Bibles to Ruth, chapter 1. Now, Naomi, we've seen, was a
true believer. And she was once a woman of wealth,
of prosperity, very pleasant. She was a woman of influence
in Bethlehem. But due to this famine that came,
she left God's place of worship. She left God's house of bread,
left God's place where He established the mercy seat. Picture Christ,
picture worship of Christ. She left that place. And she
went down to a land of idolatry, to Moab. Picture her leaving
the gospel, leaving the Lord's people, going out to provide
for oneself. And now it's been ten years,
been ten years since she left and she's coming back now to
Bethlehem, coming back by the grace of God. She's got her daughter-in-law
Ruth with her and she's coming back. Now let's begin reading
in verse 19. So they too went until they came
to Bethlehem and it came to pass when they were come to Bethlehem
that all the city was moved about them. And they said, is this
Naomi? And she said unto them, call
me not Naomi. Call me Mara. For the Almighty
hath dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full. and the Lord hath brought me
home again empty. Why then call ye me, Naomi, seeing
the Lord hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted
me? So Naomi returned, and Ruth the
Moabitess, her daughter-in-law with her, which returned out
of the country of Moab, And they came to Bethlehem in the beginning
of barley harvest. You get this picture now. Naomi
shows up to Bethlehem. Somebody's out there working
around the town and they look up and they see this woman coming
down Main Street. She's tattered in a ragged dress
and she's dirty. Her hair's all stringy. She just looks awful. And her
daughter-in-law, it's the same way. And everybody in the town
starts to gather around. They see her. And everybody's
whispering to one another, is this Naomi? They just barely
recognized the woman that left. And they said, is this Naomi? The thing we see here predominantly
is that sin changed man so drastically that only God can save us. Sin
changed man so desperately that only God can save us. Now, first
of all, in Naomi, we see a picture of the fall of the whole human
race in Adam. We see a picture of the fall
of the whole human race in Adam when we look at Naomi. They said,
is this Naomi? Is this her? We don't even recognize
this woman. Is this Naomi? And she said,
call me not Naomi. Call me not prosperous and pleasant. He called me Mara, bitterness.
I went out full and the Lord hath brought me home again empty. God made Adam after his own image
in his own likeness. After his own image in his own
likeness. And when God made Adam in the
garden, he was prosperous and he was pleasant. Adam was righteous
before the law of God. He was righteous. No offense,
no sin, never transgressed. He was righteous. And His heart
was undefiled. His heart was pure before God. He was full of wisdom. God brought
all the animals to Adam and He named them. Named them all. He
was a wise man. Made after the image of God.
Made after Christ, our wisdom. After the pattern of Christ,
our wisdom. So he was wise. He was spiritual. So he was strong. That's where strength is, is
being spiritual. Being able to worship God in
spirit and in truth. He was a spiritual man. And he
had communion with God because of the fact he was righteous
and holy. God had communion with him. He
could talk with God and speak with God. And they had fellowship
one with another. But when Adam transgressed and
disobeyed God, the moment he did that, he became bitterness
and empty. Unrighteous before the law. Instead
of being righteous now, he's a lawbreaker. He's guilty. He became unrighteous before
the law. And at the same time, he became
impure and defiled in his heart. impure and defiled in his heart,
unholy. Instead of being alive spiritually
and being strong, he became spiritually dead and weak. He lost wisdom. He lost wisdom
of God. He became ignorant of God. Proof
of that is the fact that he tried to save himself. That shows the
ignorance he became of God. No man can save himself. God
is righteous and holy and requires absolute perfection. For a man
to try to save himself shows you we became ignorant of who
God is. And he lost all communion and
all fellowship with God. God couldn't commune with him
in that state because God is righteous and he won't have fellowship
with an unrighteous man, a lawbreaker. A lawbreaker's disobeying God.
He's transgressing against God. And God can't have fellowship
with one who's transgressing against Him. God's holy. He's holy. And He can't have fellowship
with anybody that has impure thoughts in his heart. He can't
do that. We lost communion with Him. And
here's the point now. How's that affect me and you?
Because Adam was our head. Adam was our head. He is the
head of the house of mankind. So that everything Adam does,
He made us by what He did. And we are born of Him. So our
nature came from Him. We are going to have a nature
like His nature. Born of Him. Scripture says in
Romans 5.12. I want you to turn there. Turn
to Romans 5.12. Some people may not have seen
this and this is so important. This is what's not being preached
and what people are missing right here. Romans 5, 12. Wherefore, as by one man, that's
Adam, by one man sin entered into the world, and death by
sin. Spiritual death and physical
death are the result of sin. Adam died spiritually the moment
he sinned and he began dying physically. And the reason you
and I are born spiritually dead and begin dying physically is
because we sinned in Adam. Watch it now. So death passed
upon all men. For that, and the margin reads
this, For in whom, in Adam, all have sinned. You see that? All have sinned in Adam. When
God made Adam after his image, in Adam's heart all his thoughts
were pure. The only thing Adam thought about
in his heart when God made Adam Whatsoever things were true,
whatsoever things were honest, whatsoever things were just,
whatsoever things were pure, whatsoever things were lovely,
whatsoever things were of good report. That's all Adam thought
on while he was made in the image of God. And God looked at Adam
and He said, Good! Good! This is good. My creation is good. That's the
only thing God creates is what's good. Righteous and holy. And after that fall, sin defiled
his heart and the only thing that came out of Adam's heart
then was evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts,
false witness, blasphemies. Christ said this is what defiles
a man. It's not things, it's not stuff,
it's not objects that defile a man. That's not what makes
you sick. What makes you sick is the heart.
It's the heart. It's the heart. It's a cesspool
of iniquity. Scripture says, God saw that
the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination
of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. That's the fall. That's what
happened to us, brethren. You look at us now. Look at us
now. Look at the world now. murdering
one another and blaming it on second causes, blaming it on
racism and blaming it on police brutality and blaming it on this
country and that country and this politician and that politician. It comes out of the heart, out
of a man's heart where it comes from. Look at us committing adulteries
against one another. committing thefts against one
another. All of this is the product of
sin which came from man. Man produced it. You look at
us now, compared to what we were when God made us, and you can't
say good. You can't say good. In fact, God says there's none
good, not one. That's what God pronounces about
us now. There's none good, no, not one. Those folks looked at Naomi coming
down that street. They looked at her now and this
change that was made in her and how dirty and filthy and defiled
and ragged she was. And they said, is this Naomi? She left prosperous and pleasant. She came home bitter and empty. And you look at us now compared
to what God made us in Adam, and the only thing you can say
about us now is, is this Adam? We don't even resemble what we
were, because we've lost that image that God made when He created
us in Adam. Now that's true of you and me
by nature. That's every man born into this
world by nature. A dead man can't do a thing.
We can't save ourselves because we're dead. All the works from
beginning to end have to be of God. And here's what's got to
happen in the beginning. Turn to Colossians 3, just a
minute. Here's why God in human flesh, Christ Jesus said we have
to be born of God. We have to be born of the Spirit
of God. Here's why, Colossians 3.10. When a man's born of God,
when he's born again of God, God makes him to put on the new
man. Remember we saw last week, it's
not your law keeping that avails, and it's not uncircumcision,
it's not knowing you're free, it's not knowing the five points
of Calvinism that avails. It's being made new by Christ
that avails. And here when He makes you new,
you put on this new man. And here is how this new man
is made. He is renewed in knowledge. God renews us in knowledge after
the image of Him that created him. We are recreated. We are
made after the image of God by the new birth and renewed in
knowledge so that we have a right understanding of who God is and
who we are. And that's got to happen now,
brethren. God's got to do that. You can't
take the first step toward God and I can't either. God has to
take the first step toward us and renew us and regenerate us
and give us knowledge of who He is and who we are by recreating
us in His image. And that image of God that we're
created in is Christ Jesus, the Son of God. That was the image
Adam was created in. Remember God said, let us to
create man after our image. Christ is the express image of
God. And God was saying of Himself,
God the Father, and of God the Son, let us make man in our image. And thank God, thank God that
He predestinated and elect people to be conformed to the image
of His Son. And when God creates us anew,
we are conformed to His image. We are made in the image of Christ. Now before we leave this point,
let me make one other statement. When a sanctified child of God,
a child of God that's been born anew and created in the image
of Christ, whenever you and I turn to our will, going to have our
will, our will, we're going to do what we will, rather than
following after God's will, this is what, it's a similar fall
that takes place as what happened right here to her. This was a
child of God when she left Bethlehem. And this is what happened to
her. If we turn to our way rather than holding fast to Christ's
way, brethren, when we do that, we are going to be brought down.
We have to. We have to. We have to be turned
back to Christ. We are going to be brought down.
There is no difference in Adam disobeying God in the garden,
you and I disobeying Christ now that we are born again. Adam's
law was that one law of you cannot eat the fruit of this one tree.
The law of the believer is lay hold of Christ. Do not turn from
Christ. Believe on Christ. Trust in Christ. He's our righteousness. He's
our holiness. He's our redemption. He's everything.
And to turn from Him is to turn to us. And when you do that,
you're going to fall. Not forever. It's a temporary
fall because God won't lose one of His children. But anytime
we turn from Christ, it's not going up, it's going down. You
can be certain of that. Now secondly, we see here that
the only way that we can be saved from this fall, from our sins,
is for God to save us. That's the only way we can be
saved is for God to save us. Look here now who Naomi attributed
all this work unto. She said there in verse 20, The
Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me. The Almighty has. She said in verse 21, the Lord
hath brought me home again empty. She said there in the last part
of verse 21, the Lord hath testified against me. The Almighty hath
afflicted me. God is the Almighty. God is the
Almighty. God is able to save those whom
He chose to save. God is able. And that God we're
talking about is Christ Jesus the Lord. Right now, as the mediator,
serving as the mediator, he speaks of God being above him because
he's submitted himself to follow God and to bring his people home
to him as the mediator. But when that's finished, when
that work is done, that one who walked this earth in human flesh,
we will see that one is God. The fullness of the Godhead in
a body. That's who He is. And He's almighty. He is almighty. He's working this work now in
this earth. And He will save those He chose
to save. No sinner, not you and not me,
can prohibit God from saving His people. No power of evil. No preacher, no man, no sinner,
not even the devil himself can stop God from saving those He's
determined to save. Look over at 1 Samuel chapter
2. Just to your right there, a couple of pages. 1 Samuel 2. Look at verse 5. Here's our problem. They that
were full have hired out themselves for bread, And they that were
hungry ceased, so that the barren hath borne seven, and she that
hath many children is waxed feeble." Now, we're sinners. Now, how
are we going to be saved from that? The Lord killeth and maketh
alive. He killeth first. Got to kill
us first. Got to kill all our self. Everything
about self, got to kill it first. Then He makes alive. He brings
down to the grave and bringeth up. The Lord maketh poor and
maketh rich. He bringeth low and lifteth up.
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the
beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to
make them inherit the throne of glory. For the pillars of
the earth are the Lord's, and He hath set the world upon them.
He will keep the feet of His saints, and the wicked shall
be silent in darkness, for by strength, by man's strength,
shall no man prevail." Now that's the Word of God. That's the Word
of God. That's not picking and choosing.
That's just simply reading God's Word. And that's what God said.
That's what it says all the way through the Word of God. Psalm
37, 28 says, The Lord loveth judgment, and forsaketh not his
saints. They're preserved forever. But
the seed of the wicked shall be cut off. When Christ walked
this earth, He said, All that the Father giveth me. He's talking
about particular sinners. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. Why? God will bring them. God
will bring them. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out. So God's able. He will save His
people. But now, in order to save us
from our sins, God's hand will be bitter toward us. At first,
His hand's going to be bitter toward us. He has to kill us.
He has to kill us. Look at verse 20. The Almighty
hath dealt very bitterly with me. Brethren, when God chastens
us, He means to correct us. He means to cause bitterness.
And his chastening rod always has its intended effect. The purpose of his chastening
is to turn us from our way to Christ, the way of holiness. That's the way we go to heaven. And he's going to keep his people
in Christ and make us partakers of Christ's holiness. And he's
going to do that by his chastening rod. So it will be bitter. But
it's only bitter to the flesh. It's the flesh that it's bitter
toward. Because it's going against the grain. God's way is against
what your flesh wants and what my flesh wants. That's why it's
bitter. God's going to empty His child. He said in verse 21,
she says, I went out full and the Lord hath brought me home
again empty. Emptied of every false refuge.
You've got false refuges. A false refuge is a place you
go to for safety and cling to in your mind thinking this is
what's going to save me. Maybe it was a profession you
made 20 years ago when you so-called gave your heart to Jesus. Maybe
it's your will and your way of finding out different levels
of knowledge. Maybe you trusted in your knowledge.
Maybe it's some work that you think you've done and you think
that that's going to save you. Maybe it's a co-effort between
you and the Lord and you think that's how you're going to be
saved. See, God's going to empty His child of all of that. He's
going to empty you of all of that. He's going to empty you.
He's going to empty your hand of any work that you've done.
He's going to empty you of self-righteousness. He's going to empty you of self-holiness.
He's going to empty you of all self-made religion. In short,
He's going to empty you of self. Make you to see, I can't save
myself. He's going to empty us. That's
the only reason a sinner won't come to Christ. You know that? I've told you this over and over
and over and over. Sin is not what's keeping sinners
from Christ. Sin, if God ever makes us see
our sin, that'll make us flee to Christ. It's our self-made
righteousnesses that keeps us from Christ. A man that won't
come to Christ, essentially he's saying, I'm somebody. I've got
strength. I can save myself. And that man won't be saved. Christ said, I didn't come to
call the righteous to repentance. I came to call sinners to repentance. See, we've got to be made to
see our sin. We've got to be emptied, emptied. And God's going
to testify against us too. She said, the Lord, verse 21,
the Lord has testified against me. testifies to witness against
you. You know, the Lord, back up there
in chapter 1, it said the Lord sent somebody. Somebody came
her way preaching the good news that the Lord had visited His
people in Bethlehem and gave them bread. The Lord is going
to send the Gospel. He is going to send His Gospel
preacher and preach the Word. Well, the Scriptures are clear.
How can a man believe in whom he has not heard? And how can
He hear without a preacher? And how can they preach unless
they be sent? God's going to send His preacher. And His preacher's
going to preach Christ. And God's going to teach His
child Christ. And as He teaches you Christ,
what He's going to do is He's testifying against you. She thought
that she could provide herself bread. That's what she thought.
There was a famine and she thought she could provide herself bread.
God testified against that. He said, I provide the bread.
She thought she'd found that bread down in Moab. God testified
against her and said, my bread's going to be given in my house.
You think you can find Christ the bread out in nature? Think you can find Christ the
bread out on your own as a maverick somewhere? God said, I'm going
to give my bread in my house. I swear my bread's going to be
given. Testifies against us. She thought she was right in
going her way. God testified that every work
of her hand didn't take her closer to God. It only took her further
away from God. See, God's going to testify against
us. And then when He's brought us to the end of ourself, He'll
testify of Christ that He's the way. He's the way. God's going
to deal bitterly by afflicting us. It says there, the Almighty
hath afflicted me. God stripped her of everything
that was keeping her from His house. Aren't you thankful God's
able to do that? Think of the things that were
keeping us from God's house. There was a time when our vain
thoughts kept us from God's house. He stripped us of all that. There
was a time we were in some church perhaps, many of you were in
a church where you thought you were worshiping God and it was
a false gospel. God stripped you of that. Perhaps
there's mother and father, son or daughter that was keeping
you from going to God's house for some reason. God stripped
you of that. He stripped her of her husband,
of her sons, and of one of her daughter-in-laws. Took it all
away from her. through death and through desertion,
stripped her, afflicted her, and it was very bitter. But by
all this now, she sees who she is and she sees who God is. She
called herself bitterness. That's what we are in ourselves.
We're bitterness. She saw who she was and she called
God the Almighty. She saw who God was. See how
this work prevailed? She saw who she was and she saw
who God was. She's not complaining about the
Lord's dealings with her. She's resigned to His will. She's
submitted to His will. She's speaking honestly about
herself and about God now. That's what God brings you to
do. Quit lying on God and speak truth about God. Quit lying about
yourself and you speak truth about yourself. I am the sinner
and all I've contributed to this thing is bitterness. He's the
Almighty, and He does all the saving. That's honesty. By God's grace alone that she
was where she was now. She said, the Lord hath brought
me home. The Lord hath brought me home.
That's the only remedy for our lost, ruined condition. It's
God's saving, irresistible grace. That's the only remedy. And if we ever turn from God
once He's saved us, the only remedy, the way we're preserved
is Him keeping us. That's the way. And lastly, we
see how it is that we're brought to God and how we come into God's
true house. We come only through faith in
Christ. That's the only way. God's going
to have Christ magnified. He's going to have Him preeminent
in the hearts of His people. He's going to have Him preeminent
before this world. Everything He's going to bow
and confess, He's Lord of lords and King of kings. So the only
way we're going to be saved is through faith in Christ. Now
look at this, verse 22. Naomi returned and Ruth the Moabitess. Let me go back and read that
again. It says, Naomi returned that word so is important after
all this work. God did what she confessed God
did so that's how so she returned and Ruth the Boabitis her daughter-in-law
with her which returned out of the country of Moab and They
came to Bethlehem now if you want to read that spiritually
see the spiritual meaning they came to God's house of bread
and in the beginning of barley harvest in Christ, in Christ. You see, to return, to return
out of the country of Moab, that's repentance. When God grates you
repentance, that's what it is. They were going to Moab, they
were looking to Moab, they were walking in Moab, God turned them
180 degrees and brought them back to His house. That's what
repentance is. To be changed, direction, change
of mind, change of heart, to be turned from your way and come
back to God. Our way takes us further away
from God. He's going to bring you home
to Himself. That's repentance. Out of the country of idolatry,
out of the country of self, out of the country of our works.
And with repentance comes faith in Christ. We see faith in Christ
here. Everything about these scriptures
speak of Christ. Everything about these scriptures
speak of Christ. What is this? They came to Bethlehem,
Judah. That's God's house of bread.
That's God's house of praise. That's the birthplace of Christ.
They came to Christ. They came to Christ. How do you
come to Christ? You come in Christ. They came
in the beginning of barley harvest. That's very, very significant.
It means they came into God's house, in Christ, through faith
in Christ. How does it mean that? One of the translations says
this was the day of the Passover. And it could have been the day
of the Passover because the day of the Passover and the Feast
of Harvest were only two days apart. So let's consider if it
was the day of the Passover. What's the picture there? Christ
is the Passover of His people. We're going to observe the Lord's
table today. The Lord ate the Passover, the last Passover,
and He said He's the fulfillment of that Passover. And then He
instituted a new ordinance, the Lord's Table, where He says,
now you ought to eat this broken bread that pictures my broken
body and drink this wine that pictures my shed blood. But Christ
is the Passover sacrificed for us. You remember in Egypt, when
God was going to deliver them out of Egypt, The way God would
deliver them out of Egypt was this. He told them, I'm going
to slay every firstborn in Egypt. I'm going to slay them all. But
God provided Israel with a lamb. He provided them with a lamb.
He came to them and told them to slay a spotless lamb and take
the blood and put it on the doorpost of their house. And that night
when God passed through Egypt, He slew all the firstborn in
Egypt. He even slew the firstborn in
the house of Israel. The difference was He slew the
firstborn in the houses of Israel by slaying the lamb in their
place. So that when He saw the blood
on the doorpost, He passed over them. That's what pass over,
that's where we get the name, He passed over them. And Christ
is our Passover because when Christ came, He laid down His
life in the place of all the children of Israel. And all God's
children, all His elect are firstborn sons. We are all firstborn children
in Christ the firstborn. This is the church of the firstborn.
And He laid down His life in place of all His firstborn elect
children so that we died to the Lord. We die, justice is satisfied,
and by dying in our room instead, He justified us. So that now,
through faith in Christ, God sees the blood and He passes
over His people. But everybody that's outside
of that blood, everybody that's not under that blood, they're
going to come into judgment one day and have to answer that judgment
themselves. You see, God didn't provide a
lamb for everybody in Egypt. And He had to provide a lamb
for everybody in the world. He provided a lamb for His people.
Why I tell sinners that? Because that's got to bring you
down off your high horse of thinking you deserve for God to provide
a lamb for you. You don't deserve for God to
provide anything for you. And if God has provided anything
for you, it's by free grace. It's not based on anything in
you. God provided a lamb for His people. God went to the cross
for a people. Christ died for a people. And
Christ made atonement for that people. And Christ justified
that people. And Christ will save that people.
Because Christ is successful and He accomplished that work.
He didn't just die for ambiguous sins and make this gift and put
it up on a shelf and just say, I hope somebody comes and claims
it. You don't buy a gift and do that. You don't buy a gift
for somebody and put it up on a shelf and say, Oh, I hope somebody
comes and gets it. You buy a gift for somebody in
particular and you take it and you give it to that person in
particular. That's what God did. That's what God did. So they,
if they came, if it was the day of the Passover, it was the beginning
of harvest. And if they came in the Passover,
it's a picture coming in faith in Christ our Passover. But here's
something that's beautiful as well. Our translation says it
was the beginning of barley harvest. The Sunday after the Passover
was the Feast of First Fruits. The Feast of First Fruits. Look
at Leviticus 23, real quick. It's amazing that Christ died
on the Passover, picturing, because He is the Passover, He fulfilled
it, and Christ arose two days later on this Feast of Harvest. He brought, they were to bring
a handful of the first fruits of their harvest. A handful of
the first fruits of their harvest. The first fruits they picked
of their harvest. They were to bring that and they
would bring it to a priest. And that priest would wave it
before the Lord to be accepted of them. And they were signifying
by that that they didn't produce that fruit by their own hands.
God produced it. And it all belonged to God. And
only then could they partake of the fruit. Now watch this,
Leviticus 23.10, He says here, I want you to see it, Speak unto
the children of Israel, and say to them, When you come into the
land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof,
you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto
the priest, and he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord to
be accepted for you. And on the morrow after the sabbath
the priests shall wave it. Christ died on that sabbath,
I mean on that Passover day, then there was the Saturday,
the sabbath, and then on that Sunday he arose. feast of harvest
this very day. And you shall offer that day
when you waive the sheaf a he-lamb without blemish of the first
year for a burnt offering unto the Lord. And the meat offering
thereof shall be two-tenths deals of fine flour mingled with oil,
an offering made by fire unto the Lord for a sweet savor. And
the drink offering thereof shall be of wine, the fourth part of
a hen. and you shall eat neither bread
nor parched corn nor green ears until the selfsame day that you
brought an offering unto your God. It shall be a statute forever
throughout your generations and all dwellings." The meaning is
this. The Sunday after the Passover,
the day after the Sabbath, our Lord Jesus arose from the grave
and He became the first fruits. He's the first fruit of the resurrection.
And He is the work by which all salvation is accomplished. He
belongs to God. And when He arose with His people
in Him, He declared all His elect scattered throughout the world,
throughout this field, He's ripe for the harvest. And whenever
He makes you to be born again, He makes you to come to Christ
the High Priest who is also our Lamb. They had to offer this
with a lamb, the broken body and the shed blood of Christ.
They had to offer a lamb and they had to offer wine. He's
that broken body and that shed blood. And they came there to
that priest and we present ourselves to him as the first fruits of
God's creation by regeneration. And he takes us and he waves
us before God to be accepted of God. And what we're declaring
in that is all this work of salvation is not by our hands, it's by
God's hand and where he is now. And only then can we begin to
partake of the fruit of this harvest. and actually feed upon
Christ. That's the picture. That's when
they came in the barley harvest. Picture coming to God in Christ.
Now here's what we've seen. Get this. Number one, we fell
in Adam. Ruined in Adam. If you miss the fall, you miss
it all. If you're not ruined, you don't have a reason to be
saved. Ruined in Adam. Number two, By the saving hand
of God's irresistible grace, we're recreated in His image,
given faith and repentance. That's the only way we can be
saved. And number three, when He saves you and gives you faith,
He makes you to see that the only way to come into His house,
into His presence, to be accepted of Him, is in Christ Jesus, our
Passover. Christ the first fruit, Christ
the priest, Christ the lamb. who waves you before God and
in Him we're accepted, declaring all the work is of God and not
of us. Amen. All right, brethren, let's stand
together and we'll be dismissed. Father, we thank you for this
day. We thank you for these beautiful pictures of Christ in the Scriptures.
Thank you for giving Him Thank you for his perfection, for his
righteousness and his holiness. Thank you, Lord, for his obedience
to the death of the cross. Thank you that he laid down his
life for the sheep. Thank you, Lord, that he's risen
again. Thank you that he's ruling now
from the throne of glory. Thank you, Lord, that you called
us and given us faith to believe you. Thank you, Lord, that you're
keeping us and preserving us. Thank you, Lord, that all our
righteousness and all our salvation is Christ alone. Lord, we wouldn't
have it any other way. Prevent us from glorying in ourselves.
Make us only to glorify you. And Lord, call out your lost
sheep by this gospel. We ask it according to your will.
We ask it in Christ's name. Amen.