Turn with me in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter four. Somebody said, you're down in number, what are you gonna do different? Nothing. The Lord said, where two or three are gathered in my name, I'll be there in the midst. It's not about the number of the people. It's a matter that the sheep's hungry and they come to eat. Maybe the Lord will reveal his face to us this morning Maybe he'll get himself some glory. Let's put it that way. That's our hope, isn't it?

Ephesians chapter four. And what I want to say to begin with is, it's been said when it pertains to the Lord's grace or growing therein, it's been said that the way up is actually down. And that's correct. That is absolutely true. We still have this body of sin. Although we have a new man that has a new nature, that lives by faith, that looks to Christ, it will never, ever, ever choose the Lord. This old flesh will never, ever choose the Lord, never will come to the Lord. So the Lord abases the flesh. And the good news is, is though the outward man perisheth, scripture says that, the inward man is renewed day by day. It's renewed by the Lord's spirit. Isn't that glorious? We're not getting better, we're getting worse on the outside, but the inward man is renewed day by day. And that's our hope, that's our hope.

Now I wanna read our text here, Ephesians 4 verse 11 through 16. Paul says, and he gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and some teachers for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie and wait to deceive, But speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body is fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, making increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.

Now in verse 15 again There's where the two words in the middle of the verse says grow up Grow up. I've titled this message growing in grace and I have three questions for us What does it mean to grow in grace number one? Number two, how do I grow in grace? And number three, how do I know if I'm growing in grace? And I hope by the time we finish these questions that the Lord would show us how glorious that everything he requires, he provides, how glorious it is, how wonderful it is that if he requires me to grow in grace, that he is the doer thereby.

And I'm going to, I jump around always whenever I stand up here, but I'm going to go ahead and immediately jump around a little bit later on. I was going to say this, but I looked up growing in grace through an AI. I was just curious, what do you, I don't know if anybody else is using AI now, just type it in on the search bar. It pops out some pretty amazing stuff. I typed in election, and it actually gave, verse on election, it gave that the Lord doesn't love everybody, he didn't die for everybody. I was like, wow, AI knows more than a lot of people do. Anyway, the point I was making is it gave five things, and I can't remember what they are, and I'll tell you in a minute when we get to it, but five things that you do, you do, to make sure that you grow in grace. That's not true at all. It's not what you do. It's growing in grace. Grace is not something obtained or earned. Grace is freely given, or it would be merited. Do we see that? So I can't obligate God to cause me to grow in grace. I can't make him cause me to grow in grace, or it wouldn't be by grace, it would be by works. Do we see the difference?

So the first question is, what does it mean to grow in grace? Simply put, it means to see less of self and more of Him. To see less of ourself and to see more and more in Him. An increased reliance on God, not self. It involves becoming more and more needy of His grace. More and more needy of Him. And not a desire of What we want, we become like the Syrophoenician woman saying, truth, Lord, more. We become like David and say, I am the man, I'm guilty. When Nathan came to him because of his sin, he said, you are the man, David. And David said, I have sinned. We become that. We become like Paul.

Growing in Grace looks like this. Paul began to speak and he says, I'm the least of the apostles. Then he says, I'm the least of all the saints. And then at the end of his journey, he says, I'm the chief center. Well, is he going backwards? No, he said, Oh, wretched man that I am not that I was growing in grace is down. It's not up. It's not that we get stronger, we could become some super. super Christian that has all this might and power spiritually speaking. And that's what a lot of churches believe is that you come to church like you go to the gym to exercise your faith and you get stronger and stronger and stronger by doing that. It's not true. That's not true.

Growing in grace is seeing less of yourself and seeing more of him and only the Lord can cause that. Growing in grace involves becoming completely dependent upon God's grace and his divine ability to overcome our weakness. to overcome our challenges instead of us trying to fix it ourself, looking to the flesh to fix it. It's being made to see what Paul said, his strength is made perfect in weakness.

You ever feel down, discouraged, brokenhearted, especially over loved ones? I think that's normally what most of us grieve over the most, not our sin more, but wishing that our loved ones would be saved, wishing that the Lord would call our loved ones, we cry out for them. And we're weak, aren't we? Because there's nothing we can do about it. We're not as weak, we're powerless. The Lord says, but my strength is made perfect in weakness. So Paul said, therefore, when I am weak, then I'm strong, because I'm resting in Christ alone. Only the Lord can cause us to grow in grace, to rest in him alone.

He had a thorn in the flesh, Paul did. And the scripture is not clear on what it is, but there's Bible scholars and different people that kind of come up with an idea. I don't know what it was, I ain't even saying. But he besought the Lord three times. He said, Lord, if it be possible, let this pass from me. Help me with this infirmity. Heal me of this illness, this sickness, this problem, this thorn in the flesh. And the Lord didn't respond to him for three times. After the third time, the Lord says this in 2 Corinthians 12, nine, he said unto me, my grace is sufficient for thee. Now can you imagine hearing the Lord tell you that? My grace is sufficient for thee. There's rest in that. There's rest in that because if what I need is grace and he says his grace is sufficient, then I have everything I need, everything I need. He said, my grace is sufficient for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

Glory in my infirmities? How you gonna do that? You ever gloried in your infirmities? When you suffer, when your heart hurts, whenever your body hurts, whatever the affliction may be, circumstances, can we glory in that? We don't glory in the circumstance, we glory in the one where the circumstance came from. We know that it's divine providence, not. anger that sent us that issue. It's divine purpose. It's divine providence, not wrath, not punishment.

I remember in false religion, that was something that if you do something, they would say, watch out. Now you're going to get it. You made the Lord angry. You're going to get punished now. No, everything Maybe to the non-believers, they're gonna be punished. There's no doubt about that. But to the Lord's elect, Christ took all the suffering that we would ever have to take. Everything that happens in our life is not based upon the Lord punishing us. He might chasten us, but that word chasten means to teach. He's going to redirect our thoughts. He's going to grow us in grace. That's chastening. And even though it may be grievous to us, it's for our good. So everything works together for good. What the scripture tells us, to them that love God, them are they called according to his purpose. So it's not his punishment, brethren. It's his providence that sent whatever it is that we're facing our way, whatever it may be. It doesn't matter what it is.

Growing in grace is the God-given ability to look to Christ instead of circumstances. Not paying attention to the circumstances much, but look to Christ. Somebody said, well, I must not be growing in grace. Well, I got good news for you. You're not gonna see yourself grow in grace. Because if you do, you would boast in it. Just like everything else spiritual, if we can see it, it's not spiritual. If I see growth, and I talked to someone recently, They were talking about getting better and better. And they were saying how they were growing. And to me, I remember thinking in my mind, that's exactly the opposite of growing. If you see yourself getting better and better, because the scripture is very clear, the way up is down. And what did he say? My strength is made perfect weakness. Therefore, most gladly, therefore, what I'd rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. The next verse says, For when I am weak, then I'm strong. Why? Because he's resting in Christ alone, not looking to himself.

The good news is, We won't see ourself growing, but the Lord made it so that we have a place of worship. We have, well, look, read with me. Look at what he gave us. He gave us pastors, verse 11 through 13 says, and he gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers. Here's the reason why, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." Now he says, the first thing he says in verse 12 is the reason he gave us prophets, evangelists, preachers, pastors, teachers is for the perfecting of the saints. Now what does he mean the perfecting of the saints? Somebody said, well, that's progressive sanctification. No, it's not. No, it's not. We're sanctified by the Lord's Spirit. We're sanctified once and for all. It's already finished. The Lord's people are sanctified. On the end, we're inner man. We're going to hear that second hour, inner man. But this is, we are perfect in Christ, but until the last sheep is called, until the last sheep is called, then the church will not be perfect in completion in time. Do we see that? That's what he's talking about. It's the calling of the sheep. It's the perfect calling of the sheep. That's the whole thing he's saying here, that we would become, and it's all about unity here and all about the Lord bringing us together to grow us together unto him. That's what he's talking about here. The word literally means, Perfecting literally means edifying of the body of Christ. That means to be built together, to be built together.

So the Lord is, now it's true that it is finished and it's true that he's already built Zion. It's true that you can't, he won't add to or take away one member from the church, but all the members haven't been called yet. They haven't, some of them might not even been born yet. Some of us have children, grandchildren that haven't been called yet. So we don't know, Who's going to be called? That's the point. When the Lord calls the last sheep, then it's over. There's no reason for this earth to exist anymore. That was the whole reason the Lord made it.

Verse 12 is why he gave all the pastors and prophets and Now, we know the age of apostles and prophets have ended. There's evangelists now and pastors and teachers. That's what's left. The Lord doesn't speak through a man except through the gospel now. And the apostle, you had to physically see the Lord Jesus Christ with your natural eyes. Nobody's going to do that. Paul said, last of all, he was seen of me. So that apostolic age has ended. Now, all that being said, He gave us those for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.

Second thing he says here is for the work of the ministry. I was asked recently, what kind of ministries do you have? What kind of ministries do you have? And what they meant by that was, is what kind of programs do you have? What kind of outreach ministries do you have? What kind of things do you do besides church? And I said, we have one ministry. They said, one? I said, just one. We preach the gospel. We preach the gospel.

They said, what about the children? We preach the gospel to our children. And they said, well, that seems kind of boring to a child. And I said, it's life and death. It doesn't matter whether it's boring or not. It's life and death. We're not coming here to play games. This isn't a place to play games. We're dealing with a holy, sovereign God, the God of this universe. And he demands perfection. And the only way we can find ourself perfect is being found in Christ. And the only way to be found in Christ is if the Lord calls us out of darkness into his light according to his will and purpose. And he does that by the preaching of the gospel. Does it by the preaching of the gospel.

1 Corinthians 2.2, Paul says, for I determined to know nothing among you, anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And here's why, verse 13, till we all come in the unity of the faith, that means now we're all united together in one faith, in the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, so we all have the same mind, unto a perfect man and to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

That's glorification, isn't it? That's glorification, that's what that is. We're never going to be the stature of Christ on this side of eternity, physically speaking. Now, spiritually, we already are, but physically, no. The flesh isn't going to get better. We're not going to get perfect.

Actually, I heard somebody talking about obtaining perfection in the flesh. I've obtained perfection. I don't do this anymore. I don't do that anymore. And I thought, well, you just called God a liar. So you're not too perfect. I mean, the scripture, he says, if we, the scripture literally says, if we say we have not sin, we call God a liar. That's what it says. The book of James, I believe it is.

So there's the reasons that the Lord has given all these teachers and pastors and evangelists is because of the gospel to be preached and men and women to be brought in and for us to be growing in grace. There's only one way that we can grow in grace. It's not going to be based upon what we do. It's going to be based upon what God does, and it's going to come through and by the gospel. It's not going to come through and by reading books. It's not what come through, and books are good. Some books are nice. They encourage you. I read that devotional Hawker wrote. I love that book. It's a very encouraging book.

But growing in grace, the Lord grows his people one way, and it's through the gospel. If the Lord's gonna get anything accomplished, it's gonna come through and by the gospel. Going in grace, is to love the simplicity of the gospel, that it was God that elected a people, that Christ redeemed those people, and that the spirit regenerates those people and keeps them by his power, that everything required by God, he provided. Growing in grace is needing that simplicity more and more, not needing vain knowledge, not needing a different understanding of what all does the book of Revelation mean, not delving into that, Trying to find Christ on each page, needing to find Christ on each page. I've got to see him. I've got to see him.

When Abraham had sent for Isaac's wife, Rebekah, I know it was over a 30-day journey for them to come back. I think maybe it's go there and come back. I have to look it up again, so I don't want to misspeak. But it was a long time. And what questions do you think she had during that entire time? Every campfire night, what was she asking? Tell me more about Isaac. Tell me more about Isaac. She was going to marry him, never met him before, didn't know what he looked like. They didn't have pictures back then. Not that I know of. At least they didn't have cameras. We know that. Technology had come out for years and years. They may not have paintings. I don't know. Anyways. Tell me more about Isaac. And is that not growing in grace? Tell me more about Christ. Hey, yeah, I'm glad you know, your work week been this or that, but tell me more about Christ. I want to hear about him. Because that's where I can rest. That's where I can, I'm more encouraged whenever our brethren, whenever we get together and we talk about Christ, we talk about the simplicity of the gospel, we talk about, let me tell you what the Lord did for me. Let me tell you how good he's been to me. That's edifying. That's lifting one another up.

And I'm sure when she got to him, when she says she lighted off her camel means she got down pretty quick and then she put her veil on, she hit her face. I believe her response would have been something along the lines of the Queen of Sheba. When she went and saw Solomon, she told Solomon, she said, I had heard with the hearing of the ear, and now I've seen all your servants, I've saw this, I've saw that, and the way that you even walk through the temple and the staircase. She's like, the half hasn't been told me. And is that not true with our Lord? Even when we get to glory, we'll say the same thing, the half. I loved him through the glass darkly, but the half has not been told how glorious he is.

If we lose sight of this, his simplicity, that he's God and we are not. Salvation is not about what we do or don't do, it's about what he did, about what he accomplished. Salvation is not a what, it's a who. Salvation is a who. It's all of grace. If we lose sight of this, we've lost sight of everything. We're like those in verse 14, look at verse 14, that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about every weight and wind of doctrine, by the slight of men, a cunning craftiness whereby they lie and wait to deceive.

Carried about by every weight, by every wind of doctrine, they are those that concern themselves with certain words." They want certain words. And Paul warned Timothy about this. Men will get hung up on, if you don't say a certain word in your preaching, well, you didn't preach the gospel. That's not true. That's not true at all. But they want that certain word, because that's their validation for what they believe. That's part of their righteousness, is that particular word. And that's something that they have that nobody else has. And if you don't say that word, a certain word, then you're not considered a brother.

Growing in grace, we have been given, if the Lord's growing us in grace, we've been given the ability to say, I don't know what that means. You'll never hear those who live for self-righteous intellectual purposes that if only find something that nobody else has found and brag about that and say, look what we found. You don't know what we know. You'll never hear them say, I don't know. But God's people that are growing in grace, not afraid to say, I don't know what that means. I have no idea. But I pray the Lord reveal it to me in His time.

And some things you're going to see, We don't understand anything we believe. I mean, how are you gonna, how are we gonna, well, I think I say that second hour too, so, talking about the Lord's condescension. I mean, how can you even fathom God becoming a man? Men enjoy picking, some men enjoy picking the Bible apart, these every wind of doctrine, they, cunning and crafty men, they gain a head knowledge, but they miss Christ altogether. That's not growing in grace, that's, Well, the scripture says what about knowledge? It puffeth up, puffeth up. You can know a lot of things and still not know Christ. You can know the five points of Calvinism, not know Christ. We can know the doctrines of grace and not know Christ. Salvation's a person, salvation's a person. Growing in grace is being made to realize we don't need to have an explanation for everything. We are content with the simplicity of Christ alone. I don't need to have an explanation for everything. I can't understand everything about the Lord's salvation, but I believe it's my only hope. I believe everything he accomplished is true. I believe what the scripture says, line upon line, precept upon precept, and the Lord's the one that's gonna have to cause me to believe it, all by faith.

Scripture defines scripture, brethren. God's gospel's clear and simple. Salvation's of the Lord and Christ is all in salvation. That's simple, isn't it? I like simple. Maybe I am simple, I don't know, but I like it. I don't complicate it. Some men have to use their intellect as they speak to look like they know more than they know or show that they know more than you know. And that's not, that's not of the Lord. No, the Lord gives his servants, we just read it, verse 15, but speaking the truth in love. Speaking the truth in love. Now you can't, you can't feed a sheep, you know, With a shovel, you have to break it down in bite sizes. You have to speak it in love and be patient and tender, and some don't do that.

This brings us to our second question, how do I grow in grace? Now, there's the part I told you I looked up, and it said five practical ways to grow in grace. Now, I wanna just preface by saying none of these are true. That way, I'm not confused at all, or nobody's confused, because we have several people watching. Practical ways to grow in grace that are not true at all. Google says this, and the reason I'm doing it, showing you, is because this is how the world views growing in grace. This is how they see it. This is not how the Lord sees it. This is how men that don't know God see it.

First of all, first thing you need to do to grow in grace is prioritize forgiveness. Prioritize forgiveness. Then you're growing in grace, according to them. Engage in spiritual practices. Engage in spiritual practices. Serve others in a noticeable way. Yeah, serve others in a noticeable way. Fellowship with believers and cultivate awareness of grace. Notice every single one of those points to do. You need to do this. You need to do that. That's the same as they say in salvation. They did something to be saved. Now they're doing something to grow in grace. None of those are growing in grace.

Growing in grace comes one way, and it's by the preaching of the gospel. God has to grow his people. God has to grow his sheep, and he grows them by putting, he allows us to fall flat on our face, and then he shows us his glory. He shows us that we're robed in his righteousness. He shows us that we've been made the righteousness of God and Jesus Christ for the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. He shows us that we are perfect and holy as he is, that the new man that he's created inside is righteous, right now, not waiting to be, right now. And he's well pleased because it's the Lord Jesus Christ in you, the hope of glory.

If God's going to do something, he's gonna use his gospel to get it done. His word's a two-edged sword. What does that mean? Well, it both heals and cuts. The Lord cuts away what we don't need and he heals. when we need to be healed. How does he do it? By his word. By his word. His gospel abases the flesh and exalts Jesus Christ. One question you can ask if you're hearing somebody preach and you say, are they preaching the gospel? Do they exalt the Lord Jesus Christ only? Through and through. If they exalt the flesh or say there's something you need to do, that's exalting the flesh. If they do that, they're not preaching the gospel. It's that simple. The Lord Jesus Christ has to get all the glory in salvation and in his gospel, or it's not the gospel.

If you desire to grow in grace, ask the Lord. Remember, the ways up is down. And somebody said, I'm praying for patience. I'm like, okay, you're praying for tribulation. Somebody said, I'm praying for wisdom. And I said, okay, you're praying for sorrow. Got it. So we know not what we should pray. So it's best to say, Lord, created me a clean heart. Renewing me a right spirit. Grow me in your grace. Cause me to see more of Christ and less of myself. Cause me to stop looking at these circumstances, these problems that I think are too big and realize that I'm too weak and you're Your strength is made perfect in weakness. Calls me to see you and rest in you and your gospel alone.

If you ask the Lord to grow you in grace, you'll be made to need God more and more. You'll be made more and more dependent upon grace and you'll be made to rest, not do. Rest. not do. As you grow in grace, you'll be made to rest and not do. Do you know how contrary that is to the flesh? This flesh is so prideful and it doesn't get better. It doesn't get better. Talk to some of the elders. I'm telling you, it gets worse and worse and worse. And the elders that say, well, my pride got better. They're lying. They don't, they're not an elder then. You know what I mean? They don't, they don't know what they're talking about. It just gets worse and worse. Everything about this flesh gets worse and worse. That's why the Lord shortened man's days to 70 years. Can you imagine living 900 years like they used to? How wicked, evil, perverse we would be, we'd be horrible. This world would be a lot worse than it is now.

Now, notice every time I mention growing in grace, I say we are made to. That's what I've said multiple times, we're made to. What do I mean made to? It is God that worketh in you to both will and do of his good pleasure. It's God that works in us. It's Christ in you, the hope of glory. Anything that draws attention to the flesh, it's not of the Lord. It's not of the Lord, it's of the Lord if it draws attention to Christ, exalts Him. It is the Lord that does the work, the Lord that does the work. I can only grow in grace if God gives the increase. This is according to the power of God, the will of God, not the will of man or the power of man, not my choice, but God's choice. He has to choose to grow me in grace.

But growing in grace does not look like what society says it does. It doesn't look like that you become some super man or woman of faith. It means, and by their standard of faith, not ours. It means that you see yourself as the chief of all sinners, a wretched, vile creature. dependent completely upon his grace, and if he doesn't give it to you, hell's gonna be your home and you know it. You become more dependent upon him.

I've gotta hear him. Tell me more about Isaac. Tell me more about Isaac. I cannot obligate God, I wanna preface what I'm about to say very clearly. I cannot obligate God to cause me to grow in grace. Nobody can constrain or restrain him. That's an impossibility. He's God. But I can only grow in grace if God gives the increase, but that is not an excuse to treat the Lord's worship as frivolous, meaning, well, if I'm going to grow in grace, the Lord's going to do it. I'll just, it doesn't matter whether I go to service or not. No, actually this is the only place where the Lord is going to grow and grow you in grace. I mean, you could listen to CDs as well, to preaching, but you understand what I'm talking about. It's going to be the gospel. It's going to be the gospel where the Lord grows in grace.

So our priority, and I say this, uh, with the least amount of people I've preached to probably here. And I don't mean anything by it for a brother who listened. I understand it's no, but this is a, this is a priority. This isn't just a, Oh, you know, we'll see how it works out on Saturday night. No, on Saturday night, we're going to bed. We go to church tomorrow. We're going to church. Why I've got to hear about Isaac. I've got to hear about Christ. I need to hear that the debt is settled. I need to hear that my account has made right by the Lord Jesus Christ. I need to know about the blood that cleansed me from my sin. I need to know about that. I need to hear about God, how he did all in salvation, how he did election starting from the beginning, before the world even began. He loved his people and elected them unto eternal life. Then Christ was made a man. He lived 33 years as a perfect man, our substitute, and he died upon a cross that should have been ours. And he endured the wrath of God that should have been ours, and the punishment, and the hell that should have been ours. His people, and he put all their sin away, and the wrath of God is now satisfied, and the justice of God is now satisfied.

I've got to hear about this, because it's my only place of rest. I see the wickedness that I am. I've got to be here. I've got to be here. Being here should be our number one priority, not a secondary priority. I know we have obligations. Some of us have to work sometimes. Everything happens. There's a scripture that talks about having an ox in a ditch. I've had to do it. That was a law that you weren't allowed to work on the Sabbath, but if you had an ox in the ditch, you were allowed to get the ox out of the ditch. So that's just a saying, but it was true back in Bible times. We used to joke whenever I'd have to work on Sunday, I'd call up Greg and say, I got an ox in the ditch, Greg, I won't be there.

Brethren, God honors whenever his people get together. It doesn't obligate him to do anything, but this is the only means whereby we rest and grow in grace.

Which brings us to our last question, how do I know if I'm growing in grace? Because you don't see yourself as getting better, you see yourself as getting worse. You don't love yourself more and more and more. You loathe yourself more and more and more. Your dependency is not based upon what you used to desire, what you used to think was righteousness. Your dependency is completely upon the Lord now and his righteousness. You no longer desire the things of what you used to think was righteousness. You desire his righteousness alone. You have no righteousness of our own, do we? Our dependency actually isn't lessening because we're getting stronger in faith. It's becoming more and more dependent because we're becoming stronger in faith. The stronger the faith gets, the weaker the flesh becomes. Do we see that? Stronger with the Lord increase our faith. We see him more and more. We see less of ourself. Our need isn't fading, brethren, because each passing day we see death, death getting closer and closer. You see death getting, you know the believers are the only ones that think about death. I've been around a lot of people and I haven't met very many other than believers that have talked to me about death. Now some elderly people have, but people my age, no. And even believers my age don't talk about it a whole lot.

But if you are, if the Lord chooses to allow you to really think about death, and what it would be like if he left you to yourself, you're gonna grow dependent upon the Lord. And that's what he does, isn't it? He causes us to see our need of him. And he gives us, he makes us have one need, and one need only, and he's the only one that can fill that need. So we run to him, Lord, help me. Lord, save me. Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. And those that are doing that are growing in grace. They're growing in grace.

You know, it comes down to one thing. Give me Christ, lest I die. I have to hear the gospel. You have to hear the gospel more and more, not less and less. There's somebody that they tune in about once a month, and they told me, said, yeah, that's all I need. I need all I need. I don't understand that. That's what they said. And I'm not picking on anybody. I'm just simply saying the Lord creates a need in a believer. that is often, you got to hear it as often as you can.

You feel that you're in a desert and you're dirty and the gospels, how the Lord, scripture tells us that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. When we hear the gospel of the Lord, it's like he gives us a bath, if you would. He gets the old, gets our stink off, if I can say it that way. I don't know, washes our feet, just like he did to the disciples. We get to See his glory revealed, see us as righteous in him. The gospel's our source of life. It's our ability to keep moving forward. If not for the gospel, we're doomed, we're damned without any hope. We know that, we've made to see that.

If you're growing in grace, then the world has lost its luster. It doesn't have the same luster as it used to. You know, there's a lot of things in the world we enjoy still, and there's nothing wrong with that. The scripture tells us to do so. But as we think about the world, we realize it's not our home. That we're pilgrims and we're strangers and we feel out of place and we feel, um, Restless, if you would. And it's the desire to be made in the likeness of Christ. His desire to shed this sinful flesh. But only the Lord's people do that. Only those who are growing in grace have that.

See, we've got to have Him. His salvation is more precious than anything. Can anybody relate to what I'm saying about this? This is what it is to grow in grace. Somebody said, well, I don't see it. You're not supposed to see it. It's spiritual. It's just like the fruit of the spirit. You're not going to see that either. It's not for you. It's not for you. For the Lord's glory. For the Lord's glory.

Thanks be to God, we've been given the grace of God, which reveals the way we grow in grace is up, not down. And if we're going to grow in grace, he's the one that's gonna do it. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we ask that you would take this and bless it to our understanding for your glory. Grow us in your grace. Cause us to be ever more dependent upon your truth. Lord, we ask that you would forgive us our sin and abase this flesh that you might be exalted and get all the glory in Christ's name, amen.

Let's take a break.