In the book of First Thessalonians,
again. First Thessalonians, chapter
five. Paul comes to the end of his
letter to the church at Thessalonica, and he ends it the same way he's
been speaking throughout the entire letter, and it's admonishment,
it's encouragement, it's pointing them to Christ, and it's with
thanksgiving. And he says in 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 16,
rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks,
for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
Quench not the spirit, despise not prophesyings, prove all things,
hold fast that which is good, abstain from all appearance of
evil, and the very God of peace sanctify you wholly. And I pray
God, your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless
unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful as he that called
you, who will also do it. Brethren, pray for us. Greet
all the brethren with a holy kiss. I charge you by the Lord
that this epistle be read unto all the holy brethren, the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ, be with you, amen. I've titled this
message Preserved Blameless. He says in verse 23, the very
God of peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit
and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ. And he tells us how he's gonna
do that. Faithful is he that calls you who also will do it. Preserved blameless. We have
three things here. that's given to us, that is obvious
to us, that's been made known unto us, God is the sanctifier
of his people. God is his people's sanctification. He is the preserver of his people. He is faithful. He will do it
because he is faithful. And that is the third thing,
is this is all because he is faithful. Because he is faithful,
he keeps his people preserved blameless. There's a article
in your bulletin I wrote. It talks about nothing in me
is faithful. Nothing about us is faithful. Not when it comes to spiritual
things. Our prayers are not consistent. We have good intention. The scripture
tells us that the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is
weak. Nothing about us is faithful to Him, but He is. He's faithful. Nothing about us can't look at
anything that we do, can we? And say, yeah, I'm faithful now
to Him. I've been faithful over this.
The most amazing part about the Lord's gospel is, is whenever
the Lord's people stand before Him, after they've taken their
last breath in this life, the scripture says to be absent from
the body is to be present with the Lord. At that very moment,
we're gonna hear one of two things, either depart from me that work
iniquity I never knew you, or enter in thou good and faithful
servant. You've been faithful over a few
things. I'll make you ruler over many.
I've been faithful. That's what he said. That's what
he said he's gonna say. How am I faithful? Being in Christ. If you're found in Christ, you're
viewed as faithful by the Father. Cause of this, Paul tells them,
rejoice evermore. Always rejoice, rejoice evermore.
We would do well to rejoice. And you remember when we were
looking in the book of Philippians, he says, rejoice in the Lord
always. And again, I say rejoice. We
would do well to rejoice in the Lord always. The new man does,
doesn't he? We do spend a lot of our days though, not rejoicing,
but. our joy is robbed from us, we
allow our joy to be, we are the cause of our joy being robbed
because of our unbelief, aren't we? Because of our unbelief,
our joy is taken from us all the time. Is that your experience? That's my experience. I'll hear
the good news of the gospel, I'll be rejoicing in the Lord,
His finished work, and something simple will happen, my eyes will
be taken completely off of Him, and I'll, it'll be gone. That
joy will be, that joy will vanish away, and it's like, I did it
again. Lord, I messed up again. Lord,
cause me to see your face again. David's prayer was to have the
joy of the Lord, the joy of the Lord's salvation restored. You
remember the account given where David sinned with Bathsheba and
for a year, right at a year, he was, I guarantee you that
every day he was going down to the temple making sacrifice.
I believe that he desired to still worship God. Somebody asked
me one time, they said, do you believe that A born-again Christian
can do this sin and this sin and that sin. Do you believe
they're born-again Christian if they do that? I said, was
David a born-again Christian whenever he committed adultery
and murdered Uriah the Hittite? Well, if we're found in Christ,
if we're found in Christ, we've always been in Christ. So we
usually don't use the term born-again Christian. That's what a lot
of people in religion do, but we can use that term. I mean,
it's, I, I don't like using it because they associate it to
something they've done. And so we use the term elect and that
offends people and that's okay. That's what we say is we're,
we hope to be the elect of the Lord. I was using the term believer
for a while and now my family's non-believing family is saying
believers. And I'm like, well, I got it. Okay. I'm just going to stick
with the elect. That way that the offense of the gospel remains
then, doesn't it? So the point I was making is,
was David a believer? Yes, he believed God, even in
that sin. The point is, is he needed a
substitute. And when Nathan the prophet came to him, he gave
him the one thing needful, repentance. David, you're the man. He didn't
justify his actions. He said, I have sinned against
God. My unbelief has robbed me of
my joy. In Psalm 51, he wrote, restore unto me the joy of thy
salvation. That's what was taken. The joy,
the rejoicing. He couldn't rejoice in the Lord
because he had not been given repentance and he had not been
given Uh, if we don't have repentance, we, the Lord gives that repentance
to his people. Doesn't he? And he does it more
than one time. This is a continual repentance that he gives and
faith that looks to Christ. That's what he does. Nothing
compares to the dove of peace causing us to see the face of
the Lord. May he give us the grace to rejoice
in the Lord of the storm, whatever it is we're facing, whatever
he's the Lord of it. He's the cause, the first cause
of it. May he allow us to rejoice evermore. I want to, don't you?
I want to rejoice evermore. Lord, cause me to rejoice evermore.
Second thing Paul says to them here in our text, verse 17 is
pray without ceasing. Pray without ceasing. How do
we do that? How do we do that? Well, there's only one way. The
only way is from the heart of faith, believing the Lord Jesus
Christ. Can you say or agree with me
that our prayer is always, Lord, save me. Lord, save me. Do you
find yourself continually feeling that way or praying that prayer?
What does that mean when I say, Lord, save me? It means give
me Christ lest I die. If I don't have him, I have no
salvation. If I don't have him, I have no peace. If I don't have
him, I have no reason to rejoice. I'm a miserable man if I don't
have the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, in everything, in everything,
give thanks. In everything by prayer, seek
the Lord's face. Seek the Lord's face. He's not
saying to get down on your physical knees and never stop praying.
He's not saying to get down and continually be on your knees
before him physically speaking. He's talking about spiritual
things here. Pray without ceasing. That means we look to Christ
in everything we do. May that be what he causes us
to do. We give thanks in everything,
looking to Christ. Come what may, the true heart
that he gives his people looks to Christ. And it makes us confess,
Lord, thy will be done, not my will. Thy will be done. I don't
even have a will. We have one, but it's restricted
by our nature. Lord, my will's wrong. I need
your will to be done. I need your will to be done. That's the experience of the
believer, isn't it? There's a hymn that's written,
and I don't agree with the entire wording of the hymn, but this
one little part of the stanza I think's fitting. It says, oh
what peace we often forfeit, oh what needless pain we bear,
all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer. And we don't
approach our Lord as if he's a grocery store and we have our
buggy pushing it. And we're gonna take this from
him and take a believer comes to the Lord through the eyes
of faith, begging for one thing, give me Christ. I've got to have
him. I've got to have him. Yes, we
do make our requests and petitions known unto him, but what requests
and petition could we ever say would not be met if we're given
Christ. If we're given Christ, his will
will be done. And we bow to that, don't we?
He's what we pray for. The Lord makes his people thankful
for Christ, no matter the situation or the circumstance. He makes
Christ our only place of rejoicing, our only place of refuge. That's
what all this is pointing us to him. How are we going to rejoice
evermore? Only if Christ is our surety
before God, only if he Only if we see that the blood is on the
lintel in the doorpost and we're in the house, only if we see
that I am my beloved and he is mine, there's rejoicing in that,
isn't there? He's our only peace and joy. Can't rejoice in myself. We can't
rejoice in ourself, can we? Not really. No, we can't rejoice
in what we do, but we can rejoice in our substitute. That he did
everything required. He did everything necessary for
salvation. Can't rejoice in our sin, but
we can rejoice that he put his people's sin away by his own
blood on the cross of Calvary. We can't rejoice in pain. I recently had something painful
that I was enduring and still kind of battling a little bit,
and I can't rejoice in that. I'm like, this is a hindrance.
This is causing my mind to be distracted. I need to do this,
or I need to do that. That's murmuring. Whoops, I didn't
mean to do that, Lord. I can rejoice that he endured
the wrath of God. He suffered the pain and the
agony and the anguish on the cross of Calvary. I can't rejoice
in the pain. I can rejoice in the Lord that purposed it to
drive me to Christ. We can do that, can't we? We
can't rejoice in our circumstances. We can rejoice in Him. Can't
give thanks for what we see with the natural eye unless We're
not using our natural eye. If we're seeing him through the
eyes of faith, we can rejoice in that. I wanted to take the time to
go through each of these verses specifically, and I pray the
Lord gives us grace this morning to enter into all of these points
that Paul is making, but I specifically wanted to make certain that I
mentioned verse 19. It says, quench not the spirit. Quench not the spirit. That means
extinguish. Extinguish not the spirit. So
what is he talking about? Because I remember in religion,
men would say that we can limit the Holy Spirit's power. Literally,
that was the words. If we do this or we don't do
that. This is so easily misconstrued.
He's not talking about limiting, limiting the Holy Spirit in any
way. The best example I can give to you of what he's describing
is When we see Christ, when we look to the Lord Jesus Christ
through the eyes of faith, when we look to the Lord Jesus Christ
alone, the dove of peace flies to our heart. And the moment
we look to the dove of peace, the moment that we look to an
experience, the moment we look to an emotion, the moment we
look, take our eyes off of Christ and look to the dove of peace,
he flies away. He flies away. When we look to the Lord Jesus
Christ alone, the dove of peace, he flies to our heart. The moment
we look to the dove of peace, he flies away. We don't look to self. We don't
look to a feeling of peace. We don't look to joy. We look
to Christ. And those are the fruit of the
spirit that's given. Do we see that? That's what he does. Looking
to Christ, he gives his people those fruit of the spirit. He
gives us joy in the Lord. We don't look to that joy and
say, okay, I know I'm his because I'm rejoicing this morning in
what he's saying. No, no, no. We look to Christ and we rejoice
in him. Do we see the difference? We don't look to the fruit of
the spirit as our assurance, we look to Christ alone, not
ourself. Looking to self always results
in the peace and the joy of our salvation given by Christ's spirit
to disappear. Looking to self always makes
the peace and the joy given to us by the spirit of Christ to
disappear. Now it's, we still have the Lord's
salvation, nothing's changed, but The moment we look to that
joy, the moment we look to that peace, the moment we look to
those fruit of the spirit that he's graciously bestowed us as
evidence of our salvation, we're taking our eyes off of the Lord
and they, it's your experience, isn't it? It disappears whenever
that happens. How often do we look in pride to ourself? We
don't even mean to, we, We love to look to ourself. It's our
nature. It's our nature. We don't need any help looking
to self, do we? You don't have to encourage me
to look to myself. I do it really good on my own. You don't need
me to encourage you to look to yourself. No, I need to be encouraged
to look to Christ. I need to be reminded to look
to Him. How cold we get sometimes. We don't need any encouragement
to fear and doubt. We need to be made to look to
Christ, don't we? Lord, enable me. Furthermore, cause me. Make me. Make me look to Christ
in all things. Make me rejoice in his finished
work. We enjoy his salvation because of the fruit of the spirit.
We don't look to it as our salvation, but we enjoy his salvation because
of the fruit of the spirit. One of them is faith. We couldn't
enjoy salvation if we weren't given faith to look to Christ.
We love the The fruit of the Spirit, I wrote them down for
us. It's love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, meekness, goodness,
temperance, faith. Men in religion say you have
to have those attributes or you're not His. Well, it's the point
is whose fruit is it? It's the fruit of the Spirit.
It's what He does. That's the point, isn't it? This
is all the things bestowed to His people. It's his fruit for
his people given. And when the Lord, we don't look
to the fruit, brethren, do we? But we do have joy unspeakable
and full of glory. We do have peace with God through
the Lord Jesus Christ. And everything I'm describing
is all because we're looking to him. The moment we look to
that experience, no, it disappears, doesn't it? You're saying, I'm long-suffering,
I'm gentle, I'm meek enough, I'm good. No, no, Christ is all
those things. That's what he's given his people
because they're in him. That's the good news of the gospel.
It's his fruit. He reveals it in his people.
That's what he sees. That's what he sees. We don't
look for it. We can't see it. He sees it. He sees it because
it's the fruit of Christ given. Paul then says, In verse 20,
despise not prophesyings, prove all things, hold fast to that
which is good, abstain from all appearance of evil. Now, prophesying
is also a better translation with prophecies. He's talking
about the Old Testament. Despise not prophecies. And it
can be understood by this that maybe they were saying, well,
that's, and I've heard this before in religion, that's the Old Testament.
That was written to, before grace, that was written to those who
were under the law. That doesn't pertain to us. No, the scripture,
Christ said, search the scriptures. In them you think you have eternal
life, but they are they which speak of me. Genesis to Revelation
is literally the Lord Jesus Christ, all about Him. Paul's saying,
don't despise the prophecies of old. They point to a man.
They point to the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't despise them. We've
been, the Lord's been so gracious in letting us go through Genesis
all the way to where we are. We saw the Lord in the Old Testament,
didn't we? He revealed His faith to us in the Old Testament. Well, Then he says the words,
prove all things. Prove all things. Prove means
to examine to see whether it's genuine or not. You ask yourself
this question, does the Lord get all the glory for it? Does
the Lord get all the glory for it? I looked up something and
this might, it's silly, it might make you chuckle. Not my intention,
but I typed in, I typed in something and pulled it up on Google and
I ended up getting a man's name. I was looking up, I was looking
up glory of man, just different things, and I got this guy's
name that it literally says, he has this title, okay? Master,
Prophet, Doctor, Bishop, Reverend Clarence. That was the title
of the man. I thought, I don't think the
Lord gets all the glory in that title, do you? It's not, it was,
Paul says prove all things. Prove all, well, we can see clearly
sometimes that the Lord's not getting the glory in that, He's
talking about gospel preachers. He's saying, prove the gospel
preacher. Is the message clear? Is it all about Christ? Or is
he adding one thing to it or taking away one thing from it? Sometimes it's very clear. Whenever
you see the title of that man, you know he's all about self.
You know he's all about self-adoration, self-admiration. Our responsibility
is declare Christ alone. And the gospel proves itself,
doesn't it? Gospel proves itself. We hear
the gospel, we know that's the truth. God gets all the glory. That which does not give God
all the glory is not genuine. It's not a genuine gospel, and
Paul calls it evil here. Abstain from all appearance of
evil. That's what he's speaking of. Abstain from all appearance
of evil. Any false gospel, abstain from it. Now look in verse 23. And the very God of peace sanctify
you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body
be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Faithful is he that called you who also will do it. Now what
Paul is not saying, everything that we just have been going
through, everything that we've read, everything that we've heard
thus far, Paul is not saying if you do all of this, you will
obligate God to sanctify you. That is not what Paul's saying.
How are we going to preserve ourself? We can't. We can't preserve
ourself. As the elect of God, everything
must be understood and seen through the lens of the gospel, through
the lens of the eyes of faith. We must look through the eyes
of faith and see that everything God requires, he must provide.
Every good and perfect gift comes down from him, not us. It doesn't come from us. So what
is Paul saying? He's saying everything Everything
is his doing, not ours. You can go back at this point
and you could start over again from what we just said by saying,
because the Lord's preserved you blameless. Rejoice evermore
because of this. See, the Lord's the first cause
of all things. It's not what we have done. It's
what he does. God is the keeper of his people.
Rejoice evermore because of that. God is the one who preserves
his people, and everything gives thanks because of that. The Lord
Jesus Christ is the one who presented his people blameless to his Father. Rejoice evermore. Hold fast to
that good hope. Look to Christ, not self. I said
this Wednesday night, our greatest mistake that we could ever make
is looking or trying to find something in ourself that can
only be found in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Ephesians chapter four, verse
30 talks about It says, grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby
you are sealed unto the day of redemption. We're sealed by the
Holy Spirit of God. So what does he mean, grieve not? Don't look
inside of you to find something that only the Lord Jesus Christ
produced. Only the Lord Jesus Christ has.
Only the Lord Jesus Christ is. We can't look at ourself and
hope to find anything that only can be found in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Looking at I, Looking at I is
not of the Lord, it's not. When Paul said examine yourself,
see if you be of the faith, he's not saying see if you have the
fruit of the Spirit, he's saying is there anything in you, is
there anything in me whatsoever that I am looking to as evidence
or hope of my salvation? Examine yourself, are you looking
to Christ alone? Are you looking to Christ alone?
That's what Paul's saying. Aren't you glad he keeps his
own? in spite of us, despite of us. We can't restrain him,
we can't restrict him, we can't, that's the, that's rest, that's
rest for the believer. Our labors are all vanity, aren't
they? John 6, 27 said, labor not for the meat which perisheth,
but for the meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which
the Son of Man shall give unto you. For him hath God the Father
sealed. For him hath God the Father sealed. I'm still trying to speak on
being preserved blameless. God the Father is the one that
sealed his people. We have to have that manna from heaven because
of that, don't we? It's our life source. Our flesh
may say, like the Jews did, murmuring, we loathe this light bread, this
angel's food, we loathe this. light bread from heaven. The
Lord was giving them bread from heaven, and they were complaining
about it. We shake our head at that and think, man, that's how
arrogant and prideful. We're no different, are we? No,
we're no different. The Lord's given us all things
in Christ Jesus, and yet we murmur and complain. Lord, have mercy
on me, the sinner. Lord, I don't want to do that.
I don't want to complain. We have hope. We have hope because
he's faithful. He's faithful. We have the new
man, on the other hand. Our flesh may loathe this light
bread, but the new man says, give me Christ lest I die. Do
you know why? Because his people has been preserved blameless
by his blood. By his work, we have a sure foundation.
2 Timothy 2 tells us, nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth
sure. Having this seal, the Lord knoweth
them that are his. His people are sealed by him.
His people are preserved by Him. His people are kept by His power. He's the doer of it. We don't
add to or take away one thing from His work. Now He, which
established you, which establisheth us with you in Christ and hath
anointed us is God, who also sealed us and given us the earnest
of the Spirit in our heart. Whenever we were, you've probably
experienced this as well. When purchasing a home, they
ask for earnest money. And what that means is it's a guarantee
that you're serious about it. You're serious about it. Normally,
it's a pretty hefty payment, isn't it? It's a certain percentage
sometimes. It's pretty substantial. They're not going to take $1
as earnest money. The idea is you can't get the earnest money
refunded back once you are given. That way, if you back out of
the deal, they get to keep that money. I think we all understand,
but in case somebody didn't, I wanted to try to explain as
best I could. I wanna read that verse again with that in mind.
Now he which established, turn with me to 2 Corinthians 1, I'll
show you that. Hold your place here. Sometimes I get concerned about
turning to too many places and we end up turning to no places
and we should probably turn more often, so. 2 Corinthians 1. Look with me, 2 Corinthians 1
verse 21. Now he, let's read the verse
before, for all the promises of God in Christ are yea and
in him, amen, unto the glory of God. Now he, the Lord Jesus
Christ, which establishes us with you in Christ and hath anointed
us is God. who hath also sealed us and given
us the earnest of the spirit in our hearts. The earnest, remember
the earnest money given means that we're serious about buying
the house. The Lord Jesus Christ has given his spirit unto his
people as the earnest. Therefore, he's serious about
his redemptive work. He's not, it's a guarantee. It's
not that he tried to do anything. He has now given us A guarantee
that we are preserved blameless in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now
turn back with me to the text. 1 Thessalonians 5. Verse 23,
and the very God of peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your
whole spirit and the soul and body be preserved blameless. Preserved blameless. I wasn't
sure if I should start with this example or end with this example,
but we're going to end with this example. Me and my wife has taken
a liking to canning. We were raised up canning all
kinds of different vegetables with our family. We always would
shuck corn and string beans, and it was gruesome as children,
and now here we are adults doing it. That's something we couldn't
do in Florida. Couldn't grow anything in Florida. It's too hot. But
here we're able to grow things. The Lord's been merciful, so
we've been trying to can. And she is more experienced in
canning than I am. I'm not as versed as she is.
But, one thing about canning is, is if it's not sealed, it's
not preserved. That's true, isn't it? If it's
not sealed, it's not preserved. I saw that the tab on the top
was not pushed down while it was sealing, and I went to push
the tab down and did so, and she fussed at me. And I see some
of you where your eyeballs are raising, so you know that don't
do that. I didn't know that. She said, don't touch it. I said,
OK, I won't touch any more of them. Guess which can didn't
seal? The one I put my hand to. That's the only can that didn't
seal. Why? I touched it. I touched it. Without the seal,
the contents are no good. They go bad. It don't take much
time, does it? If the seal doesn't seal, it
doesn't last very long. But if the seal holds, contaminants
cannot get into the contents. If the glass holds up, the contents
remains unalterable by outside elements. It remains unalterable. The contents is not changed.
It's sealed. It's preserved. until you're ready, until you're
finally ready to consume the fruits of your labor, until you're
ready to open the can up, it's set on the shelf however long
it needed to, and then you can open it up at your own pleasure
according to the Lord's mercy and you can eat the contents
of that. What am I saying? When it comes
to salvation, don't touch it. Don't put your hand to it. The
only way that we're sealed under the day of redemption is by the
Lord's work. The only way that we're preserved blameless is
because we've been sealed by His finished work. The contents
can't be altered. It can't be messed up. It will
hold. The seal will hold. Don't touch
it. That's how you quench the spirit. It's laying your hand
to it. Don't touch it. Look to Christ. He's the one that did
the canning, isn't he? He's the one that preserved the
contents of it. He did it all. It was his work
alone. Rest. Rest. We're just sitting
on a shelf waiting for the glory of the Lord to be revealed in
us. Waiting to be glorified. We've already been glorified.
We're just waiting to find out or see that, aren't we? Look
to Christ alone, don't touch it, don't touch it. In closing,
I wanna look at Ephesians chapter one. The good news is, brethren, that
even if we try, we can't touch it. I can rest in that. Even if I try to touch it, I
can't mess it up. Isn't that good? I mean, we don't
want to. Sometimes we find ourself unintentionally
doing that. Paul said, that which I would
do, I do not. That which I would, that I'd. I find myself doing
the exact thing that I said I didn't want to do. I tried to touch
it. Well, guess what? You didn't
ruin it even if you did. Look to Christ. Rest in him.
It can't be touched. The seal can't be broken. Ephesians
1 verse 10, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times, he
might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which
are in heaven and which are on earth, even in him, in whom also
we have obtained. That's past tense, isn't it?
Obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the
purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his
own will, that we should be to the praise of his glory. who
first trusted Christ, in whom you also trusted after that you
heard the word of the truth. Have you heard the word of the
truth, the gospel of your salvation? Lord, if I haven't, make this
the day. In whom also after that you believe. You were sealed
with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance
until the redemption of the purchased possession unto the praise of
His glory. What am I saying? What's Paul
saying? We're just sitting on a shelf
waiting for the Lord to call us. It's done. We're sealed.
We're sealed. We have the Spirit as our earnest.
We have the Lord Jesus Christ has given us His Spirit that
causes us by faith to look to Christ. We are preserved blameless
before Him. You know what that word blameless
means? Blameless, it means there is nothing to blame you about. There is no blame that can be
given. Every time our adversary says, have you seen Caleb down
there sinning? The Lord says, no. No, he's blameless. Why? Because of what Christ did
on the cross of Calvary. The sin is gone. The sin is gone. We've obtained an inheritance
already predestinated by his will. 1 Peter 1 says this, Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according
to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again into a lively hope by
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance
incorruptible and undefiled, which fadeth not away. It doesn't
have an expiration date. It doesn't have an expiration
date. Incorruptible, undefiled, which fadeth not away, reserved
in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith,
unto salvation, ready to be revealed the last time. The Lord has done
it all. The Lord's done it all for his
people. He saved us. He called us. He
keeps us. He's preserved us. He's preserved
us by his power. According to his will, he's preserved
his people blameless, blameless for all time and for eternity. Let's pray.