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It's fun being together on Saturday with the men and this morning, exalting Christ together. It's just been a great blessing.
A lot has changed. I was trying to figure out how many years it's been since I've been here last. I was with Mike. We went to India a few years ago and I was in the building, but that's it's been a long time and good to see so many people that I hadn't met before people.
I've met before last time. I was here actually that the pulpit was on that side. So I don't know how many years ago that was so that's changed.
You have all kinds of people here. That's changed and it's really encouraging now. I'm risking offending you by saying this but I'm going to say it.
Anyway, some of you look a little bit older and I know that I look older too.
And yet at the same time it seems like you're also encouraged and God is blessing the ministry here and there's so much to be encouraged by just a great spirit.
Just awesome and it's great because the Lord is blessing and you're not doing gimmicks. Just the same faithfulness.
I like to liken Christianity to blocking drills. It's what you don't like in football blocking drills blocking drills blocking drills, but they're necessary and it's really what makes a great football team and so many times ministries about blocking drills because we're trying to be faithful to the
Lord by doing the basics day in and day out and God is blessing you all. It's really encouraging pray with me.
Father, thank you for what you are doing in the midst of Bethlehem Bible Church and in some ways it's great to have been gone for so long because to come back and to see the same faithful saints so many of them and to meet new people and to see how your hand really is upon the ministry and upon the leaders and upon the faithful men and women who serve.
It is amazing and it is a great testimony of your grace knowing that it's not based upon the wisdom of men trying to follow trends, but it's based upon your goodness and your loving -kindness and the way you work in the lives of people and we want to see
Christ exalted and it's great to see him exalted. Thank you for the fellowship that we have tonight.
Help me to be clear help me to be bold and help us all to understand your word better and to see the great value of Jesus Christ more clearly so that he would be glorified and honored in this community and beyond.
In Jesus name, Amen. I want to begin tonight by talking about the urgent need that there is for the gospel and faithfulness to the gospel.
There's a great and urgent need today for faithfulness to the gospel because the gospel is of first importance.
There's a great need and urgency for faithfulness to the gospel because evangelicalism at large doesn't know what the gospel is.
There's a great and urgent need today for faithfulness to the gospel because sadly the church is busy mumbling about the gospel rather than proclaiming it with clarity.
There's a great and urgent need today for faithfulness to the gospel because to misrepresent the gospel is to have a different gospel and is to be under the condemnation of God, Galatians 1.
There's a great and urgent need today for faithfulness to the gospel because too many pastors are too interested in filling auditoriums rather than pulpits.
There's a great and urgent need for faithfulness to the gospel today because when the gospel is at stake, the glory of God is at stake and there's nothing more important than that.
And with that in mind, I'm reminded of a great and simple and troubling quotation from the introduction to that classic book,
The Death of Death and the Death of Christ by John Owen, which reads, One of the most urgent tasks facing evangelical
Christendom today is the recovery of the gospel. Well, tonight
I want to sort of throw fuel on the flames because there's already a flame around here, but if I can at all encourage you to excel still more,
I want to do that. So if you have a Bible and you turn to 2 Timothy 1, I think we'll be all the more motivated regarding fidelity to the gospel.
The gospel is everything. It's what we're to remember. It has everything to do with the glory of Christ. It is the means by which people are saved.
It is really to be our heartbeat as Christians. For this church, it should be the heartbeat.
I know it is, but it can even be stronger. And so in 2
Timothy 1, verses 6 to 18, we're going to look at what I think we can highlight as five gospel mandates.
Five gospel mandates for every pastor. Five gospel mandates for every church.
Five gospel mandates for every Christian. I realize this is a pastoral letter, so it's aimed first and foremost at Timothy, the young pastor.
But what is Timothy supposed to do as he's pastoring the church? He's then obviously to communicate and share these things with the church where he's pastoring.
So it impacts the church, so it should impact this church, and it impacts individual Christians. The first gospel mandate we can summarize with this command, be passionate.
Be passionate. We see this in verses 6 and 7. Look with me at your text.
And we see it says, for this reason, pointing back to verse 5, Timothy's faithfulness in being a
Christian and being converted by the grace of God, for this reason, his genuine conversion, for that reason,
I remind you, Paul says to Timothy, to fan into flame the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands.
Be passionate. I'm taking that from that command to fan into flame. You need to stoke that fire.
And even the grammar there is, you need to stoke that fire, Timothy, and you need to keep that fire stoked.
It needs to burn, and it needs to keep on burning, it needs to be burning brightly and powerfully to never let it go out, to never let it go down, and it's in relationship to the gospel, the entire flow of this text, even this book ultimately is about the gospel of Christ challenging
Timothy. What a great challenge that is to us as believers, whether we're pastors or church members or individual
Christians. That flame that is there, because you're a Christian, in verse 5, needs to be burning, and it needs to be stoked, and it needs to be strong, fueling those flames.
Interestingly enough, in the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Old Testament, Genesis 45 verse 27, translates the same
Greek word, revived. Timothy, you need to have a personal revival in your gospel heart, and you need to have that revival kindled.
You need to keep being revived. And that would be true for Bethlehem Bible Church, to constantly be revived on the truth about Christ, and having your heart beat for Him like never before.
This is great, because Timothy would no doubt, like any pastor, be having a tough go of it. Challenges, difficulties.
You face challenges, difficulties, so do I. We've got to keep going back to the gospel, back to the gospel, back to the gospel, so that our heart can be revived.
What's interesting, we're not to it yet, but he's actually going to go off on what I'll call an apostolic tangent, and he's just going to preach the gospel to Timothy.
I would suggest to you that that is one of, if not the best way, to experience that personal gospel revival, and keeping that flame going strong and bold, and stronger and stronger, the gospel itself.
Not just telling Timothy what to do, not just saying, oh yes, we need to do this, oh yes, we need to do this, but what actually is going to provide that strong flame is the gospel itself.
We might even say this is recharging and recharging again, and again, and again, and again, so that we can proclaim it, so that we can defend it, so that we can be faithful to it.
Paul wants to jog Timothy's memory in verse 6, so he says, which is in you, through the laying on of my hands.
What a great opportunity to remember that. Timothy, your ministry's been recognized by apostolic authority.
This isn't something you just decided to do. I'm an apostle of Jesus Christ. I affirmed what
Christ did in your life. You're not alone in this. Then he gives him some incentive for this mandate to stir up the passion for ministry of the gospel in his heart in verse 7, for God gave us a spirit not of fear.
I love that. Let that flame be stoked inside of you, church, pastor,
Christian. Let it be stoked inside of you, because God didn't give us a spirit of fear.
The men of God, the people of God ought not be timid when it comes to gospel ministry.
We ought not be fearful, shy, hesitant, weak.
We should be bold. God didn't give us a spirit of fear. What is this church doing here?
Oh, you know, we are not really sure what we should do with the gospel. Maybe we'll just have a conversation with people.
This is Timothy's boldness gospel ministry. Remember, he didn't give you a spirit of fear or timidity.
Remember, Timothy, the gospel is the good news, the objective fact, the reality that is outside of you.
Timothy, outside of you, church, that Jesus Christ lived a perfect life, that Jesus Christ died a sinner's death, that Jesus Christ rose again from the dead for everyone who would ever believe in Him, so that they would be saved, so that they would be justified, so that they would be sanctified, so that they would be glorified.
That's not something that we would want to be timid about. We don't want to have an identity crisis.
Stoke those flames, pastor. Stoke those flames, church, because we've not been given a spirit of timidity.
We've been given the gospel. This is great, great, encouraging truth for us.
Well, I'm already ahead of myself, I think, because in verse 7 he goes on to say, "...but
of power." Not of fear, but of power. Paul loves to use that word in the context of supernatural enablement, holy boldness that God gives to His people, that God gives to His church if they're faithful to His gospel.
We've got this unique, unexplainable kind of boldness.
And by the grace of God, we're going to stand up. We're going to stand up no matter what.
Timothy, remember your apostolic affirmation. Don't be timid.
Remember, He gave us a spirit of power. So let the preaching have a spirit of power, not timidity.
Let the evangelism have a spirit of power, not timidity. Let the ministry by and large have a spirit of power, not timidity.
Not because we're so great, but because the gospel is so great, because Christ is so great. Because the gospel is so great.
But that's not all. Look what it also says in verse 7. And love, gospel ministry,
Bethlehem Bible Church. It's the same as any faithful gospel kind of ministry.
So we're stoking the flames, and we have a spirit of power and not timidity, and also there's a spirit of love in all of this.
We love people. By the grace of God, because of what Christ has done, we have a love for other people.
Yes, we have a love for God, and out of appreciation for loving us first, but because He loved us first, then we love
Him. And as a result of that, we love other people too. Which is why they need the gospel.
We're not trying to offend everyone, because we like to offend people. But people actually have a need, and we want to show love and compassion and kindness, and tell them about what is their only hope.
You love others. A spirit of love. I think it's interesting that this is all together.
A spirit of timidity is not mutually exclusive from a spirit of love or power.
They all go together. Too many times we think of love as sort of passive sentimentalism. It would never say anything to anyone.
It would never be bold. And they're here complimenting each other. And then
He adds to it as well. He says in verse 7, God gave us a spirit of self -control.
R. Kent Hughes gives a synonym for this, I think is helpful in this context. Level -headedness.
Clear thinking. The ability to evaluate. The ability to be discerning.
Good sense. Discretion. Sober -mindedness. Soundness of mind.
Not chasing after every trend. You're clear thinking in light of the gospel.
This is what we've been called to do. This is of first importance. This is the hill we will die on. He's given us a spirit of power, not timidity.
A spirit of love for this. And we're going to be clear in our thinking about it. Makes my mind rush over to Ephesians chapter 4 where we're not tossed to and fro by every wind of Jabez.
Right? By every wind of doctrine. We're going to think clearly. We're going to have 20 -20 vision when it comes to this business because God has given us a spirit of self -control.
He's given us a spirit of level -headedness. We are a gospelizing church.
We are a gospelizing movement. We are a gospelizing ministry. And we are not going to let anything distract our vision from that.
It even makes me think about the book of Philippians if I can mentally cross -reference there where there's division going on and what they need to be doing is striving together, locking arms for the furtherance of the gospel.
Get your eyes off of yourself. Get your eyes off of the problems that you have with some other personality and get your eyes on your business of gospelizing.
That comes from a spirit of clear -headedness. The ability to think clearly in the gospel context.
It's not about the latest thing. It's not about the latest conflict. What's interesting is apart from God doing these things in Timothy's life and apart from God doing these things in my life or your life, the life of this church,
I think we would be incompetent for gospel ministry. That Timothy couldn't crawl his way out of a wet paper bag.
Neither could I or neither could you. But God has given this spirit of boldness, spirit of clear -mindedness, not a spirit of timidity, spirit of love.
God has given us what we need. God has given us what we need.
And so since He's given us what we need, what needs to happen then in our lives and in ministries, we need to be passionate about the gospel.
I have everything I need from God. Passionate.
You can be passionate as a church. Let's move on to a second gospel mandate to be taken to heart, especially in this day, and that is be unashamed.
Let's summarize it by those two words, be unashamed. Now, there's more to it than just that, but that's a good way to summarize verses 8 to 12.
Let's look at verses 8 to 12 and work our way through those verses rather quickly, quicker than slower.
Therefore, do not be ashamed. There's our command.
There's the imperative. Be unashamed. Do not be ashamed of the testimony about our
Lord. No doubt that is gospel talk. Don't be ashamed of that.
Don't be weak or cowardice about that. Nor of me, His prisoner. He's a gospel minister, so it goes hand in hand.
But, share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God. As a matter of fact, if you're unashamed and you're really that committed, you're actually just going to not say,
Oh, the Apostle Paul, yeah, we're ashamed of him. We're ashamed. No, we're actually going to join in and be a part of it.
You might mentally cross -reference to Romans 1 .16. You know the passage probably well, if you've been a
Christian longer than five minutes. You know, we're not ashamed of the gospel. Why?
Because it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. So, he's saying, don't be ashamed.
Actually, join in the fun. Not that it's fun, but join in because you know the value.
And here's where he goes off on the gospel. Here's where I think he can't contain himself. He can't stand it under inspiration.
Verse 9, Who saved us and called us to a holy calling.
He's got the sovereign saving grace, this effectual grace. Not because of our works, but because of His own purpose and grace, which
He gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. He's just going crazy on the gospel in a good sense.
Verse 10, And which now has been manifested, has been made clear through the appearing of our
Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Are you feeling the stoke? I hope so.
This is great what he's doing here. He's reminding Timothy of the gospel. Don't be ashamed of this,
Timothy. Remember it. Consider it. Ponder it. For which, verse 11 says,
I was appointed a preacher and an apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do, but I am not ashamed.
I told you, Timothy, don't you be ashamed. I'm going to tell you by way of example, I'm not ashamed.
I've been called by Christ to do this. This is the greatest thing imaginable. For I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that He is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me.
This is great what he's doing here. Alright, Timothy, you're watching what's happening. You're having a tough go of it at times.
Maybe particularly now, and then you're watching what's happening to me in my life, in my imprisonment, and you know my history.
I don't look to see what hotel I can check into when I go to town. I check out the jail before I open my mouth and start preaching.
I know I'm going to be there. Not to mention the fact that the people who are with me, who are supposed to be supporting me in ministry, so many times don't end up supporting me.
They leave. He's going to talk about that. Timothy, don't you be ashamed of the
God. Timothy, don't be ashamed.
Be unashamed. No matter what the cost might be, don't be ashamed.
These are good words for us. You enjoy good seasons in ministry, and there's not a lot of external pressure, and there's not a lot of conflict, and you just, you know, this is good.
But you know, it's not always that way. It seems like Paul's writing to Timothy during maybe one of those seasons.
Don't be ashamed. Think about it. Think about who we're talking about here. You're wondering whether or not you should open your mouth and be bold as a church regarding the gospel for fear of what might happen.
Think about what we're talking about here. We're talking about the one who abolished death on our behalf.
We're talking about people's only hope. Don't be ashamed. Don't be a coward.
Let's move on to number three. A third gospel mandate to be taken to heart.
Let's summarize it with these two words. Hold on. Hold on.
Verse 13. Follow. Some translations say retain or hold fast.
King James, I really like that. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you heard from me.
The sound words, the healthy words in this context, the gospel words, the healthy words, the words that you need for curing your soul's ailments.
But hold or follow the pattern. Hold fast. Retain. Mounce, the
Greek grammarian says, this is a command to hold on to the gospel. Present tense imperative.
You must hold on. And you must keep holding on. You need to have a death grip.
You must pry my dead fingers off of it to get me to let go. That kind of thing.
It never will let go of the gospel.
It is everything and I am going to hold on to it. And the church where I pastor by the grace of God is going to hold on to the gospel.
I love the image, don't you? I'm going to hold on to it.
I'm going to hold on to it with everything because it is everything. The sound words he's borrowing from the medical world.
Translated in Luke 5 .31, healthy. Hold on to the healthy words.
Hold on to the antidote. Hold on to the cure. Hold on to the gospel.
Don't ever let it go. It's a great, great image. You've got the solution.
You've got what you need in the gospel. You've got what others need in the gospel. And you're going to hold on to it.
And keep holding on to it. That's what's needed. No fluctuation, no changing, no altering.
Actually, you can't get your hands on any other kind of message because you're holding on to this message. Death grip.
Maybe we should call it life grip. Because that's where the key is. It's good to stop and think about even ministries that are characterized by this,
I think. Where are those life grip kinds of ministries in history?
Where people didn't flinch. They didn't reach for something else.
They, by the grace of God, held on firm. They didn't change. They just held on.
They didn't go for anything else. One of the more well -known claim -to -fame quotes from Charles Hodge, theologian living in the 1700s and 1800s, professor at Princeton.
During the time when he published his three -volume Systematic Theology, how many of you have ever heard of that?
A number of you. Back when Princeton was a Christian institution. Published his three -volume
Systematic Theology, that well -known quotation, I am not afraid to say that a new idea never originated in this seminary.
That's a good quote. We are not about novel. We are not about trendy.
We are about gospel truth. Holding on to the gospel.
It's a great, great testimony. But a rare testimony.
I wonder, even, if somebody comes up to you and says, they're new to the church, and they say, you know, what's the vision for the next five years for Bethlehem Bible Church?
How would you respond? You know, where are you guys headed? What's next in your strategic planning?
You know, somebody asked me that. Well, how would you answer, I wonder? Well, somebody asked me that not too long ago, a new person to Omaha Bible Church, and I felt kind of intimidated.
I felt kind of dumb, to be honest with you. I said, so, you know, what's the strategic plan?
Where are things headed? Kind of give me the vision for where things are going to go in the next five years. And I said, well,
I think the plan is to keep doing what we've been doing. And the guy looked like he was let down.
And he's not at the church anymore. But you know what?
The more I thought about it, the more I thought, that's the right answer. I know that that's the right answer. Pry my dead hands off of the
Gospel, it's the right answer. Sure, there might be plans to reach out and do church planting.
There might be a plan to do this, that, or the other thing. But ultimately, our first answer should be, there's no plan to do anything differently.
We might look for open doors for ministry, where we can do what we're doing in a different place.
We don't need to have an identity crisis. What we need to do is hold on, literally, for dear life.
And I love that perspective. Well, just one more thing about this third mandate, as we're talking about zealously clinging on and boldness.
It could be done in the wrong spirit. Paul talks about the right spirit at the end of verse 13.
In the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. That's a good balancer,
I think. He's talking about this atmosphere where this happens.
Scholars would tell us, and I think they're right. As one person said, this then forms the atmosphere in which the sound words are to be preserved.
You see, how we hold on to the gospel is something God cares about.
And he says there, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. We're not talking about doing this with some kind of negative, bad kind of attitude of rigid orthodoxy.
We know what Christ has done. We know what the gospel is, and we are going to hang on to it, but we're going to smile.
We are going to have joy in our hearts as we proclaim it, because it is what brings joy to our hearts.
This is in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. Let's move on to a fourth gospel mandate to be taken to heart, and that is, let's summarize it in one word, guard, guard.
Verse 14, by the Holy Spirit who dwells within us. So this can't be done by ourselves.
This is not according to our good plan. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, He says, guard, there's the command, there's the imperative.
Guard the good deposit entrusted to you. The good deposit, obviously again in the flow here, is the gospel.
Guard the gospel. Guard the sacred trust. Guard the treasure is the idea here.
And it's not hard to understand, is it? Guard it. You're like that secret agent, if you will, who's not so secret, who has the briefcase, and it is handcuffed, right?
Your job, no matter what, your Christian duty as a church, as a pastor, as a
Christian, is to guard that sacred trust, that valuable trust.
You're busy guarding this, risking life and or limb for this issue of guarding the gospel.
This is no easy thing. It's shown in guardsmanship kind of terminology. When I think of guard,
I think of NFL guards. 300 pounders, right? Strong.
Their goal in life on the field is to keep that quarterback from being tackled on the offensive line.
Strong. They've got courage. They're going to give themselves to this sole duty.
Well, we've got this great gospel, this great Lord Jesus Christ, and what have we been called to do in ministry?
One of the things we're doing here when it comes to the gospel is we're 300 pounders. Don't mess with the gospel.
In the spirit of love, we'll say it, right? Don't mess with the gospel.
If you're ever on a pastoral search committee, you just might plant a suggestion in your mind.
This would be a good question for you to ask a pastoral candidate. Could you tell us a specific way in which in the ministry
God has given you, you have guarded the gospel against opponents?
We don't ask questions like that. We ask CEO kinds of questions. What kind of building program have you backed and succeeded?
And how many dollars did you bring in? I don't know where that is. When was the last time you, pastoral candidate, acted like a 300 -pounder and guarded the gospel successfully?
That's something I want to know. I want to know that. I would even suggest that if we're not committed as churches to guarding the gospel, it's because we don't value the gospel.
If it's really that valuable, we're going to guard it. When you go to the grocery store,
Mike and I were at a grocery store just the other day or somewhere, when he picked me up and we saw the armed guard coming out, or I did, and he was packing.
Not because he had a bouquet of tulips. I told me he had some cash.
He had something valuable. And he or his boss and those he was working for valued it enough to want to have somebody there who could handle himself and protect their trust.
Well, it's because they saw the value that they sent an armed guard. If you value the gospel and you see it as the antidote, the power of God unto salvation, then it's worth guarding.
But if it's just some kind of ditty, then who really cares? Who needs a gun? Here's a good exercise.
What are you guys doing as a church to guard the gospel? What are you doing? What are you doing in your part?
How do the pastors here guard the gospel? How do the
Sunday school teachers, how do those who evaluate curriculum, guard the gospel? We can understand the imperative, but what's it look like?
This is daily basis kind of ministry stuff. And where you see it happening, I say, praise
God. It's only by His grace that it happens. Where you don't see it happening, then this is something you'd want to do.
I would suggest to you, it starts with knowing what the gospel is. And if you don't know what the gospel is, you can't guard it.
It's also important to know who the gospel's biggest threats are. What are the threats to the gospel?
Could you write down three threats to the gospel that we see right now? I think it'd be good to be able to do that.
What have been the major threats historically that have ravaged the church and the gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ? As a matter of fact, they just keep repeating themselves. Read some historical theology and you'll say, this sounds like it was written yesterday.
Pastors at Omaha Bible Church are reading a historical theology right now. And it's just absolutely amazing to see all of these historical heresies that just regurgitate themselves.
And they have new names, new faces. But you want to say,
I've met you before. It's real life stuff. I do love verse 14 where it says,
At the beginning by the Holy Spirit who dwells within us. Because remember, the Holy Spirit's mission on earth, if you will, ultimately, is to glorify
Christ, which has to do with the gospel. John 16, 14,
Jesus says, He, the Spirit, will glorify Me. The Spirit is in this.
This is what the Spirit does. He glorifies the Son. And where we see the gospel exalted, we see the gospel protected, we see it guarded, we see evidences of the
Spirit's work in our midst. Number five, finally, we can do this one quickly.
A fifth gospel mandate to be taken to heart is two words, take note or take notice.
Specifically, Paul wants Timothy to take notice of those who have been faithful in doing this. And he wants him to take notice of those who have not been faithful in this.
He's going to show him, rubber meets the road, I'm not just theorizing, this is real, let me name some names.
This should sober Timothy, it should sober us, it should also encourage us. Verse 15,
You are aware that all who are in Asia turned away from Me, among whom are phagellists and hermogens.
Naming names, take note of them. Men you know, not faithful, have not done the things
I've talked to you about doing. And so, Timothy, so church, you might need to swallow hard on this one.
This is tough. And then, having named those who are candidates for the pastoral hall of shame, he names some hall of famers.
Here's the fellowship of the unashamed. Verse 16, May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed.
See, he's talking about the same deal that he was talking about before. He was not ashamed of my chains.
And remember, Paul's in chain because of the gospel, so it has to do with a gospel issue.
He hasn't changed the subject, he's still talking about the same issue. Verse 17, But when we arrived in Rome, he searched for me earnestly and found me.
Verse 18, May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the
Lord on that day. And you well know all the service he rendered at Ephesus.
Timothy, here are two examples. Success and failure, or failure and success.
This is a sober day for you, Timothy. It should be sober for us, too, because church history is littered with train wrecks.
And we also see, by the grace of God, those success stories where God has sustained and carried people through.
And we get encouragement from that. Well, I think our time is gone. Great quotation from a book that just got reissued,
Ashamed of the Gospel. I like this quotation. We'll end on this. All ministry in the early church revolved around the gospel.
No one would have suggested a debate about secular politics, a weight loss program, a comedy act, a stage show, a seminar on potty training for young children, or a class on time management for businessmen as a means to boost church attendance.
The church in all its ministries were single -mindedly committed to the one task of strengthening believers for furthering the gospel in the world.
May this be a gospelizing ministry to the very end when
Christ returns. Pray with me. Father, thank you for time together, time together singing, time together fellowshipping together, time together in your
Word. Thank you for this great letter that challenges us today as it has challenged believers now for a couple thousand years, calling us back, calling us back to the gospel, calling us back so that we might not have an identity crisis, so that Christ might be glorified, so that he might be exalted, so that people might have hope, the hope of eternal life.
God, bless our efforts for your namesake. And in the name of Jesus, we pray.