Burning God"s Word

Do you read your Bible? Do you read, have you read all your Bible?

Sixty-six books? Or do you just read parts of it? Do you just read perhaps a verse a day, one or two of your favorite stories?

Perhaps there are parts of it that you don't like and you just ignore completely. We're going to read of a king, a king of Judah, a man called Jehoiakim, and in the year 605 B.C., he took the Word of God, written by the prophet Jeremiah, and he took it, and he didn't like what he heard, and so he took his penknife and he cut out the parts of the scroll of the Scripture that was read to him that he didn't like, threw it into the fire until there was nothing left. Now, I don't think any of us here would take a Bible and literally set it on fire and burn it. I don't think any of us would do that, but I do think some of us marginalize the Bible. I think some of us who even profess to be followers of Jesus Christ don't really devote ourselves to the study of it, and that we may ignore it, marginalize it, and perhaps resent the teaching of Holy Scriptures. The Reformers said that one of the marks of the true church was the faithful exposition of the Word of God, and so the Reformers believed that at the center of the church was to be not an altar, not a stage, but a pulpit, so that the Bible was center in the life of the church because they believed, and we believe at Calvary Church, that this book, the Bible, is the Word of God, and it is of the utmost importance. And if we believe that, it must impact our personal lives, certainly it must impact the life of the church and all of our ministries. One time ago I read an article about churches, very cool churches, who were turning Sunday school into what the article said, and it was a secular article, they were turning the Sunday school into fun day school.

Oh, that's really nice, isn't it? In other words, what our children need is fun. Our children need something that's exciting, something that's really cool, something that's really up-to-date as it were, but in so doing the article said that they were turning from Scripture. You know, our world, our society is brilliantly at amusing us, but it is hopelessly inadequate in presenting to us the truth, the truth of the Word of God, the truth of the gospel. And at the beginning of this year, I challenged you to spend at least 15 minutes reading the Word of God, just 15 minutes.

You can spend more, that's great, but at least 15 minutes. I wonder how many of us have kept doing that. Many of you were excited to begin.

You told me in the months of January and February that this was impacting your lives, but I wonder how many of us have continued every day reading the Word of God. A few days ago, I came onto our campus here at Calvary just before seven in the morning, and I saw a young man under parking lot. We have a basketball hoop, which I confess I've never used, but I saw this young man and he was putting this basketball into the hoop over and over again.

And I thought of that. I thought, here's a young man who obviously believes that the ability to put a ball in a basketball hoop is very important. So he gets up early, he disciplines himself, and he practices over and over and over again. And I admire that kind of young man because obviously he has a goal of being a good basketball player. But as I watched him and as I walked into this building, I thought, I wonder how many at Calvary Church this morning have got up and have turned to this book and read it.

Why? Because we believe that this makes a difference in our life. It transforms our life if we read it and obey it. This morning we're going to read about a man, this man called Jehoiakim, who burnt the Word of God. And I want you to turn in your Bibles to Jeremiah chapter 36 and read about this man, and then we're going to think first of all of the primacy of the Word of God, and then secondly of the indestructibility of the Word of God. So we have been going through the book of Jeremiah, not every verse, but this is the second last message in the series on Jeremiah, and we come this morning to Jeremiah chapter 36, and we're going to read some of these verses. Here then is the Word of God.

I hope you brought your Bible with you. Jeremiah 36, verse 1, in the fourth year of King Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, this Word came to Jeremiah from the Lord. Take a scroll and write on it all the words that I have spoken to you against Israel and Judah and all the nations from the day that I spoke to you from the days of Josiah until today, Josiah being one of the earlier kings. Now notice in verse 2 the expression, write on it all the words. We're going to see that expression over and over again in Jeremiah 36. Verse 3, it may be that the house of Judah will hear all of the disaster that I intend to do to them so that everyone may turn from his evil way and that I may forgive their iniquity and their sin. Then Jeremiah called Baruch, the son of Neriah, and Baruch wrote on a scroll at the dictation of Jeremiah all the words of the Lord that he had spoken to him. And Jeremiah ordered Baruch saying, I am banned from going to the house of the Lord. So you're to go, and on a day of fasting and hearing of all of the people in the Lord's house, you shall read the words of the Lord from the scroll that you have written at my dictation. You shall read them also in the hearing of all the men of Judah who come out of their cities.

It may be that their plea for mercy will come before the Lord and that everyone will turn from his evil way. For great is the anger and wrath that the Lord has pronounced against his people. And Baruch, the son of Neriah, did all that Jeremiah the prophet ordered him about reading from the scroll the words of the Lord in the house in the Lord's house.

That's the temple. In the fifth year of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, in the ninth month, all the people in Israel and all the people who came from the cities of Judah to Jerusalem proclaimed a fast before the Lord. Then, in the hearing of all of the people, Baruch read the words of Jeremiah from the scroll in the house of the Lord, in the chamber of Gomorrah, the son of Shaphan the secretary, which was in the upper court at the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house. Verse 16, when they heard all the words, they turned one to another in fear. And they said to Baruch, we must report all these words to the king. Then they asked Baruch, tell us, how did you write all these words?

Was it at his dictation? Baruch answered them, he dictated all these words to me when I wrote them with ink on the scroll. Then the officials said to Baruch, go and hide you and Jeremiah and let no one know where you are.

Jeremiah is in prison at this point. So they went into the court to the king, having put the scroll in the chamber of Elishamah, the secretary, and they reported all of the words to the king. Then the king sent Jehudah to get the scroll. He took it from the chamber of Elishamah, the secretary, and Jehudah read it to the king and all the officials who stood beside the king. It was the ninth hour, and the king was sitting in the winter house, and there was a fire burning in the fire pot before him.

Listen to this. As Jehudah read three or four columns, the king would cut them off with a knife and throw them into the fire, in the fire pot, until the entire scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the fire pot. Yet neither the king nor any of his servants who heard all these words was afraid, nor did they tear their garments. Even well when Elnathan and Deliah and Gomorrahiah urged the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them. And the king commanded Jeremiah the king's son, and Sariah the son of Asriel, and Shalemiah the son of Abdu'l to seize Baruch the secretary, and Jeremiah the prophet, but the Lord hid them. Now after the king had burned the scroll with the words that Baruch wrote, Jeremiah's dictation, the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah. Take another scroll and write on it all the former words that were in the first scroll, which Jehoiachin, the king of Judah has burned. And concerning Jehoiachin, king of Judah, you shall say, thus says the Lord. You have burned the scroll saying, why have you written in it that the king of Babylon will certainly come and destroy this land and will cut off from it man and beast? Verse 32, and Jeremiah took another scroll and gave it to Baruch the son of Neriah, who wrote on it at the dictation of Jeremiah all the words of the scroll that Jehoiachin, king of Judah, had burned in the fire, and many similar words were added to them.

Isn't that a fascinating story? The story of a man, a king who should have known better, burning the Word of God because he didn't like what it said. So I want us this morning to reaffirm this important principle of the primacy of the Word of God. The Bible, Old Testament, and New Testament claims to be the Word of God. Listen to Paul in 2 Timothy 3 verse 16, all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Paul is saying, as all of Scripture is saying, that the Bible has its origin not in man but in God. It is the Word of God. God who is truth breathes out His Scripture, so if a true God breathes out His Scripture, the product, the Word is a true Word. That is that the Word of God is 100 percent trustworthy. It comes from God. It's inspired by God.

It's breathed out by God. All Scripture, we could translate that expression, all Scripture, as some translation do, every portion of Scripture, not just some of it, not just your favorite verses, all of it. And we read over and over again in Jeremiah 36 all the words, all the words. And God used men like Jeremiah in the Old Testament to write the Word of God. Peter in 2 Peter 1 says that men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Do you hear that? They spoke from God. These men came from God, that the Word of the Lord comes to Jeremiah and then is written down so that the written Word is in fact the Word of God.

That's it. They were carried along by the Holy Spirit. The picture is of the beautiful sailing ship. The sail goes up, the wind comes and fills the sails, and the ship is carried along. The ship is moved.

That's the picture. A man like Jeremiah is filled with the Spirit of God, and he writes the Word of God so that the product, Scripture, is in fact the infallible, inerrant Word of God. That is, when the Bible speaks, God speaks. Do you understand that? Do you want to hear God speaking?

Read the Word of God. The Old Testament is also the Word of God. We have some preachers today who would try to ignore or even reject the Old Testament and think the Old Testament is irrelevant. It's too harsh.

It's not suitable for today's contemporary, sophisticated, cool audience. But Paul, the apostle, refers to the Old Testament as the Word of God. He says in Romans 3 that the Jews were entrusted with the oracles, not of Moses, the oracles of God. And when Paul in Romans 9 refers to the words of Moses, the words of Moses to Pharaoh, he says this is what, not what Moses said, he says this is what Scripture says. That is, the Old Testament is the Word of God. Our Lord Jesus treated the historical narratives of the Old Testament about Noah, Lot, Adam, and David and so on as records of fact. Our Lord Jesus often quoted from the Old Testament in a way which He is clearly stating what God has said. In Hebrews 10, when the writer is writing about the new covenant that we studied two or three weeks ago from Jeremiah chapter 31, when he's quoting from Jeremiah 31 in Hebrews chapter 10, he doesn't say Jeremiah said, although Jeremiah did say. He says the Holy Spirit bore witness.

That is, the Holy Spirit is God. It is God who gave us the new covenant written by Jeremiah. The Old Testament is the Word of God. What about the New Testament? Well, the New Testament is clearly the Word of God. The apostles received revelation direct from God.

They recorded the Word of God. Paul says, for example, in Galatians 1, I'd have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel, for I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. This message that we preach, the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, of salvation in Jesus Christ is, says Paul, not what I think. I did not go to a classroom and was taught about the gospel. No, I received it directly from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Why? It's the gospel of God. It's the good news of God. It's the gospel of Jesus Christ and is given to us in Scripture.

So Paul says, this is of first importance, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, was buried and was raised again according to the Scriptures. Jesus Himself said as He prayed to His Father in John chapter 19, your word is truth. Not that it bears witnesses to the truth, although that's a true statement, it's stronger than that. Your word is truth. All of Scripture, not just parts of it, all of Scripture is true, whether you believe it or not, irrespective of what you think about it. You can be like Jehoiakim and reject it and say, absolutely not.

I don't believe that. That doesn't change the Word of God. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the Word of the Lord says Isaiah abides forever. The Psalmist says, forever, O Lord, your word is settled in heaven. Jesus said the heavens and the earth will pass away, but my word will not pass away. This is the primacy of the Word of God. This, my dear brothers and sisters, is absolutely foundational. This is non-negotiable, that the Bible is the Word of God. You say, why are you saying this, John?

We know this. Well, I'm not sure if all of us do know it or all of us believe it, but we need to make sure that in our lives, in our ministry, it is focused on Scripture, not your ideas or mine, the primacy of the Word of God. Secondly, the indestructibility of the Word of God. Are we surprised because the Bible comes from God that it's being attacked? No book has been so attacked as this book, the Bible. Here's a man who should have known better, King Jehoiakim of Judah. King Josiah was a godly man, a man who revered the Word of God, but Jehoiakim, as he hears the word coming from Jeremiah, doesn't like it, doesn't like being told that the Babylonians are going to come and to destroy Jerusalem. If he's a wiser man, if he's a godly man, he would have listened to the Word of God coming from Jeremiah, but no, he rejects it. And he attacks the Word of God. He tried to eradicate, think of the utter blasphemy of it, of burning the Word of God.

Don't be surprised. Satan's constant strategy is to undermine the reliability, the authority, the accuracy of the Word of God. What's the first question in the Bible? Genesis 3, by our enemy. Did God actually say that? That was a subtle question, was it? Here's Eve in the garden.

They're perfect. They're in paradise. And Satan says, you know, God said certain things, but did God actually say that? You heard someone saying to you, is that really in the Bible or is that your own idea?

Is that your own interpretation? And from that time right to the present day, skeptics have vilified, ridiculed, and attacked the authority and reliability of Scripture. Many have tried to eradicate the Bible from human existence. When the Bible was first translated into English in 1382, do you realize that reading it was against the law in England? It was illegal to read your Bible in English. And William Tyndale, who gave us that brilliant translation, was put to death because he persisted in translating the Scriptures into English. The medieval church didn't want the Bible in the hands of the common people. You can't read it.

You can't understand it. We're the priests. We're the authority. We're the church.

We'll tell you what it says, but don't read it for yourself. These attempts failed. In the mid-18th century, in France, Voltaire tried to stamp out the Bible but failed. Think of more recent attempts in countries of communism and Marxists have tried to stop the Bible being translated, have tried to ban the Bible, have tried to stamp out the Bible. They've done all they can to attack the Bible, but they've failed.

Always they have failed. The Word of God is indestructible. I recently read this from the U.S. State Department. A toddler was sentenced to life imprisonment in North Korea after the child's family was found in possession of a Bible, according to a report by the U.S. State Department. We're reporting facts here. It involved the arrest of a family, this is in North Korea, based on their religious practices and possession of a Bible.

The entire family, including a two-year-old child, was given life sentences in political prison camps. Think of that today. We've got this Bible. I mean, I don't know how many Bibles I have.

I have many of them. We're encouraged to read our Bible. We encourage our children, our students, everyone to read their Bible. Can you imagine if it was the case that if you had a Bible, you would be exiled and put in a political prisoner camp for the rest of your life?

That happens. The report said it's estimated, by the way, to be between 200,000 and 400,000 clandestine Christians in North Korea. We need to pray for our brothers and sisters there who are persecuted, imprisoned, even with possessing a Bible. North Korea wants to eradicate the Word of God. These attempts have continued throughout the history of the world. Now, you say, well, that's not the case here in the West of the United States.

No, it's not. But I want to mention three attacks, three present attacks on the Bible. There are many more, but I've selected three. Three ways in which the Bible is attacked today.

Yes, here in the United States. First of all, I'll call it the attack of liberalism, where the Bible's historical reliability and integrity have and continue to be repeatedly assaulted by liberal biblical scholars. There used to be a few years ago what's called the Jesus Seminar, and these experts, so-called self-appointed, were going to tell us in the Gospels what Jesus actually said, because He didn't say all of it.

Really? What did He do? He under law… undermine the authority of the Word of God. That began in Europe through universities, had sweeping impact throughout Europe, through my native Scotland. What was the problem? Scholars taking the Word of God and saying, no, that is not really true.

Do you know what the result has been? You visit Europe, you see these beautiful churches and cathedrals, but they're empty, aren't they? Isn't it ironic that in places, in churches and denominations which have attacked the Word of God, the attendance of their churches eventually goes down and down? You say, why is that? I mean, would you go to a church to listen to some tired, recycled political and social platitudes and pontifications?

You can say, no, I can get that myself. Why go to church and listen to some kind of life on politics, on social justice, and you say, where is God in this? Many liberal churches here in town, many liberal denominations do not believe the Bible is the Word of God. They believe it is a mixture of truth and error. Or they may say it contains the Word of God. The Word of God is there, but you don't expect it to be in all of Scripture. And if a particular passage of Scripture or a particular doctrine doesn't seem reasonable to them, or they don't feel it's right, how could God do this?

It is rejected. What have they done? They've put their reason, their feelings over Scripture. All of us, however, are to be under Scripture, not over Scripture.

And what do they do? Like Jehoiakim, they are throwing out the pieces of Scripture that they don't like. You say, what do you mean?

Let me give you some examples. They'll throw out the early chapters of Genesis. They'll throw out the miracles. Jesus didn't really feed five thousand people from five loaves and two fishes.

That's absolutely ridiculous. They'll throw out salvation through the blood of Christ. They'll certainly throw out eternal punishment.

My God would never send anyone to hell. And more and more today, and we see it over the last 20 years or so, or 30 years, they are throwing out the parts of Scripture relating to marriage, gender, and sexuality. We don't like that.

We're more advanced now. We can't accept that old-fashioned teaching, and so it is thrown out. You know what happens in these churches? Instead of preaching and teaching the Word of God, these churches become a mere echo, a mere mirror of the surrounding unbelieving culture. Isn't that true?

They're just like this around in culture. Rather than being light and salt, they have capitulated, and they are just like those who do not believe. The Bible, in effect, is thrown into the fire. My question is why would someone go to a church like that? I mean, people, they say they're followers of Jesus Christ.

I think if you're following Jesus Christ, how you can go to a church where the Bible is not preached? That's the attack of liberalism. Here's another attack. I'm calling it scientism. I'm not saying science, listen carefully. The attack of scientism. This is the view, the common view, that science has disproved the Bible. You've heard that, haven't you?

In doing evangelism, door-to-door evangelism, street evangelism, as I've done, here's a common one. Oh, science has disproved the Bible. We're told to trust the science. Science is the way to truth.

Of course, these statements, trust the science, and science is the way to truth, are not statements of science themselves. You ask, they ask the question, well, who created your God? Of course, they're making a category mistake because they're really asking you, who created the uncreated God? God by definition is uncreated. God is eternal. God has no beginning and who is no end. He is the from everlasting to everlasting.

He is uncreated. But if there is no God, science now, the consensus of science is that science, that the world, the cosmos had a beginning. Science began to say that by the 1960s.

Isn't it interesting? Aristotle believed and taught that matter was eternal, that there was always something. And so, in a sense, the cosmos, you could say, was eternal. So it didn't have a beginning.

But now science had, comes along and says no. In actual fact, there was a beginning to the cosmos, and the most popular theory in science is the Big Bang. There was a Big Bang. I won't explain it.

I'm not sure if I understand it. But there's a Big Bang, and then the world began. But where did the matter of the Big Bang come from? It was the German philosopher Martin Heidegger who asked this question.

I think it's brilliant. The most basic question is, why is there something and not nothing? Think of it. Science is saying, apparently now there was a beginning to the cosmos, but what was before the beginning? If there was nothing, how can nothing produce something? It's impossible, isn't it?

I would have thought. Where does it come from? Now, we all appreciate and benefit enormously from the advances of science. I'm not anti-science. I am anti-scientism, which rejects God.

Science can never answer the big questions of life. What was there before the Big Bang? Where did we come from? Why are we here? What's the meaning of life? To what do we owe our existence? Impersonal forces that began millions and millions of years ago, and finally we arrived, here we are as human beings.

Is that it? Are we the result of impersonal forces, or are we the result of a personal being? The Bible always said, and the statement still stands, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. But, scientism attacks the Bible. Here's the third one, perhaps the most one that we come up against most in everyday life. I'm calling it relativism. Our society holds tolerance as the highest virtue while rejecting the very existence of absolute truth. The only absolute truth is that there's no absolute truth. No absolute truth. Relativism is the dominant philosophical direction of our universities, of our schools, of our media, of all of our society.

This relativism leads to subjectivism, doesn't it? It's all about my experience. It's all about my feelings. Truth is out, experience is in.

Expressive individualism, as it's been called. If the truth doesn't — if I don't feel right about it, if it doesn't cause a warm and fuzzy feeling within me, if it conflicts with my own desires for personal fulfillment and happiness and lifestyle, I'm going to reject it. The truth is rejected in favor of my experience. Notice what I've done. We can learn from Jeremiah. What have we done?

We've erected our own idol, haven't we? Not God, but me. I will tell you what's truth. That's true for me. My experience, my feeling, my personal happiness, my personal well-being, that is primary.

That's the priority. And that's where the majority of people live, including many professing Christians. Life is all about their happiness, their feelings, their personal interpretation of the Bible, which allows them, interestingly, to live remarkably similar lives to their non-Christian friends. Have you heard people saying that? Well, that's your interpretation of the Bible.

I have mine. Well, what is yours? It's amazing their interpretation of the Bible just sounds like the view of unbelievers. In this way, morality and human behavior are reduced to matters of preference, and biblical teaching is ignored. This book is thrown away.

It's cut up and burned. Or, more commonly, in those who take the name of Christ, I'll accept this, but I won't accept that. And in this way, we're like ancient Jehoiakim, attacking and destroying the Word of God. The good news is, as we know, in spite of all of the attacks on God's Word, the Bible is still the best known and the most widely read book in all of the world. It's been translated into thousands of languages and dialects. We at Calvary put a lot of resources in supporting missionaries and mission agencies committed to the translation of the Word of God, so the people, the tribe, that nation can have the Bible in their own language.

We're thankful for men like Tyndale, who translated the Bible into English. And we've been learning, haven't we, from the inspired writing of Jeremiah. We have been learning that we are to seek this God with all of my heart. Are you doing that? Do you believe in a God?

I do. We're to seek this God with all of our heart, says Jeremiah. Yes, God is a person who can be known and, as it were, who can be found by us.

And this God who created me, Jeremiah reminds us, as we've seen, He has plans and a future for us, this living hope that we are people of hope. You say, well, how can I know God? If God created the heavens and the earth, as you're saying, John, that's a pretty big God. He is. He's everlasting. He's infinite. In some ways, He's unsearchable.

In some ways, He's incomprehensible. Well, how can I know such a God? Well, supposing you're sitting here in a congregation this morning, and I don't know you at all.

This is the first time you've been here. I don't know you. How would I get to know you? You say, I want you to know me, John. How would I get to know you? Would I take you to a medical facility, put you through all kinds of tests, x-rays, MRIs, would do all kinds of testings on you? Would I take samples from you and analyze you? No, that's not what I would do.

Not what I'd do? I want to meet you. I want us to sit down and come to my office. I'll come to your home. We'll go to Starbucks. We'll sit down and we'll do what? You talk, and I'll listen to you. We'll spend time together. You see, without you talking to me and revealing yourself to me, how am I really going to get to know you?

I will never get to know you very well unless you choose to reveal yourself. Here's the wonder of the grace of God. This God, who's our Creator, has revealed Himself.

This God, can you believe this? Has spoken to us. He's spoken to us, first of all, in creation. The heavens declare the glory of God. This morning is I'm on my back deck with my Bible. I hear the birds singing.

Look at the trees and the sky. That testifies that in one way is God speaking to me and saying, I am here. I'm a great God. Look what I've done.

But there's much more. God speaks to us in His Word. Yes, He speaks to me in creation, but now in special revelation, God speaks to me in words. And these words have been written down in a book. The only book that God has written is called, yes, you got it the Bible. This is God speaking to us. God has revealed Himself, and He wants us to know certain things about Himself, about ourselves. And so, if you want to get to know God, you open this book and you read it. What a joy.

What a privilege. And we can read it in our own language. And also, God has revealed Himself to us by coming to us.

Think of that. This great God, who in the beginning created the heavens and the earth, speaks to us in creation, speaks to us in His Word, but has spoken to us in the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, the Bible says that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and Jesus is God. And as we look at Jesus, as we listen to Jesus, we're seeing God.

We're listening to God. God has revealed Himself in a person. He's revealed to Himself in truth, truth incarnate, our Lord Jesus Christ, that this great God sees your dilemma, your sin, your waywardness, your desire to reject the Word of God, your desire just to have little pieces of the Word of God that make you feel good. And He sees our sin and our failure, and in His great love, He's coming to us in His Son, Jesus Christ, and says, now, as Jeremiah said to people, if you repent, if you turn from your evil ways, if you stop erecting your own idols and bow the knee to me and acknowledge that Jesus is not merely a man, He's God. He's the Lord.

He's the Savior who loved us, who died on the cross for our sins, was buried and rose again. And if you believe in Him, you will be saved. And as the New Covenant said, your sins and iniquities, I will remember no more. All of them gone, and now filled with the Spirit of God Himself. I'm now able to be the kind of person that God made me to be, as He empowers me, as He guides me in His Word, as He fills us with His Spirit.

Our lives are transformed and that they are now God-ward rather than self-ward or worldly that we seek to glorify God. Don't be intimidated by the attacks on the Bible. King Jehoiakim cut out the parts of the Bible he didn't like and threw them into the fire. But the Word of God was not destroyed, and God's Word will never be destroyed. Yes, the grass withers, the flower fades, but the Word of our God abides forever. Love this Word. Read it, obey it, and see what God does in your life as you bow to the authority of Scripture, the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, and seek to live a life for the glory of God.

Will you do that? Father, we bow before You as we prepare to take communion. Melt our hearts. We're stubborn. We're selfish. We're self-serving. We're proud people. Forgive us, we do ask. Thank You for our Savior and that there is always more grace in our Lord Jesus Christ than there is sin in us, and help us to focus on the wonder of salvation found in Christ and in Christ the Lord. In this name we pray. Amen.