Oh, you love that. Yeah, I know. I know, I was going. He would. He sees it. I've just
seen it now, because I'm standing there. I ain't kidding you. He's seen that the first day
we're here. That's the counter. That overhang on the counter.
Oh, wow. Yes. I just love it. Yeah, if there's something crooked,
he's the first one to pick it up. Yeah. All the builders standing
there. I hate it. Yeah. So how are we going to set up
the heat? How are we going to set this?
Just put a couple chairs or tables. And push these chairs around.
We got tables. Joanne brought two. And then
we have that black one in there. And there's a black one and a
gray one. Yeah, we have just a four-seater too. Just a full-length
one. Probably. Just to make sure. We'll bring our little one too,
just in case. So we got one, two, three tables. It's right on the desk. Have you heard about the plastic
decay in the woods? No. Okay. Interesting. Jai Gurudev. Good evening. Let's open this evening's worship
with singing number 485 out of the hardback, 485, Revive Us
Again. We praise Thee, O God, for the
Son of Thy love, for Jesus who died and is now gone above. Alleluia, Thine the glory! Alleluia, Amen! Alleluia, Thine the glory! Revive us again! We praise Thee, O God, for the
Spirit of life, who has shown us our Savior and scattered our
night. Alleluia, Thine the glory! Alleluia, Amen! Alleluia, Thine the glory! Revive us again! All glory and praise to the Lamb
that was slain, Who has borne all our sins and has cleansed
every stain. Alleluia, Thine the glory! Alleluia, Amen! Alleluia, Thine the glory! Revive us again! Revive us again. Fill each heart with Thy love. May each soul be rekindled with
fire from above. Alleluia, Thine the glory. Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Thine the glory. Revive us again. Our second hymn will be number
126, Rock of Ages. Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let
me hide myself in Thee. Let the water and the blood from
Thy wounded side which flowed, ye of sin, the double pure, save
from wrath and make me pure. Could my tears forever flow? Could my zeal no longer know? These four sin could not atone,
Thou must save and Thou alone. In my hand no price I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling. While I draw this fleeting breath,
when my eyes shall close in death, when I rise to worlds unknown
and behold thee on thy throne, rock of ages, cleft for me, let
me hide myself in thee. Thank you. Scripture reading tonight will
be out of Psalm 37. Psalm 37, starting with verse 1. Fret not thyself because of evildoers,
neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For
they shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green
herb. Trust in the Lord and do good,
so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily shalt thou be fed.
Delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires
of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the Lord,
trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass, and he shall
bring forth thy righteousness as the light and thy judgment
as the noonday. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently
for him. Fret not thyself because of him
who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked
devices to pass. Cease from anger and forsake
wrath. Fret not thyself in any wise
to do evil. for evildoers shall soon be cut
off, but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit
the earth. Lord, we come before you. We
thank you for gathering us here tonight to hear your gospel,
to hear your word. We ask that you would open our
hearts to hear it and receive it And we ask that you'd be with
Eric as he brings the message. We ask that you'd be with him
and give him your spirit and strengthen and encourage him.
We thank you for the good health of Johnny and Scott. We ask that
they might be able to come back and worship with us again soon.
We ask that you'd go with us through the rest of this hour.
Be with those who couldn't attend or are sick. Bless them where
they are. All those who are tuned in live,
we ask that you'd bless them also. We ask all this in Christ's
name. Amen. This is set up. All right, brother. Turn with me to Isaiah 42. We're going to be in Isaiah 42
looking at verses 5 through 8. Previously in the previous two
messages from this chapter our Lord has been speaking of Christ
and tonight he speaks to him. He speaks to him. Now all the
believers hope in salvation and all these spiritual blessings
which are given to us are given to us and revealed to us in the
Lord Jesus Christ. We know that it's in Christ that
our God deals with us and has fellowship with us. And so we
give thanks unto our God because his son, Jesus Christ, the son
of God, our only hope for salvation, was willing to come and save
us. He's willing to to cleanse us
of our sins and to redeem us with his own blood and to bring
us into the fellowship with God our Father. And tonight, our
Lord now gives us view in that fellowship, that sweet fellowship
that we have now with God, where he's given us light and understanding
into the things of God, we have here in our text a view into
the Father's calling of the Son, where he calls the Son to this
work of salvation and redemption for us. For us, brethren. I've titled this message, The
Calling of God's Servant. In verse one, he said, behold,
my servant. And so this is the calling of
God's servant. And we first see that it's our
God who speaks. This is the true and living God
who speaks to us. He's speaking to his son, but
he speaks to us. He's bringing us into this fellowship to see
his calling of the son who is our very salvation. And then
we'll see the calling and the accomplished works which our
Savior does for us in the covenant of grace. And then we'll close
looking at this glory which is Jehovah's. This is our God's
glory to save his people in grace apart from our works. So let's
begin here. Our God has called our attention
already to his servant, right? Behold my servant in verse 1. And this servant we saw last
week or a couple weeks ago in verses 2 through 4 that our Lord,
God's servant, deals with us very graciously, right? is very merciful in how he speaks
to us. We that are sinners, we that
are broken before him and contrite of spirit and of heart, he deals
very mercifully, very gracious, not harshly, not with cruelty,
not in making us feel foolish and ignorant because we don't
know these things, but he's very tender to us in revealing our
salvation and our hope in God. He's very kind to us. I don't want us to think that
God is indifferent to sin. God hates sin and He must punish
sin. But for us to be punished, for
us to endure that punishment, we could never survive it. We
could never endure it to the end, meaning it would never end
for us. We can never be righteous in
ourselves. And so we must, in ourselves,
endure an eternal punishment separated from God. but he provided
his son who obtained eternal redemption for us, who obtained
eternal life and has given it to us in himself. So God punished
sin in punishing the son in the sinner's stead. In our place,
Christ came and bore that punishment. Now, our God brings us to an
understanding of these things, but in religion, right, in man-made
religion, when man is pointing out sin to us, he then begins
to focus on the man and the woman and telling them what they must
do now to correct that, what they need to do to repent of
their sins in order to earn God's favor. order to earn God's acceptance
of them, right? They instruct sinners in what
they call righteousness, and what they're really doing is
they become harsh and demanding in what they say God is teaching
us about serving Him and knowing Him. They point us to works of
religion and works that we are to do under the name of religion
and under the name of being Christian in order to earn God's favor.
And so when they're explaining how it is that we obtain favor
and forgiveness with God, we see it's not righteousness. Even
though they're teaching morality, even though they're teaching
things from the law, they're actually teaching us unrighteousness
when they turn us not to Christ for our righteousness, not to
Christ for our hope, but when they turn us to the things that
we are doing or not doing in order to please God and obtain
his favor. Do you hear the difference there?
One, We declare righteousness is to exalt and to lift up Christ,
for the sinner to look to Christ the Savior whom God has sent
to take away the sins of his people. And in religion, they're
saying, yeah, he did his part, but now you have to do your part. And they turn your eyes from
Christ to look at what you are doing or not doing and what you
can do better or not do. And they use motivating things
like fear of the law or want of reward. And they turn you
from Christ. And the Lord teaches us that's
unrighteousness. That's unrighteousness because
no amount of works that we do will ever, ever make atonement
for the sins that we've committed and the offenses we've committed
against our God, because it robs God of His glory. He will give
us a heart to serve Him and a heart to seek Him, but we know that's
not our salvation. Our salvation is Christ. And
so the grace of God is radically different from the religion of
man. It's radically different from the religion of man. One
is speaking of our works, and the other declares God's works
for us. And one creates fear in our hearts
of God, fear of punishment, fear of wrath, and the other creates
love in the heart. joy, and peace, and rest in Him. Alright, and so our Lord is declaring,
He's revealing His sinner to us, He's speaking of the sinner,
and He pauses here in verse 5, and He's letting us know who
it is that is speaking. We're seeing who it is that is
declaring these words, because these are not the words of a
man. These are the words of Almighty
God, who created the heavens and the earth, and all that therein
is. Every creature, you and me, and
everything that is, God created. In this one speaking, so verse
five says, Thus saith God the Lord, he that created the heavens
and stretched them out, he that spread forth the earth and that
which cometh out of it, he that giveth breath unto the people
upon it and spirit to them that walk therein. And so this is
God of the world. This is the God of the world,
the whole universe, all of creation, that's who's speaking to us.
He created it, And he's the one that determined the lands. He's the one who divided the
lands unto the people and gave authority and raised up princes
and kings and rulers to rule in those lands. He did all that. He's the one who does according
to his purpose. We see that this one is all-powerful,
all-mighty, to do as he will. He gives us similar language
if you turn over to Isaiah 40. Isaiah 40, back a couple chapters,
in verse 22. What the Lord is doing here is
He intends to create awe in us. He intends to create a desire
in us to stop and think, I want to hear what this One who created
me and created this amazing, beautiful world, I want to know
what He says, this One. Look at verse 22 there. It is
He that sitteth upon the circle of the earth. and the inhabitants
thereof are as grasshoppers, that stretcheth out the heavens
as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in. So
we in ourselves are puny and small, even though we think highly
of ourselves, but God says we're grasshoppers. And so we like
to think that we're able to determine what shall be or not be for us. We like to feel like that we're
the ones in control and we're the ones determining our own
destiny. You know, I think that's probably
why there's probably a dual purpose in why video games, you know,
these amazing worlds and video games are so successful and appealing
to people. In one sense, it seems to minimize
the wonders of the world that we're in. It takes away the wonder
of the world that we're in and the miracle things that we see
because it puts such an emphasis on magic and powers and things
that we don't typically see, and powers we don't have, and
it makes us feel like that's awe-inspiring and wonderful,
and it minimizes the power and wonder of God, but it also gives
us a sense and feeling of control over our world and what we can
or cannot do. and whatnot, but our Lord calls
us back to behold Him and the true Creator and the true God
who determines what shall or shall not be. And in reality,
we are humbled. Our Lord has a way of humbling
us and making us to know that we can't just do what we think
is right or what we think should happen, and our God hedges us
about at times to remind us of our humanity and our frailty
and our weaknesses and our need of Him. And He is God, alright? So, the world's inhabitants,
we willingly forget that God is our Creator. And if He's our
Creator, He's our Judge. And, you know, all the roaring
and shouting and anger that we see in our country and hear of
throughout the world, it's just a sign and a mark that the world
has forgotten that God is our creator. And as such, where to
hear his words and hear what he says. Romans 1 20 says, the
invisible things of him from creation, from the creation of
the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they
are without excuse. And so the Lord is saying, don't
to us. Don't be as the fool. Don't forget
about the Lord. Hear Him. Don't wait to the day
of judgment to hear His voice. Seek Him today while it is called
today. Seek Him to know Him and to hear
what He is saying to us. And if we read just a few words
from Proverbs, Proverbs 8. Go over there to Proverbs 8 and
look at verses 5 through 8 with me. And those who have the Spirit
of God will be reminded that we are to hear the Lord. This
is wisdom speaking. The words of the Lord is wisdom
speaking. And wisdom says, O ye simple,
understand wisdom, and ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart. Hear, for I will speak of excellent
things, and the opening of my lips shall be right things. For my mouth shall speak truth,
and wickedness is an abomination to my lips. All the words of
my mouth are in righteousness. There is nothing forward or perverse
in them." Okay, so this is the one who's speaking to us and
now having our attention, in the next verse we'll see the
calling and the accomplished works that he's calling his servant,
his righteous servant to come and do and perform in righteousness
so that God is pleased well with these works that he's establishing
and accomplishing for the people. So the Lord says that what he
does is righteous and what he does is in truth. Okay, it's
righteous and in truth and the evil one He's always creating
doubts that God has the best intention for us. He's always
putting in our minds, as we see right back in the garden, and
it continues to this day, we feel like God is preventing us
from doing or being what we would be. And the reality is, we're
not free in listening to the evil one. It brings us into bondage. We are born into death and bondage
because of the lies of the evil one. And our father, Adam, believed
him. Well, he rebelled against God,
believing that, yeah, he could throw off the shackles of God. And we can't do that. And we
either hear the Lord and follow him, or we are slaves to our
lusts and sins. We're not free We're either servants
of righteousness or servants of wrath and death. So We're
to hear him who speaks in righteousness and truth. All right now this
next verse proves To us that the ways of God are radically
different from what we've been taught if you've grown up in
dead letter religion from what we've taught or even in the truth
of but being in the flesh have heard it in the flesh, right,
and not in by the spirit. So God's ways are radically different
from the way the world teaches truth and religion. All right,
so here's the calling of Christ our Savior. It's a righteous
calling. He's calling him in righteousness,
and he's the one who's going to work righteousness for his
people. Look at verse 6. I the Lord have
called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and
will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people,
for a light of the Gentiles." So what the Lord is saying to
us in calling His servant It's a declaration to us that we are
sinners and we cannot save ourselves. We need another to do for us
what we cannot do for ourselves. And if we are to stand before
Holy God and to dwell with Him in all eternity, we must be righteous. And we must be saved and delivered
from this death and bondage and corruption that we ourselves
are born into in this flesh. And so God has provided the remedy. God has provided salvation in
his son Jesus Christ freely by his grace to deliver us from
the punishment and the corruption and the death due to us because
of our sins. He is being called to take upon
him that work which we cannot do. God is calling him and bringing
him into this covenant of grace that God may be gracious to you. You see the willingness and the
kindness and the grace of God for his chosen people whom he
loved from all eternity, he's given us into the care of Christ
to do this work of grace and mercy and redemption for us. So understand our Savior came
voluntarily. He was most willing to become
poor for your sakes. But here we see the Father yet
called him, called him and outlined to Him for our sakes, so we understand
and know what He's doing. He's outlining what He's calling
Him to do for us. And He says there, I the Lord
have called thee in righteousness, because God is holy, and God
is perfect, and God is righteous, and in Him is no evil or darkness,
He doesn't accept the works of darkness and the works of sin
and that which doesn't measure up to perfection. And so he's
called one who is righteous and perfect and holy to do those
works of righteousness on behalf of his people. This servant,
he's not like us, right? He's not sly in his ways. He's not tricky in his words.
He doesn't justify. his falling short and his sins
and his evil and lusts. He makes no excuse for these
things because he's perfect. He knows what we are. He knows
that we are weak and unable, but he comes and he works perfect
righteousness. And our God does this because
his name, his glory is at stake. It's a perfect work. His name
and glory is at stake. And so Christ comes in righteousness,
and he comes to do the righteous work for his people. And Christ
is sent to fulfill this covenant of grace for his elect chosen
people. And not only does he accomplish
salvation, but he provides everything necessary for us. Everything
necessary for us to know our God, to come to an understanding
of what our God has done, to be brought into the light of
these things. Our Lord uses that term light
because we are in darkness and so he's removing that darkness
and that non-understanding of God and making known to us who
and what our God is and how we are to worship him in spirit
and in truth. Now turn over to Romans 3, 24. Romans 3.24, and here Paul describes this
redemptive work of what our Savior accomplished for us in the covenant
of grace. He says Romans 3.24, being justified
freely. justifies us. God declares us
righteous and holy and perfect before him freely. That means without us doing any
work. It's by his grace, through the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus, through the purchasing,
the purchase of Christ that he made of his people, whom God
hath set forth a propitiation. He is the propitiation. He is
the reason why God forgives us of our sins. He's the reason
why God is gracious to us and receives us. And this understanding
of this is through faith in Christ's blood. Not faith in my faith. Not faith in something I've done.
but faith in the blood of Christ, that when Christ died, he justified
me and put away my sin, made satisfaction to God for my sin. There's nothing left for me to
do. Christ did the whole thing, and
faith believes that, which is a work of the Holy Spirit, a
gift, a fruit of grace in us, worked in us by the Spirit, which
hears what Christ has already accomplished for His people,
and faith believes it. It's already done, meaning Christ
accomplished the work and all things necessary to bring this
knowledge and understanding to us, because it pleases God to
call us out of darkness to know what He's done for us and accomplished
for us in His Son. to declare his righteousness
for the remission or the forgiveness of sins that are passed through
the forbearance of God. God didn't destroy Adam right
away. He was long-suffering to his
elect people in Christ, and he forbear with the people until
Christ should come and make atonement for our sins. to declare, I say
at this time, his righteousness, that he might be just in the
justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. And so many would condemn
God and say that God is unjust to do this. When they say to
us, when we had hope and grace, and they accuse us, you've got
to do something, you've got to do something, what they're saying
is God's not just to forgive you if you do nothing. verse
saying no Christ did everything God is just and the justifier
of them which believe in Jesus because it's all his gracious
work and so Christ is the shorty he's the mediator he's the messenger
that comes declaring to us the salvation that he's accomplished
for us and he's the ratifier of the covenant meaning he's
signed it in his own blood it's done it's accomplished the works
of are finished in Christ the Savior. All right, now, we who
are His, we believe because we're blessed in Him. And we have confidence
in Him in these things. He's our life and our hope and
our joy and our peace. And all this is brought to our
understanding by the gift of the Holy Ghost. This flesh didn't
lay hold of it, this flesh didn't understand it, this flesh hasn't
improved in any way. This understanding, this light
and this life is the work of the Holy Spirit for us. And so
it's used here, well it's not simply for the Jews who were
as people of old, but it was also brought to the Gentiles.
And this understanding of this light which is brought to us
is because the Lord is revealing to us when Christ arises in our
hearts that all this time, apart from Him, we've been in darkness. And Christ has brought to light
the things of God, to our understanding, by giving us the Holy Spirit
and the knowledge of what He's accomplished for us in grace
and mercy. Now the following description
here reveals what Christ accomplishes in his people, just as I've been
saying. Verse 7, to open the blind eyes, to bring out the
prisoners from the prison, and then that sit in darkness out
of the prison house. Alright, so that, the truth is,
By nature, we all sat in the prison house. We all sat in darkness. We all were loaded down with
our sins and did not have an understanding of these things.
And religion, the religion of man, continues this ignorance. It keeps us in darkness by turning
us back to our works, by never giving us an understanding of
who Christ is and what he has already accomplished, and they
make salvation a work the flesh, a work of our will, some work
that man must do in the flesh, right? The sacrifices that we
make, the practices that we do, the things that we do or say
or don't do and say, the places where we go or don't go, that
is what religion declares is salvation and they focus us on
that and it becomes morality and it becomes a works according
to your denomination, but our God is pleased to deliver us
from that prison, that bondage, and never knowing, never being
delivered from that guilt, right, in man-made religion. There's
always something. There's either complete indifference
or there's always something that is burdening us and keeping us
in that bondage, in that fear of condemnation. But when God
brings that understanding of just how gracious He is in Christ,
that He has done the work and put away your sins forever in
His Son, and He establishes peace in the heart to believe Him,
to trust Him, to rest right there and to know there's nothing more
that I can do to make that any more effectual for me. Just believe
Him. That's a work of the Spirit of
God. And so it's the power of God
that delivers His people in grace out of that darkness, making
us to hear and setting us free, then that sit in darkness, bringing
them out of the prison house. And so am I still blind? You
may ask. Am I still sitting in darkness? What is your hope? What is your
hope? If your hope is in the things
that you're doing, then yeah, you are still blind and in darkness.
But if your hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ and His work of
righteousness, believing Him that He has made full satisfaction
to God for your sins, that there's nothing more that God requires,
that He accepts Him in His blood alone for your salvation, then
rejoice, rejoice, because the flesh hasn't given that to you,
but our Father which art in heaven. Father of the Savior, our Savior,
our Lord, our God and our Savior, He's the one who reveals that
to us. Alright, now the Lord tells us plainly that His salvation
reveals that salvation is of the Lord. This is what He's doing,
He's turning us from trusting in what the world trusts in and
making us to know this is His work, this is His glory, this
is His power that does this work. Our third point here, verse eight.
I am the Lord, that is my name. I am Jehovah, is what he's saying.
I am Jehovah, that is my name. In my glory will I not give to
another, neither my praise to graven images. And so, the name
of the Lord is Jehovah. That is a name unique to our
God. No other God has the name Jehovah. I'll read a few scriptures to
you. Exodus 3.14 says, and God said unto Moses, I am that I
am. And he said, thou shalt say unto
the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. And then in Exodus 6.3, he says,
and I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by
the name of God Almighty. But by my name, Jehovah, was
I not known to them. So our God reveals to us that
His name is Jehovah. He's the sufficient one. He's
the Savior. He's the one who's accomplished
salvation. Psalm 83 18 saying that men may
know that thou whose name alone is Jehovah are the most high
over all the earth. And so Jehovah is our God's name
alone. He is Jehovah. Now, no other
God is sufficient to save man. If you notice, all the gods of
religion turn men back to their works. It's all about what you
need to do to save yourselves. and they may put a lot of it
on the shoulders of one they call Jesus Christ, but when they
turn back to you of what you need to do now, that isn't the
Jehovah of the scriptures because Jehovah is sufficient to save
to the uttermost all his people. And so he does this salvation
freely, in grace, in Christ. And his power accomplishes our
calling. He does call us out of darkness. He does deliver us from the condemnation
of sin and the thoughts that there's something
more that we must do to set ourselves free and to have a near relationship
with him. Instead, he calls us out of darkness
and he bears that light and that salvation by his spirit in us,
turning our hearts from the love of this world and trusting in
the things of this world and the dead works of religion and
trusting him. and gives us a heart to know
Him, and to stay upon Him, and when we are cold, and when we
are distant, and when we feel ourselves far away from Him,
it's Him who's given us that knowledge, and Him who turns
us back to Himself to cry out to Him, and to ask for His mercy
and grace and forgiveness, and to draw near to us, because it's
all Him that brings that forth, and we know that, and it's His
work in us, it's his grace. And so he says, my glory will
I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images. In other words, this justification
of ours, we attribute it to none but Jesus Christ. This salvation
of ours, we attribute it to none but Jesus Christ. Our conversion
from darkness wasn't our work, it's the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so every part of salvation, when we speak of our salvation, it's
all His work and His grace. All right? As it says in 1 Corinthians
1, 30 and 31, but of Him, of God are ye in Christ Jesus, who
has made unto us wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and redemption. All right? That according as
it's written, He that glorieth, Let him glory in the Lord. And so, all who trust in their
work, they're hoping in an idol. They're hoping in a false god.
And God says, they're an abomination to me. And he despises those
that trust in idols and those that trust in their works. We want to know the Lord. We
want to serve him. We want to be children of the
Most High and know that we're children of the Most High. And
He reveals the salvation to us, that we would seek Him and cry
out to Him for it. But the works are all the Lord's. And even when we cry out to Him,
and when we feel we're near to Him, or we realize we're not
near to Him, that's all the grace and work of our God. And cry
out to Him and give Him thanks, and praise Him for it. This is
the God who created you. The God who created all that
we see. and he's worthy of our praise and adoration. I pray
the Lord would help you and cause us all to rejoice in his servant
whom he's called and has accomplished this work of redemption for us.
Amen. All right, brethren, let's close
in prayer, and then, brother, I'll close us in hymn after we
pray. Now, gracious Lord, we thank
you, Father, for your great and kind and gracious work of salvation
for us. Lord, what are we but sinners,
unable to add anything to the work of Christ? But Lord, this
is exactly what you declared to us, that you've provided everything
in this covenant of grace in your son, Jesus Christ. Lord,
help us. Help us to seek you and to serve
you and to look to you for all. Lord, help us by your spirit
to bear fruits of righteousness and to be profitable in your
kingdom to your people. And Lord, that we would call
upon your name, that we would glorify your name in the midst
of the people, our fellow inhabitants of this earth, that others may
hear and know the glory of our God. It's in Christ's name that
we pray these things. And Lord, we pray for our brethren
who are sick, who are healing or just getting sick. We ask,
Father, that you would comfort us and help us. Lord, help us
to deliver us, Lord, from the harshness of some of the sicknesses
going around. Restore us again. And Lord, help
us in our endeavors here your kingdom would be established
here and that your word would go forth and that you would cause
others about us to hear of the work that you're doing here and
that you would stir up your people and bring them out of darkness
to be a part of the kingdom and work that's being done here by
you. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen. Our closing hem will be number
340. Nearer, still nearer. 340. Nearer, still nearer, close to
thy heart. Draw me, my Savior, so precious
thou art. Fold me, oh, fold me close to
thy breast. Shelter me safe in that haven
of rest. Shelter me safe in that haven
of rest. Nearer, still nearer, nothing
I bring, naught as an offering to Jesus my King. Lonely my sinful, now contrite
heart, Grant me the cleansing thy blood doth impart. Grant me the cleansing thy blood
doth impart. Nearer, still nearer, Lord, to
be Thine. Sin with its follies I gladly
resign. All of its pleasures, pomp and
its pride, Give me but Jesus, my Lord, crucified. Give me but Jesus, my Lord, crucified. Nearer, still nearer, while life
shall last, Till safe in glory my anchor is cast Through endless
ages ever to be Nearer, my Savior, still nearer to Thee. Nearer, my Savior, still nearer
to Thee. Thank you. Your mom and Joe and Claudia
were all along. Yeah. I mean, you asked about that.
Claudia? Yeah. Claudia. Yeah, they just... Yeah, yeah, they just been careful.