Pastor Jerry Zepnick's sermon 'From Death to Eternal Life' explores the themes of eternal life, judgment, and the relationship between God the Father and Jesus the Son. Drawing from John 5:24-30, Pastor Zepnick emphasizes the importance of hearing and believing in Christ to attain everlasting life, bypassing judgment, and passing from death to life. He revisits the confrontation between Jesus and Jewish leaders over the Sabbath, underscoring Jesus' divine authority and equality with God. The sermon highlights the inevitability of death and the urgency of living a life that prepares for eternity, stressing the need for repentance and submission to God's will. Personal anecdotes and scripture, such as John 3:16 and Hebrews 9:27, are used to emphasize the realities of heaven and hell, and the necessity of walking in faith. Pastor Zepnick encourages believers to focus on the eternal future, living lives that reflect their faith and the glory of God, as they prepare for the resurrection and final judgment.

[♪ Music And Let's open up our Bibles to the book of John, chapter 5, verses 24 through 30. I'll read that and then we'll dig into it for today. It reads, Most assuredly I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has everlasting life and shall not come into judgment but has passed from death into life. Most assuredly I say to you the hour is coming and now is when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who will who hear will live for as a son as the Father has life in Himself, He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of man. Do not marvel at this, for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come forth, those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation.

I can of myself do nothing as I hear I judge and my judgment is righteous because I do not seek my own will but the will of the Father who sent me. Father God we thank you for these words today. We thank you for this ancient text, Father God, that you put in front of our eyes that applies directly to our hearts and our lives today. And I pray, Father, that our hearts would be open to hear your word and that your word would as a two-edged sword Lord God do its work of surgery on our hearts and minds and souls Lord God change who we are to be more in the image of who you want us to be, which is you. I pray in Jesus' name this morning.

Amen. And so to recap, last week we had the situation again, I'm going to go back to the key verse in this whole book is chapter 20 verse 31, that these things are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ and that believing you might have new life in Him. That is still the purpose and the goal, seeing and showing that Jesus is the Christ and that we have life in Him. And last week we had a confrontation between the Jewish leaders and Christ over the Sabbath. He healed a man on the Sabbath, and they didn't like it.

It bothered them greatly that he broke their rules of the Sabbath. And so that is just the point of it, that he broke their rules. He didn't break any of God's rules because he didn't break God's rules because he's God. He is Lord over the Sabbath. He is Lord over all of that stuff.

And he was Lord and God over them as well. And the point being that he's Lord and he's God over you. You can submit to it now or later, but in the end every knee will bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And So this is the point of what we had talked about last week and subsequently also calling God his own father, making him making himself equal with God. And as we know, the relationship between God the Father and Jesus the Son is pivotal in the life of a Christian.

It's critical for us to understand because God the Father and God the Son are one. We have salvation in Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on the cross. In fact, here in John five, Jesus gives one of the most thorough, if not the most thorough messages on the relationship between his father God and himself. And so this is something that as Christians, we can't just walk past it and say, yeah, I got it. They're two, they're one, okay, let's move on.

There's so much more to that because the submission of our very souls depends on understanding that the work that Christ did on the cross was because of the love of God for humankind. And we saw that in John 3.16. And so in fact, Jesus gives, like I said, one of the most pivotal explanations of the father-son relationship. And the key verse in this chapter, it's gotta be verse 24, I started out reading that. It says, most assuredly I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in him, who sent me has everlasting life, has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death unto life.

That is the call right there. And so that again is reflected in John 3.16, for God so loved the world that he gave his own, only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. And then we have 3.35 and 36 as well. Chapter 3, verses 35 and 36 read, The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand. He who believes in the Son has everlasting life, and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." These are all hand and hand and hand and it's so much the theme of John chapter five that we can't go past it, we can't miss it.

We can't walk in our life from this text and say, you know what, I'm good, I think. No, you can't think that you're good, you've gotta know. You can, These things are written that you may know that you have life. And so the three words that stand out in that text to me are obviously eternal life. That is the focus, that is the goal, that is the direction of the saint, of the redeemed, of the Christian believer.

There's also in there, there's judgment, there's death when you talk about eternal life. On the other hand, there's eternal death as well. And so we can't forget these things. These things are absolutely, we absolutely need to understand because they have everything to do with our eternal future. Where we will spend an eternal future.

And so we should all really, on all three of these things, we should, we ought to be, as believers, concerned with this text and how it lays on top of the life we live, the doctrine we believe in, and where we stand. Because it talks about eternal future, it talks about death, it talks about judgment. And so Let's look at, let's take and peel this apart, look at these more closely. The first one that I chose to look at, because the whole thing really is about resurrection, that the whole 25 through 30 or 29, it talks about the resurrection and what a blessing that is. But within this, it does talk about death.

And the fact is that we are all going to face it someday. And so, We have had reminders of that. We have had reminders with Delia just a couple of months ago, a young gal, and now she's no longer with us. We are not guaranteed tomorrow. We do not know, and we have had the grace of God rest upon us as a congregation in healing those who have been sick unto death and We have also seen the Lord take some people.

But altogether, we will all be gone. We will all die. Death is no respecter of persons. I forgot who said it, but six feet of dirt make all men equal. It doesn't matter how much money you have, it doesn't matter how much clout you have, it doesn't matter how poor you are or how stupid you are.

Six feet of dirt makes all men equal. When you're dead, you're dead, and that's it. And so death is no respecter of persons. And Jesus comes, everyone is gonna have to die sometime unless Jesus comes back in the meantime. And we can hope to that end, we can pray to that end.

And when we look at world events and things happening and going on now, and how Satan is dividing the church, how the true church is being persecuted, how there's so many things going on in our country with wars and just the demoralization of what once was a country founded, one nation under God. But we see things unfolding on a global level and it really could be anytime soon. And so the text that the sermon today is from, from death to eternal life, taken right out of verse 24 there. And so the first verse I have is, is a warning from the book of Matthew 24, 42. Therefore, keep watch, because you do not know the day on which your Lord will come.

Keep watch. You don't know when He will come. When it comes to dying, you hear a lot about, well, I wish I knew when, how much time do I have, and you know what, let's get our affairs in order, right? Let's get our things all in order, And if somebody knew that they were gonna die tomorrow or the day after, how would you live the last couple of days that you live? How would you spend those days if you knew you had a month, six months, a year?

I like hunting and fishing. Am I going to go out and do as much of it as I can? Right? That would be like, no, no. I will spend my dying day telling people about my love for Jesus Christ and how they can have the same Jesus that I have, that they can live for him.

Do we make our time here count? And so most people talk about getting their Affairs in order and when you talk about that it it talks about getting a will ready, right? What what you want to be remembered as your what do you want your legacy to be? What do you want that to be? What do you want?

To say in your will What your will really is? Where do you want all your junk to go. Okay, I got all this junk that I compiled over the years. It might be a four-wheeler, it might be a boat. It's all garbage in various forms of time, right?

And so even my house, my house someday will be taken down, it'll fall down. It is early stage garbage is what it is. It is early stage backfill. That's all of our stuff. It's everything that we own.

None of it is going to outlive its need. And so we look at what we have and That's what in essence our wills are. Where are we gonna give money? You know, I've heard people say, I wanna give a lot of money to my kids so they don't have to work as hard as I had to work. Boy, I pity the fool who babies their child to the degree where their child doesn't have to work.

That's not, that's, you won't find that in God's Word. And so, unfortunately, most people put more thought into what happens to their stuff than what happens to their soul. Hebrews 9.27 says, "'Just as man is appointed to die once and after that, "'to face the judgment, it's coming, it's right there.'" It's been said that a person will generally spend and I said this I figured this out You spend your first and I'm just averaging it 18 to 22 years of life you spend getting ready preparing to be on your own for 45 years, 40, 45 years, so you can earn enough money so that you can retire and spend the last 20 or 25 years of your life doing what you really want, right? But the problem with that whole equation, and we'll call it the 2045-2025, is that how much time do We spend getting ready for, after that last 2025, getting ready for eternity. Because we're standing at the brink of the end of our retirement.

How much time do people spend getting ready for that eternity that's going beyond there? We spend time saving money like a miser so that we can relax and we can go vacationing and we can do what we want while people are not hearing about Jesus, which is why we're put here, by the way. And then at the end of it, eternity comes and we're standing there with our hands in our pockets. That's not what we're called to do as Christians. We've missed our calling at that point.

Our lives are spent, are to be spent getting ready for eternity. The true believer spends his entire life walking down a path that points right at eternity. And That's our call. That's our goal. So when you think about dying, it should also make a person think about how you've lived, how we have lived, what kind of life we've lived in, and how you'll be remembered.

And what will people say about you? Most important than that, what does God think about that? What would Jesus say, right? How have we lived and how does our life reflect what God's calling on our life has been? In the end, that's what it comes down to be.

And so yesterday Bonnie and I had memorial service for her aunt and uncle. Her aunt died last November and her uncle died in December. And they have a child that, a son that lives in Montana so they pulled together the soonest date they kind of could that worked for everybody and it was yesterday. So we had that memorial service for Uncle Joe and Aunt Bonnie, that's my wife's namesake. And they are wonderful people.

They gave their life to Jesus in the 19th, mid 70s. And this memorial service was one of celebration. It was sad in ways and we were thankful to have such a blessed day between the music with Jess and Sarah and the family and the friends. And it was a really good turnout. But what really sticks with me was, besides the fond memories and the good things that were talked about them, in the eulogy, I was able to give the gospel message to a large amount of people there yesterday.

But at the meal there was an open microphone where anybody that wanted to could get up and speak about the couple. And many people said a lot of things. They said a lot of kind things, a lot of loving things, a lot of funny things about this godly couple because that's the way they lived their lives. They were Christians who lived out their faith. They didn't have a big fancy house.

When they passed, they lived in a tiny apartment in Tomahawk. In the back of this apartment building, you had to park and walk around the back. We had been there multiple times. And it was like on a gully. But they loved Jesus.

That was the culmination of their life. And when I gave the eulogy, I didn't talk about how much money they made. I didn't talk about how big and nice of a house they had. I spent the entire amount of time talking about their life in Jesus and how their actions and their life reflected a life sold out for Jesus. That's what I want somebody to say about me someday.

So how do you want to be remembered? And what do you want written on your tombstone, right? A lot of people say, hey, what are you gonna have written on your tombstone? And there were some things that I read, some examples of tombstone epitaphs. And one of them was, here lies an atheist, all dressed up and no place to go.

Right? One in Georgia reads, I told you I was sick. And in Nevada there's one that reads, here lies a man named Zeke, second fastest draw in Cripple Creek. And so we can have whatever we want put on that stone, right? But what do we want to be remembered for?

And so again, I'll ask you, what do we want to be remembered for? I know on the tombstone of John Wesley, it says, reader, if thou, if thou art constrained to bless the instrument, give God the glory. John MacArthur, he had Matthew 7.13 on his. Vaadhi Bakam, who recently passed. Psalm 116.15, precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.

I would like 2 Corinthians 521. See, even though all of us are going to die someday, death is not the end. That's the point of this whole text. The scripture tells us that our bodies are just temporary tent that we dwell in. 2 Corinthians 5.1, for we know that if the earthly tent we live in is dismantled, We have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.

So we're reminded that our soul, our spirit, live forever. The question is, where? Where? Where's it going to live? In other words, the Bible teaches us that the reality of both heaven and hell, a literal heaven and a literal hell, Jesus spoke on this often.

Death is definite, but it's not the end. And for the believer, it's just passing through a doorway. It's just moving into the next. It's when our faith becomes sight. And I'll talk a little bit more about that as we move forward.

But for over 2, 000 years, people from anywhere from children, to philosophers, to theologians, have been asking the question, what happens after we die? What happens after we die? That's what they've been asking. Do we keep our bodies? What will they be like?

Will we be reunited with our loved ones? What's heaven going to be like? What is the afterlife like? Do our actions in this life make a difference in eternity? Or are we just like dogs after we die?

Because we can say that we believe the Bible. We can say that we believe in Jesus and that we walk in Jesus. We can say that, that we believe God's Word, but our life and our walk can reflect that we believe that we're gonna die like a dog and then we're done. See, it's important that we understand that our faith needs to have feet, That we live what we understand from God's Word. That's called walking out your faith.

And so, do our actions in this life make a difference in eternity? And for the most part, these questions are answered in the Word of God. They all are, really. Like this one. Why do bad things like death happen to good people?

Or why do we die at all? And yet God's Word tells us in Genesis 2.17, what you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. For the day that you eat it, you will surely die. And what happened? He ate it, right?

He knew, He ate. That was a decision. We've all made decisions to sin. So the human body was not originally created to die. Isn't that something?

It wasn't created to die. Sickness and aging and death all came because of sin, the fall of Adam. So we may avoid this thought of the fountain of youth. We know that people had looked for it for years and they had a mythological belief that there was a fountain of youth. And so today we don't, we were past that, right?

But they still sell the fountain of youth, don't they? In medication, exercise, supplements, face creams, you know, you see the before-after pictures, you know, the before, after, you know, isn't it hilarious? What people will do to sell youth or shape. And so these face creams and these supplements and all these gyms that they market, you know, these might extend life a Little, but Scripture tells us that death cannot be put off. That it will come eventually.

And so, that there is a time to be born and a time to die. Ecclesiastes 1 and 2, To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot. This will happen. So Psalm 139, 16, so your eyes saw my unformed body.

All my days were written in your book and ordained for me before one of them came to be. Isn't that something? Everything in our life, from the beginning to the end, the day we were born and the day we will die, it's all ordained. God knows everything of it. See, we need to understand the real definition of death is what people experience because they're missing out on the life, the relationship that comes from God and Jesus Christ.

So there's life and there's death. Life is Jesus Christ. Death is separation from God and His work in Jesus Christ. Ephesians 2, 12 tells us, Remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of the promise, without hope, without God in the world. Second point that I have today is the judgment.

The judgment. There is a day of reckoning. And so we talked about this last week and that God has placed in Jesus the point of judgment. And the reality is that life and eternity is in Jesus Christ. That it is by the blood of Christ on the cross that we have eternal life.

And Those who reject Christ are judged. It is the work of Christ on the cross that judges people. You can accept it or you can reject it. So this is the truth that people didn't wanna hear. And people still do not want to hear.

Verses 28 and 29, they read, do not marvel at this for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear his voice and come forth, those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of condemnation. There's two, there's two. There's no middle one. There's not a third category. People that tried really hard, and I'm gonna give them another chance because I'm gonna let them slide, and I'm gonna invent this purgatorial doctrine.

And so if you are trying, I'm gonna let you try a little bit more and I'll let you slide in. Okay. Right? Is that what we're gonna... No!

No, you either receive Jesus Christ unto glory, unto eternal life, or you reject Him and you live how you want. And that eternal way is condemnation. To the resurrection of condemnation. I don't want to lay in the ground until the resurrection and then when the resurrection comes Get resurrected to the condemnation No This is this is Very cut and dried in here. It's at times hard to understand, but people still don't want to hear it.

Most people would avoid attending a church service because they they couldn't stand hearing the truths about a real heaven and a real hell. And and most preachers won't preach it and people don't want to hear about a hell they want to hear about how good they are about how their life works and their beliefs will get them where they want to go and that they're by nature good I'm sorry I can't lie to you I'm not sorry okay but I can't I can't lie to you that is not That is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. People don't wanna hear a fire and brimstone message. If they wanted to, we'd have a packed out place here pretty much. But that's not the case these days because pastors hardly ever speak on the reality of the final judgment.

They don't want to touch on it. They don't want to preach on Daniel or Revelation for that matter. But a Newsweek article said, if the modern pulpit is any index, Hell has disappeared from the modern religious imagination. As a doctrine, most Christians cheerfully ignore. Cheerfully ignore.

But the problem with this is that you can ignore it all you want, it doesn't make it go away. You know, when I was a young boy, I was not that good of a boy, to be honest with you. And mom would say, mom would say, you wait till your dad gets home, you're gonna have a reckoning right there. I'd be like, no. Well, my thoughts didn't change what actually happened when dad came home.

There was a reckoning. And so whether we wanna believe it or not, it doesn't change the reality. You cannot believe in Jesus or you cannot believe parts of this sound doctrine. It doesn't change the fact that they're true. It doesn't change the fact that you will be before Christ someday.

It doesn't mean that you won't, your knee will not bow and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God. That all will happen. That is a fact. You can believe what you want. I'm trying to help you to believe the truth, but you can believe what you want.

And so as we see from the words of Jesus, these truths are given along with the words of hope and words of life in verse 24. And I'm going to read 24 again, it's just too good. Most assuredly I say to you, he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has everlasting light shall not come into judgment but has passed from death until life." Passed from death until life. And there are other key verses that speak to this as well. You see, Jesus gives us a way.

He never encouraged people to stay in their sin or encouraged them to get past what they're going through on their own wisdom or effort, we can't. This is a work of God. And so there's a reality of repentance, of your will, of your sin, and a surrender of your will to that of Christ, and walking in Him. This never was a thing of, let's do this on our own. See, you cannot still love the path that Christ rescued you from.

You can't go back to that path that He rescued you from walking on and claim that you love Him. That's not possible. Acts 17, 30 and 31 say, although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent, for He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the man He has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising Him from the dead." The fact that there is a day of judgment ahead for each one of us is something we must understand deep in our souls. That's something that I believe that God has implanted within us.

The concept of justice is attached to judgment. And we don't, we don't, and I'm sorry, don't we demand justice when we see injustice happening? We see a dirty politician reaping the system and we say, hey, come on, they're not above the law. Let's get this right. When we see terrorists that flew planes into the Twin Towers, right?

When The whole thing happened at Pearl Harbor and the Japanese came in. Did we stand back and go, who? Let's fix that up in case they want to come back. No, we didn't. The whole country, every boy between 16 and 60 wanted to go and fight.

That's instilled in us that demand for justice. So that's what we're talking about. We demand judgment and we see some of the tragedies in our world today. When Israel got attacked, right? When Ukraine gets attacked, Christians get martyred for their faith.

These things go on and we want justice, right? You even have people who flew those planes into the buildings like I talked about. And those who did this were believing that there will be virgins waiting for them in heaven on the other side. But they're horribly mistaken because they're on the other side now and there's not one. There's just flames.

At the same time, if the vilest offender repents and asks God to forgive him, even in the closing moments of his life, the most horrible person can receive eternal life. Not one good work is needed. Romans 5, 20 and 21. The law came in so that the trespass would increase, but where sin increased, grace increased all the more. So that just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

See, where sin reigned, grace all the more. Grace increased all the more. Every wrong in this universe will ultimately be paid for. Every wrong that's ever happened will be paid for. The wages of the sinned will be paid, either in hell at the final judgment by those who do not trust in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, or it was paid for by Jesus when He died on the cross for us and He shed His blood.

And it gets applied to the person who repents of their sins and places their faith in Jesus' finished work and that alone. Not in something that we've done. It's not going to work. 1 Peter 1, 18 and 19, it reads, "'For you know that it was not with perishable things "'such as silver or gold that you were redeemed "'from the empty way of life you inherited from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or spot. The third point that I have today is eternal life, the resurrection, things of the resurrection, things of heaven.

So verse 29, it reads, and come forth those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment, condemnation. We've looked at the fact that there is a final judgment. It would be good to understand a bit more about the resurrection of life. There are a lot of questions about what that resurrection looks like. And when you get talking about eschatology, there are people that will pack their bags and leave because you don't have the exact eschatological view doctrinally that they do.

And this is, this is, it helps to put some flesh on the bones of this, it helps us to understand. The scriptures do give us some important insight into what heaven is like. And all of this said, the most important aspect of the resurrection of life is that we will see the Lord Jesus as he is and we'll know even as we are known. See, there's a lot of questions about what that resurrection looks like, even though we don't have that total picture of heaven. But 1 Corinthians 13-12 tells us, for now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face, now I know in part, now I know in part, It's blurry to me.

My human flesh and my vision and my spiritual understanding is not what it ought to be now. I cannot see it like I want to now. I know in part. But then I shall know just as I also am known. Just as Jesus knows me now, I will know Him then.

I will be face to face. My face will be sight, I'll be holding Jesus, and that will be that. Not our earthly body as it is now, but a glorified body. Your mind, your understanding, your wisdom, without the limits of sin and age. 1 Corinthians 15, 42 and 43.

Read, So will it be with the resurrection of the dead? What is sown is perishable, is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It's raised in power, not our power.

It's not something we've done. It's the work of Jesus. As Jesus had a glorified body, we're also going to be given the same. All these effects of living in a sin-sick world with aging, death, sickness, it's all going to be gone. No more pain, no more worry, losing my memory, Being forgetful, no saintly divisions, no ill motives, no more pride.

Praise God. What we can work on here and look forward to is our relationships. 2 Samuel 12, 23, David said, But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back? I will go to him.

I will go to him, but he will not return to me." This is David when the child that he had with Bathsheba in sin was taken away from him. And David had been fasting and he said, God, please spare the child's life. And he did it. He took the child. And in the end, that child passed away.

And David said, I cannot, He cannot come to me, but I will go to him. I will go to him. It's said that we'll have a reunion with all of our loved ones who went before us. We will be able to share that fullness of joy together. And this could make us homesick for an eternal home.

I think about loved ones that I've lost and how I'd like to spend time with them again. Well, that sounds really wonderful. I really can't imagine anything better. And see Jesus face to face. Being embraced by Him, falling at His feet and thanking Him.

And friends, this is what should really drive our lives. The passion for the glory of God. What He's done for us and who He is. The one that we will worship forever more. If we can't Spend an hour and a half, two hours, five hours, 10 hours a week worshiping Him.

Now, how are we ever going to do it on the other side forever? You see, how we live now, it matters. It matters now and it will matter in Heaven. Matthew 6, 21 and 22, But store up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, Where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Paul 2, he writes of a judgment for believers, not like the judgment for non-believers. It would be about the rewards of living for God in 2 Corinthians 5-10.

He said, for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one day, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad. So our lives will be tested by fire so that the things which are eternal are going to remain. And the things of the earth will be burned up. See we can start that right now. We can go through the Word of God and we can be sold out for Jesus.

And we can take all those things and those thoughts and those disabilities in our life and we can burn them, we can get them out. There'll come a time when Jesus asks, what did you do with your life? When you come before Jesus and you don't want to come empty-handed. Colossians 3, 1 through 4 says, Therefore, since you have been raised with Christ, strive for things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things, for you died.

For you died. You died. And your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. Guy said, I had the blessing to give this eulogy yesterday at a funeral.

Not once did I talk about how much money they made. I just talked about who they were, not even any good works or anything, just who they were in Jesus. Not about how much success they achieved in life, but what it's like living to the glory of God the Father. Jesus says to accept Him is life, to reject Him is death. The person who accepts Christ has passed from death to life.

That's all I got. Where are you? Where are you with this? I can tell you what it says, but I can't make you do it. I can beg you and plead with you that you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, that you put yourself in the right place and He is above you.

Father, we thank you for today, for the power of your words, what it means to us, Lord. I pray that our hearts and our minds and our souls would be opened up today to Your Word and the truths of it help us, Lord God, to understand and receive and to change, Lord God. I pray these things in Jesus' name, amen.