In the sermon 'Remember These Things,' Scott Brown emphasizes the importance of remembering key aspects of the Christian faith as outlined in Titus chapter 3. He discusses the duty of believers to submit to authority, reflect on their past sins, acknowledge God's role in their salvation, and pursue good works. The sermon underscores the significance of grace as a teacher, promoting spiritual growth through consistent engagement with the 'ordinary means of grace' like prayer, scripture, and worship. Brown contrasts the cultural blessings of America with the challenges faced in Crete to illustrate the need for a Christian community to be reflective and mindful. He warns against neglecting spiritual disciplines and urges believers to remember their transformation through God’s mercy, while also highlighting the role of grace in fostering a steady, incremental spiritual growth akin to a tree's rings or a pearl's formation. The sermon calls for a return to foundational practices like family worship, which were neglected in the 20th century, to cultivate a culture centered on God's word.

Please open your Bibles to Titus chapter 3 and find verse 1. Titus chapter 3 verse 1. This is the inerrant, all-sufficient, sweeter than honey word of God. Verse 1, remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities, to obey, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men. For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.

But when the kindness and the love of God, our savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness, which we have done, But according to his mercy, he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior. And having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. This is a faithful saying and these things I want to affirm constantly that those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable to men. The grass withers and the flower fades but the word of our God stands forever.

Let's pray. Lord we thank you for your word. Now come and feed your sheep tend this flock come and teach them teach all of us the ways in which we should go. And sharpen our memories of the things that we already know but we need to continue in. And train, Lord, our consciences and pour out your grace as our greatest trainer.

Amen. Please be seated. Well this passage of Scripture is about remembering. It was a joy to remember and celebrate the freedoms that we have in America to remember the Declaration of Independence and the glorious theological truths that are communicated there to remember the Bill of Rights to remember this Christian nation that was founded by pilgrims and then carried on by the founders of this nation. I think it was 29 of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence at theological degrees went to theological seminaries.

That's the way that they thought. You know, we've heard lately of people fleeing America because America is such a bad place to try to find a better country. Well, I've traveled to a lot of these better countries. And I'm just here to say that every single state in the United States of America, I don't care what state it is, even California, is better than every single country of the world. You live in a place that has been blessed so abundantly.

What a joy it is to remember that yesterday. Well so here we are we're back in Titus chapter 3 picking up where we left off. Titus is teaching us about the culture of a church and how that culture is developed and he speaks of the culture of the family and the culture of the people and how they live their lives out in the world. And of course, as you know, you know, Paul sent Titus to strengthen the churches in Crete, Crete, a beautiful island in the Aegean, one of the most beautiful islands. But guess what?

The culture was not very beautiful. And it was true of those who lived in Crete. It's quoted in Titus. All Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, and lazy gluttons. And welcome to the new community of those who have been saved out of that culture.

And these now these people are now living together in the church. They have a lot of baggage and they have to shed baggage as all of us are doing and have to do. So the summary of the letter is really pretty easy. The first chapter really speaks of the foundations of the church living in accordance with the Word of God and then appointing men of integrity, men, elders, particularly with particular qualities and keeping an eye that the church is sometimes filled with professors that are not possessors of eternal life. And so that's the first chapter.

And then the second chapter really speaks of the foundations of an order in the home. And he identifies what kind of older men, what kind of older women, what kind of younger women, what kind of younger men should be characterized in the church. These are the ways, this is the culture that you build among the people and among the families of the church. And this chapter it concludes with this remarkable statement about grace that grace is a teacher that grace teaches you many many things And then when we get to chapter three, he's just continuing to elaborate on the foundations of society and how order in society works. So order in the church, order in the family and order in society is the way that this book breaks out.

And now, you know, as we move to chapter 3, we face these very simple words right at the beginning, remind them. And these admonitions that follow are of course they're not new to those who are hearing them and they are not new to you and they're not new to me. This is repetition. Christians need repetition. You know every good father is going to repeat himself over and over again.

We've learned that from our Father in heaven as he repeats himself often in the Word of God, I'm sure that you know all these things that he's reminding here. I'm not here to bring some new fancy principle but to actually repeat things that we need to hear again. You have an outline in front of you. There are four things that I've identified here. Remember your duty to those over you and remember what you once were and Remember how he saved you and Remember what you ought to pursue So that's the flow of this passage.

We'll walk through this one by one. While there are things to remember, the Bible also tells us that there are things to forget. The Apostle Paul told the Philippian Church in Philippians 3.13, but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those which are ahead I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Jesus Christ We are called to to forgive and to forget in 1st Corinthians 13, 5, love keeps no record of wrongs. There are certain things that all believers should be working on forgetting, But there are many many things to remember and you find this pattern in the Bible. Exodus 20 verse 8, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.

In Deuteronomy 8 2, remember that the Lord your God led you. Ecclesiastes 12 1 remember the Lord in the days of your youth. Malachi 4 4 remember the law of Remember the law of Moses. Luke 17 32. Remember Lot's wife.

Acts 20 verse 35. Remember the words of the Lord Jesus that it is more blessed to give than to receive. In 2nd Timothy 2 8, remember that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead. In Hebrews 13 7, remember those who rule over you. In Revelation 3, 3, remember how you received and have heard.

Even this morning, we will read again those words in First Corinthians 11, 24. Do this in remembrance of me. We're called to remember, you know, that beautiful Psalm 103, verse two, bless the Lord, oh my soul, and forget not all his benefits. So this is the idea here. There are things that you must remember and the Bible is calls a people together to remember and that's what we do together here today.

That means that the people of God are a reflective people. They are a thinking people. They meditate upon things and they meditate upon them over and over again throughout their lives. This is so true of every believer. You read something 50 years ago as in my case and then you read it again 50 years later, and it strikes you again.

Maybe in a different way. Maybe you just needed to be reminded of it. So this is how God works. This is the creation of a culture of a thoughtful people who think about God and his ways. And they think about God and as they would look at a diamond with with multiple facets of his beauty and we're called to remember to consider what God has already said.

One rule of life that everyone must understand is that you cannot rest on promises that you do not know and that you do not rehearse. And this is the seriousness really and the beauty of the Christian life of the nourishment of God in the soul of man and how he so desires to feed his sheep and and care for them in many different ways throughout their entire lives. So as we dive into these commands, these four areas of remembrance, We should also remember the immediate verses before them because the chapter divisions aren't always most helpful because the apostle is still talking about the same thing. And what he is just what he has just said is that grace. Is a teacher.

And we're looking into one of the ways that grace teaches through repetition that that the Christian life grows best under steady deposits of grace that are that are regularly received. I illustrated it last time by talking about a drip system where plants are not best nourished by floods but just by daily regular rhythmic repetitive deposits of water. That's the steady grace. And it makes them less susceptible to drought and less susceptible to disease. It makes them stronger, but it makes them stronger very slowly.

And what God does not grow his people by spiritual downpours and emotional highs and pilgrimages and programs and the next hot preacher or principal or success book. Forget that Because God has actually designed something more beautiful, more powerful, more effective. And it's just by the quiet, faithful drip of the Word of God and prayer and singing and the fellowship of the saints just feeding the roots of the soul day after day. So the rhythms of life are far more important than the big moments. You know, you only have a few big moments in your life.

But you have these other moments that are actually the nourishing times. And they are called the ordinary means of grace. And We want to just urge this congregation to be saturated by the ordinary means of grace and not to miss them in any way. And one thing that's very clear, The power of these ordinary means is not in the act themselves, but by what God's Spirit does when you do them. It's the way that God uses them.

It's not just the repetitive duty of them. And these things are taking place now. We are already have received an outpouring of grace from the very first song to the prayers that have been prayed from from the call to worship by Trent Moody by these things that we've been singing and these these things are so necessary and you could you could think about this in terms of the tree, how a tree grows. When you cut a tree, you see the rings in the tree. And The tree doesn't become mighty and strong overnight, but the tree goes through many seasons and each ring is a representation of the season.

If you look at the rings, they're often different and they reflect times of drought they reflect times of disease maybe maybe overcrowding and the the growth was constrained Maybe even fire you can detect when you cut a tree. But Christians grow that way. They grow slowly and they actually grow stronger through the trials. And when a Christian is devoted to the ordinary means of grace it strengthens them in everything. That's the teaching that's here.

You also see this in the formation of pearls, these beautiful pearls. They're formed slowly. They're formed layer by layer, but the formation takes place as the result of the irritation in the pearl. And the Christian life is that way. We grow through corrections, we grow through trials, we grow through irritations.

When someone is irritating to you it's a sign that you need to grow as well. Wounds grow and there's such a thing as grow through your scars and God is doing something beautiful and I just don't want us to miss this teaching, this flow of teaching that the apostle is bringing about how the grace of God is your teacher. You have a teacher and her name is grace and that grace comes through these ordinary means. You know you can think about just the marvelous reality of honey in the world and the bees, just the miraculous way that honey is made. And a hive is not filled by one flight of one bee, But thousands and thousands of small journeys from one flower to another.

I read that it takes six million trips to make one quart of honey of a bee. One little molecule at a time. God has designed you to grow one molecule at a time. One season at a time. One worship service at a time.

One song at a time. One time of family worship at a time. This is how God has designed it and that's why Jesus said Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And last time we saw that grace teaches us to reject worldliness. It teaches us to say no.

I hope even this worship service so far has helped some of us to say no to things they've been saying yes to. And then it teaches us what to pursue. It teaches us what to say yes to. It teaches us what we're facing today. It teaches us to hope.

It teaches us how to do good works. It teaches us how to stimulate grace in others. Those are the final verses of the previous chapter and he's really continuing this thing. Now it's very important that we understand how God has designed the Christian life and how God has ordered the world so that His people whom He loves would be strengthened in the way that they should be strengthened. We should always recognize the moment of time that we're living in and how often our culture seeks to take away the ordinary means of grace that God has provided for us.

Something very harmful happened in the 20th century. It was the loss of family worship for several generations. Something disappeared from Christianity and in the the 20th century was perhaps the the greatest pragmatic generation in American history, with the exception of the Roman Catholic Church. And there was a neglect of the ordinary means of grace and the replacement of all kinds of programs to replace the ordinary means of grace and inventions of various things, church programs and distractions and incredible busyness in churches and youth groups and all kinds of things like that. And what happened was in the 20th century is that fathers no longer opened their Bibles in their homes.

And it was almost impossible in the 20th century to find a father in evangelicalism who led family worship daily in his family. It disappeared from the landscape. It was a tragic loss. It was actually as the result of pragmatism in the church by not actually regarding the ordinary means of grace in the way that God has designed, in that case, family life. And almost every generation since has neglected it and where There is a recovery of it here in the first quarter of the 21st century among many people and it really is remarkable what's happening today.

If you have a family that's having family worship, They're doing something that didn't happen in the 20th century, but they're doing something that happened a long time ago because of the ordinary means of grace. This is the most effective inheritance, the most valuable inheritance you'll ever give your children is by opening your Bible every day and it'll alter your family. When you open up your Bible in your family, Here's what you're saying. God is the center of this family. Everything in this family is going to be directed by God.

We're going to create a Christian culture in this family. We're going to order our lives by the Word of God. We're going to open up our eyes every day and we're going to observe wondrous things from the Word of God. We're going to saturate this family with God. We're going to fill this family with the Word of the Holy Spirit.

It's marking your family. It's actually setting aside your family. It's it's as if you're saying this will be a holy place. This family will be a holy place and then this local church will be a holy place and I will be holy as God is holy in every area of life and I will I will submit myself to the ordinary means of grace and I will be reminded in the worship of God in the prayers of the saints in the fellowship of the saints in the the celebrating of the Lord's Supper this is this is the kind of life you know there's some research out there that was done about 20 years ago by some people that I know. They surveyed 40, 000 Christians and they said probably 7 to 8 percent practice family worship on a daily basis in evangelicals.

So it's still a problem. The other problem you have, you have people who started to have family worship but they've fallen away from it. They entered a season where they were very excited about changing their life But they are those fathers who used to do family worship who used to open up their Bibles Maybe that's you maybe some of you are in that place. Well, I'm here to encourage you to say Let's be reminded of the things that are that are really critical So these rhythmic reminders are really important. Now as we jump into the text I think there's something that is implied in these words and that is that the ordinary means of grace are designed to turn you into a different kind of person daily weekly rhythmically continuous change continuous improvement continuous transformation this is the Christian life That's why when Martin Luther penned the 95 Theses, the very first was about repentance.

And he said this, that the whole Christian life is about repentance. That's because the whole Christian life is about transformation. So let's look at the text here in verses one and two. First of all, remember your duty to those over you. We are all under various authorities, and we have a duty to submit to our civil rulers and this is so neglected here but I'm gonna say something that would be offensive to so many believers have an obligation to submit to the elders of their churches and to and for wives to submit to their husbands and children to submit to their parents and for Christian workers to submit to their bosses.

We already covered that in the previous chapter. But everyone is under authority. That's because God has built hierarchy. He has built representative hierarchy in the government of His governments, whether it's the church or the family or the state, he has established representative government and that's why in our church for anyone to be an elder here they have to be elected by the congregation. This is so that representatives are set aside to exercise authority.

And authority really is only given to elders in churches. And so the congregation appoints those authorities. And it's the same way in our civil government, we appoint representatives in our government. It's very important that we work diligently to elect good representatives. And we should be voting, we should be understanding what's going on.

So he says there are five reminders here in these two verses. Be subject to rulers and authorities. This is very similar to Paul's instruction in Romans chapter 13. And second, to be ready for every good work in the midst of that authority. And Titus has already addressed this with different language earlier and then thirdly to speak evil of no one.

This is very important in terms of the rage culture that we have and you have people raging, particularly believers raging against one another, often, often inappropriately. The word he uses here is blaspheme to harm. This is the intent to engage in a deliberate insolent utterance of defamation and slander. I'm quoting from a Greek dictionary when I use those words. It's legitimate to call out wrongdoing in civil authorities or other authorities.

Jesus said the Pharisees were a brood of vipers. John the Baptist's head was cut off because he pointed out the immorality of the head of his state. And so this is an admonition to speak evil of no one. And then forth to be peaceable. It's interesting, this word's an interesting one, to be peaceable because it's, well it's translated in the King James Bible as not brawlers.

In the ESV, avoid quarreling. In the New American Standard, malign, no one. But the word is a machos a machos you you under you recognize the word macho right well this is ah machos you know you have the atheist a theist now you have a machos not not a brawler but to be peace peaceable and then fifth to be gentle showing all humility to all men He is speaking about something very critical. It is the stewardship of your disposition toward other people. You know you have you have people with the tendency to be bad stewards of their disposition and they fly off the handle and they slander and they rage and they act they act in an ungodly way.

Think about how challenging this must have been for the Cretans, because as you remember, all Cretans are always liars, evil beasts. They're beasts. They act like animals. And these people were saved out of that culture. You can imagine the challenge that that might have been, as it is a challenge for many of us not to speak evil of other people I have and remember remember remember remember this remember your duty to those who rule over you in terms of the authorities.

And then the second is remember what you once were. That's verse three. For we ourselves were once foolish. Let me read this again because I left out a word when I read this for we ourselves were also once foolish disobedient deceived serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hating and hating one another. So remember what you just were.

Moses says the same thing, similar thing in Deuteronomy 515, remember that you are a slave in the land of Egypt. The unbeliever is a slave, like under the tyranny of Pharaoh, the devil himself. And he brings, there are actually seven qualities of the unbeliever. Seven qualities of how bad you are. If you're not a believer today, this is you.

But let's look at this carefully Paul is not just pointing fingers he says we ourselves were also Paul is including himself in this list of the qualities of the unbeliever. Paul is giving his personal testimony. This is the testimony of every believer who turned away from the world. This is a self assessment and maybe someone needs to be reminded today what they once were because you're not that way anymore. You're not satisfied with your progress in the Lord.

Most believers are not satisfied. Most believers are not thinking, I've got it all together. If somebody says that they're not really a believer. But you're not the same person that you used to be because you were born again and the power of sin was broken and you're not satisfied with yourself because you want to be more holy and you still see remaining sin in your life. That's the normal Christian life.

But do you need to be reminded of what you once were? I hope it's encouraging. I hope that's thrilling to your soul actually this morning that you'd recognize how where God has taken you and what he's delivered you from but are you know on the other hand are you still trapped in your sins? Are you still foolish and disobedient and deceived and serving various lusts and pleasures? Are you living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another?

Is this you now? And if it is you, Jesus Christ will lead you out of that wilderness. And He will change your life by degrees, slowly, with the slow drip of the ordinary means of grace. But it'll be solid growth. It'll be real growth, not just dependent on a fit of emotion.

So remember what you once were. Remember. Third, remember how he saved you. Now this is the focus of verses four through seven it's one sentence these verses are a single unbroken sentence now there are many if you read commentaries on the book of Titus many will say this is perhaps the greatest, most dense testimony of the gospel in the Bible. So let's walk through it.

Verse four, but when the verse 4, but when the kindness, when the kindness, this is the kindness of God. In Romans 2 verse 4, Paul says that it's his kindness that leads us to repentance. He says, do not despise the riches of his goodness, forbearance and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance. And then you see these words, and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared. You have the love of God.

This is how you were saved. You were saved by the love of God. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever would believe on him should not perish but have everlasting life and notice the love of God our Savior you have a Savior he saved you he rescued you He came down into your life and he pulled you out of a pit. David says that you you snatched me out of the waters that were too strong for me. You couldn't resist them.

You had to be saved. You had to be born from above and snatched out. And then he says, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us. There's that word saved again. That word appears over a hundred times in the New Testament.

Not by works of righteousness. The Bible says that he saves while we were dead in our trespasses and sins. We weren't really seekers. We might have thought we were, but even in our seeking God was changing our hearts. Not by works of righteousnesses which we have done but according to his mercy.

And I love this language through the washing, through the washing of regeneration. You also have this other theme in the Bible of the washing, the washing of filthiness, and you have that beautiful thrilling ordinance called baptism where you are buried with him in baptism and you're washed and you represent that you have been cleaned that all of your sins have been forgiven. All of your past sins, all of your present sins on the day of your baptism, and all of your future sins are washed and cleansed. And you no longer have to bear the burden of the guilt of your sin because you've been forgiven by Jesus Christ. Through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.

So you have these two words regeneration. You need to teach your children these words and renewing of the Holy spirit. Regeneration means that God changed you. He changed your heart and then you believed and then you repented but it was God who did it and Ephesians 1 says that he planned this before the foundation of the world that he would change your heart you You become a new creation at regeneration. You become a new man, a new woman.

You are begotten of God. You are acted on by an outside force, which is so beautifully described in Jesus's conversation with Nicodemus where he says you must be born again. You must have this external force at work in your soul that makes you change your mind about God and about his Son Jesus Christ. So the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit. The Christian life is a life of renewal of constant refreshment and you need the ordinary means of grace for that refreshment.

Sometimes people don't, they're not refreshed because they're not dedicated to the ordinary means of grace. God uses the means that he prescribes. If you don't use them, then you might find your struggles rising and your worldliness encroaching because you're ignoring the ordinary means of grace. Verse six, whom he poured out. Again, you have this idea of washing and pouring, and like in Romans five, when we were in Romans, where you are standing in grace, like in a waterfall of grace being poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior that having been justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

There's so much to say about regeneration but it's it's like the heart of stone that turns into a heart of flesh. It's like a dead man being raised. It's like Ezekiel 37 where the dry bones come to life. There's no life in them at all, but God comes and he infuses his life into the soul of man. And that's so different than just decorating your life with a bunch of good works.

It's not like just painting over something. It's an internal profound change that takes place. It's not turning over a new leaf. It's receiving a new life. It's not just modifying your behavior, it's it's the transformation of your heart.

That's the whole doctrine of regeneration. And then he gives these word pictures, justification, meaning you're acquitted, and then adoption. You become a child of God, an heir. The judge adopts you. You've been convicted and then you've been exonerated by the judge and the judge now adopts you and makes you his son.

That's the picture of adoption to eternal life. You are adopted to eternal life. There's an unstoppable trajectory of your life into eternity and nothing no one can snatch you out of the Father's hand and And what that means is whatever is going on in your life right now, if you're a believer, you're going to make it. Because you're a son. Because you're a daughter.

Because you are an heir. And He is going to bring you onto his property forever and put you in his house forever. This is a this is a critical matter because often when we go through trials, when we go through seasons, hard seasons, dry seasons, and the rings on our tree are looking pretty pinched, we often misinterpret those seasons. God is actually strengthening us, but we often don't know how to interpret our situation because we don't interpret our situation according to heaven. We don't interpret it according to where we absolutely are going.

We don't interpret our moment in time in our lives by what God is doing, what God started, what God will finish. He said He who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ and He will sum up all things in Jesus Christ. Everything in your life, every sin, every stupid thing you've done, Jesus Christ loves his children and he's going to carry them all the way to the end. And he's going to do it by this fountain of grace pouring into your heart through the worship of God. Never miss it through the singing, through the fellowship of the saints, through the prayer gatherings.

He's going to do it drip by drip, moment by moment in your life. When you open up the Bible in your family he's going to give you just another little deposit you know you know children don't need hot preachers for fathers they need fathers who open up and read and who have one thing on their mind that their children would see the goodness of the Lord every time they open that that father would say what wondrous things do you see Do you see how good God is? Do you see how mighty He is? Do you see His loving kindness? Do you see His outpouring of grace?

Do you see that fountain of grace you can stand in for the rest of your life? And he's going to make you a son forever. That's what family worship should look like. It should be the happiest moment. You should always find the glories of the grace and the beauties and the happinesses of the kingdom of heaven.

Whenever you open that book, Taste and see that the Lord is good. One more thing about this trajectory toward heaven, let's just talk about your imperfect marriage. Let's talk about your imperfect job and how hard it is and how stupid your boss is. And let's talk about your financial problems. And let's talk about some of the goofy people in the church who sometimes misbehave.

You also need to see them and all those situations in light of where you're going. That freight train will not stop. God is going to take you to heaven even through the midst of all these trials and temptations and difficulties with people and money and all these other things. This is the promise of the Word of God. Remember how He saved you.

Heaven, because of heaven and because of grace, Wouldn't you think we would see our troubles differently? Do you think we would have a different diagnosis of our troubles knowing that we are heirs? And then finally the result of our salvation. Remember what you ought to pursue. Remember what you ought to pursue.

This is a faithful saying, and these things I want to affirm constantly, that those who have Believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable to men. Again, six times the apostle writes about good works. He's stimulating good works in the churches in Crete. And here again, he addresses good work to be careful, to maintain good works.

These things are good and profitable to men. This is just like the Lord Jesus Christ who went about doing good, so it says in the Gospel of Luke. So sharpen your mind by being reminded through the ordinary means of grace. Dedicate your whole life to them in your home and in your local church. Keep reminding yourself through all these glorious things through the singing and the worship and the Lord's Supper and all these things.

Remember, remember and keep on remembering. That's the force of these verses. Because God created us to be a people who are continuing to think and to remember, to be a thoughtful people, and to be reminded through repetition in the Word of God. There's another way to speak about this, about the training of your conscience. In Hebrews chapter five, the writer is saying, he's saying this, some of you ought to be teachers by now, but you've not trained your consciences.

He says, those by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. In the surrounding verses, he says they've become dull of hearing. They become unskilled in the word of righteousness, because they're not training their consciences by the word of grace that's the force of those verses in Hebrews chapter 5 he says I want to say more but you are dull of hearing that's the problem these ordinary deposits the drip system had been clogged up somehow by worldliness or some distraction. Over the passing of time, they became lazy. The implication of that passage is that they didn't start lazy but they became lazy.

Habits of life they just become very, very comfortable. He says, by this time, in Hebrews 512, in other words, you've wasted a lot of time. By this time, you should have become teachers by now. So God wants to strengthen you by reminding you. God wants to encourage you by reminding you.

I think that underlying all this passage of Scripture is that God wants to remind you these are thrilling reminders about how to live to do what is good for you Remember your duty to those over you. Remember what you once were. Remember how he saved you. Remember what you ought to pursue. Let's pray.

Lord, you are our rock and redeemer. You are the savior of our ruined lives and you've put our feet upon a rock and put a new song in our hearts. Oh Lord, help us to be stimulated by the ordinary means of grace all our life long. I pray oh Lord that we would return with great fervor to these ordinary means in our homes and in the church. Amen.