1 Corinthians 15, and this is
really the second part. Last week's sermon title was
The Redemption of Our Bodies, so this would be part two of
that. But really, as I thought about this, it's the wonders
of the gospel of Christ. The wonders of the gospel of
Christ. The setting here is the Corinthian
church had those people in it who denied there was a resurrection. And this was such a horrific
shock such a horrific denial of the Gospel that the Apostle,
again, led by the Spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ, gives this
gift to his church in order to teach us what Christ did, what
his Father gave him to do, what he accomplished in his life,
his death, his resurrection, and his ascension and reign in
glory. Now, these things are beyond
our ability to appreciate and our comprehension because they're
so great. But again, even though these
things are greater than anyone can comprehend, God has given
us his spirit to teach us these things. So that though we're
not able to plumb the depths of the mind of Christ and these
things, yet we can enter into the truth of it by his grace.
And we can believe what we don't fully understand. And so it is
here. But this chapter is given to
us with these different parts in it. The first part is the
declaration of the gospel. And that's given because it is
because of who Christ is and what he did that everything else
follows. Everything that occurs in the
life of God's people is a result of the work God gave his son
to do, and the work that he did and finished. And so the gospel
is the first thing the apostle gives to those he's writing to
here, and that includes us. So we must be convinced of the
truth of the gospel. We must understand what God is
saying concerning His Son, concerning the work of His Son, where He
is now, His sovereign rule over all things for the sake of His
people and for His own glory. And that's what the gospel is
about. So then after giving a summary of the gospel in the first four
verses, the apostle then goes on from verse five until what
follows in around verse 11, and he gives a proof of the resurrection
in many ways. And so this proof of the resurrection
is given by the account of eyewitnesses. Not only that, the preaching
of the gospel given to them by Christ, the results of that preaching,
and the consequences of that preaching. in the Apostle Paul,
in particular, how God, by his grace, gave him this grace to
be converted from completely opposed to Christ to now being
a man who was gladly laying down his life for the sake of Christ
and the gospel. So those things together, the
eyewitness account, the number of people who saw the Lord Jesus
after he was raised from the dead, and the gospel itself preached
by those is a strong proof of the resurrection. But then he
goes on after that from verse 12 and down to about verse 23,
and he shows the horrible, horrible consequences if there was no
resurrection. For those who deny the resurrection,
here are the facts. Here's the consequence of that,
the implications of it. And so that carries us from verse
12 through verse 23. And then from verse 24 and until
verse 28, he describes the panoramic view of the work God gave his
son to do, the Lord Jesus Christ, in order to bring his people
to God. and that if there was no gospel,
if Christ hadn't been given and accomplished that work, in the
account of the gospel, and if it hadn't been preached, and
if those people hadn't believed these things according to God's
purpose and His grace given to them to believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, and then if Christ didn't actually bring them entirely,
both in soul and body, spirit, soul and body, entirely, without
sin to God in His very presence, then all that God gave His Son
to do would fail. It would not be successful, it
wouldn't be complete. God's Word would be false. God Himself would prove unfaithful
to His Word, His promise, His oath, to His Son, to His people. God's ability to bring a people
from their sins and their death in sins to His presence, holy
in spirit, soul, and body, all of that, and the fact that He
would have required His Son to give His life in sacrifice and
offering to God for a sweet-smelling savor, and the consequences of
God requiring and not sparing His Son, delivering Him up for
us all, and yet Him not giving to His people what He had committed
to do by that work. All of this would fail and Christ
himself would not deliver up the kingdom to his father. So
that's until verse 28. And then from verse 29, until
verse 34, he corrects those who would say there's no resurrection
by describing the futility and the emptiness, the complete vanity
of many things. Number one, baptism, and number
two, the suffering of those who bring the gospel and the fact
that they die. in bringing the gospel for the
sake of those who are saved by Christ. All of that would be
meaningless if there was no resurrection. And then in verse 35, until 50
or so, he shows that even in creation, God has given us a
testimony of the resurrection. the concern or the objection
those who deny the resurrection would bring is, well, if the
dead are raised, what kind of a body do they come in? And then
the apostle expertly answers that question by referring to
God's design, the one who created this world, the master architect,
the designer, the creator, who brought all things into existence
out of nothing, the God who raises the dead. and calls those things
which be not as though they were. That God does things according
to the same pattern in the resurrection. And there's all these different
kinds of flesh, fish, and birds, and beasts, and men, and these
different kinds of bodies, earthly and heavenly bodies, the sun,
moon, stars, all these things are compared to and given as
an example from creation that God gives a body as it pleases
Him. And even though those bodies
are different, it's all the body God designed and was pleased
to give. And so it is in the resurrection. God gives to His
people a different body as it pleases Him. Even though they're
the same people in the resurrection, they have a different body. And
that body can only be given to them if the original body, which
is natural and corruptible and mortal and sinful and dishonorable
because of sin and subject to death because of sin, if that
body dies and goes into the ground and experiences corruption, then
out of that, then, God will raise up this new body for His people. Again, he revisits the fact that
this new body will be a body like Christ's body because all
that we have is because of Christ according to the gospel. And
then at the end of the chapter, he celebrates the total victory
of the Lord Jesus Christ over every enemy for his people and
how that the resurrection amounts to, it will constitute, it will
be the end of all things. When the Lord Jesus Christ comes
again to raise his people from the dead and change those who
are then living instantly into their new glorious spiritual
heavenly body that's incorruptible and immortal, at that time, the
last enemy, death, will be put to death. there will be no more
death for his people, and the grave will be emptied, and Christ's
people will laugh as the weak and helpless virgin daughter
of Zion at their enemies, because Christ has conquered all. And
so that's the last bit of the chapter. And then the final verse
of the chapter brings us back to remind the people of God that
even though in this life we live in this body of death, and even
though all these things are presented to us in such a magnificent,
glorious manner, It's done so, so that in this life we now live
and experience, we understand it's by God's design to bring
out of our weakness His power through His grace in order to
exalt to the highest possible level His glory in His Son by
what He did in the gospel. So now I'm giving you an overview
of the chapter so that even if we don't get to the details,
we'll get that overview. All right, so let's look at verse
one. He says, moreover, brethren,
so these were obviously those were believers, brethren, I declare
unto you the gospel. Now, this is always the foundation
of everything we do. Paul in 1 Corinthians 2 verse
2, he says, I determined not to know anything among you, save
Jesus Christ and him crucified. In other words, the gospel, is
what the Word of God, it's the message from the Word of God
concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was made of the
seed of David according to the flesh, but declared to be the
Son of God with power by the Spirit of holiness through the
resurrection of the dead. And so the Gospel is all-important. The Gospel is the Foundation,
it's the basis, it's the object of our faith, isn't it? It declares
Christ to us, who is the one we believe. If there was no gospel,
we would have nothing to believe, nothing that could uphold us.
But because we have this foundation that's sure, It's sure in many
ways, but it's sure by God's word and by Christ's person and
his work. Therefore, this is the foundation.
We start here, we end here, we live here. This is the gospel.
This is what we preach. This is what you believed. And
so he emphasizes this. He says, I declare unto you the
gospel which I preached to you. The way we as believers come
to believe is through the preaching of Christ in the gospel. Christ who lived, Christ who
died, who suffered and died, who was buried, who rose again,
who's now seated in glory. It's about him. He's the message
of all of Scripture, from the Old Testament to the New. It's
to His glory. All things are of Him, and through
Him, and by Him, and to Him. He's the one this Word is about. The Word of God is preached to
us according to 1 Peter 1, verse 25, through the Gospel. and the Word of God cannot fail.
Everything else will fail, but God's Word cannot fail. It's
the foundation. Science proves itself false. How many times do you hear, well,
science says, well, a popular opinion is, it doesn't matter.
The only thing that's sure is the word of God. So here he starts
there. He says, which I preach to you,
which also you have received, so you embrace this. You believed
it. It was given to you and you received
it. And wherein you stand, notice,
he declared it, it was preached, they received it and they stand
upon it. He's reminding them of these
things by which also you're saved. You're not saved unless you believe
the truth. Believing false things is false
faith. In 1 John 5, I'll read this text
of scripture to you. In 1 John 5, he says this, in
verse 20. We know that the Son of God has
come and has given us, note, an understanding. that we may
know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even
in His Son, Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal
life. Little children, keep yourselves
from idols. Don't believe another. He's the
only true God and eternal life. Don't put your trust in another.
Don't mix Christ with anything. Alright, so he's emphasizing
this. You're saved by this and God gives us this understanding
of Christ. He says, he goes on in verse
2 of 1 Corinthians 15. If you keep in memory what I
preached to you, unless you have believed in vain. It doesn't
mean we hold it in our memory so much as we hold by faith to
the things preached to us which we've received and wherein we
stand, the things of Christ. The things of Christ are what
we believe. And so he says, unless you've
believed in vain, because if there's no resurrection, there's
no gospel, and if there's no gospel, then you believe false.
And therefore you have false faith. Believing the truth is
the only thing that will save us. As I gave this illustration
in San Diego, and I've given it to you here, if you step out
on ice, it's too thin, you fall through. But if you step out
on the thick ice that's able to support your weight, then
no matter how much you doubt, the ice will hold you up. The
gospel is that thickness of the ice, and it's infinitely thick
because it rests on him who cannot fail, and cannot lie, and cannot
be moved, cannot change, the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't trust
a false gospel, or a false Christ, or you have a false faith. But
if you trust the true and living God in the Lord Jesus Christ,
then even though your faith is weak, then you have true faith,
and you'll be saved. And that's what he's saying here.
To deny the resurrection is to deny the gospel, and to deny
the gospel exposes you as having a false faith. And not only that,
but because of the resurrection, God has given us faith by the
resurrected Christ who reigns and gives repentance to Israel
and the forgiveness of sins. And were he not in glory now
giving this grace to us through the preaching of the gospel,
we couldn't believe. And so we would have a vain faith.
And so this builds up. what he's about to say now, if
there's no resurrection. You can see where he's heading.
Verse 3, he says, he's going to give us in these two verses
the distillation of the gospel. For I delivered unto you first
of all that which I also received. How that? Christ died for our
sins according to the scriptures. If this isn't true, then the
scriptures are false. If this isn't true, then Christ
didn't die for our sins. And if Christ didn't die for
our sins, what are the implications here? We're going to perish in
our sins. Why did Christ die? How could
the Lord of glory, the Lord of heaven, it says over here in
verse, what is it, verse 45 or so? The second man is the Lord
from heaven, verse 47. How could the Lord from heaven
die? That should be a greater amazement
to us than that God could raise the dead. That the Lord of glory
would come in our nature. would stoop so low, not only
in our nature, but as, he says, he was in the likeness of sinful
flesh, suffering all the weaknesses and the humiliation of our natural
body, subject to hunger and weariness and thirst and everything that
we're subject to and weakness of this body, because we're fallen
in sin. And yet he took that body, Why
would He, how could He, the Lord of Glory, do that? And why would
He come and bear sins against God and the guilt of them that
He did not commit? Because that's what He's saying
here. For the substitute on behalf of us, before God, He stood guilty
for sins He didn't commit against God. And then, what is the consequence
of those sins against God? Well, God pays back. He renders
unto every man according to his deeds, and God will render. He
will pay back. He will give the wage for our
labor in sin, whether it's our mind, or our words, or our motives,
or our deeds. He will pay back the wage of
sin, which is death. Alright, so there we have sin
and the wages of it here. Christ died for our sins. That
means he died in order to take away our sins. To bear them before
God as his own. And then to receive in himself
the punishment those sins against God deserve from God. And not
only that, but he bore all the obligations that were not his
to fulfill, but ours. And we would not fulfill them
and could not fulfill them to fulfill God's holy law. He himself
fulfilled, he came under that law and fulfilled it in his own
obedience. That obedience that caused him
to give himself in sacrifice to God for our sins. And to establish
the everlasting righteousness that was imputed to his people.
That's what he's talking about. Christ died for our sins. Therefore, the sins, because
of his death, a satisfaction to God has been made. And God
is satisfied with his death. He smells the sacrifice, the
offering of Christ for those sinful people whom he loved,
and his love to his Father to fulfill all righteousness, and
to answer his justice, and to magnify his perfections in all
that he did. And he smells it and he's so
pleased with that. Christ died. It is Christ that
died. That's what makes the difference
here. Who died and why he did it. God gave him this to do.
What mercy. What grace. According to the
scriptures. In verse 4. And he was buried.
He bore our sins in his own body up to the tree. 1 Peter 2.24,
and then he was buried in that body. Those sins then were put
in the grave and forever taken away by that fit man who went
to the grave. And they were forever left in
that land uninhabited, put out of memory before God. God remembers
their sins no more, because they are no more. How could God forget? Because there are none there.
Christ so removed them from us, and that he rose again the third
day according to the Scriptures. The resurrection from the dead
proves that death, that wage, was paid. The sting of death
has been removed, which is sin. And the law has been satisfied,
and it has nothing more to claim for those for whom Christ died. This is according to the Scriptures.
According to the scriptures, he rose again. He was delivered
for our offenses. Because of our offenses, he was
delivered up. And because of his... How does
it go? He was delivered for our offenses
and he was raised again because of our justification. That's
from Romans 4.25. It says for instead of because
in the King James Version, but it's the word because. Because
of our offenses, Christ was delivered up. And because, and he was raised
because of our justification. God's law was answered. We don't
have any further answer to give, nor can any be given. Christ
gave himself. God emptied heaven. And so the
Lord of Glory came and He did this. If Christ didn't accomplish
this, what does it say? What does it mean? What does
it imply about the Lord of Heaven that He couldn't do what He came
to do? Or that He purchased His people
with His own blood and then did not receive the purchase that
He made by that blood? And so this adds a significant
foundation here. It's historical. It's accomplished.
God has received him from the dead. It's done. Nothing can
be added. Nothing taken from it. The whole
work that God gave him to do from eternity was fulfilled when
he rose from the dead. And then he says this in verse
5. that he was seen of Cephas, Peter. Now, not only is this
what Christ did, but now he says, Peter saw him, and then the 12,
and then more than 500 brethren all at once saw him. Most of
them are still alive when he writes this letter in verse seven.
And after that, he was seen of James, then of all the apostles
again, and last of all, Last of all, Paul says, he was seen
of me also as one born out of due time, for I am the least
of the apostles. I am not fit, I'm not meet to
be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. Notice Paul was, he was breathing
out fire against the Church of God and persecuting them, hauling
men and women into court and watching them die like Stephen.
He held the clothes of those who stoned him. He persecuted
the people of God. And if you have done it to the
least of these, my brethren, the Lord Jesus said, you've done
it to me. So he says, I'm not fit. I couldn't even be counted
among the apostles. But by the grace of God, verse
10, I am what I am. Why? Why was he turned 180 degrees
in such a fashion that it was a resurrection? from his death
and sins to life to Christ. Now he lives to Christ. He lives
to God. He's the servant of Jesus Christ.
How could that be but by the grace of God through the resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ? I want to ask you a question
about this now, as I thought about this. This is something I think that
is phenomenal to think about here. But we're going to pause
here and look at this question for a minute. How many of the Lord's, how many
people, how many people died when Adam sinned? Well, you would
say everybody. Everyone spiritually died when
Adam sinned and their bodies became dead in that sin. Isn't that what scripture teaches?
The body is dead because of sin. Romans 8 verse 10. As in Adam,
all died. As in verse 22 in this chapter
even says. We all died. How many died in
Adam's disobedience? We all died, didn't we? All right. How many people then were alive
after Adam sinned? Well, they're all dead, right?
They're all dead in sins. They're dead in trespasses and
sins. Even us, who believe on Christ, we're all dead in sins. And now I have to ask the next
question. How many people were made alive throughout scripture? How many people? Well, I started
to think these questions through, and I thought, well, there was
that son of that widow woman that Elijah, or Elisha, raised
from the dead. And I started going through that,
and I thought, wait a minute. How many people were made alive by
God in Scripture? All in Christ were made alive,
weren't they? That happened at his resurrection,
representatively. In Christ, we were raised, but
the application of that comes to us individually throughout
time, through the history of our lives, doesn't it? when he
says in Ephesians 2, and you who were dead in trespasses and
sins, and you walked according to the course of this world,
the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works
in the children of disobedience and are children of wrath even
as others, the next verse says, but God who is rich in mercy
for his great love wherewith he loved us even when we were
dead in sins has made us alive, quickened us together with Christ.
By grace, you're saved. And he's raised us up together
and has made us sit together with Christ in heavenly places.
That's Ephesians 2. So every one for whom Christ
died individually in the history of their own personal life hears
the gospel. And as Jesus said in John 6.63,
my words are spirit and they are life. So when we hear, we
take By God's grace, the bread of life, Christ's broken body
and his shed blood for us, and by faith we live upon him and
we're given life, he says, whoever believes on me has, present tense,
everlasting life. That comes in our personal individual
history, doesn't it? So the next question is, well
then, Since all in Christ are made alive, and none were alive
before that, there was a resurrection that occurred, right? And that
resurrection is the first resurrection. Christ, obviously, is the first
to rise from the dead in his body. But we, individually, the
members of Christ's body, are given this life and we're raised
spiritually from our death and sins. And that happens in the
history of our lives when the gospel is preached to us. And
this is true of everyone for whom Christ died. But then also
on the last day, something else is going to happen. There's going
to be a resurrection, Jesus said, of the just and of the unjust. And so when the Lord comes again,
He says, at the last trump, the trumpet shall sound and the dead
in Christ shall be raised. It will happen so that everyone. of Christ's people, all those
in Christ who have in their own lifetime, their own individual
experience, their history, were given grace to look to Christ
and believe Him, they then, all together at once, by the almighty
power of the Lord Jesus Christ, will receive life in their body
from the dead. And now that is phenomenal to
even try to get your mind around, isn't it? That the Lord Jesus
Christ, in a moment of time, will utter his command, like
he did to Lazarus. Lazarus, come forth. He will
say that to all of his body, his entire congregation, the
Church of the Living God, the City of God, the New Jerusalem,
all of them together, as one body will rise at one time. And those who are then alive
and have not died, because believers will be on earth even up to the
end, at one moment of time, in an immeasurably short moment,
a twinkling of an eye, they all will be changed. So that all
collectively, the body of Christ, will be given this new, heavenly,
spiritual, incorruptible, immortal, glorious body with power to fulfill
the office God has given to them as priests and kings to God,
to worship and serve Him and to sing His praises throughout
eternity, and to know Him as He is. All these things will
be possible through this new body God has given to us. But
I want you to see there the grace of God here that turned Paul
from what he was before is the same grace given to all of us
individually. So that when he says this in
verse 10, but by the grace of God, I am what I am, he's referring
again to the virtue, the consequences of Christ's resurrection. Spiritually,
he gives us life through the preaching of the gospel, and
he sustains that life. He continually feeds us through
the bread of life, looking to Christ at all times. And then
he goes on here, he says, that grace which was given to me was
not bestowed on me in vain, but I labored more abundantly than
they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me."
It was Christ in him. He says, the life I live is not
mine, but Christ liveth in me. Alright, he's going on now, he's
still proving the fact of the resurrection and giving the ground
of the gospel here. He says in verse 11, therefore,
you Corinthians, including you who deny the resurrection, you
who believe and you who have denied it. Therefore, whether
it were I or they, so we preached and so you believed." Some didn't,
obviously, but some did. And so how did they come to that? By the grace of God. the resurrecting
power of God given by grace from Christ because of his resurrection,
whether it was I, Paul, James, Peter, any of the other twelve,
or any of these five hundred brethren who saw the Lord Jesus
Christ. We preached and you believed.
That's the process. That's God's ordained way in
order for us to hear the gospel. So he says, all right, given
these facts, it's undeniable that Christ rose physically,
that his body that went into the grave was like his body that
went into the grave, but it was a new body. His body that went
into grave could die. His body that came out of the
grave could not die. Right? And even though in Psalm
16 it says, thou wilt not suffer thine holy one to see corruption.
And we don't understand it physically, but we know that the Lord Jesus
Christ in his first body was a body that could actually die
because of sin. Because he bore our sins in his
own body up to the tree, suffered in that body, cried out to God. depending upon him by faith and
living upon the word of God, as he says throughout scripture. So whether it was I or they,
we preached and you believed. Now, He's going to now tell us
about the horrible, horrible consequences if there was no
resurrection. He's added first the foundation
of the gospel that all of our life, whether spiritual or eternal,
is because of Christ doing and dying and rising again. And then
he gives all the factual witnesses to that, and then his own experience
of grace, which was like every believer's, in verses 9 and 10. And then he goes on, he says,
now, in verse 12, if Christ be preached that he rose from the
dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection
of the dead? Because that's what they were denying. They hadn't
thought it through. It's like people getting together
and talking about something they're all passionate about, but no
one in the crowd has enough temerity, enough intestinal fortitude to
say, stop, wait a minute, we're all saying the same thing, we
all agree, but is it true? And so that's what Paul is saying
here. You Corinthians, you have those among you who deny the
resurrection. Let me tell you what the implications
are here if it's not true. How say some among you there's
no resurrection if Christ be preached that he rose? Verse
13. But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not
risen. Have you ever thought of that? If Christ is not risen,
then is our preaching vain. It's for nothing. And your faith
is also vain. You've believed a facade, you've
believed a mirage, you've believed something that's just someone
has imagined or dreamt up, if it's not true. Your faith is
of no value. And you don't really believe.
Verse 15, yea, and we are found false witnesses of God. We're
lying about God. or God sent us and we're telling
something that's not true, which would make God a liar, because
we have testified of God that He raised up Christ, whom He
raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. Verse 16,
for if the dead rise not, then Christ is not raised, because
he's the first one. And if Christ be not raised,
listen, your faith is vain, you are yet in your sins, because
by the resurrection, which we just talked about, our sins were
put away and the wages of sins were paid. That's why Christ
rose, because he justified us in his death. Verse 18, then
they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. All of
your brethren, those you loved, have forever perished if Christ
isn't raised. And you're yet in your sins.
And if in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all
men most miserable. Why? Because we have our sins
to answer for. And there's no life. There's
no spiritual life. There's no object of faith. There's
no word of God that's true. There's no Christ is not truly
the son of God. He doesn't have power over death.
He laid his life down, but he didn't have power to take it
up again. God delivered up his son and didn't spare him, but
God didn't raise his son up. Think of the implications here.
Blasphemous, horrific implications about God and those who preach
the gospel. and the misery that we would
have, a hopelessness for all eternity. And then he says, but
now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits
of them that slept. For since by man came death,
by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all
die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. Now, we're
gonna pause there this week. But notice here, the last part
of this, what he's saying here is that the resurrection of the
believer is because the believer is united to Christ in his death,
burial, and resurrection. And it's because of our union
with Christ, a God-made union, the bond of union which is love,
the love of God. Nothing can separate us from
it. It's in Christ. That union, made by God and maintained
by the eternal love of Christ and God in Christ, will not let
His people be separated from Him. In Song of Solomon, chapter
8, verse 6 and 7, it says, love is stronger than death. And if
there's no resurrection, then the love of Christ is not stronger
than death. And think about the horrible
consequences of that. But as in Adam all die, even
so in Christ, and that's the glorious news of the gospel,
every sinner chosen in Christ, given to Christ from before the
foundation of the world, is given this life through the preaching
of the gospel, and it becomes the most precious thing in all
of life. Everything we think about has
been completely radically changed. Because we now see truth we never
knew. We see life through the eyes
of the Lord Jesus Christ. We come to God as the sinner. God be merciful to me, the sinner. Look to your son, receive me
for his sake. And so that our heart and our
mind and our desires and our love and everything we do is
in line with the truth of the gospel. And that's the work of
God. That's the result of the resurrection.
Let's pray. Lord Jesus, thank you for your
great and mighty grace and power to raise the dead. You've given
us the truth of your own conquest and triumph over our sin and
death, and now you are seated in glory, making intercession
for your people, and none of them can be lost. All of them
will be brought. None can condemn one for whom
you died. God himself has justified us,
and it all rests on the will of God and the work of our Lord
Jesus Christ. and the power of his Holy Spirit,
and the grace of God, and his wisdom, and his righteousness,
and truth, and everything about God that's true and holy. And
we're so glad that our God is the God of the living, not the
God of the dead. And because He is, He cannot
fail. And His people shall be raised,
and we shall see our Savior and be given this amazing, glorious
body in which we may see Him and know Him. And there won't
be any impediment, no fears, no doubts, no tears, no sorrows,
no regrets. All will be gloriously reconciled
to the purpose and the will and the work of our Savior. And we
pray, Lord, for this grace, to desire Him with everything we
have and to live upon Him by faith even now. In His name we
pray, amen.