The Power of the Gospel

Let us sing a new song, let us breathe out every breath we have for you in this place. In the mighty name of Jesus, amen. Let us sing to the Lord, let us sing to the Lord. Oh, oh, oh, oh. You are worthy of all of our praise. You are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy of all of our praise. You are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy of all of our praise. Oh, oh, oh, oh. You are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy. You are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy, you are worthy. You are worthy. Oh, yeah. Oh yes, I'm about to praise this Lord. High and lifted up, high and lifted up. Exalted above them all, exalted above them all. Oh, there is no one like you, Lord. There is no one like you, Lord. Oh, yes. Oh, there is no one like you, Lord. Oh, there is no one like you, Lord. High and lifted up, high and lifted up. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Red heaven spun. ♪ From creation, His pride and adoration ♪

♪ Treasures woven by His love ♪ ♪ His careful hands, they hold us safe within His promise ♪ ♪ Of calling and of destiny ♪ ♪ From creation, His pride and adoration ♪ ♪ Treasures woven by His love ♪ ♪ His careful hands, they hold us safe within His promise ♪ ♪ Of calling and of destiny ♪ ♪ From creation, His pride and adoration ♪ ♪ Treasures woven by His love ♪ ♪ His careful hands, they hold us safe within His promise ♪ ♪ Of calling and of destiny ♪ ♪ Faithful, faithful to the end ♪ ♪ His heart is full of never-ending soul ♪ ♪ Love that's always chasing the echo ♪ ♪ His kindness overwhelming, hope won't be unending ♪ ♪ Never giving up on faith ♪ ♪ And I will sing of all you've done ♪ ♪ And I'll remember how far you've carried me ♪ ♪ From the beginning until the end ♪ ♪ You are faithful, faithful to the end ♪ ♪ And I will sing of all you've done ♪ ♪ And I'll remember how far you've carried me ♪ ♪ From the beginning until the end ♪ ♪ You are faithful, faithful to the end ♪ ♪ Your heart's an endless, heart's an endless ♪ ♪ Heart's an endless, heart's an endless love ♪ ♪ And I will sing of all you've done ♪ ♪ And I'll remember how far you've carried me ♪ ♪ From the beginning until the end ♪ ♪ You are faithful, faithful to the end ♪

♪ And all of my life, your love has been true ♪ ♪ And all of my life, I will worship you ♪ ♪ There wasn't a day that you weren't by my side ♪ ♪ There wasn't a day that you let me go ♪ ♪ And all of my life, your love has been true ♪ ♪ And all of my life, I will worship you ♪ ♪ I will worship you ♪ ♪ I will worship you ♪ ♪ I will worship you ♪ ♪ And I will sing of all you've done ♪ ♪ I'll remember how far you've taken me ♪ ♪ From the beginning until the end ♪ ♪ You are faithful, faithful to the end ♪ ♪ I will sing of all you've done ♪ ♪ You've done, now remember, how far you've come ♪ ♪ From beginning to end, you are faithful, faithful to the end. ♪ ♪♪ ♪ There wasn't a day that you weren't by my side. ♪ ♪ There wasn't a day that you let me fall. ♪ ♪ In all of my life, your love has been true. ♪ ♪ In all of my life, I will worship you. ♪ ♪♪ ♪ I will worship you. ♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ Jesus paid, Jesus paid all, all to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh.

Oh, oh, oh. Praise the one who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead. Praise the one who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead. Praise the one who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead. As we were worshiping, I couldn't help but think about the fact that why does He love us? You know, He loves you not because of your skill set. He doesn't love you because you're the best mom ever. He doesn't love you because you're the best son ever. He loves you because you had a need for a Savior. And you know the good news about that is, is that He doesn't love us any less when we're having the best, the worst struggle ever at being a mom. Maybe we're struggling at work. Maybe we're struggling in life. He doesn't love us any less than when He loves us when we think we're at our best. And so I'm here to encourage you that He loves you for who you are, not what you can offer Him, not what you can offer necessarily your neighbor. Although all those things are good, He loves you because you needed a Savior and He redeemed your life. And so I want to encourage you, don't be discouraged, but there's going to be ups and downs. There's going to be those times when you just feel like it's not going my way. But there is going to be a time where it's going to get better. And so I just want to encourage you that He loves you for who you are, not what you have to offer Him. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Mercy, hope, restore healing of all diseases. I sing prayers. I sing praises. We give you honor. Worthy Jesus. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for.

We give you praise. All of the glory, God. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for. We give you praise and all of the glory, God. And I see heaven invading this place. And I see angels praising your holy name. And I sing praises. I sing praises. We give you honor. Worthy Jesus. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for. We give you praise and all of the glory, God. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for. We give you praise and all of the glory, God. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for. We give you praise and all of the glory, God. All of the glory. All of the glory. All of the glory. All of the glory. All of the glory. Let your praises fill this place. Let heaven come. Let your angels be released. Let heaven come. We will worship God for thee.

Let heaven come. Make this place sweet for me. Let heaven come. We give you praise and all of the honor. You are our God, the one we live for. We give you praise and all of the glory, God. Oh, we give you praise. We give you thanks, all of the honor You are our God, the one we live for We give you thanks, all of the glory, God All of the glory All of the glory We give you all the glory, God All of the glory You deserve it all All of the glory To you Jesus All of the glory Let's keep singing that All of the glory It's yours, it's yours, it's yours All of the glory To you Jesus All of the glory I want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong

Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong Want to look on the face of the one that I love Want to stay in your presence where I belong I give you all of the glory I give you all of my glory I give you all of my glory I give you all of my glory How deep is your love for me? How deep is your love for me? Oh, how deep is your love for me? Oh, no. How deep the Father's love for us. How vast beyond all measure. That He should give His only Son to make a wretch His treasure. How great the pain of searing loss. The Father turns His face away as wounds which mother chosen bring many sons to glory. Bring many sons. Behold the man upon a cross resting upon His shoulders. Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice

called among the scoffers. It was my sin that held Him there until He accomplished. Thank you, Lord. Let's sing that verse one more time. Behold the man upon a cross resting upon His shoulders. Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice called among the scoffers. It was my sin that held Him there until He was accomplished. His dying breath has brought me I know that it is finished. Oh. Oh, thank you, Lord. It is finished. It is finished. It is finished. There's no one like You. I will not boast in anything. I will not boast in anything. No boast, no power, no power. ♪ Oh wisdom ♪ ♪ But I will most say Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ Is death and resurrection ♪ Come on. ♪ What should I gain from His reward ♪ ♪ I cannot give an answer ♪ ♪ But this I know with all my heart ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪

♪ I will not boast in anything ♪ ♪ No grace, no power, no wisdom ♪ ♪ But I will boast in Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ He is death and resurrection ♪ Come on church. Why should. ♪ Why should I gain from His reward ♪ ♪ I cannot give an answer ♪ ♪ But this I know with all my heart ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪ ♪ Why should I gain from His reward ♪ ♪ I cannot give an answer ♪ ♪ But this I know with all my heart ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪ ♪ His words have paid my ransom ♪ You know, a couple of weeks ago I shared about how Paul in one of his letters to the Corinthians shared his fear that somehow they would be seduced away from the simplicity that is in Christ Jesus. And I don't know what it is, man, about the last couple lines of this song. Why should I gain from His reward I cannot give an answer But this I know with all my heart His wounds have paid my ransom I feel like what a demonstration of what the simplicity of Christ really looks like. You know, I shared with the men this morning

at men's prayer out of Galatians chapter five where Paul writes, stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free and do not be entangled again with the yoke of bondage. Stand fast, stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free. Guys, I think so often we convince ourselves that it has to be more complicated than that. There has to be more to it than that. No, there's no way the gospel can be that simple. There's no way the gospel can be that good. That all who call on the name of the Lord shall be saved? No, there's got to be more to it than that. Here's the beauty of the message we get to preach, which is the best message ever preached in all of human history. It's that it really is that simple. It's not always easy, but it really is that simple because God really is that good. And so we come together in our singing and our worship. We come together in God's word, and we remember day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year, that the God who created us has also redeemed us. And through the blood of his son Jesus shed on the cross has made a way for us to be free from our sin, to be called children of God. There is no better message. There is no better news,

and we can spend the rest of eternity rejoicing in the amazing grace of God. Amen. Amen. Guys, we're so glad that you're here. Thank you for being with us at the altar this morning. If you are able to find a seat, this would be a great time to do that. Would you guys join me as you're doing that in blessing our musicians? Just letting them know how grateful we are for them. Thank you guys so much for your ministry today. Matthew Miller, hey man. It's great to see you, my brother. I'm so glad that you're here. I'm gonna come visit you soon. So glad that you're here. Thank you for being with us, man. It's awesome. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Well, today is a very special day. We've got a special guest with us. This is also, we'll tell you all about him in a minute. This is also gonna be, for those of you who haven't heard, Council of Elders have recommended that I take a sabbatical this year. And so we are, again, I wanna reiterate to you,

it is not because there is an emergency. It is so that an emergency does not arise. It's a precautionary sabbatical. I'm not checking into rehab. My wife and I aren't on the rocks. We're doing great. I am taking a time of rest to really reconnect with the Lord, to seek vision, to seek him in prayer, and to just play with my family for a while, which is, I wanna remind you, which is a sacred thing to do. And so I'm gonna play a lot of wiffle ball in the backyard with the kids, and it's, I'm gonna do it unto the Lord. It's gonna be good. So I want you to know, you're not gonna see me for the next seven weeks or so. There's no power on earth that could keep me away from our 4th of July party. I'll be there. We'll still be involved in the life of the church. My kids will be going to youth camp. My younger one will be going to kids camp. My older ones will be going to youth camp over the summer. So we're still gonna be a part of the community, but I'm gonna be going to visit Matthew Miller's church and some of the other churches in the community and receive from some of my brothers in the Lord. And I just am really excited about that,

spending time with God, with my family, and coming back, I think, refreshed and ready to run the race with new vigor and new focus all over again. So I am really honored to be here today. I'm excited to be here today. Thank you guys for making it a point to be here with us, to come and worship and get into God's work together. We get to the offering this morning. It's good news. It really is a privilege to partner with the work of God and to turn a temporary, to sow a temporary seed, to reap an eternal harvest. It was Jim Elliott who said, he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. And that is what we get to do today as we give in the offering. We are giving something that we know is temporary into something that we know is eternal. That is the kingdom of God and the proclamation of his gospel. And so as you give this morning, my hope is that we could give together, not just out of routine, not just out of habit, not just out of discipline or even pressure or coercion, but that we would give, as the Bible says, cheerfully, that God loves a cheerful giver, that we would give freely and generously as an act itself of faith, saying, God, I thank you for what you've done in my life.

And I thank you, Lord, that you're not done yet. I thank you that you're not finished with me, that you're not finished with this church community. And God, as I give today, I give what I have now for what I believe I and my family will gain in the future. That is that we will have a community here in this church to come to for many years to come, that our kids will be able to grow up as disciples of Christ, hearing the gospel over and over and over again, that we give into what is eternal, and that is the kingdom of God that stands forever, amen? Come on, so as you know, there are a few ways that you can give. There's an envelope in the seat in front of you you can use to give by cash or check or card. You can scan that QR code there in the middle, or if you have the mobile app, you can give through that. But would you stand with me? I'm just gonna pray over this act of worship. Father, we thank you that. because you loved us that you gave your one and only son. And God, if giving is a demonstration of your nature, then Father, we would ask that you would produce that attribute in us. Make us a people who give in love just as you, Father, have given in love. Lord, we thank you that as we give to the church today, that Father, we can give in hope and faith and expectation that you're going to continue to reach lives,

that you're gonna continue to heal hearts, that you're gonna continue to reach through this church, into this community, and to demonstrate your love and your power in tremendous and indescribable ways. God, I pray over every hand and every home that would give in this offering that you would continue to meet their needs. Out of the glorious riches that are found in Christ Jesus, Lord, I pray that you'd continue to meet their needs. And as we give today in faith, Father, we thank you that you are able to supply all of our needs, that you continue to bless us so that we can bless the advancement of your church, the establishment of your church, and the advancement of your kingdom. Lord, we love you today, not just in our word, not just in our singing, but in our giving. We love you today, in Jesus' name, amen. Amen, all right, whenever you're ready, we will be receiving the offering here at the front. Thanks so much. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hold on, you guys will sit. You guys can stand up in a second. I just, I love y'all. So I, one of the things that has,

I'll tell you sort of the journey that I've been on over these last few years. You know, a couple of years ago, I began to realize that we don't, you know, the church that we have planted here doesn't exist in a vacuum, right? We're a branch of a much broader tree that has been growing now for 2,000 years and was inaugurated by Christ at the cross, this church that he came to establish, this church that the gates of hell would not be able to prevail against. And so it has been a real privilege for me over these last several years to read the writings of some of my big brothers and sisters in Christ, those saints that have lived and died before us and to get to hear about their journey as they explored who God was and what he had done for them and to discover the church that stands across time and space has been one of the most life-giving and satisfying adventures for me. There's the physical church that we get together with, you know, week after week and we gather together and we eat meals together and we fellowship with one another but it has been great for me to be able to read some of the writings and to read about the lives and the ministries of those that have gone before me who are no less my brothers and sisters than any of the people in this room.

And I'm grateful for that. And I think that has been a journey that many have gone on over the last couple of years. They've wanted to find what unifies the church across different millennia, across different centuries, across different continents, what's the thing, you know, the common thread that unifies us and some in institutions like the Eastern Orthodox Church or the Roman Catholic Church have done their best to sort of co-opt church history and to say, all of church history agrees with us, no, all of church history agrees with us. And here's the thing that those who study church history, I think, really honestly and with humility will come to and that is that all of the great saints in ages past have had in common a great savior in Jesus. And also the contention that comes from trying to serve Christ while dragging your humanity along with you. And it's such a beautiful thing to see these amazing, wonderful people of God that did such tremendous things and to recognize that they were just people like you and me, that they struggled with temptation and sometimes failure like you and me, that they stumbled like you and me, that they erred like you and me, and yet God used them tremendously to lay a beautiful foundation that we get to stand on today. And over these last couple of years,

God has raised up Gavin Ortlund who is a tremendously knowledgeable and accomplished scholar of historical theology and a man whose voice has been for many, I think, not just me, a voice of. assurance and encouragement that though the foundation we are standing on is one that is made up entirely of humans that are faulty and frail like we are, it has been God who in sovereign wisdom and grace has put those humans in place, has built church history as it is to position us to follow Christ with confidence, with authenticity, with humility, and with passion today. And so I'm so grateful for Gavin agreeing to be here. His beautiful family came along with him. We have had a great time getting to know them, spent some time together last night, and they've just got just the light of Christ on them and we are seriously blessed and privileged today to be able to receive from Dr. Gavin Orland. You guys stand with me and and honor him as he comes to the stage. May the Lord bless you all. It is so wonderful to worship and to step into the sanctuary and feel right at home, right away and comfortable, and look forward to getting to know some of you, Lord willing. My kids are happy because they said, wow, we get to have a Sprite at church. This is amazing. We don't do that in our church, so I don't know if they're allowed to or not, but they got one, so there they go. But we are overjoyed to be here and excited for what the Lord will do. As we were worshiping, I had this image in my mind of a freight train barreling forward fast on train tracks, just smashing through obstacles in its way. And I thought, may the gospel, the power of God in the gospel do that in every single one of our hearts in some new area. That's my personal prayer this morning. Some new struggle, some new point of despair in your heart, some area of darkness. May the power of the gospel come into your heart in a deeper way. Okay, that's where, that's my prayer. That's where we're gonna go. I want to start by reading the scripture. We're gonna put our focus upon the Word of God for a few moments, and I'm gonna read

from Romans chapter 1, some of the most important verses that have been used to spark revival throughout church history. And we'll talk about that. But I want to read from these, and then I'm gonna say a prayer, and then we'll see what the Lord would speak to us. And these words will come on the screen as well. You can follow along with me. Romans chapter 1, verses 16 and 17. The Apostle Paul writes and says, for I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. Pause and pray with me, and let's ask our Father to speak to us this morning. Gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for Jesus, who came into this world and lived the righteous life that we have not lived. He died on that cross for our sins. He faced the penalty of our sins that we deserve to face, and now we never have to face that as we trust in you. We thank you for this, Lord. I pray for every single one of us, for every heart in this room, that the sweetness of that, the joy of that, the wonder of that, the power of that would press into some new place in our lives. Holy Spirit, we welcome you to speak to us today through your Word. In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. Now we're going to talk a little bit about the Protestant Reformation this morning. This is a work of renewal in the gospel that happened about 500 years ago, and I want to share with you a story about Martin Luther, someone that God used in this process. About 500 years ago, I think it was about 1505, in the middle of summer, he was riding a horse back to his university during a thunderstorm, and a bolt of lightning struck the ground nearby. And he was terrified, and the thought of God's judgment came into his heart and mind, and he thought, what would happen to me if I died right now? And this thought filled him with despair. He realized this would be bad news for him, and so he vowed to become a monk. in that moment. And he did. And he became about as dedicated as you can be as a monk. He would devote long hours to prayer, go on pilgrimages, you know, he would wear his superior out with his confessions. Some of us know what this

feels like. He would go and confess his sins and then he'd be leaving and he'd be saying, oh but did I miss something? And be afraid, what if I miss something? And then he would have this thought, he'd confess and confess his sins, he'd leave and then the thought would come in, well what if I really didn't mean it in my heart? And this put him on this kind of treadmill situation in his relationship with God. By the way, some of us learned this lesson the hard way like Luther did. If you're trying to make your relationship with God okay by what you do, it will never be enough. And what Luther came to see and the happy news that we'll all consider this morning is our relationship with God is okay because of what Jesus did. And it took him a long time as it takes some of us a long time. You know, I've been a Christian a long time. I forget this. I have to go back to this every single day. But it took Luther a long time to understand that he got to a point. He was in such despair that he began to feel, I wish I'd never been born. And all he felt in his heart toward God is this sense of dread, a sense of doom, sense of despair. By the way, sometimes just driving around you just feel this in people around you. There are so many people all around us who feel despair right now. Let us never forget how much people need hope. And there's so many people all around us. Sometimes you're going through the drive-thru and you can just feel it when you're interacting with people. People need the hope of the gospel. Luther had a breakthrough. I want to I want to describe his breakthrough for us and then we're gonna relate this through the text of Romans to our own hearts this morning. Here's what happened to Luther. He's studying the book of Romans. Actually, the passage that helped Luther is that very passage as we'll talk about. These very two verses in Romans. And what has the breakthrough is this. He realizes, see, all his life, we're gonna talk about this word righteousness a lot. If that's a big word for you, just think of the first syllable there, right. God's righteousness has to do with making things right, okay? Now for Luther, his whole life, the reason he's in dread fear of God as a monk is because he thinks the righteousness of God is like a big club that he uses to smash people. He thinks the righteousness

of God is his moral perfection in judging the world. And what he came to see in his passage is the righteousness of God is his perfect character in saving people. It's how he brings us into right relation to himself. And when that dawned upon his heart, I want to read you how he described this experience. You can read it with me on the slide as well. Think of the emotions of this and we'll try to relate this to our own hearts as well. He said, then I grasped that the righteousness of God is that righteousness by which through grace and sheer mercy God makes us righteous. Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. Now pause right there on that. That's what the gospel can feel to our hearts every moment when we consider it consider it afresh. This morning as we think about Jesus, hopefully this will come upon your heart like the doors of paradise opening up for you. Then he writes, the whole of scripture took on a new meaning and whereas before the righteousness of God had filled me with hate, now it became to me, listen to these words, inexpressibly sweet in greater love. Inexpressibly sweet. I want us to consider that transition from dread and doom and fear and judgment and storm clouds through the gates of paradise into the inexpressibly sweet wonder of knowing God is a father, being loved by him, knowing your eternal destiny is secure in Christ. And I want us to consider that from this passage in Romans. And by the way, I believe that many people in our world can relate to this experience. Lots of people in our secular culture are not thinking about God, but the same anxiety is in hearts today. People have the same unease, uncertainty, the storm clouds. You start thinking about the deep things of life like what does life mean? Why are we here in this world? What happens when life is over? Where am I going to go when I die? And that same Anxiety comes up in hearts today and I want us all to know the gospel in our own hearts And then we can share this message with others. Here's here's what we'll do I want us to see two things that the gospel means this morning The first one will be like the freight train. The second one will be the word righteousness two words that I want to reverberate around in our hearts first the word power and

second the word righteousness The gospel is power The gospel is not weak the gospel is the very power of Almighty God and The gospel is righteousness. Let's take those both in turn first. The gospel means power Paul writes I am NOT ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God now Why as you see here on the screen? Why would Paul start off saying that I am NOT ashamed of the gospel? You only would say that if being ashamed of the gospel is a temptation that you could fall into Why would anyone be ashamed of the gospel for Paul? It has something to do with the words that I underlined on the screen here To the Jew first and also to the Greek and a little bit of background information can help us Even though we don't face this exact same issue today that they had in the Roman Church We can relate to this in various ways what was happening in the Roman Church is that there was this kind of division between different kinds of Christians and Some people were thinking or feeling like there were the first rank Christians and the second rank Christians Okay there's this massive division between Jewish Christians in Rome and then Greek or Gentile Christians and people got it into their hearts that some people are more important than others and Paul is Explaining just before he gets to this work the verse you see right before verse 16 I put the other two verses right before that. He's saying I'm under obligation both To Greeks and to barbarians both to the wise and the foolish That's why I'm eager to come preach the gospel that leads him to say I'm not ashamed of the gospel Paul's basically saying there are no second-tier Christians there's just Christians if You're in Christ. There's no division between those who trust in Jesus whether you're wise you're foolish. You're Greek. You're Jewish You're educated. You're uneducated. It doesn't matter Everyone in Christ is unity with each other because we have unity in the gospel and This is why he's not ashamed of the gospel He's saying I'm not ashamed to preach over here or over there the Gospels for everybody now on the next slide

What I did is I put up the exact opposite I don't know This is a good thing to do as a preacher or not You tell me I put up the exact opposite of what this passage is saying so that we can better understand the logic of What it is saying, okay Here's what Paul isn't saying. This is the exact opposite verse 14. I'm under obligation to preach in Jerusalem and in the synagogues But Rome and the Colosseum and the Senate that's optional Verse 15 I'm willing to preach to the marginalized, but I'm not all that excited about it Verse 16 in fact, I'm a little embarrassed because it needs the gospel really needs some worldly impressive Impressiveness and worldly power to make it work That is what Paul is not saying but when we put it out there like that I think I'd like to invite you to humble your heart with me before this text and say can we ever be tempted to be ashamed of the gospel today We don't face the same struggle that these first century Christians were going through but all of us will have moments where we are tempted to be ashamed of the gospel Because following Jesus is not always cool It's not always trending There are times where we're gonna feel a little bit Tempted to be embarrassed When the gospel calls you You're a middle school student the gospel calls you to be a friend to a person that other people want to avoid We could be tempted to be ashamed of the gospel when the gospel calls us to take our sin and bring it into the light When everyone else around us is building a brand to look more impressive We could be tempted to be ashamed of the gospel When the gospel calls us to generosity To giving outward when everyone else is trying to climb upward We can be tempted to be ashamed of the gospel Here's one as one who spends time on social media. This one is real and the gospel calls us to be a peacemaker When everyone else around us is rewarding

combativeness and outrage We can be tempted to be ashamed of the way of Christ So this is the encouragement for us think of the freight train What's the reason we shouldn't be ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God for salvation We'll go back on the next slide and see this again And I want to try to press this into our hearts this morning. The gospel is a message of a crucified Messiah who was not cool in the moment of his crucifixion. If Jesus had lived today, he would have died with every last social media follower unfollowing him. All his disciples abandoned him. It wasn't impressive in the eyes of the world. But in that message, and in the way it works out in our lives, is the power of God. The gospel is the good news that any human being can be reconciled to God because of what Jesus did on the cross. He died on the cross for our sins. He rose again from the dead. So when we confess our sins to God, we forsake those sins. We trust in Jesus. We are adopted as God's children. We are forgiven of everything we've ever done and everything we ever will do as we keep trusting in Jesus. And we're given eternal life in the presence of God. And that is not a message that gives you worldly prestige,

but it is a message where the power of Almighty God resides. And we should never be ashamed of where the power of God is. Imagine a middle school student at recess, and he's trying so hard to fit in with the cool kids. And he's carefully managing his image, and he's laughing at the right jokes, and he's trying to hang out with the right people at recess and so on and so forth. And we're not looking down at middle schoolers because everybody does this in their own way. We just get more sophisticated ways of doing it as we get older. But he's there at recess trying to be cool. And then suddenly, dad walks onto the playground. He sees his parents. Now, I'm a parent of five young kids for some reason. I don't know why, but whenever my kids see me in public, it's like, oh, dad, go away, like this kind of thing. We get embarrassed of our parents. I did the same thing when I was a kid, so no fault with that. But it's like, I'm hanging out with my friends. I wanna be cool. And then dad comes along and says, son, we have to go. I'm taking you to meet with the entire team of the Tennessee Titans. They all wanna meet you. We gotta go meet them. We're leaving right now, come on. Now, in that moment, the seventh grade boy

stops being embarrassed about being with his dad, right? It's like, my social circle was here. Now, it's just expanded because I'm on a different scale, right? He's gonna say goodbye to his friends and say, I got something way bigger to do right now. Friends, when we follow Jesus, we have something way bigger than the value system of this world. Let me encourage you this morning. In the areas of your life where following Jesus is hard, it is shaping eternity. Who cares if it's impressive in the eyes of the world? This is the power of God that is at work in your life and in mine and in our ministry to others. And the world may look at that and not find it impressive, but let us never be ashamed of the gospel. One of the explosions in our culture we see is of self-help books. And sometimes I like to go to Barnes & Noble and just browse. I'm not interested in what people are reading. I just wanna know what are the things people are curious about, you know? And so I was at Barnes & Noble recently and I was reading the title of self-help books. And it was interesting how many of them are about you. Right? I've got a couple titles here I wrote down. Awaken the giant within you.

The road back to you. Get your life back. Switch on your brain. Lots of things like this. Now, you can learn things from all different kinds of books, but one of the things you think about is those books are tapping into a real need. We all sense we need help, right? But the problem is so many of these types of books put it back on you. And the gospel's so much better than that because the gospel's about the power of God coming into your life. So the gospel's gonna do something that's not within you. It's gonna bring something outside of you. The resurrection of Jesus. The power of Almighty God. It's gonna bring into your heart and into your life what you cannot do on your own. And deep down, we know we need that. I know I need that. I'm so thankful that Christianity is not something we're engineering. I'm so thankful this is not about self-discovery. It's about Christ-discovery. And I wanna think about what that means for us this morning and maybe this could be an encouragement like a freight train blowing through some obstacle in our lives this morning. When we feel stuck in a particular sin,

we don't need to despair. Sometimes we can be tempted to this. We can be tempted to think, well, that's just the way I am. I'm just always gonna be that way and that's how it's always gonna be. And the gospel says to us, no, the gospel is the power of God for salvation. And so we have the opportunity when we feel stuck in our lives to say, Holy Spirit, do within me what I cannot do in myself. Sometimes we get discouraged by the state of the world. This happens to me a lot of times when I'm spending too much time on the internet. looking at news, looking at social media, looking at things going on. I know some of you can relate to this too. By the way, great practice. If you're ever too tempted by your phone, this is what I do. It helps me. Because we can all get sucked in to the cycle of outrage and so forth. Keep an open Bible right there next to your desk. And if you find yourself tempted to just go and aimlessly scroll on social media, just open up your Bible and read a verse instead. It's a great redirect. But this truth from Romans one is a great encouragement to us when we feel overwhelmed by the state of the world.

To remember, guys, we're not doing something that is of our own making. The power of God is at work in our churches, in our hearts, in our marriages, in our parenting, in our evangelism, in your ministry that you're leading. This is bigger than us. And it helps us overcome discouragement. Our hope is in a God who raises the dead. Where are you and I tempted to be ashamed of the gospel today? Man, I was searching my heart with that question all week thinking that. Where am I tempted? Where is following Jesus not trending in my context and I need to remember the power of God in the gospel? Sometimes it's when we grow weary in our calling. Some of you may be God's called to do something. And six months in, six years in, whatever it may be, we can grow weary because it's not impressive in the eyes of the world. And we need to remember, this is where the power of God resides. May I encourage you, and this applies to whatever your calling is. Maybe it's an overt ministry. Maybe it's being a stay-at-home mom or a stay-at-home dad. I often encourage Esther when we're thinking about parenting as can be, it's such a joy, but there's a lot of energy involved, right?

And we say, this is shaping eternity. When we're faithful to following Jesus, that will reverberate on forever. That helps us not grow weary in our lives following Jesus. Maybe some of us are tempted to be slow to identify as a follower of Jesus in our work setting or at school. This passage would remind us, let me never be ashamed of the one who rose up from that grave and whose resurrection power is flowing through my life. I'll just say this prayer. This is a prayer from my heart. If it's in your heart, you can join me in it. Lord, help me never be ashamed of the gospel. Help me to be rock-solid committed to Jesus. I'm gonna tell, by the way, some of you have heard the song, I Have Decided to Follow Jesus. I'm gonna tell you the story that led to that song to finish this sermon. It's a great illustration of not being ashamed of the gospel, can give us a good target for us here. But I wanna make one final application point before we move on, and this is because we're talking a little bit about church history and we'll have Q&A later this morning and you can ask questions and we'll talk about what it means to be a Protestant and what God did through, I mentioned Luther, but so many others. Here's a thought that struck me that I think is good

for us to land upon our hearts this morning is what would have happened to Luther if he had never read Romans chapter one? You know, Martin Luther only was able to read that because he became a monk and he started learning the original languages and he was studying the book of Romans and it wasn't till late in his life. And in his day, there were so many people who didn't have access to the scriptures. And we only know about the gospel because we have access to the word of God. And one basic application from that is to say we should be grateful to have the Bible in our own language today. You know, sometimes my Bible is sitting there and I realize I've not been spending enough time in the word. One of the things that helps me is I remember, think about all the sacrifice that got that Bible to be on my desk just now. Not just printers and editors and translators today, but frankly, the blood of the martyrs throughout history. We would not have the Bible if Christians had not protected it during times of persecution in the early church and if brave men and women did not translate it and disseminate it throughout church history. What happened to Luther happened not just because of a rediscovery of the gospel, but because of a rediscovery of the scriptures.

And I wanna tell you just about a couple examples of that because I think this can be inspiring. By the way, did you know there's many languages in the world today that the Bible's still not translated into? And so we can follow the example of these pioneers and say we need to get the word out there. For me, I know this sounds crazy, but that's what I'm trying to do on YouTube because a lot of unreached people are right here in our culture and they've never heard the gospel message before and I'm desperate to go wherever I can to get the gospel message out there. On the next slide, I'll give you a couple examples. On the next slide, you can see a picture of the Bohemian reformer. named Jan Hus, or John Hus. This is him standing at the Council of Constance in the year 1415 AD. Do you see him there? He's in the center in those black clothes right there. This is about 100 years before Martin Luther produced his famous 95 Theses that he nailed on the door that sparked the Protestant Reformation, so the story goes. And Luther was not the first person to protest abuses happening in the church. Hus was burned at the stake on July 6th, 1415, and his convictions for that were numerous,

but one of them was his conviction that the Bible has authority over any other function in the church. If it comes to a contest between what some other authority or mechanism in the church says and what the Bible says, I'm gonna go with the Bible. Because the word of God stands over us, and we respond to it, and the church is created by the word. We're not over the word, we're under the word. And Hus died for that conviction. I get choked up every time I talk about the martyrs, so I'll get through this, don't worry, but it's inspiring, and you know what it does in my heart? It makes me wanna say, I wanna give my life for the gospel today. We need courage today like Hus had. There was one point where he was brought before church authorities, and they demanded his submission, I'll paraphrase his response. He basically said this, I am bound to obey the teaching of Christ's apostles, and if church authorities today go against them, I must refuse to obey them, even if you put before my eyes fire for the burning of my body. But I've read through his letters a lot. He knew what his fate would likely be for the stand he took. Incredible courage.

Let me tell you about another one. On the next slide, you can see a picture of this. This is William Tyndale. You ever heard of the name Tyndale? You often find that name associated with Bible translations. He translated the Bible into English at a time when this practice was fiercely persecuted. He was only one of many who was burned at the stake for his efforts of translating and disseminating the Bible to the common people. Oh, I'll never forget. The stories of church history are so dramatic. It's like, why don't we make more movies about this? You can get great stories. In the 1520s, we won't go into detail, but I wish I could tell you about the way they smuggled these New Testaments into England. They literally put them in casings to protect them from getting damaged by any liquid, and then put them in wine barrels so that the authorities would not detect the New Testaments. And these Tyndalean New Testaments just sold like hotcakes. Everybody wanted one. And it lit England on fire. And they took such courage to do this because of the pressure that stood against them. Why did they do that? Because of their conviction that I want us to wrestle with today as well,

that the Word of God needs to get out there. People need to hear the text of Scripture. And this was Tyndale's ambition in his life. I'm gonna read you what he said, and I pray the Holy Spirit would inspire some of your hearts as well. Early on in his life, he's speaking to a church authority who's pushing against him. And he said, if God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plow shall know more of the Scriptures than thou dost. And he succeeded. The Word of God went shotgun everywhere, and it transformed the world. And he suffered for that. And there's so many other stories like this we could share. But if nothing else, what does that do for us? Friends, let us be grateful to have the Scriptures available to us. And let us be eager to speak out the message of the Gospel to make it clear to those around us. Now, let's ask a deeper question, and this will take us to the conclusion. How does the Gospel save? This is where it gets interesting because we've been saying the Gospel is power, the Gospel saves, the Scriptures convey the Gospel. We need to get the Word of God out there because this is how people experience salvation. But I want us to see specifically

what Martin Luther saw in our passage and what he saw specifically in verse 17. And it has to do with righteousness. And I believe that if we can see this, everything will change. This is where the, what was the lay? Unspeakable sweetness. This is where the sweetness comes in. On the next slide, you can read this verse 17 with this. Paul says, for in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith. As it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. Three quick comments on the three words I underlined there. And hopefully, boy, if there's nothing else we get from this sermon, I hope you'll really consider this amazing statement. First, the word revealed. revealed. What that reminds us is the gospel isn't something that we guess if we're smart enough. This is not something we engineered or built up. This is something God showed us. God has come into human history and showed us the way of salvation. That's why it's so important for the scriptures to be translated and the gospel to go wide. Second, the word righteousness. This has to do with making things right. Now what Luther came to understand is that in this passage the righteousness of God is not just a hammer to smash you. The righteousness of God is clothing to cover you. How do you know that? Here's the key. I was going back through this text again and again. Finally it struck me. Know what it says. In it the righteousness of God is revealed. What's there? That's right. That's the gospel. In the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed. Now the gospel is about salvation. So the righteousness of God here can't be God's moral perfection and just judging the world as Luther feared. The righteousness of God in this passage is God's saving righteousness. It's how God saves you and me and he's morally perfect as he does so and here's the best part of all and this is what I want to press into our hearts.

He gives you and me a righteous status. The gospel is the good news that when you trust in Jesus your sin goes to him and his righteousness goes to you. So on the cross Jesus bore your sin. You don't need to bear it anymore and when God looks at you when you trust in Jesus he sees you clothed in the righteousness of Christ. The term for that is justification. That just means you're declared righteous. It's the opposite of condemnation and whether we realize it or not that is our deepest need to be restored to right relationship to God. Let's put it like this. This is the happiest way I like to think about this. You and I had a massive debt to God. Jesus Christ came into this world. He didn't only pay off all the debt. What he then did is take all of his money and put it in your bank account. That's justification. That's the righteousness of God to save you. You will have a righteous status in the sight of God. You're clothed in Christ. You're united to him. When he sees you he sees you clothed in Christ's righteousness. That means we relate to God from this standpoint of not needing to fear judgment. Like so many of these wonderful songs we were singing we're talking about how deep the father's love for us. Why should I gain from his reward? That's what Jesus has done for us and some of us might say well how do I get in on that? And just as some of us were encouraging us this morning as well it's really easy and that's the third word that I underlined here. All you have to do is believe. You just put your faith in Jesus and that's it. And the words here the language here is showing us that this is the initial step we take into this status but also from faith for faith. This is how we walk as a Christian. Sometimes we think well okay when I become a Christian my sins get forgiven. So if you become a Christian on I don't know January 1st then on January 2nd and 3rd you feel really forgiven. But by March you're a little uncertain and by October you're like well am I am I sin still forgiven? And we walk by faith at every moment of our Christian life. Our sins past present and future as we trust in Jesus are blotted out far as the east is from the west. The Bible uses this great imagery let's let it land on our hearts. What is crimson becomes white as wool. That's what God has done with your sin and mine. It went on to Jesus it's been born already fully that's why he had to go to the cross. Now you and I never need to fear God's judgment as we trust in Jesus. Whether we realize that or not that is our deepest need and when that problem gets solved everything else is going to be okay. Because if you have God as your father everything is going to be fine. You're going to go to heaven forever and even the suffering of this world is actually God's going to work it for good. So nothing can hurt you nothing can harm you if you've

been justified if you've been made righteous in the sight of God. Now if I may let's finish off by doing some application work on our hearts with this because I find and I bet I'm not the only one is that I need to be reminded of this and I need to come back to this and understand what does this mean when I'm struggling because I'm a sinner. And all of us you know it's this old slogan they used to say, I'm both righteous. and a sinner at the same time. When some of us hear about how God has made us righteous, some of us might be saying, not me. We can understand that. Sometimes you come to church, you slink into church, you feel like, do I deserve to be here? We have those emotions at times. Let me press this into our hearts. On the next slide, there's gonna be these two big words. Now, my philosophy about this is, let's not make up big words, but when the big words are there in the Bible, let's use them and define them. Justification, sanctification. Now, that was supposed to be an arrow from justification to sanctification. Let's hope the question mark isn't some kind of way of God getting through to us or something like that, all right? Justification leading to sanctification. Really simple way to break that down. Justification is your righteous status. Sanctification is your righteous behavior. Justification is the baseline of just what you are in God's sight.

Sanctification is how it's going on any given Tuesday or Wednesday. Now, those are different. God sees you clothed in the righteousness of Christ, but on any given week, we struggle with sin. We commit sins. Now, here's what I think can encourage us. So many times, we base our justification on our sanctification, and what we need to do is base our sanctification on our justification. Does that make sense? Here's the thing. Don't think, well, am I doing well or am I not doing well? If so, then God loves me. That's not the gospel. The gospel is God loves me, so help me obey better. The gospel is your status comes first, and it's immovable. Nothing can shake it. In the sight of God, you are righteous. Now, live into that, and when you struggle with sin, pray, repent, confess to your brother or sister in Christ. Keep going, but don't think God has given up or running out of patience. Sometimes, we look at our Heavenly Father, and we wonder if he's like us. We wonder if he gets fatigued and irritated, and the good news of Jesus is, for those in Christ,

God has nothing but favor for those in Christ. There may be discipline, but we will never face condemnation. He will never turn his face away from us. You're not gonna go from being a child of God to not a child of God. Oh, and then you repented, so now you're a child of God again. Now, you're struggling, so now you're wondering. It's not like that. Your status as righteous, as adopted, that is secure. On the same slide here, this really helps me. I got this from a book. I've changed, updated the language here, but it helps us distinguish what does and does not change in our relationship with God. When you trust in Jesus, there are certain things that don't change. Your fellowship, that can change. You might not feel close to God after you sin. Your experience of God's blessing, that can go up and down based upon your behavior. Your assurance in your heart, how much you feel assured of God's love, that can go up and down. God's delight in your actions, that can vary. God's discipline, that can come into the life of a believer. But what cannot change is your status as a child of God. You don't go from a child of God on Tuesday to an orphan on Wednesday.

If you're a child of God, you're a child of God. God's desire for our welfare, that is never gonna change. I mean, I think about this with my kids because it helps me so much. I have five kids, they're just amazing. Every day, it's like an experience just to be their dad. And you know, it's just laughable to me to think that I would ever not just fully love them. It's just laughable, right? Whatever's going on, I'm never gonna stop loving them. If that's how I feel, and I know you parents out there, that's how you feel as an imperfect parent, how much more does the heart of our perfect heavenly Father feel this toward his children? We need to be reminded of that. What cannot change is God's affection and love for us, and what cannot change is our eternal destiny in the gospel. If you're united to Jesus Christ, your fate is as secure as his. Your heavenly inheritance is as certain, more certain, let's say, than the rising of the sun. Just like Jesus didn't die and then stay dead, he rose from the dead, so you too will rise with Christ. And if you're like me, what I need is to go back and stop basing my relationship with God on the left column and root my heart in the right column. Say, this is who I am in Christ, and speak that power and that righteousness into the dark places of my heart.

How do we do that? Simple things help me. Maybe it means in the morning, before you head off into your workday, have a song. I mean, some of these songs we. you sang are so wonderful. Take a song like How Deep the Father's Love for Us and just meditate on those lyrics and listen to it. Maybe when you're doing your housework, have these songs going on in the background that can remind your heart of the truths of the gospel. Maybe it's a particular verse and what we need to do is take that verse. Maybe it's Romans 8.1, No Condemnation for Those in Christ. We take that verse and it's like sticky notes. We put it all over, like the interior of our mind and our imagination. We put sticky notes everywhere of Romans 8.1. Maybe you take literal sticky notes and you put them on your fridge and on your car dashboard and other places to remind you no condemnation for those in Christ. Maybe it's Romans 5.1. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. We remind our hearts through the scripture and through songs. Maybe, honestly, I think one of the biggest things we need is to bring our burdens to another brother or sister in Christ and unburden our heart

and share how we're doing. And then we have the opportunity to gospel one another. So someone comes and they confess their sin, they say, I'm struggling in this area of my life. And then we get a chance to be like Jesus to them, to encourage them, to remind them of the gospel, to speak hope into their struggle. And we need that. We need each other to encourage our hearts in the gospel. I wanna bring things to a close and then we'll have a time to pray and respond and appropriate this in our own hearts. We're summing up. We've said two things from this passage today. We said the gospel is about power and the gospel is about righteousness from this text. That means the gospel is about doing what you can't do by yourself. It's about the power of God coming from without to within, into your heart, doing what you can't do. And we said the gospel is about righteousness, which means making you right with God. Jesus putting all his money in your bank account, which is a metaphor for saying he's clothed you in his righteousness. That's the good news that Martin Luther discovered 500 years ago and that changed the world. That's the good news that we need today. You know, when I look around our world these days, I'm praying for revival because there are so many problems

and it's like life is short. Let's be really simple and let's be really easy to read. Let's just pray for revival. Pray for a renewal of the gospel in our day. That's what I wanna give my life to. And this passage inspires me when I think about people like William Tyndale and others, it inspires me and it makes this prayer come up in my heart to say, Lord, help me never be ashamed of the gospel. Help me live for this. As we were singing the songs earlier, we had several songs where the lyrics basically boiled down to saying, I worship you. Boy, those simple words landed on me afresh. I was saying, God, I wanna give myself to you. I wanna spend my life for you. I wanna worship you with my life. I know so many of you feel the same. And the gospel is worthy of that, to spend ourselves for it. Here's a final image of that. This helps me understand what it means to be unashamed of the gospel. And just, I'll give you the brief snapshot of it. Esther and I talk about this. Every time we talk about it, we cry because it's so beautiful. The gospel was advancing in India. It came to a particular village.

Several people became Christians. They experienced the power of the gospel. They had their sins forgiven through Jesus. And the authorities that be did not like this because it was a threat to their power. It always happens during revival. The gospel comes in and it disrupts the power structures of the world, and so there's always opposition. And this particular man was accosted with denouncing Jesus and told to do so. And he was threatened with having his children killed. And he said the simple words, ah, I have decided to follow Jesus. And his children were killed. Then his wife was threatened to be killed, and he said the simple words, I have decided to follow Jesus. And his wife was killed. And then he was given one last chance for his own life. And he said again, I have decided to follow Jesus. And he was killed. Well, guess what happened? The people who were doing this were so overwhelmed with this testimony, they thought, why would anyone do that? Why would anyone give their life knowing it's gonna cause such suffering, the worst pain you can go through? And long story short, this led to a process

of them confessing the name of Jesus, and the entire village came to know Christ. And that all leads to the song that many of us have sung today, I have decided to follow Jesus. When I hear that story, you know what I think? Lord. Don't let Jan Hus and that beautiful man and all these people go and spend their lives following Jesus without me getting to follow in their footsteps. I don't want to be ashamed of the gospel. The gospel is the power of God for salvation. It deserves my everything. I want to give my life to this and then I want to pray for a fresh work of the gospel in our day. And what would happen, my dear friends, if all of us just agreed together to seek the face of God for a fresh work of the gospel in our time? What would happen? What would happen if we just put tuned up, there's so many distractions, right? We tune out distractions and we say, God, pour out your Holy Spirit like you did on the day of Pentecost and let the gospel go forward with power today like a freight train. That is what the world needs and what better thing to give our lives to, what better thing to give our hearts to. I want to have us have a time to just reflect for a moment. If you'd close your eyes with me, we're gonna pray and we're gonna ask the Lord to do some surgery in our hearts, but we're also gonna pray for those around us. As we begin, perhaps the first thing we can do is for anyone who is here this morning who has a personal need for Jesus, if there's anything that is standing in the way, blocking that inexpressible sweetness that we've talked about, maybe it is a sin that we need to confess silently to you right now, maybe it's suffering, maybe it's discouragement, maybe it's depression, maybe it's a feeling of despair and doom, maybe it's someone else who is harassing us, attacking us, whatever that is, just to take a moment and ask. I'll ask the Lord to minister to you and I'll invite you to open up your heart and receive the love of Christ afresh this morning. And you can just pray to him quietly

there in your chair. You can pray, Jesus, forgive me. Jesus, help me. Jesus, pour out your love on me. And whatever is in your heart now, just take a moment and receive the love of Christ for that. And then we want to take a moment and we want to pray for the advance of the work of Jesus around us. And so I want to invite you to think of a person or a place in your life that needs the power of the gospel. It could be a neighbor, family member, a friend, someone that's just a distant acquaintance, someone you don't even know personally, or it could be a work setting, could be a physical place around that you drive by, could be a particular family, could be whatever it is, a place that needs the hope of Jesus. And I want to invite you just to silently pray for that person or that place and pray that like the freight train, the power of the gospel would invade that space. Then I want us to just come together and pray to Jesus. Jesus, we love you with all of our hearts. We thank you for coming into this world and living the life that we should have lived, for dying on that cross for our forgiveness. We will never touch bottom or run out of wonder and amazement for what you have done for us. You are so good. You are so kind. There is literally no need in our hearts that cannot be met by your love. For each of us here, Lord, I pray you'd minister to your servants here this morning. For anyone who is here who doesn't know you or is uncertain about where they are in their relationship with you, I pray you'd pour out your Holy Spirit on their heart and draw them to yourself and give them assurance of how much you love them. For each one of us, Lord, who's facing trials and tribulations, I pray you'd give them strength. Holy Spirit, pour out on their heart to teach them the courage like that man who said, I have decided to follow Jesus. That's what we want to do as well. Help us to say that, Lord, in our hearts. I have decided to follow Jesus. And lastly, Lord, as we look out on our world and we see so many problems and so many points of suffering, points of confusion, just chaos it feels like sometimes, we pray you would pour out your Holy Spirit for a great awakening to the wonder of Jesus. That there would be a new movement in which many come to know your love, your power, and that it

would change the subject from all of our problems. And that many would come to know you in our day and use us for that end. We pray in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Come on, amen. Gavin, thank you so much for an awesome and transcendently timely word. There is never an occasion where the gospel is not needed. And so thank you, man. So good. I want to I want to do two things. If you would like to give to support Gavin in his ministry financially, we will make sure that you have the opportunity to do that. Of course, you can use the you can scan that QR code there and you can use the the envelope in the seat in front of you. If you're interested in that, we'll make sure that the buckets are near the doors. But also, I want to make sure that I communicate this clearly. We have an opportunity for you. So in the next service, instead of preaching a message, we're going to do a Q&A. We'll worship together. And then and then Gavin and I will just have a conversation where he is going to field some of your questions. And so I know some of you may have questions about things that he taught or said today. Some of you may have questions about things he didn't teach or say today.

But we as we are wanting to sort of reinforce our understanding of the foundation on which we stand, I would encourage you, if you have questions about why, what it what it means to be a Protestant. Gavin literally wrote a book called What It Means To Be Protestant. So he wrote the book on that. So if you have any questions about what it means to be a Protestant, this would be the perfect opportunity for you to ask those questions. You can scan there. There should be a QR code we can throw up on the screen. We'll we'll throw that up. You can use your phone to scan that code. It'll take you to a page and you can just type your question in. We will get through as many of those as we possibly can in second service. I would encourage you to to stay. Go grab a quick bite to eat and come back, you know, hang out and fellowship, worship with us again. And then and then in second service, we'll be having a Q&A that I know is going to be an exciting and interesting and unpredictable time. So I yeah. Man, how much do we appreciate Gavin? Is this one more time? He has to tell how grateful we are. Fantastic. We will we'll leave this slide up so you can have time to think about your question.

Scan it there. Let us get as many as possible. We would love to have just a great in-depth conversation with Gavin. But let's just let's come before the Lord one more time in prayer and then we will dismiss for the day. Father, we we thank you for the gospel that that is the expression of your power in our lives to bring salvation, not to all who attend the right church or to all who read the right book, but to all who believe. And so, Father, would you reinforce our hearts, convict us away from any any shame or hesitation or reservation or confusion about what the gospel really is. Bring us back again and again and again to the richness, the richness of your grace, the depth of your mercy and the kindness of your love. God, we thank you for the Ortlund family, for their willingness to come and give their time and their energy and their wisdom to us. And God, we pray that they'd be richly blessed today and every day moving forward, continue to use their lives for your glory. And God, we say not just them, Lord, but us as well. You use our lives to glorify your name and to advance your kingdom in profound ways. And we ask this in the wonderful name of Jesus, your son. Amen. Amen.

God bless you. Thank you so much for being here. We will see you back here hopefully at eleven thirty for our second service. Thank you so much. You You