Acts 28:11-31 (April 14, 2024)

The Gospel of the Kingdom Reaches Rome

Well, today we're going to finish our series through the Book of Acts. We started back in August, making our way at a pretty quick pace through the Book of Acts, and we're going to finish that today. When we began, we titled the name of this series Conquering in the Name of Christ, and the reason for that is that the Book of Acts is about the spread of and the victory of the Gospel starting in Jerusalem, moving through Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

We've followed, as we've gone through Acts, we've followed the ministry of Peter, taking the Gospel to the Gentiles. We've followed the missionary journeys of Paul, and we've seen that churches were planted all throughout the area surrounding Jerusalem, throughout Asia Minor, which is modern day Turkey, and then from there, we see it spread even as far as Rome, and that's where we pick up the story today.

Paul is on his way to Rome, and we pick that story up in Acts 28, verse 11, and what we see is that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is victorious, and the world and its peoples and nations that were under the dominion of the evil one, that they are being conquered by Christ, and by Christ's church, and in the name of Christ.

Their sins washed away. These nations, these peoples, they're being brought into fellowship with the triune God. They are inheritors of eternal life. Their loyalties have been shifted to King Jesus, so that they live according to His word, obeying all that He has commanded.

And so, with that as our context, and remembering where we've been in the book of Acts thus far, let's finish the book, beginning in verse 11, we're going to read through the end of the chapter, and God's word says this.

After three months, we sailed in an Alexandrian ship, whose figurehead was the twin brothers, which had wintered at the island. And landing at Syracuse, we stayed three days. From there, we circled around and reached Regium.

And after one day, the south wind blew, and the next day we came to Puteoli, where we found brethren and were invited to stay with them seven days. And so we went toward Rome. And from there, when the brethren heard about us, they came to meet us as far as Apiphorum and Threanes.

When Paul saw them, he thanked God and took courage. Now when we came to Rome, the centurion delivered the prisoners to the captain of the guard, but Paul was permitted to dwell by himself with the soldier who guarded him.

And it came to pass, after three days, that Paul called the leaders of the Jews together. So when they had come together, he said to them, Men and brethren, though I have done nothing against our people or the customs of our fathers, yet I was delivered as a prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans, who, when they had examined me, wanted to let me go, because there was no cause for putting me to death.

But when the Jews spoke against it, I was compelled to appeal to Caesar, not that I had anything of which to accuse my nation. For this reason, therefore, I have called for you to see you and speak with you, because for the hope of Israel I am bound with this chain.

Then they said to him, We neither receive letters from Judea concerning you, nor have any of the brethren who came reported or spoken any evil of you, but we desire to hear from you what you think. For concerning this sect, we know that it is spoken against everywhere.

So, when they had appointed him a day, many came to him at his lodging, to whom he explained and solemnly testified of the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus from both the law of Moses and the prophets from morning till evening.

And some were persuaded by the things which were spoken, and some disbelieved. So when they did not agree among themselves, they departed after Paul had said one word. The Holy Spirit spoke rightly through Isaiah the prophet to our father, saying, Go to this people and say, Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, and seeing you will see and not perceive.

For the hearts of this people have grown dull, their ears are hard of hearing, their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.

Therefore, let it be known to you that the salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will hear it. And when he had said these words, the Jews departed and had a great dispute among themselves.

Then Paul dwelt two whole years in his own rented house and received all who came to him, preaching the kingdom of God and teaching the things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no one forbidding him.

Amen.

Christ in the Law and the Prophets

This is the word of God to us. If you'll remember from last week, Paul bound on his way to Rome, shipwrecked, ended up on the island of Malta. They stayed there for a time. And what we read about in verses 11 through 15 of this chapter is a little bit more of the travelogue of how he ends up getting to Rome.

Believers in Rome had heard about his coming, and they came and traveled a day's journey toward him to meet him and escort him into the city, and upon his arrival, he's afforded pretty lax accommodations or restrictions, I should say, from the Romans.

He had rented accommodations and was allowed to stay there with the soldier who guarded him, and so it was a pretty lax setup for a prisoner. This meant he could have visitors, and after three days being there, the leaders of the Jewish community in Rome came to hear him, and Paul made his case that he was innocent of all the charges against him, and that he had been a faithful son of Israel.

And he declared, in verse 20, that it was for the hope of Israel that he was bound in.

These chains.

Now the hope of Israel, of course, is the Messiah, the appointed and anointed one who would deliver Israel and the world from their sorrows and their sins, and set up his throne as the true Davidic king.

Jesus is this Messiah. And so Paul proclaimed to them, Jesus. Jesus as the Christ. Jesus as the Messiah. And so on the appointed day, the Jews came to where Paul was staying, where he had rented his lodging, and verse 23 says, he explained and solemnly testified of the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus from both the law of Moses and the prophets, from morning.

To evening.

So it's important for us to realize that Jesus didn't just come on the scene out of nowhere in the first century. That there was a long history of a promised deliverer that the people of God were looking.

For.

There's a long history that the whole Bible had been anticipating and slowly, progressively.

Revealing.

And so when it says the law and the prophets, the law and Moses and the prophets, this is shorthand for the Old Testament. And it's all about Jesus. The Old Testament, the law and the prophets, they're all about Jesus.

You'll remember Luke wrote both the Gospel of Luke and Acts, right? And we've seen as we've gone through the book of Acts, how so much of the book of Acts is a recapitulation of the life and ministry of Jesus in the life and ministry of the apostles, which is then passed down from Jesus to the apostles to the Christian church.

And so you'll notice that in Luke's Gospel, at the end of it, last chapter, Luke 24, we find Jesus talking to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. And he says, and Luke says, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself.

So after his resurrection, Jesus talking to the disciples on the road to Emmaus, explaining everything from the Bible, from the law of Moses and the prophets, everything concerning himself. And then here, Luke, in his last chapter, Acts 28 of this book, we find Paul, remember last week we saw that his being saved from shipwreck was like a resurrection story here in the book of Acts.

And after that, we find Paul in Rome persuading the people about Jesus from the law of Moses and the prophets. This whole book is about Jesus. From cover to cover, he's pointing us to Christ. The Old Testament prepares us for the coming Deliverer.

The Old Testament sets the stage for the arrival of Christ. It gives us, it speaks of Christ in types and shadows and previews of the true Deliverer.

To come.

And it all starts in the Garden of Eden, at the very beginning of human history. In Genesis 1, that's where it starts talking and pointing to Christ. What I want to do this morning is I want to take us on a brief journey through the Old Testament.

I want to take us on a brief journey through the Old Testament leading us to Christ and show you how Jesus fulfills the law of Moses and the prophets, to show you how Jesus fulfills the Old Testament.

And so we start at the very beginning where God made everything by His Word. Remember, you read Genesis 1, it says, and God said, it's repeated, and God said, and God said, and God said, let there be light, and there was light.

And then we get to John 1, and we see that Jesus is the Word of God, who was in the beginning with God, who was God, and who made everything. John 1 talks about He's the Word of God, and nothing that was made was made without Christ.

Jesus is the creative Word. He is the Word of God. We move on to Genesis 3, after the fall into sin, when God promises, Genesis 3, 15, promises to send a deliverer to crush the head of the serpent, to crush the head of Satan, though Satan will also bruise his heel.

And we learn that this deliverer will be the seed of a woman, Genesis 3, 15. Then we get to Matthew, and we find that Jesus was born of a woman, but not of a human father. He is the seed of the woman, and He was bruised at the cross, but He was not destroyed.

He rose from the dead, crushing Satan's head and defeating Satan's sin and death. Staying in Genesis 3, we read about the shame of Adam's nakedness being covered when God sacrificed an animal and took the animal's skins and clothed him, made clothes for Adam and Eve to cover up their shame, to cover up their nakedness.

And then we remember that Jesus was the final sacrifice, and the shame of our sin is covered by His righteousness, by His obedience, like a robe. We move on to Genesis 4, and there Abel is killed by his envious brother when God accepts Abel's worship, but rejects Cain's worship because Cain's heart was unclean, because Cain brought an unacceptable offering to the Lord.

And then we remember that Jesus was killed by envious brothers, His kinsmen, the Jews, because their hearts were unclean. Jesus brought true worship, but the Jews of Jesus' day did not worship in spirit and in.

Truth.

They honored God with their lips, but their hearts were far from Him. Next in Genesis, we see the story of Noah, and the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and every intent of the thoughts of man's heart was only evil all the time.

So God judged the world with a flood, but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and he was saved through the ark. If you read that account, you'll notice that the ark had one door.

There was one door.

If Noah and his sons were going to be saved from the judgment of God and the flood, they had to enter that boat through one door. There's one way of salvation. John 14, 6 tells us that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and that no one comes to the Father except through Him.

He is the one way of salvation, the one way to be saved from the judgment of the wrath of God against sin. You look in Genesis 12 -22, and there we find the story of Abraham, where he's promised a great name.

He's promised a land. He's promised that all the peoples of the earth will be blessed through him, and he has a son whom God calls him to take up to the mountain to sacrifice, and that the boy is saved when the ram is caught in the thickets by its horns.

It's important that he was caught by the horns and not by the flesh, because if he was caught in the thicket by his flesh, he would be blemished, but God will only accept an unblemished sacrifice, and so Isaac was saved by this unblemished substitute sacrifice, the ram, in place of Isaac.

Jesus, the son of Abraham. He was the sinless, that is, unblemished substitute sacrifice who died in our place, bringing salvation and thus blessing to all the peoples of the world. Joseph, we keep on going in Genesis, Joseph was sold into slavery, yet God preserved him and used him to maintain the line of the Messiah.

Genesis 50 -20, one of my favorite verses in the whole Bible, Genesis 50 -20 says, Joseph says that what his brothers meant for evil, God meant for good, to save many people alive. So Jesus' brothers, his kinsmen, meant evil against him, in the same way that Joseph's brothers meant evil against him.

But God meant the crucifixion for good, to save many people, giving them eternal life. So far we've just made it through Genesis, I'm going to speed up just a little bit or we'll be here all day. When Israel left Egypt, they spread blood on the doorposts, remember the story of Passover?

They spread blood on the doorposts so that the angel of death would pass over their homes, preserving their firstborn sons. Their homes were literally covered by blood. And all who have faith in Jesus are covered by His blood, and final death and judgment will not befall them, because they're covered by the blood.

The Ten Commandments and the law showed the way to live in God's world, yet it also acted as a mirror, showing Israel their own disobedience, their own uncleanness, their own sinfulness, because they consistently disobeyed it.

And it showed them that they had no way of escape from sin on their own, because they could not keep the law of God, yet Jesus perfectly kept the law of God. And then He provided a way of escape from sin through His death and resurrection.

The law made provision for a day of atonement, and if you go back and read in Leviticus about the day of atonement, you notice there's three things there. You have when the priest enters into the Holy of Holies to make the sacrifice on the day of atonement, you have God, the presence of God, you have a high priest, and you have an unblemished substitute sacrifice in Christ.

He is all three in Himself. He is God, He is the high priest, and He is Himself the unblemished substitute sacrifice. Second Samuel 7 foretold about an eternal king in the line of David. Jesus is that Davidic king, having ascended to the right hand of God, being given an everlasting dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve.

Him.

Daniel 7. Micah foretold about the deliverer being born in Bethlehem. Isaiah said that He would be born of a virgin and that by His stripes we would be healed. Then one starry night in Bethlehem, Mary the virgin gave birth to a baby boy, and Joseph named Him Jesus because, Matthew 1 tells us, He will save His people from their sins.

By His stripes we are healed. You see, back in the days of Abel, Abel offered one sacrifice for himself, one sacrifice for one person. And then in the days of Moses and the Passover, each home was covered by the blood, and Israelites offered one sacrifice for one family.

And then in the days of Israel, a high priest would enter into the Holy of Holies and offer one sacrifice for one nation. But in Jesus, Jesus offered Himself as the one sacrifice. Not for one man, not for one family, not for one nation.

Jesus offered one sacrifice for the whole world. Every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. Jesus Christ is the promised deliverer who was foretold and previewed throughout the Old Testament. This whole book, the whole things about Him, from Him, and to Him, and through Him are all things.

Do you see, do you see how these stories throughout the Old Testament point to Christ? Christ having won His kingdom by His life, death, burial, and resurrection, He ascended into heaven where He currently rules and reigns, and He must reign until He's put all His enemies under His feet.

This is the gospel of the kingdom that Paul is explaining there from his house in Rome. And using all the Old Testament scriptures, he shows them who their Messiah truly was. That Jesus was the one they had been looking for.

That Jesus was the one that God had appointed and anointed as the Christ. That Jesus was the hope of Israel. And what it tells us in verse 24 there is that some were persuaded, but that also means that some disbelieved.

Some were persuaded and some disbelieved, verse 24. I want us to look briefly now at how the book of Acts ends with respect to Israel and the.

Jews.

This has been a major theme throughout the book, Jew and Gentile, and the gospel going forth to the nations. One thing you'll notice is that everywhere Paul goes, he goes to the Jews first. And some believe and give their loyalty to Jesus, placing their faith in Him, but most.

Do not.

And those who do not, they end up opposing Paul and the gospel that he preaches. And so this is a pattern all throughout the book of Acts, all throughout all of his missionary journeys. And we see the same thing happen here again.

He goes to Rome, he goes to the Jews first. Some are persuaded, some disbelieve. And just like in other places in Acts, they hear Paul up until the point where he speaks of proclaiming the gospel to the Gentiles.

And that's the line that is just too far. It's been that way throughout the book of Acts. It's the same thing here. But as we saw in our survey of the Old Testament just a moment ago, this is precisely the line that God has been aiming for the entire time.

The whole point of the Bible is that God is bringing about worldwide worship. Think about it.

Think about Adam.

What would have happened if Adam had not sinned? What would have happened in the world? Because you'll remember he was charged in 215 to work and keep the garden. That's temple language that has connotations of worship and obedience as well.

And so Adam, he is called to worship and to obey. Then he was called to be fruitful, to multiply and fill the earth. And had he not sinned, what would he have filled the earth with? Those who worshiped and obeyed.

The point from the very beginning is to fill the world with worship and obedience to God. That was the goal from the beginning. But he lost it when he sinned. But what Adam lost, Christ will win. Christ will win the worship of the nations.

Christ will fill the world with those who worship. The knowledge of the glory of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. He will have the worship of the nations. Every tribe, tongue, people and nation.

The salvation of God had been sent to the Gentiles. And verse 28 tells us, and they will hear it. Praise God for that. But the Jews, they had shut their ears, they had shut their eyes and they had shut their hearts.

Paul quoted from Isaiah chapter 6. Which is, if you remember Isaiah 6 is the call and commissioning of Isaiah. But it also, if you keep reading past that initial part of the call and commissioning. It includes words of impending judgment against Israel.

But the thing, if you read Isaiah's quote and then you read Paul's quote. He changes, he slightly adapts the quotation. You see Isaiah, God tells Isaiah to go and tell the people. And by doing so, to quote, make the heart of this people dull and their ears heavy and shut their eyes.

So by his proclamation he's going to make their hearts dull. Paul changes the quotation to say that their hearts have already grown dull. That their ears are already hard of hearing. That their eyes are already closed.

Therefore what we see is Paul is pronouncing judgment on Israel and the Jews who disbelieve. The ones who refuse to believe in and worship Christ. Yet at the same time he is extending the offer of hope and salvation to them.

But here's the thing, they must find it in Christ. There's the one way of salvation and it is Christ. Therefore what he does, he testifies to all who will listen to him of the kingdom of God. We see that in verse 23 and verse 31.

He testifies to all who will listen to this kingdom of God. Now this phrase kingdom of God is one that Luke used prominently in his gospel. More sparingly in the book of Acts. But he uses it here and I want to highlight this phrase gospel of the kingdom for just a minute.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is about his kingdom. You see there was a transfer of authority in the world at the resurrection. There was a transfer of authority at the resurrection of Jesus. And what happened then is the world order, it really changed then.

The resurrection fundamentally changed the world. That is in the previous order of the world the nations were under the authority of rebel gods. Fallen angels, ultimately Satan. Deuteronomy 32 verse 8 says that the Most High divided their inheritance among the nations.

When he separated the sons of Adam. This is referring to Genesis 11 after the flood. Deuteronomy 32 verse 8 also says that the Lord kept Israel as his portion. So there is this very real sense in which rival principalities and powers had real authority among the nations at the time.

But when Jesus died as the atoning sacrifice for all men and he rose from the dead the world was reborn. And Jesus was then taking back the peoples and nations for himself. The whole world was under his authority.

Romans 1 verse 4 says it like this. It says Jesus was declared to be the son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead.

That is he was made king.

That is what the language of son of God with power according to the spirit means.

It is kingly language.

And so when he was resurrected he is declared king of the world. And when he ascended on the cloud to the ancient of days he received, this is his coronation, he received that everlasting dominion and glory and kingdom that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him.

That is all rule was taken from the principalities and powers and given to Jesus to rule the world. This is what we see in Matthew 28 when he says all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

First part of the Great Commission right? It is the ground of the Great Commission. The reason we go out and disciple the nations is because they belong to Christ now. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to him.

It has been taken from the principalities and powers. Ephesians 1 verse 20 says that God raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places far above all principality and power and might and dominion.

That is the gospel of the kingdom. You see the gospel is not primarily therapeutic about how to make your life better. Now don't get me wrong, Jesus makes your life better. Living your life in accordance with his word, reborn by the spirit, it makes your life better.

But that is not the primary message of the gospel is that Jesus will make your life better. The gospel is not even primarily personal about your individual salvation. Though it is by the gospel that you are personally saved and that you receive forgiveness of sins.

And to be saved every person must personally, individually confess faith. They must believe and confess that Christ is Lord. But primarily the gospel isn't about us, it's about Christ. It's about the king and his kingdom.

That Jesus is Lord of lords and king of kings. That he has ultimate rule on the earth. That he is colonizing earth and taking it for heaven. That he has been exalted and given the name that is above every name.

And at that name, at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow. Those in heaven and those on earth and of those under the earth. And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. To the glory of God the Father.

The gospel is the announcement of the victory of Jesus Christ. God's son and anointed deliverer. That he has won his kingdom through his perfect life, death, burial, resurrection and ascension. And he invites us into it having paid for all of our sins on the cross with his blood.

And then sending us with him to rule alongside him. Therefore the call of this gospel of the kingdom, this gospel of the king. The call is for everyone to submit to Jesus. That's the primary message of the gospel.

Is that Jesus is king. So come along quietly. Jesus is king. Go ahead and submit. Jesus is king.

Bow the knee.

Give your allegiance and loyalty to the rightful king of the world. Jesus Christ of Nazareth. And if you do, you will receive forgiveness for every one of your sins. Every last one. And you will receive eternal life and fellowship with God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

And a new heart making you a new creation. Making you a citizen of heaven and making you a son of God. This is the message that Paul is preaching in Rome when the book of Acts ends there at verse 31. And I must admit it's a bit of an odd ending isn't it?

The book kind of ends abruptly.

Right?

Because we want to know what happened to Paul. We've been following Paul's story for about half of this book, right?

And we want to know.

Because we've been following. We saw Paul originally, going by the name Saul. And he's holding the garments for those who are stoning Stephen. He's an enemy of the church at that time. He's an enemy of Christ at that time.

And that's where we first saw him. He's holding the garments of those stoning Stephen. Then we encounter Paul on the road to Damascus where the Lord Jesus encounters him. And he is converted and commissioned to go preach to the Gentiles.

And we've been following him along on these three missionary journeys. And all sorts of things have happened. He's been shipwrecked at various times. He's been beaten at various times. His life has been threatened.

He's been arrested. All of these bad things have happened. We've seen him preach. We've seen him reason daily in the hall of Tyrannus there in Ephesus. We've seen him send out church planters. We've seen him teaching the church.

We've seen all this good that he has done. We've seen all this bad that had happened to him. We see his arrest and trials in Jerusalem and in Caesarea. And his shipwrecked journey to Rome. And then what happens to him after that?

Does he stand before Caesar?

Is he killed?

Is he set free? Does he make it to Spain like he had talked about in Romans? And Acts doesn't tell us. Luke doesn't tell us.

We don't know.

Because Luke just stops. Now if you'll read up on this, you'll come across all sorts of different answers as to why Luke stops without finishing Paul's story. But here's what I believe. I believe he stops there without telling the rest of Paul's story because this book is not about Paul.

He's not telling Paul's story. He's telling a different story, and he needed to tell Paul's story for part of that. But this isn't Paul's biography. Luke's writing about the kingdom of God. Luke is writing about the spread of the gospel and the victory of the gospel and the spread of the church.

He begins in chapter 1, verse 8. Jesus tells the apostles, you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth. And then we follow that pattern being fulfilled as we see the spread of the church, the spread of the gospel, the spread of the mission of God.

That's what Luke has told us about. So Luke, he told the story using Peter for a little while, and then somewhere along Acts chapter 12, Peter just drops off the face of the map. He just drops off the map, doesn't he?

We don't hear about Peter anymore. He doesn't conclude his story in any kind of way. He doesn't tie up any loose ends. He doesn't tell us what happened to Peter. He just stops talking about Peter. The reason is his point wasn't to talk about Peter.

His point was to talk about the mission of God. His point was to talk about the victory of Christ. Likewise, Luke doesn't tell us what happened to Paul because the point isn't the people. The point is not even the apostles.

The point is the mission of God. The gospel of the kingdom has spread from Jerusalem to the heart of the Roman Empire, to its capital city. The church was established. The Gentiles have been included and been brought in, and the ministry of Jesus had been passed to the apostles and now has been passed to the Christian church, dispersed all throughout, taking over the world, conquering in the name of Christ.

Luke ends Acts rather abruptly without tying up the loose ends because there are no loose ends to be tied up yet. The mission of God is continuing. The mission of God is not done yet, and so he can't conclude it because it's still going forth from Rome throughout the rest of the world.

What Jesus began and the apostles continued is still continuing today. It's continuing with every time you share the gospel, every time you proclaim Christ, every missionary we send out, every church that is planted, the mission of God is continuing.

We still announce the victory of King Jesus. Every time we gather and proclaim the victory of Jesus on the Lord's day, we are continuing the mission of God there. We still call the nations to submit to Christ and to obey all that He has commanded.

We still call our families. We still call our friends. We still call our neighbors and our coworkers and our fellow countrymen to bow the knee to King Jesus and confess Him as Lord, to place their faith and loyalty in Him.

We still take the gospel to the four corners of the earth, and we still conquer in the name of Christ, and we shall until He comes.

Prayer of Thanksgiving and Commission

Let's pray together.

Our Father in heaven, Lord, I thank you for the time that we have spent in the book of Acts. I thank you that what we have seen is the victory of Christ. Thank you that we serve a risen Christ. Thank you that we serve a victorious Christ.

May we not be full of despair when we look out and see hard times in the world, when it seems like everything that is good and true and beautiful is dying. For we follow a God who knows His way out of the grave, and Christ has been resurrected and crowned.

Lord, thank you for the faithfulness that we have witnessed as we've read through and preached through the book of Acts. We've seen our fathers in the faith, mothers in the faith, faithfully proclaiming the gospel, faithfully obeying Your Word, faithfully enduring hardship.

Lord, I pray that we would learn these lessons. Lord, I pray that we too would be victorious. Your Word tells us elsewhere that those who overcome, overcome by faith. We overcome the world by faith. Lord, help us to live by faith.

Help us to keep our heads up, our eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. Help us to be faithful in proclaiming the gospel and living in light of it and obeying Your Word. Lastly, Father, I just want to thank you for Christ.

He is the center, the blazing center of the Scriptures. And of all Your revelation to us, everything in the Old Testament was pointing to Him, everything in the New Testament and since Christ is pointing back to Him, everything holding up Christ.

Thank you for the life and work of Christ on our behalf. And I pray that every person that is in this room today, Lord, I pray that they will bow the knee to King Jesus, submit to Him. He is King. It's a fundamental fact.

It's not that He's King of just some people. No, He's King of everybody. We're all called to submit then.

And I pray that they would.

And as Philippians chapter 2 says it, pray that they would bow their knees, confess with their mouths that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. May you be glorified in all things, Father, we pray.

In Jesus' name, amen.