Now, I read our Lord's word there in John, and he said, if you love me, keep my commandments. He said, if you love me, keep my sayings. He said, the Holy Spirit will teach you and bring to remembrance my sayings. Tonight, when we read this text, hear the Lord speaking to you, hear Christ giving you this word. Colossians 4 verse 5. Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every man. Now, before we get into these verses, I want to remember what the Holy Spirit has taught us in this letter up to this point, where we saw in Colossians 1 that God our Father in his Son has made all his elect, that he's regenerated you, that he's given faith to believe. He's made you fit. He's made you meet to enter into heaven's glory right now, into our eternal inheritance. Nothing needs to be done to make you holy to enter in there. He said there in Colossians 112, giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear son. In him we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sin. You know what that means? That means right this moment, and like that thief on the cross, from the moment the Lord gave you a new heart and gave you faith to behold him and cast all your care on him, Christ had made you fit to enter into heaven right then. He made you meet to enter in. It's all of God the Father of Christ Jesus. How fit are we? Look at Colossians 2 verse 9. I wish I could get this play on words because it really makes this stand out. But what the Spirit is saying here is as fully as Christ is the Godhead in a body, That's how true this second verse is. In him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And as completely as Christ is the fullness of the Godhead bodily, you are complete in him. That's the play on word. You're as complete in him as he is the complete fullness of the Godhead in a body. That's how fit he's made you. When he's given you faith to trust him. Created a new holy man. You are complete in Christ. Nothing, we're gonna look at some precepts tonight. These precepts are not gonna add to that. And as we look at these things, you're gonna realize you've come short of these things. But you falling short of perfect obedience, not gonna take away from your completion in Christ. These things are not gonna add to it, and not gonna take away from it. Christ put all our sins away for not doing these things perfectly, and he is our perfection in which God receives us as having done these things perfectly. And then he told us that that the Lord put away all our sin on the cross, circumcised on the cross, baptized in the immersion of judgment on the cross, died in Him, arose in Him, and then He came to us dead in sins and He gave us a new heart. He said in Colossians 2.13, having forgiven you all trespasses, blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, took it out of the way, nailing it to His cross, and he spoiled principalities and power. So he fulfilled the old covenant for us, honored the law, took it out of the way, and he brought us under the everlasting covenant of grace, established, ordered and sure in all things by Christ. And so knowing that our life's not in this world, knowing that Christ is our life, we're not subjecting ourselves to the touch not, taste not, handle not to this world's preaching, We're not coming under the commandments of men that the world's being deceived by. We know our life's not in this world, our life's at God's right hand. And this is what the Lord uses through the Spirit to mortify our old man is this gospel, Colossians 3.1. If you then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth, for you are dead, you old man of sin died under the law, and your life is hid with Christ in God. And when Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall you also appear with him in glory. Mortify thereby your members which are upon the earth. That's how our members are mortified. I know it says therefore, but it could be translated thereby. That's how it's done. The Lord keeps you looking to Christ and treat this old body like it already is. It's dead, died in Christ, judgment settled, risen in Him. That's how the Spirit makes us put off the old man and put on the new man. And in this new man, look at verse 10, Colossians 3.10, you've put on the new, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Christ that created him. Where there's neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision or uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond or free, but Christ is all. He is all, Christ is all. All salvation, everything we need, Christ is. And he's in all his people. Now, we've seen our Lord's word on how we're to be merciful and forbearing and forgiving to one another within the church. We saw how we're to submit to those that be in positions of authority. Now in our text, we're gonna see how we are to walk and speak to those that are without, that are outside of the church. Three things I'm gonna just look at here in the text I read to you. Number one, walk in wisdom. Number two, redeem the time. And number three, season our speech. Season our speech. Eyes walking and seasoned speech, that's what we're looking at. All right, let's look at the walk in wisdom. Verse five, Colossians 4.5, walk in wisdom toward them that are without. Now we're not of this world, you and me who the Lord has regenerated, this is who this is to, the saints. We're not of this world. Nothing about us that Christ has created is of this world. Think about that. He didn't use anything that's of this world. He didn't use our old flesh. He didn't modify it or mend it or he didn't use it. He gave us a new Holy Spirit that's of him. And all our righteousness and holiness and redemption is him. Nothing we are in our new man is of this world. We're not of this world. We're of a holy nation. Chosen of God, redeemed by Christ, created anew by the Spirit, a holy nation. We're of the citizens of the city whose builder and maker is God. We're not of this world, but we have to live in this world, and the Lord on purpose has left us to live in this world. So we're to walk in wisdom toward men and women who are unregenerate, who do not know the Lord, who are without, outside. We learn everything looking to our Savior. Hearing our Savior, looking to our Savior, we learn everything. We learn in our Savior what we could not learn in the letter of the law. We learned it in Christ. He really is our wisdom. Walk in wisdom, walk in Christ. He is our wisdom. Of God are you in Christ, who of God has made Christ wisdom unto us. He's made him righteousness unto us, sanctification unto us, redemption unto us. So we give him all the glory. He's our wisdom. Everything we learn in this world is from Christ, and it redounds to his glory, and we learn it looking to Christ, looking to him. He really is our rule of life. Christ is. We have a living union with our living Redeemer, We're taught of the spirit, we're led by the faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ, leading us, guiding us. We look into his word, looking for Christ. If you ever have a question about what you should do, look in his word and look for Christ and see what Christ did. He's our example. He's the pattern we're to follow. Now he's far more to us than an example. He is truly the holiness we have to have in order to enter into God's holy presence. He's the righteousness we must have. He is all our salvation. But he is our example, and we don't have a better example. You can't find a better example than Christ is. Paul prayed in the first chapter that we would walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, And if we're gonna walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, we're gonna have to look to Christ, who always pleased the Father, who pleased the Father with His perfect obedience, and whose perfect obedience, we're seated there now with Him, and we're pleasing to God. We need to look to this one who pleased God, Christ Jesus. Now, in John 13, our Master washed the feet of His disciples. This is some of these sayings. This is some of these commandments of our Lord. Our Savior washed the feet of his disciples. And when he did that, he said, if I then, your Lord and master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I've given you an example that you should do as I've done to you. He wasn't saying there that we need to have a ceremony and start washing one another's feet. He was teaching us the humility that when your brother's feet are defiled, when he's fallen, when he's sinned, he's teaching you the humility and the meekness that we need and the forgiving and merciful spirit that we need to wash one another's feet speaking of Christ and what Christ has accomplished so we can point each other to Him. That's what He's teaching us there. But you see that? He said, I've given you an example. He's the one we're to follow. We're to look to Christ for everything and follow Him. When we do well, look with me at 1 Peter 2. When we do well and Men of this world cause you to suffer? Our Lord left us an example, 1 Peter 2, 21. He says, even here unto where you called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow his steps. Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. Who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered, He threatened not. Now, he was perfect. You know, we suffer and we say we're suffering wrongfully. We've done well and we're suffering. Well, there's always some sin mixed with what we do. But Christ was sin not at all. And he was treated terribly by men. But he didn't revile again. What did he do? But committed himself to him that judgeth righteously. who is owned self by our sins and his own body on the tree that we being dead to sin should live unto righteousness. What is that? It's not a what, it's a who. Look at the next word. That we should live in a righteousness by whose stripes you were healed. Our righteousness is Christ and we're living to him now. But you see there, he left this example for us in the process of making us righteous. All God's elect were made righteous by Him. In the process of accomplishing that, our Savior, at the hands of men, suffered wrongfully. But He did not revile that. He committed His cause to the Father, and He bled and died and redeemed His people. Now He tells you and me, when you suffer, you commit your cause to Him. Follow His steps, obey His precepts, and look to Him, trust Him. That's how our Lord walked in wisdom to those that were without. That's what He did His whole time on this earth. He walked in wisdom toward them that are without. Listen to this now, Matthew 10, Matthew 10, verse 16. Now this, I'm gonna say it again for for anybody that wasn't here to hear it in the beginning. We're not talking here about anything that's gonna make you and me righteous. We're not talking about anything here that's gonna make us holy. We're made holy by our Lord. We're made righteous by our Lord. And when He's really sanctified you and given you a holy heart, created this new man in Christ's image, He makes us look out of ourselves to Him for our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. We know our acceptance with God is Christ alone. Nothing we do. And as I said, nothing where you're going to fail at all these things. You're not going to do these things in the perfection as God calls perfection. But even when you fail in these things, Christ Jesus, you know, that's not going to take anything from what you are in Christ, complete in Christ. Perfect in Christ. So, these things here, now look, Matthew 10, 16. This is our Savior saying, this is His command. Matthew 10, 16. Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves. That was our Savior when He walked this earth. He's the holy man. He's the faithful man. He's the righteous man. He's the blessed man. He's the one man God the Father's looking to. He's the God-man mediator. But as the Son of God come down taking flesh, He made Himself a servant. And He's serving for us. And He is the only one the Father's looking to to represent His elect. And this is how our Savior walked. He was in the midst of wolves. And he was wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove. And he tells his people now, you that he sanctified, he says, now I'm sending you. He said this to his apostles and his disciples when he sent them forth to preach. But this is so of all of us, we're in the midst of wolves. We're looking at walking in wisdom toward them that are without, unregenerate men, wolves. Be ye wise as serpents and harmless as doves. You know, the thing about a snake is this. A snake is always near to a refuge. And the moment that that snake feels harm in any way or detects danger in any way, it's in that refuge. It's gone. Christ is our refuge. The first way of being wise as a serpent is always having your heart set on Christ above. Always looking to Christ our refuge. Always depending on Him, knowing that we're safe due to His finished work. He's justified His people. And He's not going to let one of His people be separated from Him. Our Lord Jesus, by His grace, has made us brand new. He's made a new creature, a new creation within, we just saw, created in His image. at New Man's, holy Christ in you, the hope of glory. We're trusting His finished work, we're trusting His grace toward us, we're trusting Him to rule our providence for us. He's our refuge in all these ways. Everything that's coming to pass, He's ruling it. He's ruling in men and ruling men whether they know it or not. He said, the wrath of man's going to praise Him. If it comes to pass and it's wrathful, if it's against God, against his people, it's going to bring praise to God. That's the only reason he permitted it to happen. He said, the remainder, I'll restrain it. He won't let it come to pass. So if it comes to pass, he's bringing glory to his name. Remember that. That's gonna be your refuge, Christ himself, knowing he's ruling providence. And so you be wise as a serpent, always fleeing to Christ your refuge. and be harmless as doves. As much as possible, as much as the Lord enables you by his grace, live without offense before men. Do not let men harm you by persuading you to commit sin with them, and don't you offend them. Try to promote the glory of God and the good of men at all time, at all time. Remember, there's very few men and women in this world who believe the gospel. There's very few. Our Lord's always had a remnant in every generation, but the Lord's people have never been the majority in this world at any given time in history. We're a remnant, a remnant. And our Lord Jesus, he gives faith to that remnant, but there's a multitude, religious, but Vainly so, not knowing Christ is salvation, not knowing He's righteousness, trying to go about and establish their own righteousness. But you always remember, you always have this in your mind when you're speaking to somebody, always be remembering this. This might be one of God's elect. This might be one He's loved with an everlasting love in Christ. This may be one Christ died for. And the Lord may be using you. At that moment, you're speaking to a person that doesn't know it. The Lord might be using you to bring that person under the preaching of the gospel. He might be doing that. You may not feel gifted to speak the gospel to him, but I'll tell you some of the best witnessing that was ever done was when Philip came to Nathaniel and he said, we found him. And Nathaniel said, can anything good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip said, come and see. You can always say, come to service. It's when it starts. 7 o'clock midweek, 10, 15, Sunday morning. Come see. Come see. So that's the first thing. Be walking wisdom toward them that are without. Men are looking for anything they can find to justify themselves for not assembling with the Lord's people, not believing on Christ, and just throwing all religion out the window. That's why the Pharisees constantly came to Christ, they acted all sincere, but they were constantly trying to get Him to say something that they could use to say, that's why we're not following Him. That's why we don't believe Him. But be wise to that. Here's the second thing, redeem the time. This part, this is part of that first point. Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Now, make the most of the time that God has given us on this earth. He set an appointed time for us on this earth. That's what he's saying, make the most of the time God's given you on this earth. And when the Lord opens the door for you to speak to somebody, take advantage of it. Use the opportunity God gives you to speak to others concerning Christ. How urgent should we be? Go to 1 Corinthians 7. 1 Corinthians 7. Here's how urgent we should be and the spirit we should have in this thing of speaking to folks about the gospel. I pray, Lord, would make us really hear this. 1 Corinthians 7, verse 29. This I say, brethren, the time is short. It remaineth that both they that have wives be as though they had none, and they that weep as though they wept not, and they that rejoice as though they rejoiced not, and they that buy as though they possessed not, And they that use this world as not abusing it, for the fashion of this world passeth away. See the next word, I would have you without carefulness. In other words, God's teaching us, our Lord's teaching us, the time is so short to speak this word, to speak this gospel. The time we have on this earth, He's saying let nothing interfere with spreading this gospel. That's what we're here for. We're not here to build up our bank account and build up our state and create something to make folks remember us by. We're here to preach Christ, spread this gospel. We're here for that. I was thinking about this. I was 37 when I moved here. I'm 55 now, just not far from 56. And that went by in a blink of an eye. I mean, like that. My children were six and four. Went by just like that. I was thinking then, I was 24 when I left my home. If I live, if Lord permits me to live till I'm 79, that's just 24 more years. You know how fast that first 24 years went by? like that. What is your life? It's even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanisheth away. My days are passed away as the swift ships, as the eagle that hasteth to the prey. The Lord has set our time on this earth. He said it, and our time is appointed, and each child born of God, we're born of God that we might serve our Lord Jesus Christ in promoting this gospel. And the reason is our Savior has redeemed all God's elect. He's paid the price. He's justified them. And he's going to send the gospel to them and he will quicken and regenerate them and give them faith because he's not going to lose one. The holy justice of God has been satisfied. And that justice demands his people must be called out and given faith. And he's going to give every one of them faith. So he That's why we're here, is to preach this gospel to his lost tribe. We're searching for those lost sheep. We don't know who they are, but our Lord does. But we ought to redeem every opportunity the Lord gives us. We ought to consider all our time each day, this is what I'm here for, to be promoting this gospel in some way. Soon in Luke, we're gonna hear our Lord declare, I must be about my father's business. That's the spirit. He puts in a, we must be about his business. Must be about his business. For anybody that's hearing this that's never cast all their care on Christ, behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. Now. Your time is short. The last birthday you had might be the last one. One of them's gonna be, and you don't know, Don't think, well, I'll have years down the road to believe on Christ. Today's the day of salvation. Believe on Him today. He's the sanctification, He's the righteousness we must have. We can't enter into God's presence by our works. There's no goodness in us. We have to be found in Christ, robed in His righteousness. He has to be our perfection with God or we can't be accepted. You've got to be as holy and righteous as God. And the only way that can be is to trust Christ. He's the righteousness and holiness of His people. I pray He sends the Spirit and make it so in your heart, make you know that. And for you and me that are here, here's how the Holy Spirit summed it up in Colossians 3. Look there at Colossians 3. What is this redeeming the time? This is a pretty good description of it right here. Verse 17. Whatsoever you do, In word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him. Now, let me repeat what I said before I get to this last point. I said, when you hear these precepts we're reading here in Colossians 4, hear them as they are in truth. Hear Christ speaking to you. For you that are His, this, and when He says, keep my commandments, if you love me, keep my commandments, this is His commandment. This is Christ's commandment. Why am I to do this? Why am I to walk in wisdom toward them that don't know the Lord? Why am I to redeem the time? It's because so they will hear Christ in the gospel that we speak, and the focus will be Christ and His works. That's the only thing you want to be the focus, Christ and His works. You don't want to be the focus. You don't want to do anything that'll turn people from hearing Christ or make them prejudice against you in hearing the gospel. You want their hearts and minds set on Christ. Look here, Colossians 4, 6. Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every man. Let your speech be always with grace. The gospel of Christ is offensive. It's offensive. Paul talked about men who preach works and they give sinners something to do, making them think they can be saved by something they do. They contribute some way to their salvation. And Paul said they do it to take the offense out of the gospel. Paul said, if I preach circumcision, if I put something in the sinner's hand to do, I wouldn't suffer persecution. I wouldn't suffer rejection from men. So the gospel's offensive. When you tell folks God chooses whom he will, by grace, not based on any merit in them, nothing about them. He did it by grace. When you tell them we're such ruined sinners that Christ had to come and lay down his life for his people. And you tell him, he didn't come and just make salvation possible. He didn't come and just put it on a shelf, if you'll just avail yourself of it. No, he accomplished redeeming his people. He was made a curse for his people, and he redeemed us from that curse. He made his people the righteousness of God. And we're dead in sin, and he's going to come and quicken you, and regenerate you, and he's chosen to do it through the foolishness of preaching. And if he doesn't give you the Spirit, these things will be foolishness to you. You won't receive them and you can't receive them. Now that's offensive to a natural man. But we don't want to speak it in such a way that we offend men. We're not trying to be offensive. Let your speech be with grace. Let your speech be with grace. Speak it with meekness and reverence to God. Look at 1 Peter 3, 1 Peter 3, 14. He says, be not afraid of men's terror, neither be troubled, verse 15, but sanctify the Lord God in your heart. See him as your refuge and be ready always to give an answer to every man who asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear. Meekness is trusting the Lord. Meekness is knowing I'm entirely in the hands of my Lord. He's going to have to reveal this. Reverence is bowing to Him, trusting Him, being reverent to Him. Having a good conscience, aware as they speak evil of you, as if evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conduct in Christ. Now, no sinner's willing to receive it, so we're gonna have to trust the Lord. We're gonna have to be in meekness, depending on the Lord, and reverence, speaking the gospel, speaking the truth to men. And remember this, go to 2 Timothy, when men oppose you, they're not opposing you, they're opposing themselves. The natural heart's enmity against God. The carnal mind is enmity against God. Sit on things of this earth. You preach works and they'll eat that up. But you start declaring salvations of the Lord, man's carnal mind hates the God who gets all the glory. And man gets none. Verse 23, but they're not opposing you, me, they're opposing themselves. 2 Timothy 2.23, foolish and unlearned questions avoid, knowing that they do gender strife. And the servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto all, apt to teach patience in meekness, instructing those that oppose themselves. See that? They're not opposing you. Well, they're speaking unkind things to me. They're shooting the messenger, because they can't get to the God who sent it. But they're not opposing you, they're opposing themselves. And you're praying that God, peradventure, will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth, that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will. All right, that's the first thing, speak, be gracious. Secondly, season with song. The Lord Jesus is the salt of the covenant. You know, in the meat offering, this is what the Lord said. Every oblation of thy meat offering shalt thou season with salt, every one of them. Neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from thy meat offering. With all thine offerings thou shalt offer salt. All the offerings picture Christ. Christ is the salt. Salt preserves because our Lord Jesus fulfilled every word of that everlasting covenant of grace. He fulfilled every word. He fulfilled the old covenant, took it out of the way for his people, and he established a new covenant of grace for his people. And he, because it's settled in his blood, established in his blood, It's sure, and that salt that Christ is, being the salt of the covenant, preserves us. The reason the Lord didn't destroy us when we sinned in Adam is because of Christ. The reason he didn't destroy you when you were dead in sin for however many years you walked in darkness was because of Christ. The reason this world's held in store right now is because he has a people he's redeemed, and they're gonna be called out. Christ is the one preserving this world. He's the salt. Salt preserved. Salt heals. Salt heals. In 2 Kings 2.21, the Lord sent Elisha. There was some water, it was bad water, and the land was barren. And the Lord sent his messenger, Elisha. And he went forth into the spring of the waters and cast salt in there. And he said, thus saith the Lord, I have healed these waters, there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land, and so the waters were healed unto this day. What is all that picture? Me and you by nature, all those God's gonna save by nature are the barren, dead water, the barren land, that's what we are. But the Lord sends his messenger like he sent Elisha, and we preach Christ Jesus, the salt, And thus saith the Lord, Christ speaks into the heart, and he enters into the heart and spirit, and he heals you. He creates a new man in his holiness, in his righteousness, and you have eternal life. That's the picture. Salt heals, salt preserves, salt heals. That's why he, and it being the preservative, that's why he calls you and me who believe the salt of the earth. because you're in this world to preach the gospel of Christ the salt, the salt of the covenant, and that's why this world's preserved. That's why this world's held in store for your sake, to preach the gospel for the sake of those he's gonna call out, that he's already loved and redeemed. And here's another thing about salt. It makes food savory, and salt makes you wanna eat more. That's why you can't eat one potato chip. They cover them up with salt. What was that, which one brand was that used to be? Bet you can't eat just one because they got salt all over them. Make you want another one. Well, he gives you a hunger for Christ, you want more. You keep coming back, you keep coming to Christ, coming to Christ. We never tire of hearing his gospel, we never hear of hearing of him. So let your speech be with grace, let it be seasoned with Christ, the salt. Don't try season two. You can over-salt things. Now, for a believer that knows the gospel, you can't preach Christ too much. But you take a person that doesn't know the gospel, what I'm saying is don't open up a fire extinguisher on them and just overload them with everything at once. Give them enough they can handle, and let them think on that. He said there, do this that, he said, that you may know how you ought to answer every man. Now, we don't compromise the gospel. We're gonna preach the gospel. But we always look for an open door to speak Christ to men, but there are different ways to answer men. You know, foolish and unlearned questions, he said, avoid those. Sometimes the answer is to be silent. You don't have to answer every question. But when the Lord makes it obvious a person wants to hear the gospel, I'm just going to give you this real quickly, I'm running over. Paul said, I'm free from all men, but I've made myself servant to all men, that I might gain them more. He said, to the Jew I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews. To them that are under the law as under the law. To them that are without law, as without law, though I'm under the rule of Christ. He said that I might gain them that are without law. To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak. I made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. And this I do for the gospel's sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you." What's he talking about? Here it is, it's this simple. I want anything to be the focus but Christ. When those men came and they compelled Titus to be circumcised, they tried to force him to be circumcised, Paul said, we did not put up with that for an hour. Why? That the gospel might continue with you, that the truth might continue. If we had submitted to that, the truth would have ceased. You would put in one little bit of leaven and the gospel's done, over. But then he's going to the Jews to preach Christ, I mean, naturally, Jews after the faith. He's going there to preach Christ. He's taking Timothy, who's a half Gentile. And he said, Timothy, we're going to circumcise you before we go. Why? Same reason. So that the gospel would be the focus. Christ would be the focus. And men wouldn't be able to use Timothy to turn from Christ and make an issue out of something that wasn't an issue. When you really know that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision availed, that it's not what you do or don't do that availed. When you really know it's Christ who makes you a new creation entirely of Christ, entirely by him, that's when you have liberty. That's when you know that these things that we do or don't do is not my salvation. It's him. So Paul would not let things that were minor become major. kept the focus on Christ who is our all. If you're talking to a stranger and they tell you, say they say you're adopted, they're adopted. I figured out some way of talking about everybody God saves is adopted. We're Gentiles adopted, predestinated to the adoption by Jesus Christ. I was in a a barbershop one time getting my hair cut, and a young man came in that was a member. He wasn't a believer, but he attended the service where I was going. And when I got ready to pay, I paid for his haircut. And I didn't tell him, didn't say any, I just went up there and told the lady, put his on mine, I paid for it. Well, he comes in the service, first thing he did was run up to me and said, you know, thank you for paying for my haircut or whatever. And I said, feels good to know it's all paid, don't it? He said, yeah, that felt good knowing it's all paid. I said, that's what our preacher's been preaching to us. Christ paid it all. He paid it all, we don't owe anything. And just, this is an example, try to find some way of turning that conversation to Christ and speak Christ to them. Redeem the time, take every opportunity you can. And here's the thing, I don't know how to go about that. Listen, what did the Lord tell that gathering? He said, go home to your friends and tell them how great things the Lord has done for thee and has had compassion on thee. I think any of us could do that. You know, what'd you do? I sinned. That's all I did. That's all I ever contributed was sin. And the Lord had compassion on me. The Lord had mercy on me. He came and made me hear Him. He gave me a heart to hear Him. I didn't do that of my will. He gave me a will. He gave me life. Then I began to see more and more and all the way back to eternity where it started with God the Father. You can tell them what he's done for you. So that's it, brethren. Walk in wisdom toward them that are without. Redeem the time, take every opportunity, and have your speech seasoned with Christ, with grace, speaking of what he's done. Let's go to him, brethren. Father, thank you for your dear son. Thank you for being compassionate to us, being gracious and merciful. Lord, keep us looking to our Savior. Give us strength to speak of you and to obey these words of our Redeemer that we saw tonight. Make us useful in your hand, Lord, to point needy, perishing sinners to the only salvation there is, Christ our Lord. Be with your people everywhere. Be with our young people here that don't believe you. Lord, pray that they're yours by grace. Any way that we can be used, Lord, that's what we want. We want to be used by you to further the good news of our Redeemer, your dear son. It's in his name we ask it. Amen. All right, Brother Adam.