Therefore

I am truly left wondering, how many of you, aside from singing here, is that a fairly familiar hymn to you?

Those of you who, like me, had a pretty much fundamentalist upbringing, you would know that, but that also would mean that you probably had never, ever heard of the fourth hymn, the fourth stanza of the hymn, because the loneliest thing in the world is to be the third or fourth stanza of a hymn in a

Baptist church. You'll never, ever be known, but I know that when

I memorized 2 Timothy 1 .12, it was really, really easy, as long as I did it in the

King James Version. It almost made it impossible to memorize in any other translation, because I had that hymn in my head.

Music is an amazing thing, especially if you do struggle with scripture memorization.

There are a lot of songs out there where scripture has been placed to music, and it is amazing.

I've seen some people couldn't memorize a verse if their life depended on it, but they found that music, and they can now memorize all sorts of scriptures.

Just one other thing to keep in mind, one other way that you might be able to memorize and study

God's Word. Speaking of which, turn with me please to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10, we press through in our studies of this tremendous book.

Chapter 10 is a fairly long chapter, a lot of material in it, and we know chapter 11 pretty well, and then chapter 12 and 13, the very practical exhortations to Christian living that we find there.

But we press on Hebrews chapter 10 before we look to God's Word. Let's once again ask

Him to bless this time. Indeed, our Heavenly Father, we pray that by Your Spirit You would be with us now.

You would help us to lay aside those things that might be distracting to us, that we might hear

Your Word, that we might understand, that we might be made better servants of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

It is in His name that we pray. Amen. Indeed, as we have been working through the book of Hebrews, we in essence have reached the pinnacle.

That does not mean that it's all downhill from there in the sense that, well, we'll just have to sort of finish the book off and it's not really going to matter that much.

But clearly there has been a crescendo of argumentation that has taken place that finally was concluded in the words of verse 18 of chapter 10.

Now where there is forgiveness of these things, there is no longer any offering for sin.

And so the fundamental argumentation of the entire book has now been presented in the sense that from the beginning the author has been saying there is nothing to go back to.

Those Jewish Christians who are under pressure to go back to the old ways, there is nothing to go back to.

There is no longer any offering for sin. If they give in to the great pressure and the great pressure is being placed upon them, was to offer sacrifice.

For by offering that sacrifice, they were in essence saying Jesus Christ is not who

He claimed to be. The sacrifice of Christ was not something that God ordained.

And as we will see, that will be described for us in just a few verses when we talk about those who go on sinning willfully, having received the knowledge of the truth, how they trample underfoot the blood of the

Son of God. There was no possibility of some type of pluralism in the thinking of the writer to the

Hebrews. That is, there is no possibility that you could go to a

Jewish gathering, that you could participate in Jewish worship, that you could in fact offer the sacrifices.

There is no ability to syncretize these things, no syncretism, putting together various forms of worship.

No, he saw that to confess Jesus Christ and to confess really what the

Jewish scriptures themselves had foreseen and prophesied meant that you had to remain faithful to the confession of Jesus Christ and that to go back to Judaism or to try to find a way of fitting some form of Jewish worship that included the sacrifices in would be a fundamental denial of who

Jesus Christ truly is. And so having now established that from many different lines, and hopefully you remember what those lines were, the

Melchizedek priesthood and the very deity of Christ and the work of the intercessor and the high priest and the sacrifices and all these different ways.

Now we have that argument set forth and then you have the therefore.

The therefore. I've heard entire sermons. I don't think I've ever heard one here, but many, many moons ago

I remember someone giving an entire sermon based on the word therefore.

And you know what? You could do it real well. There's so many of them to be found in the

New Testament, especially in Paul. But there is in verse 19 that therefore.

And so having built up this edifice, having put to, well let's admit, sometimes some of these sermons were a little tough.

We had to deal with Old Testament passages and we had to struggle with things that had happened a long, long ago and we had to put all of this together and sometimes it was difficult.

But we've finally gotten to the point where the writer can say, therefore, since we have completed this task, therefore brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he inaugurated for us through the veil that is his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

And so you see a clear transition taking place here. You've had the theological argument, the quotation of the

Old Testament. You've had the argumentation about the sacrifice of Christ and the fact that it's a one -time thing versus the repetitive sacrifices of the

Old Covenant. And now you have the transition, here's the foundation, therefore press on.

Now we are going to have another transition in chapter 12 where in light of all of this, the doctrinal foundation that has been laid, the encouragement to press on, to not to go back, to not to give in to the pressure that's placed upon you, then chapter 11, the faith chapter, all the exhortations concerning faith, then you have the transition into, now in light of all that, here are the practical implications in everyday life of what this should mean and how we should treat one another, how we should really interact with the world, the practical applications.

Very clear parallels to what we have in the book of Romans. When you think about Romans, chapter 8, that big, huge cathedral of Christian truth and then chapters 9, 10, 11, the application there, and then chapter 12, present your body's living sacrifice in the next couple of chapters, the practical outworking of these things.

Now why should we take note of the therefore? Well, that therefore is probably why you are here for.

What I mean by that is, look, there are a lot of places you could have gone this morning where the temple would have been pastor and the music, and there would have been some, maybe an orchestra, a nice choir, and by the way,

I love orchestras and choirs. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I'm not sure where we'd put them, honestly, but we'd have to take out the first three rows and where would

Rick sit? If we took out the first three rows, I mean, come on, he'd be completely lost. So, you could have gone places where, trust me, the guy preaching was not wearing a bowtie and had hair and looked a lot better than me and there would have been all sorts of programs and, you know, it seems that there's places you could have gone where they just outdo each other to figure out what to call the latte bar in the back of the church.

I think Hebrews is probably one of the best ones I've seen. That sort of fits in real well with where we are right now, but they even had one of those at the

Mennonite church I was at back in Ohio recently. Can you imagine a mega Mennonite church with a latte bar?

I mean, I felt like I was in another universe at that point. That was really weird. But, anyway, you could have gone to a lot of places today where, you know, you could have just sort of disappeared in the crowd.

Nobody would have known whether you were there or not because the crowd was so big anyway. And seeing, you know, they would have screens and you would have seen the pastor's big face on the screens, which is one reason we could never do that.

You could have done a lot of things, but you're here instead. Why? I think because of the very observation that we need to make right here at the beginning.

And that is, before the author can get into giving practical, everyday advice for living, before the author can talk about how we should interact with one another, and all the godly, practical implications that come in the

Christian faith, and those things are all wonderful to discuss, and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. We're going to be doing that in the next few chapters.

But, you see, before the author got there, he laid a foundation for that kind of discussion.

And, unfortunately, I think a lot of churches today just, they just don't think that you're committed enough, or maybe they just don't trust the

Holy Spirit to make you committed enough, to work through all that stuff, and to get the foundation, and there's one inevitable result for that.

If you don't lay the foundation in the doctrine, the teaching, first, then when you get to all the practical suggestions and applications, that's all it is, is suggestion.

It's opinion. It's, well, I think you'd be better off doing this, or I think you'd be better off doing that.

If you don't have a foundation upon which to stand, what's the difference between standing up here and talking about interpersonal relationships, and going and listening to some secular psychologist doing the same thing?

There has to be a foundation, and what has happened in so many evangelical churches today is, well, that foundation and doctrine, that turns people off.

I mean, how many Sunday mornings and Sunday evenings have we been working through the book of Hebrews to get to this point?

You can't expect people to be attending that regularly. I mean, they've got football games to go to, and vacations to take, and boats to take out to the lake, and you just can't expect people to do that.

So, we shouldn't really bother. What we need to do is we need to take that practical stuff, let's not worry about that doctrinal stuff which divides and makes people bitter, ugly

Calvinists, and things like that, and just leave that off to the side, and what we need to do is we need to package the positive stuff with some upbeat music, and need to make sure the pastor is dressed the way he needs to be dressed, and all the rest of that stuff, and that way we'll help people more.

And the inevitable result is that you have maybe very true concepts that are being reduced down to the mere opinions, inclinations, and feelings of men.

It's no longer, do this because of what God has done for you. Because you have a perfect high priest who is the

God -man, who has entered into the heavenly place, and he appears in your stead, because you have been united with him, because you have that assurance, because you have the perfection of forgiveness in him, therefore do these things, becomes, well, let's not worry about all that, you'll just be happier if you follow my suggestions.

There's a huge difference between those two things. The motivation becomes focused upon me, and my betterments, and my happiness, rather than wow,

I am the servant of Christ, I could not have saved myself. I have been purchased with a price, therefore when

God says this is how I would have you to live, these are the principles that you are to apply in your life,

I can't stand back and go, well, I don't know, maybe, you know, the guy down the road says something different, and the guy over at that place where they've got an even better latte bar says this, and I just sort of get to take a little bit from this guy, a little bit from that guy, and I'll just cobble it together, and this will be my

American religion. We might do that with clothing, and housing, and sports, and things like that, but it doesn't work with God's truth.

And so, we need to look at the therefores, and recognize there is a relationship between the revelation of what

God has done in history, the revelation of what God has done specifically in the person of Jesus Christ, though clearly, the book of Hebrews has told us,

Jesus didn't just pop in out of no place. There had been preparation, there had been the preparation of God's people, there had been the giving of His word, there had been those prophetic utterances that point us toward this great fulfillment, and yet, this took place in history,

God did these things, we need to understand why God did these things, we need to hear how the apostles explained these things, so that when we get to verse 19, we read, therefore brethren, we have a foundation.

And those words don't change meaning with every passing generation.

That's the other thing that we lose here. If we don't see the necessity and importance of doctrine, and the revelation of the gospel itself, then we get to reinvent it, every generation.

And the next generation coming up, they're going to come up with something new. Everything's back on the table with each generation, and don't get me wrong,

I am not saying that the young people who are raised in the church, there does not come a time when they have to own, they have to enter into, there's that time when you realize, you know what,

I can't just believe this because mom and dad told me to, I need to believe this because I actually believe that it's true.

I can't rely upon my parents' faith, and we call the young people to that kind of faith all the time.

We call you to be serious about these things, and while we hope you have heard a clear explanation of what the gospel is, and how it's important for you to follow in obedience,

I remember very clearly the time in my life when

I realized, you know, I've been taught all of these things, but do

I believe it because I want to please my parents? Or do

I believe it because it's real? And I believe it, and I'm going to build my life upon it.

I'm not saying that that doesn't happen. It happened for me. I think all of us know a time in our lives when

God dealt with us in that way. But what I am saying is that this movement we have in evangelicalism today that basically says, you know, we don't have to worry about the people who've come before.

We don't have to think about that. We just get to, you know, sort of designer religion ourselves.

We get to pick this and pick that and pick those things and put it all together and make something that's comfy for me.

That's not Christianity. And Christianity doesn't function in that way because what happened in the past is what happened in the past.

It had a specific meaning. And we are really cheating people in a major way when we give to them fluffy designer

Christianity. And I think they know it. I think they recognize it.

Because there is something that is very valuable and precious in an unchanging message that recognizes that God has done something.

He's continuing to do something. And I'm called to be a part of that. I get to stand with the saints.

We're going to read in just a few chapters. Being surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses.

I get to be a part of that. And there's something extremely valuable, there's something precious there that we should never, ever put aside.

That we should never, ever pawn off for the current fad that people are using to, in essence, fill buildings with religious hypocrites rather than disciples of Jesus Christ.

That's not what we want. And that's not Christianity. So I think it's important to think about the therefores.

And this is a good place to do so when we are at a transition point. We've just had the conclusion of a doctrinal, very deep doctrinal argument.

It extended for chapters. And what does the writer do as soon as he's said that?

Well, first, he recognizes the need to make application to his audience where they were.

Now, there are very few of us in this room who have Jewish relatives who are pushing us to go make sacrifice out in the desert someplace so as to deny

Jesus Christ. And it might be very easy for us to, as a result, sort of step back and say, well, you know, it's interesting.

I can certainly understand how they would have been under a lot of pressure back then. And, you know, that's the kind of pressure

I'm facing. And sort of separate ourselves and not really enter into this next portion of exhortation.

But I hope we have come to realize that the reason that the Word of God, one of the reasons the

Word of God has been preserved for us is that incredible miracle that takes place, well, every time we get together here.

Now, you may be going, uh -oh, Pastor Fry is not here and White's talking about miracles. What's going on?

It is simply a miracle that we can gather and think of all the different backgrounds that we represent, the different jobs that we have been pursuing this week, the pressures that have been ours, physical abilities, mental abilities, educational levels.

We're all pretty much in the same realm when it comes to the financial part. I haven't seen anybody pulling up with, you know, they have a new

Lexus each week. But not too many folks like that. But we're all pretty much in the same realm there.

But we all have different financial pressures upon us, medical issues. We come from different places.

We're different people. And yet we gather in this room and we open up a 2 ,000 -year -old book in its newest sections, much older than that in its oldest sections.

And for a rather short period of time, really, it may seem longer to you, but a rather short period of time, we talk.

Well, actually, one guy talks. And as a result, people walk out.

And sometimes if we come in unprepared and we let our minds wander, we don't experience really much of anything.

Let's admit it. It happens. But if we've prepared ourselves, it's amazing.

The wide range of needs and desires, sometimes that we don't even know about when we come in, that are met by the same

Word. And of course, we believe being ministered to each one of us by the

Spirit of God, who searches all things, knows our hearts better than we know our hearts, and knows what we actually need.

The same message, and this isn't some post -modern, you know, put our hands up and go, ooh, type, type thing, where you just, you know, someone stands up and goes, ah, the smell of purple.

And everybody goes, ah, you know, and pays them thousands of dollars for these great insights.

No, that's not what we're talking about. It's one message. It's one gospel. When Pastor Fry and I stand here, we are trying to communicate one thing.

We're not trying to give you, you know, some kind of woo -woo speech that then you're supposed to contemplate on and get woo -woo feelings from the woo -woo speech.

That's not what we're doing. And yet, even though we're saying this text has a meaning, it's understandable, we give you background, sometimes

I throw some Greek and Hebrew at you just for the fun of it, and yet, all these different needs, different people being built up in Christ in different ways, it's an amazing thing when you think about it.

In fact, it's downright miraculous. And so when we think about this, when we think about this text and the exhortation and the fact that God in this text is still speaking to us today.

Well, how can that be if we're not, like I said, there isn't anybody here, at least I know of, that's got

Jewish relatives that are trying to cause you to abandon the faith. But obviously, obviously, we all recognize there are all sorts of pressures against every single one in here to abandon the exclusivity of the sacrificial work of Jesus Christ.

There are so many subtle ways in which, in essence, you'll be invited to just offer the sacrifice.

Maybe not in the bold way of bringing an animal and its throat is slit and its blood gushes out upon the ground.

Now, remember in the early church, in those first couple of hundred years, one of the ways that pressure was put upon Christians was what's called

Caesaropapism, or the worship of the Caesars. And what you would have to do to get this certificate called a libelus was you had to offer just a pinch of incense upon an altar.

Now, some of you younger folks may not know what incense is. Some of us back from the 60s might wish we didn't know what incense was.

But, see, all the old people are going, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, the little sticks you can put out and the little cone things.

Oh, hey, bro, yeah, all right. And you just take just a little pinch of this incense, which, when burned, makes wonderful smells that stick in your clothes and things like that.

And all you have to do is offer it on an altar. You know, the altar, the fire, and it would just flame up.

And that's all you had to do. Now, of course, you also had to say, Kaiser kurios. Caesar is

Lord. But you didn't have to cut anybody's throats, and you didn't have to kill an animal.

And, you know, it's just you and the government representative. Those government representatives have been around for a long time, haven't they?

It's just the two of you. And it wouldn't take much. And your life would be so much easier.

You could buy and sell and trade, because now you had the libelous, which sounds vaguely like a mark in the book of Revelation somewhere.

But you just offer that little bit of pinch of incense. And you know what?

We live in a day where there are so many ways to offer incense on the altar of the world.

So many. And you and I face them every single day. Every day, pressures are placed upon us to conform ourselves to the image of the world, rather than seeking to be conformed to the image of Christ in all of our lives.

And I'm not talking about, quote -unquote, legalism here. I'm not talking about trying to make yourself just look different for the world for the sake of looking different.

We know the difference, hopefully, between a legalistic fundamentalism that makes your actions of being different something you can boast in before God.

And we all, hopefully, know how that has worked. We know the difference between that and what we experience every day where these pressures come upon us and we have to make choices between whether we are going to respond as a

Christian under the Lordship of Christ, or we're just going to move along with the world.

We're going to speak like the world. We're going to think like the world. We're going to look like the world.

We're not going to challenge. We're just going to blend in. That's what offering the incense was.

And see, there were so many people that would bring animals to the altar in Jerusalem.

You could probably just sort of blend in. They didn't have to blow a trumpet and say,

Look! Apostate Christian comes back to Judaism. You could just blend in.

How often have we given in to that temptation? How often?

And every time we do, we have to recognize that the book of Hebrews is speaking to us.

It's speaking to us. Yes, there is a sin. And I think very clearly, I will argue when we get to it again,

I've argued it before, that what John talks about in 1 John 5 when he says there is a sin, we talked about this on a

Wednesday night recently, there is a sin leading to death. And I do not say you should pray for someone who commits it.

I think it's the same sin we're going to be looking at beginning with verse 26. Trampling underfoot the blood of the

Son of God, going back, offering the sacrifice, making that final statement,

Jesus is not who he said he was. That act is what is being referred to in Hebrews, 1

John. It's the sin unto death. But how many times do we flirt with it?

How many times do we, not realizing what

Christ has done for us. Oh, we may know the... It's one thing to know the doctrine. It's something completely different to live in light of it.

Christians have always thought about what Christ did for us.

And we normally focus upon those clear public things in his crucifixion.

It's in Latin, so we Baptists probably figure that's a terrible thing if it's in Latin. There's nothing wrong with Latin, but I understand why we...

But we've heard the Via Dolorosa. The way of sorrows.

The path that Jesus trod carrying the cross. And yes, it's completely possible to go overboard and create idolatry about these things, but we think of his perfect obedience to the

Father even to the point where our Creator is willing to be treated the way that he was.

He never cut corners. There was never a day when he got up and said, you know, today

I'm just not going to love the Father perfectly. For if he had, we would have no redemption. It never happened.

And yet, the pressures that were upon him, he was truly a man. He put himself in the situation of being dependent upon the

Spirit of God. It's so easy for us to dismiss Christ's testimony and his example for us, because he's

God. Yes, he was. But there is something about that incarnation where he voluntarily makes himself of no reputation.

He becomes dependent upon the very Spirit of God. Just like we are. And so he was under tremendous pressure.

And in fact, I dare say, none of us have ever faced the pressures that our

Savior did. And yet, he was found to be without sin.

And what was his motivation in that? Ever thought about that? What was Christ's motivation in that?

Oh, well, it's the Father and the Son. I mean, perfect relationship. How could it be anything other?

But there was still a motivation. He was the God -man. You want to see what loving

God really means? Look at how Jesus obeyed the Father. There's the picture of loving

God. And as hard as it is, because I remember the first time

I heard this, and I was like, oh, man, that's uncomfortable. But it's a true statement.

Every time we sin, we prove that we love ourselves more than we love our

Savior. Every time we sin, we prove that we love ourselves more than we love our

Savior. Why? Well, we're not doing what he said to walk in his commandments, but I've often thought of it this way.

Why should I wish to increase the load, the bearing of sin that was his?

Why would I want to add to what my Savior suffered on my behalf? Just simply to satisfy my lusts, my desires, my ego, whatever kind of sin it is you might think of.

Yes, he bore it. But should it not be just a given that I as a

Christian would not want to add to what he bore on my behalf?

If I love, should that not be my motivation? You see, we can talk seriously about sin.

There are some people who say, if you believe in salvation by grace, you can't talk seriously about sin.

You can't warn people seriously against sin. That's just not true. I can recognize there's nothing

I can do. And I can recognize that my salvation is not based upon my keeping my nose clean.

Because I can't do that either. I'm not adding anything to the work of Christ. But when you recognize that a heart that's been changed by grace is a heart that is going to love

God, and that the motivations of the Christian life are motivations of love, now you start realizing where the balance in Scripture really is.

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Oh, people read that and they go, oh,

I haven't been doing well and I need to do some more.

I need to get sort of religious today. You ever notice the days you try to get religious are sometimes the days that end up being the worst?

I need to get religious today. I need to work out my salvation with fear and trembling because I'm trembling.

I'm fearful. That's not what the whole text says. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling for it is

God who is at work within you both to will and to do according to His good pleasure. The fear and the trembling is the recognition of who's at work within me.

My motivation for what I do as a Christian is love for the

God who has done what? And this brings us full circle back to the therefore.

When we really enter into an understanding of what God has done.

Creation. Providence. The Incarnation. The ministry of Christ.

Then all that Hebrews has laid out for us. Who was this one in chapter 1? This is

Yahweh entering into His own creation. He's the Creator of all things. All things hold together.

This is the One who has come. And yet He's the fulfillment. He's the

High Priest and the Melchizedek Priest. You see all this argumentation. Then you go into the atonement and the intercession of Christ and the one time and our union with Him.

All of that which God has done which I could not do for myself. All of that He's done for me.

And then He raises me up to spiritual life. And He draws me unto Christ and then all

He says is not earn the rest of your way. He does not say to me, that's all

I'm going to do for you. You do the rest yourself. None of that. He unites me with His Son and then

He says to me, follow Me. Follow Me.

Your following Me isn't going to add anything to what Christ has done. Follow Me. My loving kindness is yours.

My everyday presence is yours. Follow Me. But why would we do that?

Out of a motivation of love. A motivation of love. And that's why the author can say, therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus.

All that comes from the preceding argument. Since God has revealed His truth, now we live this way.

When we're convinced of the truthfulness of the Gospel, when we're convinced of the truthfulness of what

God has revealed, it must impact how we live.

Anyone who can truly enter in and understand to what

God has done in Christ and then just sit back and go, well, sounds like a nice story.

You haven't entered in. You haven't seen yourself. But a person who has, a person who recognizes their own sin, a person who recognizes their own need, and then sees the perfect provision provided for that, that's the work of the

Spirit of God in the heart. That's the kind of faith that will persevere.

That kind of person is open to the Word of God, desirous to learn more about the Word of God, desirous to grow in the grace and knowledge of the

Lord Jesus Christ. And that's the person who's filled with thanksgiving, filled with contentment.

That's the mature Christian. And that's obviously what we want for everyone.

Every once in a while, Pastor Fry and I will have a conversation and we'll talk about, is there growth in godliness?

Do we see evidence of Christian maturity amongst the saints?

And that's what should be the result of regular exposure to God's truth joined with the work of the

Spirit of God in your heart. Now, you can sit there forever and you can have the greatest head knowledge in the world of what this says.

And then walk out of here and live like the devil. All that does is really give you a tremendous amount of condemnation on the day of judgment.

Talk about having light. But when there's been a change inwardly, then we're not blown about by every wind of doctrine.

We're not constantly wringing our hands and wondering. There is a confidence that does not come from anything within ourselves.

It comes from recognition of what God has done. And so it was not my intention, actually, to stop at therefore.

I don't believe that I have ever failed to get through just one verse at any point in time in the past.

I did at least read the rest of the verse. You will all testify to that, I hope. But I feel it is important.

We have worked... I have certainly worked hard in this study.

It takes a lot of work. I hope you realize. I hope you realize when Pastor Fry, he is so focused upon being prepared on Sunday morning and Sunday night, that when almost anything comes up during the week that would interrupt his preparation time, he will see if I can take his place.

That's how focused he is. And we have done a lot of work.

And I realize, trust me, I realize it is work for you to sit there and listen to me, especially in the book of Hebrews.

But we have done all this work. We have laid this foundation. Hopefully you have a better understanding now than you have ever had before of what atonement means.

And all the intercession and the high priest and the beauty of what God has done.

But that avails you nothing if you don't therefore have confidence, if you don't therefore persevere, if you don't therefore draw near to God, if you don't therefore have your hearts sprinkled and cleansed.

There needs to be a result of all of these things. And thankfully, thankfully, as I stand up here,

I can proclaim these things to you, but I'm not the one that's accountable for making that happen in your life.

Thankfully, it's the Spirit of God who takes His truth and makes application in your life.

But we need to be desirous of that happening. So why are you here for?

Hopefully because of that therefore. The therefore of what

God has done in Christ and as a result, we must live in light of it. That's where we find joy.

That's where we find happiness and fulfillment. When we see God's truth and how it applies to our lives.

Let's close in a word of prayer. Indeed, our

Heavenly Father, as we have considered this day Your truth in a very broad fashion, we would pray that we would not be amongst those who are so often exposed to light that we become blind to it.

So often exposed to Your truth that we take it for granted. Lord, we know so much and we desire to know more.

We desire to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But Lord, help us to be good stewards of what we already know.

May we make application. May we do so from the proper motivations, the motivation of love.

Love born from a heart that realizes its own sin, its own depravity, and yet the perfect provision has been made through our

Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. May we indeed, even in this day, examine our hearts and may we respond to You in love for what