amen.