December 5, 2021 - Sunday Service Live Stream (Part 2)

Ascension Presbyterian Church Longwood

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His disciples came to him, then he opened his mouth and taught them, saying,

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Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

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For we are poor indeed. And help us to become more Christlike, that we will be holy, and help us to see sin for what it is, a vile and wretched thing.

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Help us to pursue what is right, in Jesus' name. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

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Lord, lead us in the life of repentance. Our gracious God and Father, we ask that you would grant us the grace to see our sins as you see them, that we would be able to see the sinfulness of sin, and how great our sin is, and rebellion against you, that it would cause us to mourn, but not without hope.

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For we know, dear Lord, that you have reconciled us to the blood of your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, and we celebrate that, again, as our brother has prayed this

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Advent season. We pray, dear Lord, that we would remember that this joy goes forth as far as the curse is found.

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We ask this in Christ's name. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

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Lord, help us to find our strength in you. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.

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Lord, may we always seek first your kingdom. Father, make us just desirous and just starving for your word,

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Lord. Just humble us before your cross and remind us daily of the walk that we are to have in our lives,

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God, and just set our sights upon you, and just dwell by us day by day, and make us just righteous in your name.

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Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Lord, keep us mindful of what forgiveness means.

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Forgive one another. Help us to speak what's necessary for edification only, dear

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Lord, and help us to remember that the reason why we can forgive is because we first have been forgiven by you.

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And so help us to go out and be a forgiving people. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see

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God. Lord, create in us clean hearts. Dear Heavenly Father, we live in a world riddled with guilt or tainted.

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Lord, your word serves to set our minds, to set our heart.

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Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. Lord, help us to pursue peace.

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Those around us without regard to just any consequences or what they have done to others.

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70 times 7, and clearly this is just an exaggeration,

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God, for you have forgiven all of our sins, which have just set us forth to this world on fire for you.

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Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

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Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake.

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Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven.

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For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. Please stand.

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We'll take up our Psalm of the Month. It is Psalm 29b.

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We've had one practice session on last Sunday before lunch, and we had one, those who were at the prayer meeting, on Thursday evening.

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You'll catch on very easily if you're not here, and Alyssa is going to help us by playing through it one time.

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Just remain standing and turn in your

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Bibles to Isaiah. Isaiah, this is

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God's holy and infallible word. I'm only going to be reading verses 6 and 7 today.

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Isaiah 9, beginning at verse 6.

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For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given.

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And the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

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Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end.

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Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and establish it with judgment and justice.

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From that time forward, even forever, the zeal of the

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Lord of hosts will perform this. Please pray with me.

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Lord, we come to you today in need of this glorious reminder that you are the

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Prince of Peace. You have reconciled us to God, to yourself.

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You have made out of a diverse people of Gentile and Jew one body, a dwelling place for you in the

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Spirit. Lord, today I pray that your people will experience and enjoy and apprehend the depths of your peace and your love for them.

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O Christ, be exalted and glorified today in our midst, we pray, through the powerful operation of your

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Spirit. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Please be seated.

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The message today is a little bit more topical than expositional.

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I'm going to use Isaiah 9 to make the case for Jesus as the

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Prince of Peace. It's important to remember that Isaiah prophesied to people living during three eras prior to the

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Babylonian exile, during the exile, and after the exile.

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Isaiah spoke into a dire situation. Judah's enemies grew stronger and stronger, and they were feeling as though God had abandoned them.

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And Isaiah doesn't have all good news. Isaiah prophesied about their future defeat, exile, and return.

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But in so doing, he gave us two prophetic visions of a child.

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A child, who we would learn later in its fullness, would be God himself clothed in the flesh of humanity, the incarnation of the second person of the

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Trinity, the Lord Jesus Christ. And this one, promised in Isaiah 700 plus years before his birth, would carry the weighty responsibility of governance not only of his people, but of the world and the universe.

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Turn back to Isaiah 7, just a couple of pages with me. Isaiah 7.

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We'll begin reading in verse 3. The Lord said to Isaiah, go out now to meet

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Ahaz, you and Shir Jashub, your son, at the end of the aqueduct from the upper pool on the highway to the fuller's field, and say to him, take heed and be quiet.

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Do not fear or be fainthearted for those two stubs of smoking firebrands for the fierce anger of Razin and Syria and the son of Ramalia.

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Because Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Ramalia have plotted evil against you, saying, let us go up against Judah and trouble it.

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Let us make a gap in its wall for ourselves and set a king over them, the son of Tebel.

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Thus says the Lord God, it shall not stand, nor shall it come to pass. For the head of Syria is

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Damascus and the head of Damascus is Razin. Within 65 years, Ephraim will be broken so that it will not be a people.

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The head of Ephraim is Samaria and the head of Samaria is Ramalia's son. If you will not believe, surely you shall not be established.

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Moreover, the Lord spoke again to Ahaz, saying, ask for a sign for yourself from the Lord your

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God. Ask it either in the depth or in the height above. But Ahaz said, I will not ask, nor will

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I test the Lord. Then he said, Here now,

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O house of David, is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will you weary my

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God also? Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.

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Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and you shall call his name

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Emmanuel. Curds and honey he shall eat, and he may know that he may know to refuse the evil and choose the good.

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Before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that you dread will be forsaken by both her kings.

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The Lord will bring the king of Assyria upon you and your people and your father's house days that have not come since the day that Ephraim departed from Judah.

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Now, this contains the first of those two incredible prophecies about Christ.

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Chapter 7 here in our text and Isaiah chapter 9.

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But it's a troubled time in Judah. The enemies have gathered around.

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And in fact, at the arrival of our Lord Jesus Christ in Bethlehem that we sang of in two different occasions this morning,

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Rome fully controlled the region that God had promised to Abraham. It was a dark time.

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There's no doubt that maybe Ahaz thinks that maybe my son

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Hezekiah, maybe he's going to be the one who's going to restore the kingdom. If you go on to Isaiah, later chapters 37, 38, 39, you realize

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Hezekiah will not be the one who will save Israel or Judah. So the promise is given in the midst of turmoil, but the deliverance is not immediate.

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There is hope for the future, but there's prophecy essentially saying that you're going to be put into exile.

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You're going to be suffering. You're going to have a really rough time. But in the end, my long -suffering patience for you,

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I will deliver you. Isaiah says in our text, for unto us a child is born.

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In chapter 7, we just read the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and you shall call his name

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Emmanuel, which means God with us. These people are under the heavy weight of God's judgment, and there's a promise that God would be with them.

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And this is if you know anything about the Old Testament sacrificial system. If you know anything about this,

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God at times must have seemed very distant from the sinful people. He's always willing to save.

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He's always willing to deliver them. But they must have felt He was far from them.

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The consequences of their sin are being reaped on their own heads. And here in these two sections, these two chapters, we have a prophecy about a child who will come and save them.

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It says later in our text that the government will be on his shoulders.

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You and I have seen how leaders have risen up and fallen. I think

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I've been alive for nine presidents. And when they come into power, oh, they're so powerful and strong.

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And they last for four years or eight years or they die or whatever. And they're just gone.

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Their power is fleeting. It's temporal. But the promise of Second Samuel and the promise of Isaiah is a perpetual kingdom, which we know is occupied.

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The throne is by our Lord Jesus Christ. A never ending reign, a never ending kingdom, which you and I are blessed to be a part of.

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Judah needed a ruler and a deliverer for their present circumstances.

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But Isaiah speaks of greater things. The throne of David will be established forever.

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How did they hear the prophecy? Could they have envisioned the incarnation of God himself?

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It seems almost impossible that they fully could have grasped it. How could

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God, so other and so transcendent, so different, how could he become man?

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But this is what Isaiah says with us.

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A God whose glory cannot be approached. A God who's a consuming fire.

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How can this one come and be with us? How can we stand in his presence?

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No doubt we know that the Jews of Jesus day long to expel the

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Romans. And less than 40 years after the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, Israel, as we know it, would be destroyed.

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Jerusalem would be sacked, the sacrificial system eradicated. So dark days have hope, but there may be even darker days before these hopeful things are realized.

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Well, there are four things I want you to consider today. I'm not going to go through them systematically, but this may be helpful for you to organize your own thoughts.

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First, I want us to think about peace with God. Peace with God.

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Second, I would like us to think about peace with man. Peace with man.

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Third, I'd like us to think about peace within. And fourth, the ministry of peacemaking, which is reconciliation.

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We're focusing on this title, the Prince of Peace. It's interesting. If you look back at verse six of chapter nine, wonderful and counselor.

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Maybe we could ascribe those to just a human king. Maybe. Prince of Peace.

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Maybe we could ascribe that to a person. This is the guy who's brought in the peace.

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We cannot, however, ascribe mighty God and everlasting father to just a mere man.

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Those designations are reserved for God alone. How can we speak of a government and a peace in which there will be no end?

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David, the great man we spoke of in Sunday school this morning. He lived his years and was gathered to his people.

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Moses, he's a great man. He lives to be 120 years old, but he dies. Noah lives to be however old, 900 years old, but he dies.

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But this one, his reign, his rule, not fleeting like all the transient rulers of our age and of history.

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His government, his peace, the expansion, the increase of it.

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There will be no end. Well, what is this peace?

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Shalom is one of the key words, the scripture.

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And this Hebrew word most often refers to a person being whole and sound and uninjured and safe.

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It's not merely the absence of conflict. There's a positive element to it.

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There's more to it than that. Jesus doesn't just deliver us from hell.

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He makes us righteous. He doesn't just spare us from judgment.

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He crowns us with glory. Shalom, a very important concept in scripture.

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In the Old Testament, it had very much that wholeness, that soundness flavor.

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But in the New Testament, we learn that this idea of peace is revealed as the reconciliation of all things to God through the work of Christ.

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The scripture says God was pleased through Christ to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or whether things in heaven, by making peace through Christ's blood, which was shed on the cross.

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And that's from Colossians chapter 1. There's something else that's important to think about God in relation to this peace.

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He is the God of peace, but we are rebellious. We have waged a war against God in our sin and our unbelief.

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We have rebelled against him. So one topic of scripture that's very important is peace with God.

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And it means to be reconciled with God. And God himself is the agent of this peace.

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Either he grants it or he removes it. Psalm 85,

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Jeremiah 6. And then he and his family were given a covenant of peace.

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What an incredible thing. A gift that was given to Phinehas, thrusting a javelin through a wicked woman and a wicked

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Jewish man, sparing the people. Amazing. You may remember that there is an offering under the

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Mosaic economy, which is known as the Shilamim offering or the peace offering.

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It's one of the only Levitical sacrifices in which the offerer receives back some of the meal to eat.

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Does that sound familiar at all to you? We celebrate it every week in the

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Lord's Supper. An image in its full bloom, the revelation of the person and work of Christ.

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But sin disrupts peace.

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There's something else in scripture. It's one of our ideas here. The second thing I told you to be thinking about is this idea of peace with man.

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God's peace brings in peace with others. It means the end of hostilities and war.

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Deuteronomy 20, Judges 21. It doesn't mean only reconciliation between warring factions or nations, but it also comes all the way down to personal relationships.

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So I want you to think about the scope of this. On the highest level, man in Christ is reconciled with God.

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God makes peace with the man. Though the man is the warring rebel,

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God does it. And it trickles all the way down through every institution, the church, the formation of the

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Jews and Gentiles in one body. All the way down to a husband and a wife and a little child.

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That they might be reconciled with one another. That they might live at peace with one another.

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Well, because of time today, I'm going to cut some of this short. I'm going to turn first to a couple of New Testament passages.

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I'd like you to turn to Ephesians 2. Ephesians 2.

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This is going to be very important to us in our understanding of Jesus as the Prince of Peace.

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And some of the work he has accomplished in that role.

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We begin reading in Ephesians 2, verse 11. Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision made in the flesh by hands.

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That at the time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise.

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Having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were afar off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

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For he himself is our peace. Who has made both one and has broken down the middle wall of separation.

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I've said this before, but it's very important that you understand this. We have racial tensions in America today.

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They do not compare to this racial tension. There is no gulf that exists that's wider than the

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Jew -Gentile distinction. In fact, the division is given by God himself to separate

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Israel from the nations. But in his mercy and in his grace and because of his son and the government, the increase of which there will be no end, the

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Gentiles have to come too. The ends of the earth have to come and they have to belong to the king.

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We were strangers from these promises. But now in Christ, we had no share in the commonwealth of Israel.

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But now in Christ and Christ himself is our peace.

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Turn over to the book of Philippians really quickly in chapter four. I have to point this out as a as a matter of application.

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I was going to spend some more time on the Ephesian section, but many of you today are experiencing turmoil and hardship in your life.

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And Christ has come to do something about that as well. We love to think about these things on the grand level.

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I prefer the theological level. We have to recognize that God has done something so powerful in Christ.

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He's done something to bring peace down to the smallest creature.

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Look at verse four of chapter four. Rejoice in the

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Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to all men.

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The Lord is at hand. Be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving.

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Let your requests be made known to God. Now, I want to stop here because anxiety is a very powerful force in our world today.

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Many people are suffering from it. And quite often it sounds we just read a

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Bible verse. OK, there your problem is solved. You're not anxious anymore because you just read the scripture. You have to, in faith, believe the scripture.

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You have to believe that God is actually at work in Christ to deliver you from your anxiety.

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If you're anxious, take it to the Lord in prayer and supplication. Do it with thanksgiving.

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Let your requests be made known to God. It says in verse seven and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ.

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What a powerful truth for us to lay hold of. Are you struggling with anxiety?

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Are you wracked with fear? Are you depressed? Are you having a hard time?

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Take it to the Lord in prayer. Lay it all down before him.

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If he can turn the ruins of a world stained by sin and flip it back right side up, he can rescue you and deliver you from all of your troubles as well.

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And let the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds.

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Through Christ Jesus. Turn over to Colossians in chapter one. Again, we want to lay hold of this idea of Christ as the prince of peace.

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And one of the greatest passages in all of scripture is here before us. Let's begin reading in verse 13.

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There are dark days in Judah when the prophecy is given. There are dark days, as we sang in Bethlehem.

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But there's a light shining there that can never be put out. Verse 13.

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He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the son of his love.

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In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.

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He is the image of the invisible God. The God who cannot be seen has been seen and we've seen his face and that face is

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Jesus Christ. Born of a virgin, born in humble circumstance, born in a scruffy little small town.

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Jesus, the king of kings, comes into the world to rescue his own creation from all of that corruption.

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He's the image of the invisible God, the firstborn, first rank over all creation.

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We should pause here. We get this very fully. We won't have time today to look at it. In John one, we get the sense that's echoed here in verse 16.

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What an amazing statement. The one who comes and rescues. The one who's born 700 plus years after Isaiah's prophecy.

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The one who would say, before Abraham was, I am. That Jesus was the one, it says here in verse 16.

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For by him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth. Visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers.

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And maybe one of the most powerful statements in all of scripture.

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All things were created through him and for him.

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I want to stop and I want you to think about your present estate as a child of God.

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By natural birth, you shouldn't be here. The corruption of sin is comprehensive.

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But Christ in his love and his mercy, the one who created all things, called you out of this world to redeem you as his sons and daughters.

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How secure is your place when the creator, redeemer, sustainer, the king of kings takes you as his own and ushers in his reign of peace.

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Not only in you and your family, not only in the church. But to the nations.

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This is Christ's world. The darkest place in the

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Middle East, that sand belongs to Jesus Christ. The animism of Africa will be thwarted by the reign and rule of Christ.

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The Buddhism of the East will be washed away by the blood of Christ.

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He's before all things.

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And in him all things consist. He's the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he may have the preeminence.

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For it pleased the father that in him all the fullness should dwell. And I want you to listen again, children, carefully.

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All the fullness dwells in Christ. And by Christ, to reconcile all things to himself by him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, how?

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He's made peace through the blood of his cross. So the incarnation of Jesus is part of this grand plan of God and redemption to bring and reconcile all things to himself.

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Let's be reminded of who we were. Verse 21. And you who are once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works.

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Yet now he has reconciled in the body of his flesh through death to present you wholly and blameless and above reproach in his sight.

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If indeed you continue in the faith grounded and steadfast and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which

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I, Paul, became a minister. These things are all very familiar to us.

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Advent helps us to see it fresh again. Judah was in a dire situation.

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Rome is in a dire situation. Dare I say the United States of America is in a dire situation.

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But Jesus. But Jesus. The prince of peace.

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He's won the peace through the blood of the cross. He's conquered the enemies.

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And he's ushering in a continual growth in us, in the church, in the world of this peace.

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Well, I have two more places to go. We'll close here because of time. Let's go to Romans chapter five.

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Romans chapter five. Maybe your marriage is in perfect shape, but maybe you know someone who's had a struggling marriage today.

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If God is able to take sinners and reconcile them to himself in Christ, I believe wholeheartedly that he can save and preserve and restore a marriage.

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The greater informs the lesser, doesn't it? If he can do cosmic things, there's violence in the heavens, and he can put that back in order.

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There are black holes swallowing up galaxies. Whatever that is, he makes that right.

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The animals who used to be friends, they attack each other. He's going to make them lie down next to each other in peace.

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Can he do that in your family and in your marriage or your friend's marriage? Yes, yes, he can.

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Romans five says, therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our

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Lord Jesus Christ. There are no sweeter words ever said to mankind that now you have peace with God.

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It's all because of the incarnation. It's all because of Christ. It's all because of his work. You have peace with God through our

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Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand.

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Are you standing there by faith?

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And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only that, we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance, and perseverance character and character hope.

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Now hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the

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Holy Spirit who was given to us. For we were still without strength.

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In due time, Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die.

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But God demonstrates his own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

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Much more than having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.

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When you were enemies, he reconciled you to himself through the death of his

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Son. Now, think about your standing in your place. You've been reconciled, we are now saved by his life.

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And not only that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

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We're too reserved for this, but we should be leaping for joy in our seats.

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All of this pressure and this weight is off because we've been reconciled to God. We can now have peace with one another.

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Mark is a Yankees fan. How can you get along with the

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Yankees? But we do in Christ. The final thing

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I want us to think about, we barely touched on these ideas, but we have a ministry of peacemaking.

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We've been studying before this little break because of Advent and Thanksgiving. We've been studying the book of 2

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Corinthians. I want you to go back there really quickly now. I want to remind you of chapter 5 again.

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Incredible things are happening in redemptive history, which we commemorate this season.

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A virgin birth, an incarnation of God in the flesh.

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And if we were to go back and do a little more deep exegesis of that text in Isaiah, I think we would find that the great beneficiaries of all of this is us.

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God's doing it for his glory, certainly that. These things are happening for the blessing and benefit of the people of God.

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I'll begin reading in verse 17.

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If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away.

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Behold, things, all things are new. Now all things are of God.

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And here it is again. This is at the heart of the peace that he's made, who has reconciled us to himself through Jesus Christ.

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And here's something shocking. And he has given us the ministry of reconciliation.

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That is that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

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It's amazing that God would save us. We should be in awe of that. But how amazing also is it that we should now do these great works of heralding the

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Prince of Peace. God is allowing us and the proclamation of Christ and his gospel to be agents of his reconciliation, to be peacemakers as we prayed through the

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Beatitudes this morning. We carry the greatest news with us.

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We live it, we breathe it, we embody it, and we proclaim it. Be reconciled to God.

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The Prince of Peace has come to deliver you from the bondage of all of your sin and death.

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Ambassadors for Christ, Paul said with his company. As though God were pleading through us, we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.

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I should pause here to remind you that we have cute little stories and nativities about a baby born in Bethlehem.

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But because he takes the government on his shoulders, the baby grows up, and the baby takes on the burden of all of our sin.

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And it pleads the Lord to crush him. Jesus, you're going to go and redeem your creation.

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You can imagine the father saying to the son, but the peace that you are going to win is going to be costly.

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But Christ, knowing the joy that is set before him, knowing that he's going to bring many sons to glory, eagerly goes to the cross that he might reconcile you to God.

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To give you the ministry of reconciliation. Friends, ponder these four things again before we close.

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Whatever angst you have in your life, whatever problems you have, and they are many, I know.

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I'm acquainted with those problems. Today, your heart can rejoice because you have peace with God, because of his love for you.

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It's an astounding thing the love of God is behind all of this work to bring you to himself.

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Today, you may have conflict with people in the church, or your extended family.

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All the walls of separation have been torn down. The gender distinctions of the only two, there's only two of those, by the way, male and female.

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The slave -master relationship, that's been conquered. The Jew -Gentile divide, that's been conquered.

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We have to lay hold of the peace that Christ has secured for us.

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There's a tale of Peter, one of my favorite characters in the

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Bible. When he got to Galatia, he forgot about the peace that Christ had delivered to him.

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He'd been restored after all of his failures, and he decided that he wasn't going to be able to eat with the

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Gentiles. So Paul had to rebuke him. You see, when we sin, we forget the peace that Christ gives.

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If we're having these conflicts in our lives, it's largely because of our sin and our forgetfulness that Christ has ushered in his reign of peace, and he's done it in us.

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We possess that. We have to walk in faith and believe and act as if that is true.

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And third, today, some of you, your blood pressure is through the roof. You're filled with anxiety and fear, and you're worried about all the things and issues of life.

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Jesus, in John 14, and after the resurrection, says, Hold your hands out.

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Receive the gift of his peace. He secured it. He made everything.

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He's redeeming this world. He's redeeming all of us. He can grant us.

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He can give us peace, and it can be real. In faith, lay hold of the peace that Christ gives.

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And I think an area for us, we may have to confess as Reformed people, we need to get back.

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We started the modern missionary movement. Calvinists did that. We have to remember we have a ministry of peacemaking and reconciliation.

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We go out into the world. We tell them that the Prince of Peace has come, and his reign and his rule last forever and ever.

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Kiss the Son. Worship him. Bow down to him. Be reconciled to him, we say.

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Well, I want you to remember today that Christ, our

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Lord, is the Prince of Peace. Pray with me. Oh, Lord, we, like Ahaz and those in Judah, we often look for a ruler or someone to come and rescue us from our present circumstances, but you have something much bigger in mind.

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Oh, Lord, I'm so glad the government is on your shoulders. I'm so glad that you have secured the throat of David, and it will never leave your clutches for eternity.

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Lord, forgive us for our short -sightedness. We only see the present realities and struggles.

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We only see our captivity and our exile, but we don't see the arrival of the

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King and his reign of peace. Oh, Lord, I pray that today in the power of your

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Spirit that you would give us greater insight, illumine our understanding of the comprehensive reign and rule of Christ today.

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We pray. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Let's continue our worship through the presentation of tithes and offerings.

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When the young men get to the front, I would ask that you would stand in anticipation of singing the Gloria Patri.

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Please stand and let's pray together. Lord, we thank you that you have ushered in your reign of peace.

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We ask, Lord, that these tithes and offerings would be used for the ministry of reconciliation, to proclaim your gospel, to live the

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Christian life in the community, to build a faith community, a church that will stand until your return for your glory.

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Oh, Lord, we ask that you would accomplish all of these things. We ask them in the name of Christ.

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When we hear the good news, it's important for us to vent our joy in Thanksgiving.

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Let us sing heartily to the Lord. Let's give glory to God in the singing of the Gloria Patri. Lift up, let us give thanks to the

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Lord. It is good and right and so to do.

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Oh, Holy Lord, Father Almighty, everlasting God, because you sent your beloved son to redeem us from sin and death and to make us heirs in him of everlasting life, that when he shall come again in power and great triumph to judge the world, we may, without shame or fear, rejoice to behold his appearing.

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Therefore, with angels and archangels and with all the company of heaven, we praise and magnify your glorious name, evermore praising you and singing.

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The sovereign majesty whom we have offended, and yet you are our most loving and merciful father who has given your son, the

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Lord Jesus Christ, to reconcile us to yourself, who himself has ratified the new covenant with his most precious blood and has instituted this holy sacrament to be a perpetual remembrance of him till he comes.

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We ask, O Lord, that we would sanctify these, your creatures of bread and wine, which according to your institution and command we set apart to this holy use, that they may be sacramentally the body and blood of the

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Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, crucified for us. Amen.

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Our Lord Jesus, on the night in which he was betrayed, took bread. He blessed, gave thanks, and broke it.

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He gave it to his disciples, saying, Take, eat, this is my body. Likewise, he took the cup after supper, saying,

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This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Drink from it, all of you. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the

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Lord's death until he comes. Therefore, we proclaim the faith.

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Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.

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Let's approach the table now by praying together in unison. We do not presume to come to this, your table,

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O merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in your manifold and great mercies.

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We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under your table, but you are the same

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Lord who always shows mercy. Grant us, therefore, a gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of your dear

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Son, Jesus Christ, and to drink of his blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his body, and our souls washed through his most precious blood.

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And that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us.

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Amen. Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.

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Therefore, let us keep the feasts, the gifts of God for the people of God.

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Thanks be to the Lord. Thank you for feeding us with the spiritual food of the most precious body and blood of your

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Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. And for assuring us in these holy mysteries that we are living members of the body of your

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Son and heirs of your eternal kingdom. And, O Lord, grant us this other benefit, that you will never allow us to forget these things, that by having them imprinted on our hearts, may we grow and increase daily in the faith which is at work in every good deed.

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And now, Father, send us out to do the work you have given us to do, to love and serve you as faithful witnesses of Christ our

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Lord. To him, to you, and to the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory now and forever.

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Amen. Please stand. Receive the blessing now.

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The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the