Holding Fast

And just because there's a church in every corner doesn't mean the gospel is preached on every corner.

And there's one thing that we, as God's people, must not allow ever to change, and that is the gospel of Jesus Christ. If we are to stand firm, if we are to be united in the battle for truth in our day, we must be clear and unwavering on the gospel. This is the Thursday edition of Renewing Your Mind.

I'm your host, Nathan W. Bingham. All week, you have been hearing messages from Ligonier Ministries 2023 National Conference. Over three days in Orlando, we were called to stand firm and show what that looks like in the life of a Christian and in the life of the church. Today we're featuring a message from Burke Parsons.

He serves as Ligonier's chief publishing officer and the editor of Table Talk magazine. Here's Dr. Parsons as he calls us to hold firm to the gospel. When it comes to holding fast or standing firm, we understand that we live in a rapidly changing world. Everything is changing, and it is changing maybe more quickly than ever before, and certainly more quickly than most of us care to see. With the advances in artificial intelligence, advances in science, blockchain technology, Web3, Metaverse, we can go on and on and on and talk about the changes that are happening all around us. But what truly is most fascinating to me is not the changes that are taking place in the world, but in truth the rapid changes that we have seen in the church.

Over the past several years, the changes that we have seen have truly amazed me, though not surprised me. For any of us paying attention, the truth is, is that over the last several years with the changes in the church, it has allowed progressives and liberals to sort of more freely identify themselves. It used to be years ago that we could recommend churches to people.

Remember those days? But now churches are changing so quickly, their messages are changing so quickly, their pastors' views and perspectives are changing so quickly, it's very difficult to recommend churches anymore. You know, 20, 30 years ago we could recommend a church to someone, or we found out they were going to a local Baptist church or a Bible church or even sometimes a Presbyterian church, though that was less frequent, and we would hear that they're under the preaching of the Word of God. We could trust that they were hearing the Word of God, that they were hearing the gospel of God.

That's not the case anymore. And just because there's a church in every corner doesn't mean the gospel is preached on every corner. Things are changing rapidly.

Churches are changing rapidly. And there's one thing that we as God's people, as Christians, must not allow ever to change, and that is the gospel of Jesus Christ. If you would turn with me to Galatians chapter 5, we're going to read from verses 1 through verse 15.

We're not going to look at this in depth. I'm not going to be expositing this verse by verse, which is my habit, but we're going to be looking at some of the themes of Paul in Galatians chapter 5 and in the book of Galatians beginning at chapter 5 and verse 1. This is the Word of God. For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm therefore and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Look, I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law. You have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit by faith we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything but only faith working through love.

You are running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion is not from him who calls you.

A little leaven leavens the whole lump. I have confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view, and the one who is troubling you will bear the penalty whoever he is. But if I, brothers, still preach circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been removed.

I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves. For you are called to freedom, brothers, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. But through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another. Let's pray together. Our gracious and loving Lord, we thank you for your Word. Lord, help us to be more grateful for your Word.

Help us not to take your Word for granted. Lord, we ask that through our time together that we would not come to love conferences more as ends in and of themselves, but rather you would help us to love our local churches more. You'd help us to love one another more. You'd help us to grow in our love for you more. That our time together would help us to grow in knowledge. Our time together would help us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ and our love for you, our Lord. All for your glory we pray.

Amen. Now throughout Galatians, Paul is dealing fundamentally with how men are made right with God. He's dealing with this through the lens of focusing on the gospel. We understand that justification by faith is not the gospel, yet it is centered around the gospel. Paul warns them from the outset in chapter 1 that they are leaving the gospel for another gospel which is no gospel whatsoever. Now I've found over the years that Christians are often confused about what the gospel is.

Now that should alarm us. I remember many years ago teaching a seminary class, and as I defined the gospel, one of the students said, I've never heard a definition of the gospel. And this student was a third-year seminary student. He'd never heard an explanation of the gospel. I imagine even this evening if I went around the room and I asked you, what is the gospel, we'd have various interpretations and definitions and explanations of what the gospel is and perhaps what the gospel is not. Many of those explanations I'm sure would be right, but some of those explanations would add things to the gospel that the gospel in its most simple form does not contain.

It's Charles Hodge, the great old Princeton theologian who said that the gospel is so simple that a small child can understand it, and yet so glorious or so vast that even the wisest theologians will never exhaust its riches. The simple gospel of Jesus Christ is news. It is good news. That's what the word euangelion or gospel in Greek means. The gospel is news.

It is good news. It is an announcement of victory, of what God has done through Christ by the power of the Spirit, not only the death of Christ but the life of Christ. The pure and simple gospel message of Jesus Christ does not contain warnings or threats or commands.

Now warnings and threats come. Commands to repent and believe come on the heels of the gospel message. But the gospel message itself is a message of victory, is an announcement of what God has done.

It is good news, plain and simple. The commands to repent and believe come upon the hearing of the gospel. The command to take up your cross and follow Christ come on the heels of the gospel proclamation. But the pure and simple gospel must be preserved, and that is exactly what the Apostle Paul is striving to do with the Galatian church, as they have these false teachers coming in, these Judaizers claiming that in order to be truly right with God, in order to be truly justified, in order to be saved, they needed to add to the gospel the law, more specifically as Paul deals with in chapter 5, circumcision. Now Paul hints at circumcision earlier on in Galatians, but he waits until towards the end in chapter 5 to deal with this pivotal issue of circumcision.

That was the matter at hand. And circumcision represented not only circumcision, but it was representative of the law itself. And these Judaizing false teachers were coming among the churches saying, you must not only believe in Jesus as the Messiah, you must also accept and follow the law of God in order to, and that's the critical point, in order to be made right with God. And so in verse 1 of chapter 5, Paul in this verse looks back upon what he has just said in chapter 4 and verses 21 through 31, and then looks forward to the rest of what he says in chapter 5. It's a pivotal verse where Paul makes a stand and says boldly, for freedom Christ has set us free. It's a beautiful statement. It's for freedom that Christ has set us free.

It seems obvious. It seems like something that Paul shouldn't have to say. Of course, freedom is for freedom. But you see, they had begun to believe the lie that the freedom that they had in Christ, the freedom by trusting the gospel, by believing Christ was a freedom not unto freedom, but a freedom unto slavery.

And so Paul makes this obvious point almost as if he's speaking to children because they were acting like children and believing these false teachers. And so Paul has to state for the record in the simplest way and most obvious way he possibly can, freedom is for freedom. Christ set you free for the sake of your freedom. Now, the problem with freedom among many people in our day is that they don't understand what freedom is, nor do they understand why freedom exists. Most people think freedom is this. Freedom is doing whatever you want, whenever you want, however you want, identifying by whatever you want, with whomever you want at all times. That's not freedom.

That's anarchy. Freedom is having the ability or being enabled to or being set free to do and to be and to live in the way that we ought to live, the way we ought to do what we are called to do. It is freeing us to be what we ought to be, not doing whatever we want to do. Now, the Galatians were having trouble understanding this. And so Paul says it's for freedom that Christ has set you free.

And he goes on in chapter 5 to explain what that freedom looks like and what it doesn't look like, stand firm therefore and do not submit again to yoke of slavery. We need to stand firm in every area of the Christian life. We as Christians have had over the last many years, particularly over the last several years, we have had to work hard to stand firm on Christian ethics. We have had to stand firm when it comes to gender. We have had to stand firm when it comes to life and what life is and how life must be defended. We have had to stand firm on every matter under the sun in the face of the onslaught from our culture, and even as the culture has in some ways infiltrated the church. Some of you have had to do these battles in the church as you have sought to stand firm on the Word of God.

And what Paul is telling the Galatians to do here is to stand firm. It's a militaristic term saying you must be on guard. You must be ready to defend.

You must be ready to stand your ground. And soldiers would stand even in arms as they stood their ground to defend. And as one has said, a good soldier doesn't fight fundamentally because he hates what's in front of him.

He fights fundamentally because he loves what's behind him. And as Christians, we are called to stand firm not simply because we hate the ideologies of the world and the zeitgeist or the spirit of the age of our culture, but because we love what is behind us. We love the Bible. We love the gospel.

We love our Lord, and we want to defend His character, His truth, and His Word because it's the only thing that we know that gives life to this dying world. Stand firm, Paul says, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Look, I, Paul, I say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no value to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law.

Now, Paul's already made this case earlier on in Galatians wherein he quotes Deuteronomy chapter 27 and verse 26 essentially saying that if you seek to be justified by keeping the law, any part of the law, well then you have chosen that path. You've chosen the path of trying to fulfill the law on your own, and that means you have to fulfill the entirety of the law. You have to fulfill the entirety of the book. You have to fulfill all the law. And so if you're going to take that path and you're going to let circumcision or whatever law it is that you think is going to make you right with God, you've got to complete it all.

You've got to do each and everything perfectly. So if you accept circumcision, if you accept that route, if you believe these Judaizers and these false teachers, these legalists among you, then you've got to go to the very end of keeping the entirety of the law, and you are severed from Christ, you who would be justified. You've fallen from grace. Now the key to understanding this verse is really twofold. The first comes with that phrase right there in the middle, you who would be justified. Notice he's not saying they are justified, some of them. He's saying you're claiming to be justified. You are claiming to know the grace of God. You are claiming to trust Christ. You are claiming to be a Christian, but in fact you're not. Those who would accept circumcision and strive to keep the entirety of the law in order to be made right with God actually don't know God.

They actually don't know Christ because they're not trusting Christ because they're not trusting the gospel of Christ. Paul says, you who would be justified by the law, you've fallen from grace. Is it possible to fall from grace? Is it possible to be severed from Christ, to be joined Him and then severed from Him? Is it possible to have grace and then fall from grace?

No. Paul is speaking in a matter of speaking in a way in order to make his point because in truth Paul understands well that there are many in the church who profess to be Christians, though they are not true Christians. We read in John's first epistle that there were some Christians who were of us, but they didn't remain with us because if they were truly of us, they would have remained with us.

The point is, is that there are many people who profess Christ and then fall away, but they actually never knew Christ because if they actually knew Christ, they would have remained. They would have remained faithful in the end. Certainly they may have sinned. They may have fallen into grievous and heinous sins, but they would have repented. They would have been restored.

They would have been reconciled, and they would have eventually and ultimately continued with the people of God. Paul is giving to them such a severe warning because this type of salvific legalism is deadly. Paul, you can tell, is upset.

He is angry. He is doing everything he can to warn them that if they choose the path of trying to keep the law in order to be made right with God, they're damned. See, standing firm in the gospel is about not adding to the gospel because when you add to the gospel, you actually are subtracting from Christ. Paul continues, verse 5, for through the Spirit by faith we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. So here's the equation that Paul is giving to the Galatians. If they take the path of the law and circumcision, that leads to condemnation. But if they take the path of trusting Christ, if they take the path of the true and pure gospel of Christ, that is the Spirit and faith and love and freedom.

He's trying to paint a very simple picture for them so that they can understand loudly and clearly exactly what he's saying. You were running well, verse 7, who hindered you from obeying the truth? This persuasion is not from Him who calls you. The persuasion of the false teachers, the persuasion of the Judaizers is not from Him who calls you because God is not a legalist. God gave His law, and we love His law. But legalism separates the law of God from the character of God. It separates the law of God from the person of God and how God has commanded us to appropriate His law in the appropriate way to our lives, but never, never as a means of justifying us who were born in sin, never as a means of justifying us or making us right with a God when we were born sinners. And you know what sinners do?

They sin. And what Paul is warning them about is if they take this path, they will in fact find themselves apart from God, apart from Christ, apart from grace. I have confidence in the Lord that you will take no other view. Paul is confident. He is encouraging them. It sounds a little bit like reverse psychology. I have confidence that you are going to remain steadfast.

I have confidence that you are going to take no other view but the one that He is giving them and the one who is troubling you. This Judaizer will bear the penalty, whoever He is. But I, if I, brother, still preach circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been removed. The offense of the cross is something that we have often forgotten. The reason why the cross was an offense, an offense particularly to the Jew, is because of what God says in Deuteronomy.

Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. Have you ever wondered why the Jewish leaders, when Jesus was alive in His earthly ministry, why the Jewish leaders went to Pilate? Have you ever wondered why they didn't just stone Jesus, which they could have done and sort of asked forgiveness later? Have you ever wondered why they had to work so hard to work within the Roman system in order to get Jesus crucified? Is because the Jewish leaders knew that they had to send a loud and clear message to the entirety of Israel that this man, Jesus of Nazareth, is cursed of God because He hanged on a tree. It wasn't enough for them to kill Him any other way. They had to see to it that the Roman system, and only the Romans would crucify, that He would be crucified on a tree to send that message because they wanted to make sure it was clear to all of Israel that He was cursed, not just by them, but that He was cursed of God. What they didn't realize is that God was using them in His brilliant, sovereign, orchestrated providence to bring about the reality that Jesus Christ would indeed become a curse for us.

Paul says a little leaven leavens the whole lump. It's interesting that he includes that here in the midst of this argument, because Paul is dealing with a type of legalism that we can refer to generally as salvation or salvific legalism. It's the sort of legalism that we see so often in Jesus' ministry and arguments with the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the Jewish leaders because they were arguing simply for a salvific legalism, a sort of law keeping that made us right with God. But there are other types of legalism as well. You've noticed some of these types of legalism. Salvific legalism is the most deadly form, but it's not very prevalent among the church.

We don't hear people talking about having to keep the law or portions of the law in order to be made right with God. The sort of legalism that we typically see and hear about are one of the other three types of legalism. The first of those three types are… you can consider it perhaps letter of the law legalism as opposed to the spirit of the law. The letter of the law legalism, we see examples of it in the New Testament wherein Jesus' disciples were picking grain on the Sabbath because they were hungry, and the Pharisees and the Jewish rulers attacked them. The second type is a sort of tradition of men legalism wherein men make their traditions as if they are the law of God.

Now, this happens all the time. It's very common in the church. In fact, it could be argued that it's one of the most deadly types of legalism in the church when we take our traditions and we insist that they are the sorts of things that good Christians do.

And we don't stop there. We don't just say good Christians do these things, but we give the impression that if you don't do these things, you may not actually really be loved by God. Traditions might be very good traditions.

They might be traditions in your church or in your family or habits that you have been involved with all your life. But if you make those rules, those rules that are not biblical rules, and let's not make any mistake about it, the Bible gives us rules. The Bible gives us lists of dos and don'ts.

Again, make no mistake about it. We're not talking here about following the Word of God and the law of God. That's not legalism. That's called Christianity. And just since we're on the subject, being dogmatic about being holy is not legalism. Being dogmatic and being firm about loving the Lord and loving His Word and loving His law is not legalism. That's biblical Christianity. But when we take our laws and our traditions and we put them on others, and pastors are most notorious for this, we parents can sometimes do the same thing with our kids. That we have good traditions, good rules that we place upon our people, on our children, and make them feel that as if you do not do these things in the exact way that I've done them and the way that they were assigned to be by my father or one pastor here another time, that if you don't do this for a certain number of days, or you don't do this for this much time, or you don't do this sort of thing each and every day, then you're really maybe not as loved by God as you think. See that type of legalism, in the end it actually doesn't make people work harder.

It makes them want to give up. And if children are raised with a sort of pharisaical legalism and then they leave the church later on, they didn't necessarily leave Christianity. They left an entirely different sort of pharisaical religion. The fourth type or third type, depending on how you're counting, of legalism is a sort of spirit of legalism. We see this exhibited in the older brother of the prodigal son. We see it exhibited in the Pharisee who's saying, I'm glad I'm not like that man.

It's an arrogant, smug, prideful sort of legalism. And we all have it. And it happens each and every one of our hearts. We naturally want to think of ourselves better than everyone else. That's why Paul has to tell us, don't think more highly of yourselves than you ought to think. In fact, not just that, but elsewhere he tells us, hold others in higher esteem than you do yourself. Paul tells the Galatians here, in verses 13 and following, he says, you're called for freedom. You're called to freedom, brothers.

He's just dealt with how they can add to the gospel and how they can lose the gospel by adding to it and subtracting from Christ. But then in verse 13 he says, you are called to freedom, brothers, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. Do not abuse your freedom.

Do not presume that your freedom exists for you to do whatever you want. That, my friends, is antinomianism. And antinomianism is running as rampant today in evangelicalism just as legalism is running rampant today.

And you'll notice something. It's fascinating to me. You'll notice that many Christians, particularly many pastors, they tend to sort of lean one way legalistic or they lean antinomian. They don't come right out and say they're antinomian.

And they don't come right out and say, I'm a legalist. But they have this tendency to either lean legalistic or they have a tendency to lean antinomian when we're called to stand straight up. We're called to stand firm in one place and remain unwavering on the Word of God. But this sort of antinomianism Paul was also very aware of. It's something that Paul was likely accused of, which is why he goes later into this in chapter 5 talking about the fruit of the Spirit in the works of the flesh. The works of the flesh come when we are misusing and abusing and presuming upon the grace of God the freedom that we have in Christ to do whatever we think we can do. But the fruit of the Spirit comes naturally because the Spirit is dwelling within us, and it naturally flows from the heart that is united to Christ by the Spirit. So Paul says, don't use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

Through love serve one another. Why is Paul in the midst of defending the gospel, in the midst of explaining how it is we are justified by faith, and faith alone? I remind you that justification by faith alone was the material cause of the Reformation. Authority was the formal, or the foundational clause. Authority, not the magistrate's authority, not the church's authority, not the authority of popes, but authority of the Word of God and the Word of God alone as the only infallible rule for faith and life.

That was the foundational. That was the formal cause of the Reformation. Justification by faith was the secondary, or material cause of the Reformation. And what Paul is doing here in talking about justification tells them that in their standing firm, they are to stand firm. They are not to add to or subtract from the gospel. They are to stand firm, and they are to fight together and through love serving one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.

Now this is fascinating to me. Why is Paul telling them to love one another? Why is Paul reminding them of the second greatest commandment, to love our neighbor as ourselves, to love one another? And the focus here is on the church. Why is he telling us to do this? Why is he getting after them for biting and devouring one another, for gossip and slander?

It's interesting to me. His call here is for them to stand firm, and in their standing firm for the gospel, in being steadfast and unwavering on the one gospel of Jesus Christ, to get along and to love one another as they serve one another, reminding them of the love that we are to have. I think Paul's doing that because when we're standing firm, when we're being bold for the gospel, it's easy not to do so in love.

It's interesting, in 1 Corinthians 16 and verse 13, Paul says, be watchful. Stand firm in the faith. Act like men. One of the greatest problems we have, quite frankly, in America today, men don't act like men.

It's also one of the greatest problems in the church today. Act like men. Be strong. And then notice what Paul says next. And let everything you do be done in love.

Why? It's because when we are acting like men and being strong and courageous and bold and unwavering and steadfast and defending the gospel and defending the faith once delivered for the saints, our tendency is to be mean-spirited. Our tendency is to be unnecessarily unbiblically divisive. Our tendency is to hate one another. Our tendency is to cause divisions and dissensions in the church.

Our tendency is to bite and devour and gossip and slander one another. In Philippians 1, Paul encourages the Philippians in verse 27, only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ. That's the pattern in Scripture. If you have the gospel, if you know Christ, then you'll walk worthy of the gospel. This is what a true Christian is, by the way. I find it fascinating how many Christians are puzzled by the question of who's a Christian.

It's fascinating to me. And sadly, it often comes when a loved one has died. You might have a loved one who never went to church, never worshiped God, never talked about their love for Christ, never ever spoke of the gospel. And when they die, their loved ones say, well, you know, I can only hope that He's in heaven.

What evidence did they give you whatsoever? What fruit did they give you whatsoever that they knew the Lord Jesus Christ? It's like we turn into universalists when friends die, and we love them. But let's not forsake the gospel because we love someone even though it might be our own child. A Christian is someone who trusts Jesus Christ. A Christian is someone who knows Christ.

And a Christian is someone whose knowledge and trust of Christ leads to a fruitful life of righteousness following Christ, loving Christ, repenting at the foot of the cross of Christ. If you have Christ, you're going to walk worthy of Christ. If you have the gospel, you're going to walk worthy of the gospel. If you have the Spirit, you're going to walk in the Spirit. This is the pattern of the Christian life. Let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm.

And notice how he describes their standing firm. In one Spirit with one mind, striving side by side for the faith of the gospel and not frightened of anything by your opponents, this is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation and that from God. What did Jesus say to His disciples in John 13, 35? They will know, you are My disciples, by your love for one another.

Now notice He said that after He dismissed the heretic from the room. They will know, you are My disciples, by your love for one another. Here Paul is telling the Philippians, your being of one mind, your standing together as you stand firm will demonstrate to your enemies that they are going to lose and be destroyed in the end. This unity that Paul calls for throughout his epistles, the unity that Christ prays for in John 17, is not merely a spiritual unity. We already have a spiritual unity in Christ through the gospel. Jesus is praying there for a true, visible, physical manifestation of that unity that exists because of our true unity in the church, our true unity in the gospel.

Now some of you right now are saying, now wait a second. What exactly are you saying? What I'm saying is very simple. If we have the gospel and we believe that gospel, well then we have unity in the gospel. We have unity as the one holy, catholic, and apostolic church. I mean, look at us here this evening.

Look at those who are speaking at this conference. You think about the friends that you've met here over the years. You didn't know that you could love Presbyterians as much as you do. Those Presbyterians didn't know they could love Baptists as much as they do.

You find that you come together with people of like mind because we have the same gospel, and we have the same Lord, we have the same faith. We know we have differences, don't we? And we're not saying those differences don't matter.

That's the mistake of liberalism. We're not saying those secondary and tertiary differences don't matter. No, sometimes as Machen said, sometimes those secondary matters are the things about which men will most fight. It doesn't mean we don't fight over them. It doesn't mean we won't argue about them.

It doesn't mean we just toss them aside. What it does mean is that we recognize the priority of the gospel. We recognize the priority of the cardinal virtues of our faith, and we stand our ground on them, not ignoring our differences, but saying, yes, there are differences. They are outlined for us in our creeds and our confessions. And they state very clearly where we differ, but we have creeds and confessions to guard our faith, to understand where one another is looking at things from differently, the hermeneutics we use to get to those different doctrinal positions, but we respect each other. We show love to one another, because that love, not just with lip service, but real sacrificial love.

That is a witness to the watching world. And if we lose that love for one another, if we lose the unity that we have in the gospel, and make no mistake about it, dear friends, it's not a unity in spite of the truth. It's not a unity saying, hey, nothing really matters.

Let's just all get along. That's what they say in the evangelical church. The truth of the matter is, is that we have come together and say, no, these things do matter. And unity exists not in spite of the truth, but precisely because of the truth, grounded in the truth. And this is the truth.

This is the truth. We don't all look at it exactly the same way. We don't always interpret it exactly the same way. But in the end, we are all reading from the same original document, and we are all agreeing that though we have differences and though not everything is in this book alike, as plain or as simple as we might like it, we know that we have a unity in the one true Word of God, in the gospel of God. One of the things I loved about R.C. is that he chose his fights carefully. And he fought, and when he fought, you knew it, and you could feel it. But he fought for the gospel, and he worked hard to show grace and charity to those Christians with whom he differed to the end of his days. May God give us more men like R.C. Let's pray together. Father, we thank You for Your love for us, and we thank You for the unity that we have in Christ, the unity that we have in Your gospel. Lord, may we stand firm in Your gospel, unwavering for Your glory alone until Christ returns. For it's in His name we pray. Amen.

That was Burt Parsons on this Thursday edition of Renewing Your Mind. If you'd like to join us for next year's national conference, the theme is The Way, the Truth, and the Life. Very few places remain, but you can learn more, and if you're quick, register at Ligonier.org forward slash 2024.

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