Let's be turning to Luke chapter
one. Come now to where Elizabeth's
time was full. It was the fullness of time for
her where she would bring forth a son. She would give birth to
John. And that's one thing that we
see about our Lord's promises is in the fullness of time and
the appointed time, His purpose comes to pass. You can bank on
it. You can count on it. When God
has purpose to do something, He shall indeed bring it to pass. If it's healing, it'll be healing.
If it's hearing, it'll be hearing. If it's a work of His grace to
give life, you're gonna live. You're gonna live. Now when she
bore this child, John, her cousins, it says, and her neighbors, they
rejoiced with her in this, and then eight days later, it was
the time when boys would be circumcised, so they brought him into the
synagogue, and he'd be circumcised and then named. He'd be given
a name. The name that was given to him
was John. That's what the angel told Zacharias,
that he shall be called, he shall be called John. And the name
John means that God is a gracious giver. God is a gracious giver. And John the Baptist was certainly
a gift of God in the sense that it speaks of. It's a harbinger
of the grace of God who is Christ. Christ is the gift. We thank
God for his precious gift, the gift of his darling son to sacrifice
himself for sinners, for his people that are sinners. that
haven't earned this gift, we haven't earned God's favor, Christ
has. Christ has earned and obtained
the favor of God for us. And so John here, he's given
as well for this gracious purpose, to prepare the hearts of the
people that the Christ has come. The time for Christ, the time
of the fulfillment of the promise of God made unto us in the garden
that the seed of woman would come and crush the head of the
serpent, our enemy, that time was at hand. It signaled God's
good and gracious will and purpose for his people. Now, at this
time, when we're looking here at Luke chapter 1, we see that
God is giving his people many wonderful confirmations. Now,
it began in a small manner. It began with an angel coming
to Zacharias. And Zacharias understood, and
Elizabeth was made to understand, and maybe a few people, but I
don't know. It doesn't really say. And then
an angel came to Mary. And then when Mary returned,
an angel came to Joseph. And now at this circumcision,
it begins to broaden. It begins to expand and spread
that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand. It's near. It's near. And Elizabeth said,
when they circumcised him, she said, his name is John. And they
said, well, that doesn't sound right. No one in your family
is named John. That can't be. They wanted to
name him Zacharias. And she said, no, it's John.
And so they turned to Zacharias, who seems to have had a stroke,
basically. He couldn't speak. He couldn't
really understand and yet here he asked for a writing tablet
and he said his name is John. His name is John. And the people
marveled at this. And it says now in verse 64,
and his mouth, Zechariah's mouth, was opened immediately and his
tongue loosed. And he spake and praised God. Now here's Zechariah, this man
who did not believe God, who distrusted the things that he
was hearing and doubted of them. And he was now loosed from his
bands. loosed from his bands. Aren't
you thankful that the Lord has loosed you? You that believe
Christ, you that were dumb and unable to speak the glory of
God, and you who had an ear stopped up so that you couldn't hear
the glory of God, you've been loosed from your bonds by the
grace of God. In the hour he purposed, just
as he said it would be, when these things be fulfilled, then
you'll receive your hearing and your speech once again. And so it is that in the appointed
hour of God's grace, you that hear, you that believe, give
God thanks because it was by his appointment, his gracious
appointment for you. And so we see here in this that
yes, Zacharias sinned. Yes, Zacharias was unbelieving
and doubted the true and living God, and yet we see that the
grace of God, the will of God was not stopped. Could you imagine
if God withheld his blessings because of sin? Now, that's not
an encouragement to sin, but what I'm saying is we all fell
in sin. We don't deserve life and light,
and yet God still promised to send his son and then fulfilled
that promise. Even though we're all enemies
by nature and warred against him, God still brought to pass
his gracious will and purpose for his people because he's not
going to fail to bring to pass life and salvation for his people.
just because we're sinners. No, it's we give God thanks that
because in spite of our sin, in spite of our enmity and rebellion
against God, he gave his son and accomplished our redemption
and did this work for us and in us to give us light and life
and liberty in his son. And so we see God's gracious
will and purpose being accomplished and nothing man can do, and that
includes all our enemies, not even the evil one, can stop God
from accomplishing what he wills and purposes to do. And so verse
65 and 66 says, fear came on all that dwelt round about, And
all these sayings were noised abroad throughout all the hill
country of Judea. And all they that heard them
laid them up in their hearts, saying, What manner of child
shall this be? And the hand of the Lord was
with him. Today I want to look with you
at these sayings that were noised abroad. We're told in verse 67
his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied. Zacharias, his prophecy concerns
Christ. It concerns the grace of God
that was given for you. You that cannot save yourselves,
you that are sinners, you that have nothing to bring to God,
no righteousness, no good works, nothing to speak for you, God
has provided all your salvation in Christ and by Christ. And
that's where he blesses his people in the Lord Jesus Christ. If
you would know God, if you would have God meet with you, it's
going to be in Jesus Christ and not outside of him ever. It's
all, we know God, and God reveals himself to us in his darling
son, Jesus Christ. That's how we come, and there's
not another way. There's no other name under heaven
given among men whereby we must be saved. If God has purpose
to save us, it's in Christ. It's in Christ Jesus, in Christ
alone, through faith alone, because of what Christ alone did for
his people. And so his prophecy concerns
Christ, and his prophecy is full of grace and comfort for the
sinner who cries, who needs help, who's burdened, who's sick, who's
dead in trespasses and sins, and has no means of freeing themselves
or giving themselves life. Christ has come for that one,
to set them free and to give them life and salvation. So I
want to look at these sayings. And these sayings, I believe,
is the prophecy here. these things that were recorded
for us by the Holy Spirit that we should know and delight in
these very things. So every word of this prophecy concerns God's
gracious promise in Christ. He begins in verse 68, blessed
be the Lord God of Israel for he hath visited and redeemed
his people. Let's look at these two things.
He visited his people and he redeemed his people. So first,
this right here is a gracious visit. We want the Lord to visit
us. It's a gracious visit. We want
the Lord to draw near to us. Now I know the wicked who fear
not God and who lived to rebel against him. They don't want
him to draw near, but the people of God do want the visit of God. We saw this morning, and we've
been seeing for weeks, how that the Lord visited Abraham, and
it was good. He renewed his promise. When
the Lord drew near to Abraham, he told them the covenant. He
told them of his gracious promise, and he renewed that every time
that he spoke to Abraham. He kept repeating it. That's
why I keep repeating it because that's what the Lord has shown
me. Keep preaching Christ. Paul knew nothing among us save
Jesus Christ and him crucified. And so the Lord draws near and
it's a gracious visit. And he renews that promise. That's
how we know it's gracious, because he's declaring Christ to us.
You know, when God sent Moses to speak to the people, to his
people captive in Egypt, God told him, he said, I have surely
visited you and seen that which is done to you in Egypt. God visited his people and he
looked at their afflictions. He looked upon them for good,
for their good. And when the people heard that,
when Moses came and told the people that, that the Lord had
visited the children and looked upon their affliction, they bowed
their heads and they worshiped. And that's what the visit of
the Lord does for his people. When the Lord draws near in grace
and mercy, declaring his word, it leads to his people worshiping
God in spirit and in truth because God's revealed himself to us.
And when he reveals himself, his child is going to know him
and worship him and give him thanks for what he's revealed
and done and worked in them. We can look at Naomi. When Naomi,
she went out of Israel to get some bread, because there was
a famine in the land, and while she was there in Moab, she heard
how that the Lord had visited his people in giving them bread. And so we want the Lord to visit
us because when he visits us, he gives his people the heavenly
bread upon which we are fed and nourished and strengthened and
comforted. The heavenly bread, which is
Christ. And so again, when Christ came
into the world, was that a gracious visit? Absolutely. We'll see
at some point when the angels announced, they said, peace on
earth, goodwill toward men. God sent his son into the world
for a gracious visit to redeem his people, to visit his people,
to look upon our burden and affliction of sin, buried under that death
and ruinous heat of this flesh, corrupted and vile and wretched
things that we are. Christ looks upon us to do us
good, to be gracious and merciful to his people. And so that brings
us to the second point. He visited his people and he's
come to redeem his people. We're sinners by nature, dead
in trespasses and sins, unable to loose the shackles and set
ourselves free. We don't have lit up eyes that
can see and understand the things of God. We don't know them. We
don't know the true and living God. We don't know how to come
and worship God. We don't understand him. We don't
have the mind of God because we need a spirit. And in Adam,
we come forth spiritually dead. We don't have the spirit. We
must be born again, born anew, by his spirit, giving us a new
man, a living man, born and formed of the seed of Christ. It's Christ
in you, the hope of glory. And so Christ came to purchase
us from that captivity. Peter speaks of this and he tells
us that the purchase price is the blood of Christ. It isn't
with gold and with silver. That's how men purchase the souls
of men. They spend earthly, carnal, fleshly
things. But Christ came with something
more precious. And there was a price to pay,
a price demanded for our lives. And he paid that price, the price
being, if they're to have life and to go free, you must give
your life for everyone that you will set free. You must lay down
your life for them. And Christ willingly, gladly
paid the price with his own blood to deliver us, to ransom us,
to take us from the hands of justice to make satisfaction
to the Father that we would live in Him, by Him, rejoicing in
Him and know Him. And so Christ came and accomplished
this redemption of His people when He came and visited them.
That's what Zacharias is saying. He's saying God has visited His
people. He's redeemed His people. Third,
in His coming, the promise of God made to David was remembered. God left nothing out. He remembered
his word to David. He said in Luke 169, And hath
raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant
David. What is a horn? What's that talking
about? Well a horn in scripture is a symbol of strength. It speaks
of the strength of our salvation, the strength of God's salvation
for his people. We're not going to shake it.
We're not going to break it. We're not going to destroy and
weaken or ruin the salvation of God for his people. It's a
strong salvation. It's a strong salvation. Why? Because it's wrought for
us by the mighty King, by our David. the Lord Jesus Christ,
of whom David was a type, and a picture, and Christ came of
his loins. He came, that promised seed of
the woman, coming through Eve, and through Abraham and Sarah,
and Isaac, and Jacob, and through Judah, Jacob's son Judah, and
through David, That's where the seed came, according to the flesh. I'll read Psalm 89, just a few
verses. First verse 19 and 20. Then thou
spakest in vision to thy holy one and saidst, I have laid help
upon one that is mighty. Amen. God didn't lay the stripes
and the beatings and the whippings that we deserve for our sin upon
us. He laid them upon back of his
son. They plucked out his beard. They
spit in his face. They beat him and punched him
and mocked him. And he took that humiliation
for you. for you that this day believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. And he carried that cross and
he was nailed to that cross, put up upon that cross for you
that believe him this day, not because he sinned, he did righteously. He fulfilled all the will of
the father. He spoke the words that his father
gave him to speak and nothing more and did nothing more. He
did what the father sent him to do to obtain and accomplish
the redemption of his people, which includes you that believe
on him this very day, and trust him for all your righteousness
and all your keeping with the Father. Christ is that one, the
mighty one. I have exalted one chosen out
of the people. I have found David my servant
with my holy oil have I anointed him. And we'll see that. We'll
see that when Christ came to John the Baptist to be baptized
of him and the Father sent his spirit upon him so that John
could see and know this is the one. This is the one whom you've
come as a forerunner to to declare him the Lamb of God to my people.
To show him. And then it says in verse 28
and 29 of Psalm 89, my mercy will I keep for him forevermore. And my covenant shall stand fast
with him. His seed also will I make to
endure forever. That's you and me. I believe
on him to endure forever in his throne as the days of heaven. This is an eternal salvation.
God has given us life and inheritance and eternal inheritance. in his
darling son, Jesus Christ. And so God continues to renew
this promise of his seed to this day. We see it all the way through
the line. I've already said it, so I won't say it again, but
he's brought it to pass. This is the fulfillment of his
promise to bring that seed. And now he comes up to Mary,
who's of the seed of David, and Christ comes forth. Christ will
come forth. Now forth, his coming, fulfills
the prophecies of the prophets. Remember, Yes, John was just
born, but Zechariah continues to prophesy of Christ because
John's birth is a harbinger, he's a forerunner of Christ.
And so it says in verse 70, as he spake by the mouth of his
holy prophets, which have been since the world began. And the way we'll just look at
this verse is that everything, that's recorded here in this
scripture speaks to you of the Lord Jesus Christ. These verses
are telling us of, yes, we see ourselves described in here as
sinners in need of salvation, but it's telling you of the Savior. It's to prepare you to see the
Christ, to know who he is, to know that this Jesus of Nazareth
is the very Christ of God. He is the Son of God, manifest
in the flesh. God come in the flesh, justified
of the spirit to save his people. Jesus is the servant of God,
who humbled himself in the flesh, who fulfilled all that the Father
sent him to do. And his birth is detailed in
these scriptures. His life is detailed in these
scriptures. His death is detailed. His resurrection
is detailed. The redemption that he accomplished
is all written for us in this Word of God. This is the word
of God. Believe it. Believe him whom
he sent. After his resurrection, our Lord
comes to his disciples to show himself to his disciples. And
this is what he said. He said, these are the words
which I spake unto you while I was yet with you, that all
things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses
and in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning me. When you
open this word, that's who you're looking for. You're looking for
Jesus Christ, because that's whom the Father speaks of. That's
whom he tells us of, that we may come to the Father through
Jesus Christ, the Son, and rejoice in worship in him. Believe in
God and all that he said to us in Christ. And then notice verse
70, what it says here, just to reaffirm what I said, Verse 70
in Luke 1, as he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets. There's one mouth. All the prophets,
all the writers of this word have one mouth, one voice, one
subject, the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what they're speaking
of. Their message throughout the span of hundreds of years
between them, in some cases, maybe even thousands of years,
Thousands of years, yet they all have one voice, the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's the voice we hear. The
Lord says, thy people shall lift up, thy watchmen will lift up
the voice with the voice, the voice of the Son of God, of His
Spirit declaring Him. It's Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
Now fifth, we see the effects of His redemption. Look at verse
71. that we should be saved from
our enemies and from the hand of all that hate us. Now, we're
under this topic of the effects of Christ's redemption here.
First, it's that all that seek to utterly destroy you, the enemy
of your flesh, the enemy of your soul, the evil one, this world,
all the sin and violence that's in it, even this old man of flesh,
the enemy of the grave, the enemy of death, that would bind you
and keep you dead, all your enemies, Christ has come and utterly destroyed
them. He's conquered them. He is the
ruler. He is the glorious salvation. He's the mighty God, the mighty
king of his people. And so he's conquered all our
enemies. That's true of the corruptions
within and the temptations without. Verse 72 and 73, we see here
that Christ's coming, this is another fruit of his redemption,
it restores favor with God for us. He restored the favor of
God toward us. And that enmity that's in us,
he takes it away so that now we rejoice. We want God to visit
us. We ask, Lord, draw near to me. Lord, please visit me. Lord,
please make this word living to me. Don't pass me by when
you're coming and visiting your people. Please come here. Please
stop here. Please sup with me and bless
your people. That's what we want now because
of his grace and mercy. And so verse 72 and 73, to perform
the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath which he swore to our father Abraham. And we've been
seeing that repeatedly because we have been in Genesis looking
at Abraham, and we see how the Lord keeps reiterating and reaffirming
his covenant of grace that he made with Abraham to do him good,
and all the nations are blessed in Abraham. And so this vision
of all the nations being blessed in Abraham, meaning that all
God's people come by faith just like Abraham, and we rejoice
in that seed of Abraham, as of one the Lord Jesus Christ we
rejoice in that seed Christ and Christ alone and John the Apostle
John now recorded this for us in Revelation 5 verse 9 and 10
he saw this vision when he was when he was writing down the
the revelation of Jesus Christ It says that they sung a new
song. This song is of redemption. That's what we sing of, our redemption. They sung a new song saying,
thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof. And that book meaning, you've
accomplished redemption, our salvation, and you're fulfilling
and implementing all the gracious will and purpose of the Father
in the earth. All authority has been given
to Him. He is opening the book and He is doing things as it
pleases Him. He is in complete control. Your God is sovereign. Nothing
is happening outside of His will and purpose. Christ is in total
control. The book is in His hand. The
seals are being opened by Him. It's all in his hand. And so
it's the seals thereof for thou was slain and hast redeemed us
to God by thy blood out of every kindred and tongue and people
and nation and has made us unto our God kings and priests and
we shall reign on the earth. That's what Christ's redemption
has done. And there's not a nation or a
people, there's not a man or God doesn't exclude, men and
women come to him, smart, unintelligent. Rich, poor, doesn't matter what
race or ethnicity or what your background is or who your mommy
and your daddy were, if you're Christ's, if he gave his life
for you, you're coming. And you're gonna be standing
there worshiping God in Christ, in him. Now because of Christ's
redemption, he gives us power and grace to serve our God in
newness of life. Look at verses 74 and 75 in Luke
chapter one. that he would grant unto us that
we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve
him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him
all the days of our life." How does he do this? Well, he sent
his Holy Spirit to seek us out when we were lost in darkness,
in spiritual darkness, when we were taken captive and confused
in religion and tossed this way by this wind of doctrine and
tossed that way by that wind of doctrine and we were on a
stormy sea and one day we think we're saved, the next day we
think we're lost and we were just so confused and so troubled
and so burdened and lying under that heap of a mess and terrified. But God sent his spirit to seek
us out when we were lost and sitting in darkness and sitting
in a heap of lies and confusion and not knowing the true and
living God. And he revealed to us, he visited
us and revealed to us the redemption of Christ. And that's what he
does. He calls us to walk with him
and by faith we follow him, though it might be a tiny little seed
of a mustard seed. It might only be some smoke coming
up there. but if it's of the Lord, He's gonna keep you growing
in Him. He's gonna keep revealing and
manifesting Himself to you and settling your heart, comforting
you, because you see, when I look at myself, when I look at my
works, and my whatever, any part, when I'm looking at me, I get
discouraged, because all I see is an insufficient man. I'm an
insufficient man. I don't have what it takes. I'm
not this faithful guy. I'm not this good person. I see
sin and iniquity yet in this flesh. And I feel the temptations
of this flesh and this world. And I'm terrified when I look
at me, and I expect to be swatted away any moment. But, when the
Lord wills, when he's gracious, he turns my eyes off of myself,
because that's not where they're to be, and he puts them on Christ. And when I see him, and how perfect
he is, and how faithful he is, and he tells me, look to my servant,
look to me, trust me, don't look at what you're doing, trust me,
I'm working in you, I've called you, and I've purposed to do
what I will in you, And seeing my weakness, it's good because
it puts my face in the dirt at the feet of Christ, just like
Mary always went. She always went to Christ at
his feet. That's a good place to be. So he shows us our weakness. He shows us our sin, not to destroy
us, but to bring us to the feet of Christ and to go to him and
say, Lord, keep me. Lord, forgive me. Lord, turn
my heart. Keep my eyes looking to you.
Keep me faithful in preaching Christ and Christ alone to your
people, feeding them with the bread of heaven. That's what
I'm called to do, and that's what I want to do, and that's
only by His grace. That's only by His grace, otherwise
I would be turned away. And we all know that's true,
we that are sinners, we know this is what God has done in
us. So Christ is the encouraging word, and He keeps us walking
in the light of God, and knowing Him who loved me and gave Himself
for me. a sinner, so that I could say
to you that are sinners, trust him, believe him, he keeps his
word, he will not turn you away. All who need him, all who come
to him for help, he never turned one away. He never turned one
sinner away who sought him for grace and mercy. He is gracious
and faithful and kind and gentle And he doesn't lay heavy burdens
upon his people. He blesses us in Christ. And
then sixth, again, like you're saying, well, isn't this about
John? Well, Zechariah is talking all about Christ at the birth
of John. That's why I'm talking about Christ instead of John,
because this is the prophecy that the Spirit gave to Zechariah,
to speak of Christ. This is what it means. This is
what his coming means. And so Zechariah declares when
this glorious redemptive work was going to begin in time. It
begins at the appointed hour, when John was born. Verse 76,
And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the highest. You're
not a great man in yourself, and John knew it, he said, he
must increase, I must decrease he must increase I must decrease
and he's because he's a prophet of the highest and thou shalt
go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways Christ here
is the highest he's the highest he's the glorious Redeemer he's
our husband our friend our Savior our God Our Almighty, we worship
God in Him. And John is His prophet. John
is His prophet. So John was sent beforehand.
Why did you come, John? To prepare the heart of the people
for the coming of Christ. to prepare the people for the
coming of Christ, to turn them, here they are, all the Jews,
they're laboring, they're working under the law, they're making
the sacrifices, they're giving their tithes and doing their
things, and they're thinking, this is our righteousness, and
John comes and shakes all that up, and says, that's not your
righteousness, that's not your salvation, the Lord is coming,
the kingdom of God is at hand, the Lord's coming, he's your
salvation. Put aside those things trusting
your works and your goodness because you're not good and you're
not righteous. You're sinners and you need the
grace of God which is revealed in Christ. Get ready, he's coming. Don't miss him. He's coming. That's what John was sent to
do. He's that one spoken of in Isaiah 40, when the Lord said,
comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Tell them that their warfare
is accomplished. It says in that same chapter, verse three through
five, that John is the voice of him that crieth in the wilderness.
Prepare ye the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a
highway for our God. Stop bringing in the confusion.
Stop bringing in all the lies and trusting those things. Make
it straight. Look, look to Him. He's coming.
Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall
be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the
rough places plain. And the glory of the Lord shall
be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth
of the Lord hath spoken it. This was done that they might
hear the good news, that they might hear Christ in spirit and
in truth. It says verse 77, to give knowledge
of salvation unto his people by the remission or the forgiveness
of their sins. It's to show us that our forgiveness
with God is not because we earned it. or that we did something
to convince God to say, okay, we'll let that one go. No, it
was given to us, forgiveness is obtained by Jesus Christ paying
the price for that sin. And then verse 78, through the
tender mercy of our God, whereby the day spring from on high hath
visited us. It's telling us that Christ is
our light. He's the day spring. He's the
one that sheds light on the word of God so that knowing him, we
know the true and living God. Knowing him, now you can read
the scriptures and know it's speaking of Christ. This is teaching
me something about Christ, what I need to know of him. I may
not see it, but I know it's talking of him. Lord, shine your light
upon this and reveal this word to me. Help me to see what you're
saying here, because he's the day spring. And in the grandest
scale, what it's saying is, knowing Christ, now you see plainly God's
word. You see plainly God's mystery
revealed. You now know that Christ is salvation. The mystery, there's no more
mystery. It's all of Christ. This is who it's speaking of
is Christ because he's the light. Verse 79, to give light to them
that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our
feet in the way of peace. Christ is the light that the
Father has given to the people and we wouldn't know it except
Christ, except it's revealed to us in Christ. Paul said, for
God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, I said
in the first hour that light speaks of God's gracious will
and purpose. When he said, let there be light,
and there was light, that was God signaling he had a gracious
will and purpose for a people, for a people. And so for God
who commanded the light to shine out of darkness hath shined in
our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And so what our Lord is telling
us here as we're finishing this first chapter of Luke, it's to
prepare your hearts for the coming of Christ. It's to prepare your
hearts for the coming of Christ. All these witnesses that we've
seen here have been called up to the witness stand to testify
to you, to say to you, this Jesus of Nazareth is the very Christ
of God. Believe him, rejoice in him.
He's coming. The Jews were tinkering around
in religion. They were trusting their works
under the law, under the old letter of that former priesthood.
But John came, and what it says in the last verse, verse 80.
What he's showing us there is John was never trained up by
the flesh. He didn't go to their synagogues to be schooled. He
was taught by the Lord. He probably went to the temple,
as he was supposed to do, but that wasn't his teaching. His
teaching was the Lord, not by men, because he was sent to prepare
the people for a better priesthood. That one made after the priesthood
of Melchizedek. which is the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so verse 80 in closing, and the child grew and waxed strong
in spirit and was in the desert till the day of his showing unto
Israel. So I've enjoyed that first chapter
and hearing from these witnesses, it rejoices my heart to see that
this Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. And I
pray that he did the same for you my brethren as well.