First Peter chapter two. Now
before we read and preach, let's pray. Our Lord Jesus, you are good
to call us together like this and to give us opportunity in
heart to do so. We thank you that you do not
forget us. And we pray that you keep us
from forgetting you. Our great desire this morning,
above all others, is that we would enter into true worship. You said, when you were here,
that they that worship the Father must worship him in spirit and
in truth. For the Father desires such worshipers. So Lord, that's the sort of worshipers
we desire to be. But such is not within our capacity
in our natural selves. In our flesh dwells no good thing.
You said the flesh profits nothing. Therefore, simply because our
bodies are here does not mean, Lord, that we shall be able to
enter in to worship our God and King. Lord, it requires your spirit among us, to testify
with our spirits that we are the children of God, and if children,
then heirs. For it is upon that foundation
our hearts are moved to worship you. It is in the knowledge of
your goodness toward us that we lift our hearts in praise.
And these things can be known and believed only from the spiritual
man. So Lord, Awaken us spiritually
that we may worship. Oh, may we see Christ. Lord, give us that spiritual
treat of beholding his glory. I've seen him and all the wonders
of his person and all the success of his work and all the grace
of his nature. We long to see him. If we do
not see him, Lord, we will feel that we have wasted our efforts
here this morning. So reveal him to our hearts.
The Lord himself said that the work of the spirit was to take
from what is Christ and show it to us. Oh, may he do that
today. Inspire my heart, Lord, from
the scriptures which we shall look to. And may the message of Christ
go forth with power. In Christ's name we pray, amen. Now beginning in verse 13, we
run into a word that does not sit well with human nature. And of all the humans in the
world who do not like this word, It would be Americans, because
we have been brought up, politically speaking anyway, that this word
does not apply to us. And that's the word submit. The very founding of our nation
was an act of rebellion against the powers that be. And it was
based upon the idea that we have the God-given right to live as
free men and women. Now, I'm not here to argue politics.
I'm just stating why Americans think the way they think. And so as we grow older, of course,
we realize we've got to submit to our parents. Well, I said
we realize that. They insisted that we submit
to them. And hopefully we learned a bit
of what it means to submit. But when we reach adulthood,
most, if not all of us, think that our days of submission are
over. You hear children say, I can't
wait till I'm grown up and I can do what I want. I remember doing more of what
I want as a child than I ever do as an adult. Responsibilities. that come upon a person in adulthood
pretty much determine the course of his life. Now I'm glad that
we live in a form of government where we are permitted or given
the privilege of choosing those who lead us. I'm glad that we
have a constitution that carries with it more authority than any
individual or group of individuals. And that we can appeal to that
if we feel that we have been wrongly confined. But having said all that, in verse 13 we read this. Submit
yourself for the Lord's sake to every authority instituted
among men. We as believers in the Lord Jesus
Christ are called to submit to those who are in authority. And
he says we're to do that whether to the king as a supreme authority
or to the governors who are sent by him to punish those who do
wrong and to commend those who do right. For it is God's will
that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of
foolish men, live as free men. Why can the believer live as
a free man no matter what government he lives under? Because he is
a freeborn child of God, that's why. Even if he is under the tyrannical
rule of a civil authority or a religious authority who threatens
him with violence, he's still a free man. The disciples, Paul
in prison had more freedom than the man who locked him in there.
Why? He's free in Christ. If the Son
shall make you free, you are free indeed. You shall know the
truth and the truth shall make you free. Now, that doesn't mean
that there are not those we're called on to submit to. It doesn't
mean that we are free from all the disasters and catastrophes
that can befall men. It means in the ultimate sense
of the word, we are free because in the end, in the end of all
things, there shall be no chain that binds us. Not even the chain
of death can hold a child of God. It says that the God of this
age, speaking of Satan, has the world captive. But he doesn't
have everybody in the world captive. If you're in Christ, he doesn't
hold you captive. You're free. He says, live as free men, verse
16, but do not use your freedom as a cover up for evil. Live
as servants of God. There are those who hear the
word freedom, and we make much of the believer's freedom here,
don't we? We do all we can to avoid useless religious rules,
which actually make up a great deal of what many churches are
involved with. I was brought up in a church
like that. They had a rule for everything. I couldn't dance. I couldn't
go to the movies. I grew up, I remember, I grew
up rather naive about the people because I was in that kind of
religion the whole time. And I thought that people were
doing all of that. And I remember when I got to junior high school,
some of my classmates were starting to smoke. Well, my church had
said, you know, smoking is a horrible sin. Now, don't get me wrong
here. Smoking is bad for your health.
Don't do it. But it's not a sin. It's not
a moral thing. It's just not a healthy thing.
But nonetheless, our church had made that a sin. And I remember,
you know, I'd hear somebody was smoking. Oh, no, they're going
to hell, you know? All kinds of things they had
rules about. Rules about the clothes you could wear. Rules
about how long your hair had to be. I don't know what they're
going to do with young men now to make them look godly. They
shave their head and hair off. When I was a kid, of course,
we were raised by the World War II generation, which had crew
cuts and stuff like that, and my generation wanted to grow
their hair way down long, and they, oh, it was awful. Rules,
rules, rules. We make a big issue. We're free from that. But Peter
says here, live as free men, but now don't use that freedom
to cover up sin. Now, I can't recall personally
meeting anyone who would at least openly admit that that's what
they're doing. But I've seen it written by some, like in Facebook
threads and stuff like that, and they say, well, all my sins
are forgiven. I'm a free person. It doesn't
matter how I live. I can live to indulge my flesh.
It's not gonna make any change. I'll just let grace cover it
all. You know, the truth of grace was never taught to us to encourage
us to sin. Salvation is not just being saved
from the consequences of sin. It says he shall save his people
from sin. One of the great blessed aspects
of heaven You know, people think heaven is just, it's a good place,
and hell's a bad place. Well, that's true. But what makes
heaven good and hell bad? You say, well, hell's made out
of fire. Well, I think that those are symbolic representations
of hell. I think that the suffering of those who rebel against God
is much worse than fire, but fire is the best that could be
used to describe the kind of suffering. But nonetheless, they
think of the fire and then say, what's so good about heaven?
Well, up in heaven, they got mansions and they got streets
of gold and they got this and that. Misunderstanding the imagery
of the book of Revelation. Friend, the blessedness of heaven
and the cursedness of hell is not in the geography. Do you
know what the The blessedness of heaven is, is to be in the
presence of God without sin. That's the blessedness of heaven.
And if you don't want to be without sin now, it's not likely you'll
find any satisfaction in being without sin there. And do you know what's the cursedness
of hell? To be in your sin in the presence of God. I've heard
people say hell is where there is no God. The people in hell
wish God wasn't there. To be in hell is to stand in
the presence of God covered in your wickedness. And you are
that way forever and ever and ever. And those who are in heaven are
faultless, before the throne of his glory and full of joy. Why? In Christ they are without
sin. Right now we are without sin
in that our legal relationship with God has been satisfied through
the death of Christ. The payment of our sin has been
made. God has no cause against us. And yet we know that sin is very
much a part of our existence, isn't it? But I believe that this can be
said of every believer. He hates it that sin is a part
of his existence. Oh, he can get in it and he's
like, I'm not saying that every party's like this, I'm just saying
he's in his sin and it feels like he's in a party and he's
having a great time. But sin, when it is done, it always brings
forth some kind of death, just maybe the death of your peace,
the death of your enjoyment. A time of chastening from the
hand of the Lord. A time of self-loathing that
you can't get out of. Believers can never be satisfied
pursuing sin. Sin always brings regret. Why? Well, because God's done
something in him. God's given him a spiritual nature,
a nature that's truly of spirit. God is spirit. God created man
in his image. That means man, as he was created,
had spirit as well as body. And while the beginning of God's
work in us, created within us by the new birth, a spirit that
had no sin and still has no sin, yet it coexists with this flesh,
and Paul described it, in me, that is, in my flesh dwells no
good thing, and we've got this constant struggle going on. And
so he cautions us, live as free men, enjoy that spiritual freedom,
enjoy the knowledge that God is not out to get you. Enjoy
the knowledge that's appointed unto man once to die and after
that the judgment, but that's not going to happen to you because
your judgment has already been accomplished in Christ Jesus.
You've already died in him. You've already been judged in
him. You are free, but don't use that freedom to excuse your
sin. There's great forgiveness in
the gospel of grace, but there's no excuses. Show proper respect for everyone,
verse 17. Like I said, we're in a bit of
an odd situation here as citizens of the United States. If the United States was the
religion, one of the sacraments of our religion is to make fun
of our politicians. And admittedly, there's a lot
you can make fun of or get angry about. And I do my share and
more of that. And yet our Lord says, show proper
respect. There have been presidents during
my lifetime, during my adulthood that I liked. There have been
presidents I didn't care much for and there have been presidents
I despised. There have been Congress people,
I don't know how they got there and I don't know how they stay
there. but we were to show proper respect
for them. I remember in November of 63, when JFK was assassinated,
I was in the third grade. Just coming up the steps from
the playground, somebody said, the president's been shot. And
that sounds so outlandish. I said, no, it's not. And then
I got up to our classroom, and the teacher's standing there
looking just as somber as can be. And we sat down and got quiet. She told us the news. President
Kennedy had been shot and killed in Texas. Now, me, I didn't care much. I mean, I was in the third grade. That's just not a big deal to
me. But I got home. And when I went in the house, there's
my mother sitting on the edge of the bed crying. Now, I know that my parents did
not care for Kennedy. They thought he did a lot of
things that shouldn't be done, both politically and in his personal
life. But there she sat crying. And I said, why are you crying?
You didn't like him anyway. And she said, that was our president.
Show respect. Now that's what a believer is
called to do, show some respect. And then he goes on, love the
brotherhood of believers. Love one another. You say, well,
if they had just do so and so, they'd be easier to love. He
didn't say love them if they're easy to love. In fact, you don't
know if you love someone until it's hard to love them. Isn't that true? Anybody can
love somebody that's easy to get along with. But the truth is, you might not
be loving them, you just might be using them. You might just
be liking them. You might just be enjoying what
good things they bring to your life. You don't know if you love
somebody until you wish you didn't have to. Get married. And then you find out. Now I
say that from what I've heard from other people. It's always
been so easy to love my wife. But everybody else understands,
you know, when you get married, you find out that person you
love does some things you don't care for, and it takes some work
to keep loving them. And it's an unfortunate thing
that they've made it so easy for people now to say, well,
we have irreconcilable differences. I heard somebody say, well, we
just don't work anymore. What do you mean you don't work? You
love, love one another. And it's true within the church. I love everybody here. I hope
you love me. I know I'm not always easy to
love. That's why it's gotta be a love
relationship. If it's a like relationship, it's not gonna
last. Personality is great against
each other. Ways of seeing things are different. Matters of personal conduct,
believers have different views on that. And that's all right. We're just
never to allow those things. to cause us to cease loving our
brethren. Now understand when he speaks
of love, he's not talking about an emotional state. He's not
talking so much about affections. He's talking about how we treat
one another. Love always looks for the welfare
of others. Now that's what love is. It's
the attitude of the heart that looks at something besides self
and says, I will do them good. Yeah, but they aren't nice to
you. That doesn't matter. I'm going to do them good. I'm going
to treat them right, and I'm going to treat them more than
right. I'm going to go beyond what just the minimum is required
by laws and such. I'm going to love them. What
did our Lord say? Those that curse you, bless them. Now that's love. What do you
want to do? Well, if somebody cuts us off
in traffic, that's all they got to do. Somebody, you know, we're
at a four-way stop and somebody goes out of turn. Well, who in
the world do they think they are? Or something much, much
worse. Somebody come up and curse you
to your face, I've seen what some of these violent protesters
are doing and what they're saying to people. And I mean, I get
cranked up. I have to be careful how much
of that stuff I watch. And I think, boy, if I was there,
I'd say blah, blah, blah. Maybe that's why God doesn't
let me go there, because I would act like an idiot. In love, well, how should you
deal with those people? But love the brethren. Fear God. This isn't a matter of being
afraid in that legal sense. You better do right or God's
going to get you. If you're in Christ, God's not
going to get you. because he got you in Christ. He punished
your sin in Christ, he satisfied his retributive justice in Christ. He disciplines his people, he
chastens them for their good, but he never does anything to
exact a penalty from them because a penalty has been paid. And
as Augustus Toplady, the writer of Rock of Ages, he said in another
hymn, justice will not payment twice demand, first at my bleeding
surety's hand and then again at mine. He won't do that. So nothing that happens to you,
that is if you're in Christ, nothing that happens to you is
for the payment of sins. That's already been done. But
we fear God out of respect of who he is. The very epitome of human sinfulness,
according to Paul, is summarized in these words. And it's the
cause of all human sin. And when it reaches an ultimate
level, why, if it were that way with everybody, you wouldn't
be able to live with each other. But it's this. He said, there is no fear of
God before their eyes. And the Old Testament is written,
by the fear of the Lord, men depart iniquity. Even those that
don't believe him, they got a certain respect for him that will restrain
how far they're willing to go in the sin. Fear God, honor the
king. Now, let me say this. I am so
thankful we don't have a king. We've had a few that thought
they were, but legally speaking, we don't have a king. And even if they try to act kingly,
they've only got four years to get it done. And then we can
get them out. I'm glad. Nonetheless, we should
have a proper respect for those who occupy the places of authority
in our country. And we should, as much as conscience
allows, follow the laws that they write. Now, as freeborn
sons of God, we don't ever have to do anything that they say we must do if doing
it means disobeying our Father. We don't have to do that. We're
that free. But we are to submit to the political
leaders whom God has set over us to accomplish his purpose. Then he says this, verse 18,
slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect,
not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to
those who are harsh for it is commendable if a man bears up
under the pain of unjust suffering because he is conscious of God. But how is it to your credit
if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But
if you suffer for doing good and you endure this, this is
commendable for God. To this you were called because
Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should
follow in his steps. Now, a couple of things. First
of all, none of us here are slaves. We may use that, you know, ah,
my boss, he works me like I was a slave. Yeah, but he writes
you a check at the end of each week, and that means you're not
a slave, and you can quit anytime you want. So you're not a slave.
It may be your boss doesn't treat you with decency. It may be your
boss doesn't treat you with the amount of respect that we ought
to be willing to treat any other human being. That happens. But
none of us are slaves, and none of us are slave owners. Consequently,
we got to adjust this word to where it might apply to us, and
that would be the employer-employee relationship. And here's what
he said. If Paul were writing, I believe
I can change it this much. If Paul were writing to our church
in our day, he'd say, now, so long as you work for a man and
get a check from him, you do what he says. And you do it whether
he's nice or whether he's mean. You do it whether he's the kind
of boss you like or the boss you don't like. Now, if you can
find another job, fine. But so long as you're taking
a paycheck from him, you show him respect. you submit. And that's not easy. That's not
easy. And then, and we're gonna skip
a little place, because that's really what I wanna center on,
but it speaks down here in chapter three, verse one. Wives, in the
same way, be submissive to your husbands, so that if any of them
do not believe the word, they may be won over without words
by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and
reverence of your lives. Your beauty should not come from
outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of golden
jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of
your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet
spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. And let me say
this. It's of great worth in God's
sight, whether you're a man or a woman. Now, he's addressing
women here, but don't think this only applies to women. A meek and quiet spirit is highly
esteemed by God. For this is the way the holy
women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves
beautiful. They were submissive to their
own husbands like Sarah who obeyed Abraham and called him her master.
You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give
way to fear. Now this is one of those subjects
probably no matter what you say you get yourself in trouble so
I'm not gonna say much. But I do know this, that God
has set up an order. Now it should be that love so
rules in our heart that we should never have to resort to the order.
Husbands should love their wives as Christ loved the church and
gave himself for her. And wives should love their husbands
as we love Christ and gladly give ourselves to him. That ought
to be what does it. But what it's going to look like
if we do that is a submissive spirit on the part of wives towards
their husbands. Not so submissive that they do
wrong if their husbands command them to. There's things husbands
are not permitted to tell their wives to do. Now you and I who have had the
privilege of living in a society that has been worked on and formed
by the gospel for 2,000 years. This isn't near the issue it
was in Paul's day. There were some women who were
married to some rough men. And these men were abusive. I
don't know how abusive, but they were. And Paul said to them, submit.
He says, do not give way to fear. Don't be afraid of them. Know
this, they are under God's hand. And also know this, a loving, a believing woman who
is married to an unbelieving man, God may use her meek and
quiet and submissive spirit, her reverence towards him and
her God, as an end, as a way in, for the gospel to find purchase,
for the gospel to find a way into his mind and God may use
it to open his eyes and he himself become a believer. Now, we don't have the time and
I don't even know if it'd be worth taking the time to try
to make all the qualifications You know, there are things I
don't think women have to put up with out of men. But here's the general rule.
Submission. And to the men, he says this,
verse seven. Husbands in the same way, in
the same way, in the same way as what? What he told women.
Therefore, excuse me, husbands in the same way, with meekness,
with submission to God and reverence for him and then in the same
way be considerate as you live with your wives. Over the years that I've been
here a few times I've touched on this subject and it's generally
been, from what I've heard of it, it's generally been the opinion
that the men come out on the short end of the stick. I guess
as a man I feel a great sense of responsibility for what it
means to be a man, what it means to be a husband. I've been one
now for over 42 years, and I'm not going to pretend I started
out doing things right, because 22, 23-year-old men don't know
much. I hope I've learned some things over the years, but I
had a good example set for me. Had a good father who was good
to his wife. And I talked to him one time
about, you know, well, aren't husbands in charge? He said,
well, he said, yes. He said, but the house belongs
to everybody. And while the husband may be
the head of the house, he is to rule the house for the benefit
of everyone in it. He's not to be making him a place
just like he wants it and everybody else has to adjust. That's just not how it works.
You are considerate. It says regarding children, it
says that God That the Lord has pity on them that fear him. He
pities them as a father pities children. A good father understands
the limitations of his children and doesn't demand more of them
than what they can do. Now, Paul here speaks of the
wives as being the weaker partner. not weaker in mental capacity,
not weaker in spiritual capacity, nor weaker in the sight of God. They are heirs together with
the husbands of the gracious gift of life. How are they weaker? Once again,
our advances in technology, our advances in medicine and all
kinds of things has made this particular weakness not so evident,
but he was just talking about physical weakness. Men are bigger. Men are stronger on average.
And he says, do not use your physical strength as a means
to dominate your wife. And there are men that do that.
They intimidate their wives and children into submission, and
that's as godless as can be. If a man loves his wife as Christ
loved the church, he will find in all likelihood that his wife
has no problem in responding to him in loving submission. If a man loves his children as
God loves his children, in most cases, he's going to find that
they are willingly submissive to his rule. Be considerate. And you know
something? While it doesn't use the word
submissive, considerate. Being considerate is a willing
surrender of your way for what the other person needs. And that's a kind of submission. We've seen several ways, several
relationships in which we are called on to be submissive. And
in another place, it tells the believers, all of you be submissive
to one another. And it's always using the same
word. And it's a word that indicates voluntary submission. One thing
you will never find in the scriptures At least I haven't found it,
or at least I can't remember it. If I ever saw it, I don't
remember it. I never find any case where it
tells one person to rule over another one. It never says, husbands, rule
your wives. It says, wives, be submissive to your husbands. It doesn't say, fathers, rule
your children. It says, children, obey your
parents. There's a difference in the way
that comes across. God never has granted to anybody
an authority which they are to use for selfish purposes. Wherever authority is granted,
it is granted that it might be used to take care of those for
whom the one in charge is responsible. As a pastor of this congregation,
There's been certain authority given to me, but not certain
authority given to me to please myself. Authority given to me
to take what wisdom and spiritual understanding I have and direct
the affairs of this church and in the teaching and all this
for you. For you. I'm never to say, what do I want? That's what I want, not the issue.
It's what we all need that I am to use as the guiding principle
and the exercise of the authority given me. Now, and here's the
better part of the message. We have a good example set before
us of this, and in the light of this example, we ought to
be so willing to do any of this Verse 21, to this you were called
because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example that you
should follow in his steps. He committed no sin, no deceit
was found in his mouth. Now Christ never did anything
wrong. Never. Verse 23, when they hurled
their insults at him, Now, we hate being insulted even when
the insult might be true. Don't we? We don't like to be called out
when we're wrong. How would you like to be called
out when you weren't wrong? That's what happened to Christ.
He never did anything wrong. He never committed a sin. He
never told a lie. And they accused Him of both.
And when they hurled their insults at Him, He did not retaliate. We will defend ourselves against
a true accusation, or at least try to take the edge off of it,
because we don't want to accept that someone has rightly accused
us of something. And when they rightly accuse
us of it, we may get mad. Our Lord didn't get mad when
they accused Him of things He never did. They brought him before Pilate,
and they suborned witnesses. That is, they got people that
would lie on him. And they told lies about him.
He didn't deny them. He didn't bring down curses on
them. But while hanging on the cross, bearing the sins of his
people, enduring the pain that had been inflicted on him by
these people who had lied on him, He said, Father, forgive
them. They don't know what they're
doing. He submitted himself to them. He who made the heavens
and the earth, he who spoke, and it was, and who commanded
and stood firm, he of whom Nebuchadnezzar says he does as he wills in the
armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and
none can stay his hand or say unto him, what do you think you're
doing? Him into whose hand the Father
had committed all things. Him, who is the very focus of
this creation, the very reason it exists. He submitted Himself to wicked men to do to Him what
never should have been done. And He never called on God to
square things up. Never. He said, forgive them,
Father. What did he do instead? And here's
how we can submit and submit in the midst of suffering, submit
under suffering that is unjust. He entrusted himself to him who
judges justly. You know, when we try to exalt and exert ourselves against
those that we feel we have a cause against. You know what we're
doing? We're saying, I don't think God can get justice for
me on this. I'm going to have to do it. Paul said, do not take vengeance.
Vengeance is mine, says the Lord, I will repay. When we take vengeance,
we're likely going to take more vengeance than is appropriate.
And when we take vengeance, we might find out later on, we were
taking vengeance against someone whom God had chosen for whom
Christ had died, but the Spirit just hadn't called him yet. And
we took vengeance against one who is our brother in the mind
of God. But if we leave these things
to God, he knows exactly what to do. Verse 24, he himself bore our sins in his
body on the tree so that we might die to sin and live under righteousness. By his wounds, you have been
healed. For you were like sheep going
astray, but now you've returned to the shepherd and overseer
of your souls. Look what our Lord did. They
killed him for sins that you and I did, and he never opened
his mouth against anybody. They treated him worse than they
treated the actual thieves and murderers crucified with him. They mocked him. They spit on
him. They pulled out his beard. They shoved a crown of thorns
on his head. They nailed his hands in his
feet and let him hang there. And so cold and uncaring were
they about this monstrosity that they were committing. They sat
over there toss dice to see who gets to keep his cloak. And that's all happened, and
our Lord submitted to it. Say, how do you know he submitted?
Because he's the Lord, and he doesn't have to put up with anything.
He told Peter, when Peter took out his sword and tried to split
somebody's head wide open, and he missed and just shaved off
his ear, the Lord picked up the ear and put it back on. Peter
said, put your sword away. Don't you realize if I wanted
to, I could call on my father, he'd send six legions of angels. That means he could get out of
there anytime he wanted to, and he didn't. He submitted himself
to the wicked will of men. Creatures who were breathing
because of him. Now for those of us who can take
this scripture and say, yes, he bore my sins in his body on
the tree. Doesn't that take kind of the
starch out of your collar? There's our Lord hanging on a
tree. He's being abused. He's had people say awful things
about him, and he's not answering. But why are they saying that
about him? Why is God letting this happen? Because my sins
are on him, and he is seen by God as the sinner. I say he bore my sins. Do you
know what he said? He said my sins, meaning his
sins, are bound up. on my neck, he has bound my sins
on my neck. Well, why'd the Lord say my sins?
He had no sins. When my sins were laid on him,
he owned them as his sins before God, and that's why he never
defended himself. You'd be hard-pressed making
me admit to my sins. The Lord Jesus Christ admitted
to my sins. How can I ever cry foul? for the way I've been treated,
when I've never had to pay for my sins. And Jesus Christ paid
for sins he never did, and yet he never cried foul. We read this, simply amazing. But let me tell everybody here
something. That one who died is the Savior you need. You say,
well, I've already been saved. You still need him. And if you
haven't been saved, that is, if God has not opened your eyes
to Christ, if you've not called on him, he's the Savior you need. We are all sinners in need of
a Savior. Christ is a Savior we need. And
we just read how he did that salvation. He bore the sins of
his people in his body on the tree. And he put them away. And when the Holy Spirit comes
to one of God's elect and opens their eyes to see that. Why,
it's unbelievable. And yet they believe it anyway.
I pray that this morning each of us will be taught by the Spirit
of God what we need, and then we will be taught by the Spirit
of God that Christ is all we need, all we need, and move in
us to call on His name. And then all the talk of submission
and everything else, okay. If I'm a child of God, I can
submit. I'm just in this world for a
little while anyway. He submitted himself to what I deserved. Certainly
I can submit myself to others in this world, even if they don't
treat me right. All right, we're going to observe
the Lord's table.