So last week we have been following
the Lord Jesus as he begins his ministry in Galilee. Mark's gospel is a brief, in
some ways, summary of the Lord Jesus as the servant God and
he comes in chapter 1 serving his people by identifying with
them serving his people by defeating Satan in the temptation of the
wilderness and last week we saw that the Lord Jesus began the
calling of his disciples and he called them with effortless
authority Jesus came, Jesus called, Jesus called them personally,
Jesus called them with power, and then he leads his disciples
into ministry, which will be the pattern until he returns
to his father, having completed the work he came to do. And also
this will be the ministry of all his disciples until they
are called home to glory. He leads his disciples into the
synagogue and as he teaches others there, he teaches his disciple. The term disciple means learner,
one who sits under the ministry of a teacher and learns. Jesus is the great teacher and
his lessons are powerful and their depth infinite. and we
never finish learning from every one of his lessons, because the
Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword,
dividing even to joints and marrow. So in Mark 1.21, they went into
Capernaum, and immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue
and began to teach. They were amazed at his teaching,
for he was teaching them as one having authority, and not as
the scribes. Just then there was a man in
their synagogue with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, saying,
What business do we have with each other, Jesus of Nazareth?
have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy
One of God." And Jesus rebuked him saying, be quiet and come
out of him. Throwing him into convulsions,
the unclean spirit cried out with a loud voice and came out
of him. And they were all amazed, and so that they debated among
themselves, saying, What is this, a new teaching with authority? He commands even the unclean
spirits, and they obey him." So the Lord Jesus is God. The
Lord Jesus speaks reality into existence. His words are spirit,
and they are life, John 6.63. So in the ministry of the Lord
Jesus, his words are incredibly significant. In fact, his miracles
and his actions are there to support and enhance the words
he spoke. He speaks words which come from
God and his works and his words are joined inseparably. So why
up teaching ministry? Why are his words so important?
They are important for the declaration of who God is and they are the
way God has ordained to save his people. 1 Peter 1.23 says
that you have been born again, not of seed which is perishable,
but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring Word
of God. James says in 1 A.D. that He
brought us forth, He gave birth to us by the Word of Truth so
that we would be a kind of first roots among His creatures. and
in Romans 10 17 it says so faith comes from hearing and hearing
by the word of God and Simon talked about Enoch and in Hebrews
in that same passage that talks about Enoch it says that without
faith it is impossible to please God so faith comes from hearing
and hearing by the word of Christ This is why Jesus begins by teaching. The Word of Truth is God's ordained
means of bringing His children to a knowledge of their salvation.
Faith that begins in the Word is sustained by the Word of God. If faith begins with experiences
not related to God's Word, it will always be looking for something
outside of the Word of God for its confidence. Saving faith
is a heart knowledge of the Lord Jesus as revealed in his true
character in the gospel proclaimed in the scriptures. And we need
to be aware of any faith which is not grounded and sustained
by this book. so the Lord Jesus goes before
his disciples and where they are he is always John 12 26 that's
why in verse 38 of Mark 1 the Lord turns away from those multitudes
who want healing or want to see healings and goes to other places
to preach he was leading his disciples by example and may
the Holy Spirit lead us as they were led into a ministry of the
word we need to encourage all we meet to be people who find
all we need for life and godliness in the promises of God. There
are many who claim to love the Lord Jesus and then by their
words or the direct implication of what they say, they deny him
because they disagree with his teaching. We must be careful
never to separate the words of the Lord Jesus from his works.
They are just one piece. because there are many different
Jesus proclaimed throughout the world. There were in the days
of the apostles and nothing has changed. Jesus promises his people
that in Mark 13, 22, for false Christs and false prophets will
arise and will show signs and wonders in order to lead astray,
if possible, the elect. Thank God it's not possible.
And 2nd Timothy 4.3 says, For a time will come when they will
not endure sound teaching, sound doctrine, but wanting to have
their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers
in accordance with their own desires, and will turn away from
the truth and turn aside to myths. So the true Jesus is God the
Son. The true Jesus loved His bride
from the foundation of the world. The true Jesus is the Christ
of God who came because of His faithfulness to His Father and
to His bride. The true Jesus came into this
world to save His people from their sins. The true Jesus died
in their place, suffering the righteous wrath of God for their
sins and theirs alone. The true Jesus cried, it is finished,
and all the promises were fulfilled. They are yes and amen in him. It is finished. God has no anger
toward his children. It is finished. God sees his
children as perfect, holy, and blameless before him. It is finished. God's children are not under
the law of Moses for blessing, or for punishment or for sanctification. It is finished. God's justice
is perfectly satisfied in Jesus. All of God's children are qualified,
made fit for heaven's glories. They are complete in him. Colossians 2.10 The true Jesus
leads his bride into perfect rest from their labors. The true
shepherd binds the brokenhearted, heals the wounded, releases the
captive, and carries his little ones close to his heart. And
the true Jesus is still fulfilling his promises. He doesn't change. In your bulletin we have a wonderful
quote from Spurgeon, and it's just in reference to 2 Peter
1.4 where it says that He has given us His very great and precious
promises. It would be great for you to
read along with me because it's just a beautiful piece of writing.
It's on the third page, three of your bulletin. And he begins
by saying, God's promises are precious because they tell of
the exceeding great and precious things. We have promises in the
Bible which time would fail us to repeat, which for breadth
and length are immeasurable. They deal with every great thing
which the soul can need. Promises of pardoned sin, promises
of sanctification, promises of teaching, promises of guidance,
promises of upholding, promises of ennobling, promises of progress,
promises of consolation and promises of perfection. In this blessed
book you have promises of the daily bread of earth, promises
of the bread of life from heaven, promises for time, promises for
eternity. You have so many promises that
all the conditions and positions of the believer are met. I sometimes
liken the promises to the locksmith's great bunch of keys, which he
brings when you have lost the key to your treasure chest and
cannot unlock it. He feels pretty sure that out
of all the keys upon the ring, some one or other will fit, and
he tries them with patient industry. At last, yes, that is it. He has moved the bolt, and you
can get at your treasures. There's always a promise in the
volume of inspiration suitable to your present case. May the
Lord's promises be your delight and your counsellors, and they
will befriend you at every turn. Search the Scriptures and you
shall meet with a promise which will be so applicable to you
as to appear to have been written after your trouble had occurred.
So exactly will it apply that you will be compelled to marvel
at the wonderful tenderness and suitableness of it. It is as
if the tailor had measured you from head to foot, so exactly
shall the garment of promise fit you. The promises are precious
in themselves, from their suitability to us, from their coming from
God, from their being unchangeable, from their being sure of performance,
and from their containing wrapped up within themselves all that
the children of God ever need. He has given us His very great
and precious promises. So how much comfort do we miss
out on when we turn to human wisdom? How often have you, like
me, looked in every nook and cranny for a solution to a problem
and then finally come to God and His Word and it's all made
clear. Well may we say, Lord I believe,
please help my unbelief. But there's another danger that's
prevalent, and that is to separate the words of Jesus from those
of the apostles. Jesus will not allow such nonsense. The promise of God is that he
leads his people through the Holy Spirit, his apostles. He
will teach them all things, according to John 14. When the Lord Jesus
was dying in the upper room, he made these great promises.
And in John 16, he says, When He, the Spirit of Truth, comes,
He will guide you into all the truth. For He will not speak
on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak, and
He will disclose to you what is to come. So the only witness
we have of the life, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus
is from the apostles. And this is not by accident.
To fellowship with God, we must fellowship in the teaching of
the apostles. Their doctrine must be ours and
their practices must be ours. But back to Mark. Luke tells
us that when the Lord Jesus came preaching, he read those wonderful
words from Isaiah 61. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me, because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery
of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the favourable year of the Lord. So in Mark's Gospel
we see these promises from God fulfilled in action. Having defeated
Satan in the temptation in the wilderness, he can now rob the
strongman's house. of all of God's people. As we
saw last week, Jesus calls with power and authority and leads
his disciples into what should be the focus of all gospel work,
a teaching ministry, a proclamation of the glory of God in the saving
of his people. And so God's word is precious. John Gill says, This Word of
God has been quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword.
It has pierced and penetrated into the recesses of the heart
and laid open the secrets of it. It has been the means of
enlightening the mind, giving life to the soul, regenerating
and sanctifying the heart, and of producing faith and every
other grace in it, and of strengthening, comforting and reviving the spirits
of people, the people of God, when in distress or by afflictions
or Satan's temptation. So every believer, every true
believer has a testimony within himself that these are the words
of God and they come with divine authority. The other thing the
Lord Jesus does is he teaches publicly. His teaching was open
for all to see and hear. And we need to live our lives
with openness before God and men. You cannot hide anything
from God. One of the great Christian freedoms
that we have is that we have no righteousness of our own.
All that we held dear prior to conversion has been exposed as
filthy rags and dung. We have nothing of ourselves
to establish or defend. We either have Christ's perfect
righteousness or none at all. So we defend Him. And so all
issues to do with the teaching about the Lord Jesus from the
scriptures should be public. There's never a reason for keeping
any of them private. One of the great tests of our
faith is confidence. And that's a great synonym for
faith. Confidence in the Word made flesh and the Holy Spirit's
ability to make it effective in the lives of his children.
All the activity of men to make a show of righteousness just
puffs up human pride. Unless the Lord works, they work
in vain. And so he taught publicly. Mark
1.22 says they were amazed at his teaching for he was teaching
as one having authority and not as the scribes. The teaching
of the Lord Jesus was unlike any teaching the Jews had heard
in their synagogues. The standard way of teaching
at the time was to give a reputed teacher's opinion. In Jews' day,
there were two famous schools of rabbis, those belonging to
a man called Hillel and another one to a rabbi called Shammai. And these people used to discuss
the opinions of these guys and so they would minutely pick over
the law and create the traditions of men. And we would do well
to remember there is nothing new under the sun. The opinions
of these men were held in high esteem. but also we are promised
by God that every error and every false teaching we see in the
scriptures is alive and well in our day. The root of all false
teaching is always in the wisdom of men and in some way esteems
the worth and work and wisdom of men. All false religion talks
of man's activities in coming to God, in being right with him
by the works of men. We must not forget that the men
Jesus called to be his first witnesses were fishermen. There
were thousands of well-trained theological zealots in Israel.
Josephus says there were 7,000 Pharisees, many of whom were
scribes. What a huge mob to choose from. But we also must not necessarily
assume that false teaching comes from insincere men or from people
who have outwardly malicious intentions. But whenever we hear
from men, we are commanded by God to test their words against
Holy Scripture. Test everything and hold on to
the good, says Paul in 1 Thessalonians. Do not believe every spirit,
but test the spirits to see if they are from God, 1 John 4,
6. You are listening at the moment
to a spirit. Test what you hear. So serious
is this and so important that in Acts 17, Paul talks of the
Bereans. After the tough time he had in
Thessalonica, he went down to Berea and we are told that the
Bereans tested the words of Paul from the Old Testament. They
had their Old Testament and they had the words of Paul and they
tested them and God commends them for testing them. And yet
Paul was an apostle sent from God. To disagree with Paul and
to remain in disagreement with Paul was to be in such a dangerous
place that there was no reason to entertain any hope for the
future. And yet to test him against the
Scriptures is to be commended by God. And so it's an encouragement
to all of us that we test everything. That's one of the reasons we
don't subscribe to creeds and confessions and require assent
to the documents of men. And that reason is that we want
the word of God to have supremacy in all matters. We must encourage
all we meet with and each other to bow to the scriptures. Our
practices must arise directly from this book or we have no
right practicing them. The doctrines we teach must be
clearly stated from this book, and if not, we have no right
teaching them or encouraging others to believe them. We must
be very careful putting any of our trust in men. Not long after
I was converted, I came across the books of a very famous English
theologian and pastor of a huge church, a man named Roy Clements. And he was an internationally
respected author and a conference speaker. And anytime I had an
opportunity to give a book away to someone I thought would be
encouraging, I'd get one of Roy Clements' books. But a few years
after he was my hero, it was discovered that he had left his
wife and his family and his large congregation of a thousand people
to take up living with a young man. And I checked on the internet
a couple of nights ago and he is still in the business of advocating
tolerance to homosexuality within the churches. And that's a good
lesson to learn, isn't it? The best of men are men at best. And the Lord Jesus goes to the
place where people were believing they were worshipping God, but
in reality they were following the words and traditions of men. Jesus, by teaching the truth
powerfully, shows the emptiness of their religious activities.
We must never forget that it was his teaching about himself
which so offended them. When the light of truth was shone
on their practices, they were seen for what they really were,
just the traditions of men. Mark 7 verse 6 shows this so
clearly. So we have before us in these
verses a warning from God. The men and women in the synagogue
would have assured everyone that they were truly worshipping the
God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And yet when He, this God, came
and stood in their midst and spoke to them and performed miracles
in their sight, so often the reaction of those most religious
was to oppose Him passionately and seek to kill Him. The lesson
for us is simple. Don't play games with God. The most serious reality lies
in this area. So many of the religious leaders
of the Jews have spent the last 2,000 years in hell contemplating
their sins. Jesus said they would die in
their sins, surrounded by the reality that all they ever did
was sin against the light given to them. We must take the warnings
of Scripture seriously. I beg of you, please, don't play
games with God. Beware of the traditions of men
and following men, especially if they become popular and esteemed
in the eyes of many. What you believe and practice
must be sustained only from this book. And where you differ, be
prepared humbly to acknowledge your error without hesitation. Being wrong is not a problem,
but staying wrong, when God speaks his word, is dangerous and damning
to the souls. Isaiah says in 66 too, but to
this one I will look. this one I will esteem, to him
who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at my
word." And we often think that evangelism is what occurs outside
the church, but here the Lord Jesus begins with those inside
the religious world. They are the ones who are blinded,
and captive, and needed release from oppressive leaders. And
as it was then, so it is today. And so Jesus speaks with authority. The people were amazed at the
way he spoke. And God's appointed teachers
should speak with authority. If people bring a message that
God has given them from his word, then it's not something just
to be debated. It's to be examined in light
of the truth of God's word and believed or rejected on that
basis alone. We should never be in the business
of just throwing morsels to sinners to toss around like other philosophical
concepts. We speak as God's ambassadors.
The message is not ours, it is His. It's the Gospel from God,
the Gospel of God concerning His Son. The reaction to and
the results from the message are not our concern as much as
we agonize and pray and grieve over what happens around us.
But we are dealing with power from God Almighty. We proclaim
the truth and leave God, leave to God the results. Also, we
must be consciously aware of the real living presence of the
Lord Jesus. He has promised to be here in
our presence. He's not an absent observer,
but a constant companion. And may the Lord help us never
to let issues of doctrine become an intellectual exercise. It's
dangerous to ever allow the things of eternity in our God to be
reduced to debates. Every doctrine is about the Lord
God and reflects upon the Lord Jesus. We always need to work
hard to have Him as the centre of our thoughts in any discussion. The big issue is what does it
say about the Lord Jesus and His perfect work on behalf of
His beloved Bride? So God's servants are not self-serving.
Faithful men are faithful to the souls of men, faithful to
the truth of the Holy Scripture, faithful to the glory of God.
They who have a word from God speak the word of the Lord clearly
and distinctly, regardless of the cost or the consequences. God's servants don't adjust the
message to win the favor of hearers or because they fear the frowns
of people. I've lost my place. To be faithful
to your souls, I and all who speak to you on God's behalf
must strive to be faithful to God's word. We are ambassadors. We have the King's message to
deliver, and he has taken all responsibility for the response
to the message, good or bad. It is not my job to speak peace,
peace to you. The Prince of Peace will do that
in His way at His time. Our task is to raise Him up to
be seen in His true character by all who hear. And after His
preaching, immediately after His preaching, Jesus heals the
demon-possessed man. So, Jesus' words and works are
seen together. His works validate his teaching. They are just proof of what he
says. And there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean
spirit, and he cried out, saying, Let us alone! What have we to
do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us?
I know who you are, the Holy One of God. And the whole issue
of demons is something I just want to touch on briefly. A couple
of questions might come to our minds as we read the Gospels.
Why was there so much demonic activity around the time of the
Lord Jesus? And he seemed to be encountering
them all over the place. 1 John 3 says that Jesus came
to destroy the works of the devil and to expose him. He came to
expose who Satan was and the way he holds people captive.
And all of the miracles of demon releasing from demon possession
are pictures of the way the gospel works in the lives of people
to release them. And so he came to expose hidden
things and secret things. and He came to show that He is
absolutely sovereign over them. And I believe He came to show
that we are to leave the work of dealing with demons in the
hands of the Lord Jesus. What do we have to do with them?
Nothing. It's extraordinary that there
are people around the place who look for them everywhere and
amazingly they find them almost under every rock and behind every
tree. And yet there's a whole bunch of God's people who are
aware of their reality and don't have to deal with them all the
time. And so what do we have to do with them? I think the
best answer is absolutely nothing. Anything to do with that satanic
world is for us to stay as far away from as we possibly can.
We have nothing to do with tarot cards, we have nothing to do
with palm reading, turn the page on astrology, have nothing to
do with it. And the other thing that I think
these verses show is that the Lord Jesus has the power to deal
with it. We actually leave those things
in the hands of God and we go to the real power and the real
power is in the Gospel. I think the other danger is that
if we actually think that we've sorted out where demonic activity
is, then we've missed out on the fact that Satan is a crafty
foe. And in the Scriptures, not only
were these people possessed of demons, but there was another
group who was possessed of demons who were much, much more dangerous,
and they were the Pharisees. Jesus said that they belonged
to their father, the devil. And so Satan not only works in
ways where he oppresses people by activities of demonic things
in this world, but the greatest and most dangerous activity he
has is when he comes dressed as an angel of light. and comes
bringing a message that looks so much like the gospel of the
Lord Jesus and he talks about Jesus and he quotes the scriptures
and then they lead people away from the Lord Jesus because they
aren't turning people to the true Jesus, they are turning
people to the idol. And so we need to be aware of
the subtlety of Satan and stay away from him and then go back
to the gospel because the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. And so these miracles performed
by our master are instructive pictures of his grace and his
power. And they are there to teach us
about the way he saves his people. And these days there is so much
talked about miracles and all of those things. I think what
the scriptures are saying is that those times have finished
where people are endowed with a special power to know demons
and to name them and to cast them out, I think the witness
of scripture is that that time finished with the apostles. And
that doesn't mean that God is not still doing marvellous things.
As we saw in Psalm 72, all he ever does is marvellous things. And he still releases people
from the captivity of satanic influences. And so, but now we
have the completion of scripture and the witness of the apostles
was manifestly demonstrated that they were speaking the truth
of God because of the things that they could do, the miracles
that Paul and the other apostles could perform. Once the scriptures
are written and completed and finished, there's no longer any
need for that. The other thing that's so clear
from this passage is that these people, these demons, acknowledge
who Jesus is. We are specifically told twice
that the demons knew the Lord Jesus. And in verse 34 it says
the same, and he healed many that were sick with various diseases
and cast out many devils, and he didn't allow them to speak
because they knew him. The scribes didn't know him,
the Pharisees didn't know him, or acknowledge the truthfulness
of his teaching. The religious leaders of the
day denounced the Son of God as a false prophet. But those
demons knew both who he was and the truthfulness of all he taught.
and yet they were not saved, their knowledge wasn't a saving
knowledge, and we should lay this to heart. The mere belief
and acknowledgement of Bible facts and Bible doctrine is not
salvation. I realize there is no salvation
apart from the knowledge of the gospel truth, but merely having
your head full of facts is not salvation. That kind of faith
is no better than the faith of the devils. They all believe
and know that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. The demons know
what he came to do about his effectual, sin-attaining work
on the cross. they all know that he's seated
upon the throne of heaven and all the demons know that he's
coming again in judgment and will cast them along with the
wicked into everlasting hell but saving faith is no more an
act of the head than it is an act of man's imaginary free will. Saving faith is a matter of the
heart. James 9 says that the demons
believed but Romans 10 9 says that if you confess with your
mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised
him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart a person
believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses,
resulting in salvation. Heart faith is more than information
in the head. It is a transformation of the
life from the inside out. Heart faith is more than knowing
about Christ. It is trusting Him, loving Him,
rejoicing in Him, commitment to Him, and clinging to Him. Martin Luther once wrote, Christianity
consists of personal pronouns. It's one thing to say Christ
alone is Saviour. It's another thing altogether
to lift your heart to heaven and say Christ alone is my Saviour. The demons of hell acknowledge.
that Jesus is Savior. But only the child of God really
says from his heart, he is my Savior, he's my husband, he's
my friend, he's my Lord. So salvation is not a reformed
life or a reformed creed. Salvation is a personal knowledge
of Jesus Christ revealed in your heart by the Holy Spirit. It
is not information in you, but Christ in you, which is the hope
of glory. Colossians 1 27. And in these
verses, there is comfort for those who are seeking to serve
and live with their savior. But we're often cast down by
our sense of weakness and insufficiency. The difficulties you fear eventually
will vanish before you because the lion that roars before you
as you walk in the path that God has laid out before you,
has no teeth and has no claws and is on a chain. And the one
holding the chain is our Redeemer. The lion cannot hurt you. The
worst he can do is make a lot of noise. And he who gives you
grace will also give you glory. And in this passage, finally,
we see the completeness of our Savior's dominion. As we said
earlier, he preached the kingdom of God, the dominion of the King. And this is particularly shown
in the way he saves his people. In this passage of scripture,
we see that our Savior, the Lord Jesus, is truly God over all. Sickness and disease, Satan and
the demons of hell, sin and death, all flee at his word. And with
authority, he commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey
him. And this is the reason he came,
was to destroy the works of the devil. And here we see our Redeemer,
the Holy One of God, destroying the works of the devil in the
life of the chosen sinner by his powerful, all-powerful grace. That poor man in the synagogue
pictures all fallen men under the dominion of Satan. God's
children, like all others, are by nature children of wrath and
captive of Satan. Ephesians 2 makes it very clear. We all lived among them in the
lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and
the mind, and were by nature children of wrath as the rest.
Yet on this day, on that Sabbath day, this poor soul came to the
house of God. And there he sat as Satan's helpless
captive until the Lord Jesus met him in his house and delivered
him by his almighty power and fulfilling the prophecies of
the Old Testament that he would release the prisoners from their
captivity. And at the very approach of our
Savior, the unclean spirit in that poor wretch trembled, knowing
that the Lord Jesus possesses all power and authority, even
over Satan himself, as the Holy One of God. And what confidence
we ought to have in such a Savior. No weapon formed against us can
prosper. No temptation can destroy us. And it says in Romans 16, 20,
that the God of peace shall bruise Satan under our heels shortly. Also, this event should cause
us to remember that it is by sovereign grace alone that we
have freedom. We were as helpless as a demon-possessed
man. We never rise above needing grace
and mercy from our God. We are not climbing some spiritual
ladder to greater perfection. Christians grow in the grace
and knowledge of our Lord Jesus, and He moves us to grow in faith. To grow in grace is to be increasingly
aware of our desperate need, and the only place of hope and
refuge is the Lord Jesus. For in the time of trouble he
shall hide me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle
shall he hide me, and he shall set me upon a rock, says Psalm
27 5. We must remind ourselves every
time we see anyone we might think we might be tempted to look down
upon that we are no better than them. Our only boast is that
the Lord Jesus has shown us mercy and grace. This is to grow in
knowledge as we see the faithfulness of our God to do all He has promised,
and we grow to know Him with a deeper understanding of His
word of promise. So he who loved us and gave himself
for us is the absolute sovereign monarch of the universe. We may
safely trust him. He is too wise to make a mistake. He is too good to do wrong. He
is too strong to fail. And at the end of this episode,
these people went away amazed at His words and His work. And
may He grant us the grace to look expectantly for Him to do
amazing things in our lives and through us as we go through our
lives this week. Let's just pray. Heavenly Father,
we do thank you and praise you for your goodness and your love
and your mercy. We thank you for the way you
save us, Heavenly Father. You rescue us from the emptiness
of the things of this world, from the snares of Satan, and
you continually, Heavenly Father, to gather your people, to hold
them close to your heart, and to set us upon a rock, the Lord
Jesus, where our only hope and our only refuge is. We thank
you, Heavenly Father, that you have promised to carry your people
through the dark times of this world, and that you will lead
us into heaven's glories. And all of this is done because
of the work of the Lord Jesus. We praise you, Heavenly Father,
that we have such a strong Redeemer, that our husband is powerful,
that our husband has overcome all of our enemies, that our
husband has gone before us, gone before us to the cross, bearing
all triumphant from the grave, having
defeated Satan and defeated death. And now, Heavenly Father, all
of your children stand before you, robed in the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus. We pray, Heavenly Father, that
you would cause us to rejoice in our Saviour and have our eyes
fixed on Him, who is the author and the perfecter of our faith,
as we walk through this world in the paths you have set before
us. We thank you and praise you for our Saviour. We pray in Jesus'
name. Amen. I don't know if I've got anything.
I think I've only got one heart. Oh well, it's 40 minutes and
it's still ticking.