A Gospel Reminder | Last Words of a Dying Man Series

going to start a new series through the book of 2 Peter. Walking through the series that we're calling last words of a dying man. Last words of a dying man. The reason we're going to call it that is because 1 Peter wrote to a group of churches that would be in modern-day Turkey today and he's writing to them in the middle of persecution. The middle of suffering. Nero is wreaking, having on the church and destroying the churches and the people are experiencing unbelievable pain. And so Peter writes a letter. His first letter was to write to them and encourage them to persevere and to not quit, to stay the course in the middle of all of the suffering and to set their eyes and their hope on Christ and Christ alone. And so here he is now, a few years later, and Peter is in a Roman prison and he's writing the second letter in the same conditions of Nero's oppression and suffering that they're going through. But this time Peter is writing this and he knows he is going to die soon. He knows that the end is near. He knows that he's never going to make it out of the prison. In fact, I want you to see what he says in in 2 Peter chapter 1 verse 13. He says this, "I think it right as long as I am in this body that phrase in this body is a phrase that means that I'm alive. He says to stir up by way of reminder." Now listen to this, "Since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon." In other words, I know that I'm about to die. And here's why he knows that. He says as, excuse me, the Lord Jesus Christ has made it clear to me and I will make every effort, so listen to this, so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things. So here's what's happening. Peter's writing to the same group of churches again who are experiencing suffering and persecution and he's saying, "Look, I am about to die." He literally is on his deathbed in this Roman prison and he's going to be crucified upside down just maybe weeks and months, maybe a year later. And he's writing this last message to these people that he loves and he says, "I'm going to write to you again because when I'm gone there are things that I want you to remember. There are things that I want you to hang on to and not forget. There are things that are going to anchor you in the future." And here's the idea. The first letter he wrote, he encouraged them

to endure and to persevere. In the second letter he is calling these believers not to just persevere in the faith but to preserve the faith. He understands that because of suffering and persecution that the church is going to be vulnerable and susceptible for false teachers to come in and to mislead the people astray, to distort the gospel, to make it more acceptable to the culture, to water it down in order for them to be embraced by the community rather than suffering for their faithfulness to Christ. And here's what Peter knows. Peter knows that when the church of Jesus Christ is suffering or persecuted that the enemy will use anything he possibly can in order to destroy the gospel, work through them. We see this in our culture today. We're seeing persecution of Christianity and Christianity being made fun of and even people being in prison. We saw somebody a couple of weeks ago who got a ten-year sentence to jail because they were speaking out against abortion. So we're seeing this this rise of suffering, rise of persecution for Christian beliefs and and Peter is going to help us understand that whenever suffering rises and persecution increases the church is susceptible to begin to distort what we believe in order to accommodate culture. And we see this. We see this. There's a few mainstream denominations that we've seen the last couple of years and because of political and social pressure of cultural shifts you've seen them change their entire belief system on issues of morality and salvation and sexuality and because of that you're seeing literally the crumbling of those denominations that in one day in our nation's history were the source of revival. So how do Christians not just persevere in the faith how do we preserve the faith this is what Peter wants us to see as we navigate through this series in the face of opposition. So we're going to jump in today in first or second Peter chapter 1 and we're only going to look at verses 1 and 2. We're going to jump in really quickly here. Second Peter chapter 1 we're going to start reading in verse 1 and 2 if you're there say the Bible is true. Awesome. He says, "Simeon or other translations, Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ to those who have obtained of faith, of equal standing with

Make grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. Now, let's be honest, so many of us in this room, and we begin to read books of the Bible, typically and especially the letters, you typically will skip verses one and two and three, 'cause that's just the introduction. Let's get beyond all of the fluff, and let's get to the meat. And the truth is, I wanna preach only those two verses today, and I've been contemplating this week like turning it into a two-week sermon, because there's so much in verses two and three that I wanna talk about. So what Paul, but Peter does here rather, is he wants to start this letter by reminding these believers of a few things. Like he wants to remind them of the work of the gospel in their life, reminders are important. I know that we're in a really fun season here at New Beginnings, this is the time of the year, my favorite time of the year, because all of our college students are returning. You guys put your hands together and welcome our college students. Many of them are back, some will come next week. And in fact, we got a couple of sports teams. I wanna acknowledge real quick. We have our ETBU, women's volleyball team here. Let's celebrate.

Hey, you guys, girls, just kind of wave your hand, Ruhai. And then we have our Latino men's soccer team somewhere in the house. You guys wave, wave your hand, Ruhai, okay. Awesome, welcome you guys. It's hearing you guys on in your seasons this year, but college students are returning and it's a fun season for us. But I know this is a massive season in the life of their family. Many are returning sophomore, junior, senior, year, some of them are, many of them are freshmen coming in and no doubt, the last couple of days, there have been a lot of conversation about reminders in the home. I mean, letters that have been written cards and notes that have been stuffed away in drawers that students will find in a few weeks where mom or dad have written out, don't forget emergency contacts. Here's what to do in this situation. Here's where the nearest Walmart is. Here's where you gotta go. Like all these reminders and then there'll be moments where maybe parents are sitting down and saying, hey, don't forget who you are. Remember your last name. Remember who you represent, right? And so those reminders are good and this is what Peter does to begin this letter.

He wants them to remember their identity and the work that the gospel has done in their life. And so here's what I wanna do as we start. I wanna show you three reminders that Peter gives the church here. Three reminders that Peter gives the church about the gospel and its work in their life. Here's number one, write this down. He reminds them of their position. He reminds them, first of all, of their position and their position is that they have equal standing before God, they have equal standing before God. Look what he says in verse one. He says, "Simium Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ." Now listen to this phrase, "To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing "with ours." So rather than acknowledging them for their location or their region, he's talking to believers, churches that are scattered throughout modern day Turkey, but rather than acknowledging that the various regions represented, he puts all of them into one category and this is how he describes them. To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours, now why is that important? Well, Peter is Jewish, he's a Jew. He is a person born in Israel, raised in Judaism. And this is important because if you look

at redemptive history, the Old Testament, here's what God does to redeem humanity. God chose to set apart for himself a nation, a people, the nation of Israel, the Jewish people. And the reason he set them apart, he established a covenant with them and here was his mission and goal. God's plan was to bring redemption to all of humanity through the nation of Israel. This is one of the reasons that as believers we should support Israel in and politically align ourself with support of Israel because of God's redemptive plan that he has had with them and continues to work through them. But God's plan was to redeem this people to himself in order to bring about redemption for all of humanity. So he establishes this first covenant, this is gonna be my people. And so you have the covenant community of faith. When through them, he is ultimately gonna bring about Jesus Christ who would usher in a second and greater covenant where now all people who put their faith and trust in him would become the people of God. Does that make sense? So why is this important? Peter is recognizing, hey, for a long time there's kind of been the people of God and then the rest of y'all. See what he's writing to is predominantly a Gentile community. What does that mean? It means that it's everyone who's not Jewish

or not from the nation of Israel. And here's what he's showing them. He's showing them that now because of the finished work of Jesus, Now because of the work of Jesus, every person who puts their faith and trust in Him, whether you were a Jew or a Gentile, whether you're slave or free, whether you're a man or a woman, it does not matter that in Christ, every single person has equal standing before God. He wants them to know their position. They have equal standing. See, up into this moment, there is this social, spiritual, and racial divide that existed, and Peter is saying now, because of the greater covenant established through the death bear and resurrection of Jesus, we are now one as the people of God. Now why is that so important? It's important because this is, the issues that we have in our culture today is this, when it comes to the religious upbringing that many of us have, we are conditioned to begin to see our life on the basis of who we are and what we've done. There are some of you in this room. And if you were to get vulnerable and honest, there are decisions that you've made in your life. There are choices and paths that you've taken

that you regret and that you're ashamed of. And there are seasons of your life where you wish me if I could do it over again, I would have done it completely different. And because of that, many of you are believers, but you walk in this sense of shame and guilt over things that Jesus has forgiven. And because of that, you feel like, okay, man, I'm a second-class Christian. I'm a second-class citizen in the kingdom of God. And I just want you to be reminded of today. Listen, if you are in Christ, it does not matter who you are, what you've done, where you've been, how immoral, irreligious, uninterested in Jesus, you were once in your life. Once you are in Him, you stand before Him and you belong to Him and you have equal standing with every other Christian. There are some of you in this room that because of those decisions, you have not followed Christ. You think you've got to clean yourself up and fix yourself in order for you to be accepted by God. Listen, what Peter wants you to know, listen, you cannot fix yourself, but you can come to Christ. In the moment you come to Christ, it doesn't matter what your past is,

it can be redeemed, and here's why. He has more grace than you have sinned. Now, the basis of this, how do we receive this equal standing? The basis of this is God's grace through faith. Notice what he says here in this passage again. He says, who have obtained a faith? Those who have obtained a faith. The word obtained there is a word in the original language that literally means to a divine allotment or a divine gift. He says, listen, this right standing that you have is not because you're good enough and you've gotten your act together, it's because God in his divine grace has chosen to give you a faith that can give you an equal standing before him. That you've obtained this, this is not by your work, it's on the basis of God's grace through faith that you were able to be reconciled back into a relationship with God. And because of that, when you by faith receive the gift of salvation. You are fully restored, you are fully forgiven, you are fully redeemed. So check this out. You and I have the same standing before God as the Apostle Peter who's writing this. Isn't that great to know? Now, here's the question.

How is this possible? Like, how is this possible? How can we, even though there are some of us that have done way worse stuff than others? How can we all, though our sin degrees may be less or more, have equal standing before God? Well, here's the second reminder Peter gives them. He reminds them of what makes this possible and here's what makes this possible. It's Jesus' righteousness alone. It's Jesus' righteousness alone that gives us equal standing before God. I want you to see what he says again in verse 1. He says, Peter is servant and apostle of Jesus Christ to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours. How is this possible? By the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. Paul makes it, Peter rather makes it perfectly clear that what makes this possible, this equal standing is that it's not how good we are or how bad we are or how religious we are or how irreligious we are. We are brought near to God on the basis of what Christ has done. And here's what we do. We like to categorize people into different classes or ourselves. So here's what the classes that we use. We go, okay, this person's a bad person or I'm a bad person, but this person over here's a good person.

Or we may even consider ourselves a good person. So we have this classification. There's good people and there's bad people and we determine that based upon what we view as good and what we view as bad. The other category we use is we go, okay, hey, this person is, man, they're a religious person. This person, man, they go to church, and it doesn't matter what faith, they just, they go to whatever they believe in, they really wholeheartedly believe in it, and, man, they're very religious, and they read their Bible, and, man, I've seen them pray a lot, man, they were super religious, this person over here, man, they wouldn't come through a church if you prayed, if you paid them to. They're just irreligious, they make fun of Christian, they make fun of religion, they would never read the Bible and believe the Bible, man, they're religious, and then there's irreligious, then we have another classification, this person's moral or they're immoral. Now, this person has high ethic in their life, they tell the truth, they have integrity sexually, they're somewhat pure, so they're moral, this person over here, man, they are a train wreck, you can't believe what they say, you don't know what they're gonna be doing, you can never trust them, and so those are the categories,

they're good, they're bad, they're religious, they're irreligious, or they're immoral, or they're immoral, but here's the thing, the Bible does not use those categories to classify people. There are categories, but here are the categories, according to the word of God, we are either dead in our sins, or we are alive in Christ. According to the Bible, we are either, it's not religious or irreligious, we are either lost because of the rebellious heart that we have toward our heavenly Father, or we have been found by Him and fully restored to Him. The Bible says we are either unrighteous because of the sin, and we miss the mark of God's perfection, or we have been made righteous in Christ, and this is the point that Peter is making, our equal standing with others in Christ before God is not rooted in how good you are, bad you are religious, or irreligious, or immoral, or immoral, it is whether or not we are righteous, or we are unrighteous. You see, in this room, some of you here are in the position like Paul would say in Ephesians chapter two, we are dead in our trespasses and sin. Others of you in the category of what Paul says in Ephesians chapter two, but you have been made alive in Christ. Jesus in Luke 15 says, hey, listen, some of you, you're lost like the boy that ran away from his father in rebellion, and then some of you in this room, you have been found by your father and fully restored to the family.

You are either clothed in the righteousness of Jesus, or you're not clothed in the righteousness of Jesus. But the only hope that we have is his righteousness, and here's the problem. What does it mean to be unrighteous? It just simply means that we have not met God's standard. Now, how many of you, let's just have some little honest confession in the room, how many of you raise your hand if you have broken at least one of the commands that God has given us of things you should or shouldn't do? Raise your hand if that's you. All right, if you didn't raise your hand, you don't understand the question, all right? And in fact, we just need a person next to you to just start testifying about your attitude the last few minutes, I mean, they, right? Every single one of us, you know what that means? It means what Paul says in Romans chapter three, verse 10 is true. There is none righteous, no, not one. It doesn't matter how good you think you are, how religious, listen, if you are trusting in your religious behavior for your righteousness, at best all you have is self-righteousness. At best all you have is self-righteousness. And self-righteousness, by the way, is unrighteousness according to Scripture. This is a spiritual condition of all of us in this room. Listen, do you realize that without Christ,

so I said in Christ we all have equal standing. Everybody say amen to that? Hey, without Christ, we all have equal standing. Without Christ, you have an equal standing. What is that? We are dead in our sin. We are lost without hope. We are unrighteous in need of righteousness. And it doesn't matter how bad your sin is or how much you cover your sin with some extra good works that you do. But listen, if you are not in Christ, your standing is that you are separated from God and you are the rightful recipient of His judgment in wrath. 'Cause here's what the Bible teaches us. The Bible teaches us there's only one thing we need to have a right relationship with God, to have a right standing before God. And that's righteousness. It's God's righteousness not our own. The problem is we've all just admitted, none of us have that in and of ourself. So how is there hope? Here's what I love. God demands, listen, that we have righteousness and if we don't have it, we deserve His wrath and His just punishment. You don't love about the gospel. Eyes right here for a second. I love this about the gospel.

It's what makes it so glorious. Is that what God demands from us, He provides for us. So what God, listen. us because of his justice, watch this, he then provides for us by his grace. So the nature of God is this, he is just, he has to deal with sin, but he's gracious and he wants to forgive sinners. And so when those two come together, here's what you have. You have Jesus, God in the flesh, coming to live among us, living the life we couldn't live, dying the death we should have died, resurrected three days later, so that those who would put their faith and trust in him, here's what he says he'll do. His righteousness would be given to you, your sin would be given to him, so that you, like 2 Peter, tells us you could have right standing before God because you've been clothed in the perfection of Jesus Christ. But God demanded from us, because of his justice, he provided for us through his grace, didn't God good? And I love, Peter wants to make sure we understand the nature of Jesus, the deity of Jesus, of what makes this possible. Look what he says here, he says this, he says, "By the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ." What is he saying here? Peter wants us to know very clearly, Jesus is not just another moral teacher, he's not just another religious man, he's not just another prophet that the Lord has sent, he says very clearly, "By the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ." Peter is explicitly saying, "Jesus is God." So when Jesus puts on flesh and he comes and dwells among us, I love this, God says, "You need my righteousness and I'm going to have Jesus come and bring it to you." This is the hope that we have. Our position of equal standing is rooted in the righteousness of Jesus and Jesus alone. Well, the question is, what is this produce in our life? What's the difference that it makes in our life on an ongoing basis?

I'm glad you asked. Peter's going to tell you. Here's truth number three, I want you to write down, Peter then reminds them of what the gospel produces. Now, what is that? The gospel produces a life of continual grace and peace. The gospel produces a life of continual grace and peace. Look what he says in verse three, "He's just made grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord." Peter is saying, "I want you to experience and encounter the ongoing work of the gospel in your life." Now what does that look like? Well, first of all, it looks like grace. What is grace? Is God's unmerited and undeserved favor in our life? Is God's unmerited and undeserved favor in our life? Did any of us deserve Jesus? No. But he gives Jesus to us. Why? Because he's gracious and he's kind. So grace is God's unmerited and undeserved favor. What is peace, peace? Listen to this. It's not the absence of chaos, it's rest in the soul in the middle of it. See, a lot of times people think, "Well, peace means everything is well in my life and there's no controversy, there's no turmoil, there's no chaos." No, no, that's not what peace is. Peace from God, the peace that surpasses understanding, is the fact that your soul can rest when the bottom has dropped out of your life.

Through the years I've seen this, and there's people on all of our services, people in this service right now, I've walked, I've watched them walk through unimaginable loss in their life, loss of a husband or a wife, a loss of a child. And I can tell you, story after story after story, the people that I've witnessed that in the midst of having their life turned upside down and tears that you would not imagine yet in the soul there was this sense of the Lord is here and he's not going to abandon me. That's the peace that he wants to give and he says, "Listen, this grace and peace is not just something you receive at salvation, it's the ongoing work of Christ in your life." He says this, he says that it'd be multiplied, what does that mean? It means that it continues to abound in your life, so check this out, grace is not what you just received at salvation, although that was a gracious act of God, amen? Grace is what we live in every day, so the same grace that took me from a dead man in my sin to make me alive in Christ and born again as a new creation. That same grace is the same grace that is working in my life in the progressive sanctification of making me more and more and more like Jesus. If there's transformation toward godliness in your life, it ain't you, it's the grace of God being multiplied in your life. It's the favor and the blessing. do what God wants and then we walk in 1 John 1, 9, if you confess your sin, he's faithful and just to forgive you your sin and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. Listen, he doesn't do that because we deserve it. He does it because he's gracious, amen? Peace be multiplied to you. What is that? That is the shalom of the soul. That is the all is well, even when everything around me is not. It's the presence of God in the midst of your storms that anchor you and allow you not to quit. It's amazing.

This is what God wants to provide. How do we experience this? We experience this, listen to this, in the knowledge of God, end of Jesus our Lord. Everybody says here, make grace and peace be multiplied. How many want grace and peace multiplied in your life? How do I do that? In the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, another way of saying that is, in the knowledge of God through Jesus. The word knowledge there is not intellectual knowledge, it's not just knowledge you get from a classroom, epic and no-skill, intimate knowledge, experiential knowledge, personal knowledge. When I was dating my wife, we were a long-distance relationship. I was in college and we would spend hours on the phone and say, what did you talk about? Whatever she wanted to talk about. We would tell things about one another and like, here's who I am, what kind of stuff would you tell? Anything she wanted to know, I told her, anything I want to know, she told me. I wasn't in my dorm room with a notebook out going, all right, could you repeat that phrase again in case you ask about that later, I want to make sure I'm good for the quiz. I didn't do that because I wasn't studying a subject I was getting to know a person. Through the knowledge of God through experiencing, you know, so when you go to his word, listen to him, this will change your life. This is why we have a Bible reading plan that we make available to you, walk through a chapter a day, listen, this will change your life. Stop trying to glean information about Jesus from the Bible and get to know the Jesus of the Bible, reading through the Gospel of Luke personally right now and just, I'm getting to know Jesus. So this is what I'm reading and you're reading and you're like, "Jesus, tell me what was that like for you?" Like when those disciples did that, like were you mad about that?

So what happens, I'm reading this and I'm just talking to Jesus about what I'm reading like he's in the room because guess what? He is. And there is a study to this, there is a learning this, but it's more than that. This is why prayer meeting is so important for us as a church family, 630 every Wednesday night. Why? Because we have a value. God's presence is essential. Why is God's presence is essential? It's because in God's presence, I get to know him. Prayer is not about you telling God the things that he already knows. It's about you learning who he is and listening to his voice and communing and you offering up request and him saying no or yes or maybe you're a wait or why do you want that and him just work. What's happening is prayer is not meant to be transactional but relational. The knowledge of God. And when you get to know him, he changes everything. Listen to what Jim Shaddick says about this, James Shaddick says this. He says, "In short, grace and peace can only be found and experienced when one knows God and one can only know God in relationship with Jesus." This beloved is at the heart of the gospel. And listen, here's the thing I love that Peter knows this. Peter knows this. How do we know this? Because Peter is chained in a prison knowing he's never going to get out. Nero made sport of how he killed Christians for entertainment. And the Holy Spirit told Peter, "You're not leaving prison. You're going to die here." Peter knows.

I don't know exactly what my death is going to be but I know it's going to be awful. And so maybe in the knowledge of this reality, he gets a pen and a paper and with hands trembling and tears flowing, he says, "I got to write some final words to people that I love." [MUSIC PLAYING] this grace and this peace that He's writing to them going, "When I'm gone, I want you to remember these things. "I want you to be anchored in these things." And He's reminiscing about the gospel and the work and the dangers and He's calling them to faithless. How could Peter have this posture? Here's why, he walks with Jesus for more than 30 years. That's how. He's an older man sitting in a jail cell who doesn't just have theological degrees when he learned about Jesus. This is a man who walked and he cried and he prayed to and he experienced. And because of this, the last words of a dying man, grace and peace flows from Him. See, what does this look like in real life? A week ago Monday, I believe that was the day, was a five-year anniversary where our church family lost one of our dearest, most faithful members of our church. And this man was more than just a church member. He was a mentor, a dear friend. He was like a spiritual father to me in many ways. I probably learned more about leadership from this man than maybe anybody else in my life. I learned how to walk with integrity and have charisma and five years ago, we lost our friend, Roy Brown.

And man, as a pastor, there's just certain people through the years that just impact you in different ways and Roy was like a spiritual father to me. I mean, he puts his big old arms around me and squeeze the back of my neck and pull me in and just tell me he loves me. Ask me a question, talk to me about leadership, ministry, and we found out he was diagnosed with cancer. We just all pray and that God would heal him and God chose not to heal him. And as he got the news that he was down to his final days, Roy was always a strong man and he was strong until he died, but more internally and spiritually than anything else. He's kind of a larger-than-life personality. If you know him, you know what I'm talking about. And I'll never forget, he sent a message, "Hey, I want you to come see me, I want you to bring the family." And we made the drive out to the lake house and we set in his living room and it was the last time I was ever gonna see my friend again on this side of eternity. Of course, when we walk in, we small talk, we talk, small talk for Roy was tell me about the church. Well, we got planned, what are we gonna go next? What are we gonna do? He's always wanting to know, what's the next campus we're gonna plan? We gotta get after it. Look, we gotta, whatever God's doing, we gotta get there.

I mean, he's just kind of hyping me up and we spent probably an hour and a half out there just hanging out talking. And then when he got toward the end of that conversation, Roy just said, "I wanna talk to you for a few moments." I wish I could have recorded the conversation. But one of my heroes, spiritual father took the time, literally on his deathbed to give me his last words, the last words of a dying man. He started with my youngest and he said, "Mica, I hate that I'm not gonna see you grow old. "But I love you. "Jesus has great plans for your life. "Follow him." He went to my son Noah, Noah. Be a godly man. Walk with integrity. Trust Jesus to make you the man that you, and he poured in to know, then he goes to McKenna McKenna, God has his hand on your life. Trust the Lord. He has big things for you. Then he got to Adrian, and he says, "Adriene, "you're calling us a pastor's wife. "God is using you greatly." And he just spoke words of encouragement and it powered her and her calling. And then he got to me and Roy would always call me son,

ain't he? Son? Finish the job. Finish the job. Don't quit. You do everything that God's called to you. [MUSIC PLAYING] And he said, "I hate that I'm not going to be there to see it, but trust the Lord and finish the job." When that conversation was over, you can imagine, as I'm crying now, we were just all a mess. We were able then to turn to Roy and tell him how much we love him. He talked about heaven, how excited he was, even though he was sad to leave the people he loved. It was in his eyes the sense of confidence and courage, there was no fear. And about two weeks later, I was able to preach Roy's funeral. And I'm telling you this, I will always forever cherish the last words of a dying man. And here's one of the reasons why when we got in the truck to leave, I looked at my kids. We were all just a mess. We were crying as hard leaving as we were because we knew. It was going to be a little while. And the only thing that I could tell my kids in that moment, I just said this, "If you've ever wondered why the resurrection of Jesus matters, you've just seen it. If you ever wonder what it looks like for Christ to be your hope, you just saw it, you just saw what it looks like for him." This is what I said, "For a man to stare death in the face without fear." That's the power of the gospel and that's the power of the Jesus that we follow. All because of the last words of a dying man. For some of you in this room, this question is for you. Do you have the hope of Roy Brown in your life?

Do you have the grace and peace that we witnessed in his life? Do you live with that kind of confidence about your salvation, about your eternity? Or is there a question mark of whether or not you know him? The difference in Roy's life is that he embraced Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior and it changed his life forever. Roy would say this, "If you see anything good in me, it's came from Jesus." If you have the hope and the confidence about your salvation and your relationship with Jesus like that, I'm going to ask you to bow your heads. If you're uncertain of your relationship with Jesus, I'm going to give you a moment to respond and then I'm going to give a response for those of you who are believers. If you're in this room and you're like, "I don't know that I know Jesus, I don't know that I've ever embraced his righteousness, I've trusted in my good works, or I thought I was too bad, or I've tried to clean myself up, or I've been religious." But you've never trusted Jesus as your Lord and Savior. Here's what I encourage you to do right now where you are. If you need to trust Christ, if you're sensing this drawing to you, say, "What is that feeling that I have of wanting to do that?" that is the Holy Spirit, graciously giving you the faith to receive Christ and have equal standing because of his righteousness. And you need to obtain it by receiving the gift. If that is where you are and you're sensing that right now where you are, just confess your sin and say, "God, I'm a sinner and I need a Savior, and I'm asking you to come and live inside of me." I recognize that your death and resurrection and your righteousness is my only hope. Save me in Jesus' name. With no one looking around, keep your heads about in your eyes because I'm going to ask you to do something that's going to take courage and boldness. It's going to take courage and boldness, but the Holy Spirit will give it to you if you trust Him. If you pray to receive Christ this morning, you're saying, "I want what you're talking about.

Like, I need Christ in my life, or I just prayed with you." With no one looking around, I'm going to ask you to do something very bold. Right now where you are, I'm going to ask you to stand to your feet if that's you. just stand. I know that it takes a lot of courage. But here's the thing, if you're serious about trusting Christ, it means the greatest thing in your life just happened to you. And if this is something you're serious about, you're going to be willing to stand. I'm going to ask you to stand right now if that's you. Praise God. It takes a lot of courage. Praise God over here. You're standing, just look up. There's going to be an encourager that's going to reach out to you. They want to pray with you. Yeah, go ahead and slip out of your seat. Several people, you're not alone. There's anyone else that wants to stand. Praise God. These encouragers just want to help you begin this journey. Those who are believers in the front look up at me for a second. Let's just put our hands going to celebrate what Jesus is doing today. We're going to respond. And here's for you, here's the response. Are you living, experiencing the multiplied grace and peace in your life? Like are you living in this faith? Are you living the confidence of who you are in Christ? If not, I want to encourage you, like ask the Holy Spirit, would you give me? Are you growing in your knowledge and your relationship with Jesus? If not, ask Him to do this work in your life. Let's just take a moment and stand. We're going to sing just for a moment. And let's respond to this altar is open. There's some prayer partners available still. And if you need prayer, come. But let's ask Jesus to do this gracious work in us today as we sing.